What was your first Ford daily driver?

cfhgarza

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My first car was a 1984 Mercury Lynx 3-door. Ford family.

My first Ford branded car was a 2013 Ford Focus Titanium hatchback. Here she is in camp mode in Hocking Hills State Park. I miss that car but we needed something bigger.

My work car is a 2001 Focus XZ3 and my wife has a 2014 Focus hatchback. Can you tell I like Ford Hatchbacks? ?

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E Monty

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First was a 2 door 1988 Beretta, blue with some 5 star mags. First Ford was a gold 1964 Galaxie 500 XL that I traded my labor for when I was 17. That car was a very decent car when I started driving it but 2 Michigan winters and it started to show rust bad. Lots of fun memories in it!
 

jdh951

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My first vehicle was a longbed 2wd 1986 Ranger XL 2.3L 5MT. Purchased inexpensively in '97 during HS with paper route and neighborhood odd job earnings. Used for first job as local courier driver. First of 5 Rangers?
 

egilbe

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My first Ford and car was a used 1978 LTDII S four door. What a party boat. Wrecked it going to a party with my cousin who was too drunk to drive. In retrospect, we were both probably too drunk to drive. Flipped it onto the roof doing "dukes of hazard" around a corner on a dirt road. He ended up in the backseat. I was still behind the steering wheel, kind of, and had to reach up to the ignition and shut the engine off. I guess those 351 clevelands weren't made to run upside down. it was running kind of rough.

bought a 78 toyota corolla to replace it. Went from a party barge to a tiny econobox. I was pretty much sitting in the back seat.

I joined the Army and sold the corolla to a friend and when I was in El Paso, I bought a new 87 Ford Ranger GT. I ended up wrecking that and fixing it a couple times while I had it. When it had around 187K miles, I sold it to my father for $500 and he drove it for a few more years. The speedo only worked half the time and then only partially, so he put a few hundred miles on it a year. Actual miles was probably north of 250K. I have so many fun memories with that truck.

During hunting season one year, a group of us was standing in my father's driveway when one of his friends spied a deer walking across his yard. He calmly used the Ranger's truck bed as a rest, laid the cross hairs on the deer and pulled the trigger. Imagine his surprise when the deer didn't drop dead. He fired a second shot and the deer took off at a dead sprint. They searched for blood and not a drop. They were scratching their heads trying to figure out how that deer was missed. Then it dawned on them. They walked back up to the truck and saw the bullet exit holes on the downhill side of the truck bed. You see, the yard sloped downhill from the parking spot and although the scope was above the truck bed, the barrel was not. They laughed and the shooter went into the garage and grabbed a hammer and pounded in the shards of metal sticking out from the two holes. My father sold that Ranger to a friend's son and bought a new 2011 Ranger to replace it.

My third Ford was a New 93 Escort GT. It was a leftover. My ex-wife wrecked that and she never got it fixed. My next Ford was a new '97 F150, that was sold off during the divorce. After child support, I barely had enough money for rent. In those dark times, I borrowed cars, carpooled to work, walked. My youngest brother sold me his '93 toyota pickup in 2003, but with three kids, that wasn't the best vehicle. I saw a '97 chrysler town and country minivan for sale in a yard on one of my long walks and bought that. It was a piece of crap. I dumped so much money into it trying to keep it on the road, it would have been cheaper to buy a new vehicle, but divorce ruined my credit. One day, after owning it for four years, I shut the sliding door, the bottom of the door fell into chunks of rust. I did some more investigating and more rust. It was never getting another inspection sticker. I drove it until the starter died in it and called a junkyard to tow it away. I got $75 for it.

I purchased my friends 2001 Jetta Wolfsburg in 2007. I drove that until 2016 when I bought a new 2017 Hyundai Elantra. Now that my kids are grown, and I no longer have to give money to a parasite, I could purchase my current 2020 Ranger Lariat. Hopefully, I make as many fun memories in this Ranger, too.
 

Rp930

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Imagine the Pinto scared and shocked a lot of racers .
It was too loud to be a sleeper but it was pretty quick. I still remember taking my Mom to the grocery and you could see the big windows in the front of the store rattling. Fun stuff.
 

P. A. Schilke

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Mine was a 1986 2-tone brown Bronco II and this rusty old 1971 bronco that I wish I still had!
Hi Josh,

Ah the memories! Back story on the Bronco II.... Consumer Reports decided the Bronco II was tippy and proceeded to create the data to fit their answer and they managed to flip one on its side (Protective out riggers were used to protect the driver. They weigh about 150lbs, biased outside the wheel base.) Light Truck Engineering responded with press releases to point out CR force fitting the data to the answer. However we had to ensure stability and regain customer confidence. So one of the actions was to release the transfer skid plate 100% to slightly relocate the center of gravity downward for example. We tried mightly to flip one on its side without out riggers expecting to just throw the Bronco II away if we could flip it. Alas...we were unable to flip the vehicle on its side....CR never backed down from the Avoid classification, but sales were pretty steady. I always view it as a fun little vehicle... Where does this all end? Well....CR forced all manufacturers to test with out rigger brackets on the vehicles to ensure the imbalance caused by these brackets does not "upset the apple cart"... So you the customer bares the added cost to protect for something that will never be part of a vehicle...out rigger brackets...

Best,
Phil Schilke
Ranger Vehicle Engineering
Ford Motor Co. Retired
 

cb4017

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1972 Pinto!! It’s a miracle I survived ? I remember having to take it in for the gas tank protection shield recall. Good times.

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I remember when you could buy kits to drop small block V8s in a Pinto. Always thought it would be a blast.
 

Bsenecal

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1972 Pinto!! It’s a miracle I survived ? I remember having to take it in for the gas tank protection shield recall. Good times.

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Sweet car and that's a nice roof rack.
Brian
 

Bsenecal

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Mine was a 1986 2-tone brown Bronco II and this rusty old 1971 bronco that I wish I still had!
Those Bronco II's have been trashed by many, I had an old 1988 Eddie Bauer edition that I bought in 1992 for cheap and used to to commute with and tow a snowmobile trailer for several years great vehicle in my opinion for that time frame.
Brian
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