After selling our beautiful 1972 Pontiac convertible, we intended on buying a T-bird. We wanted a car that was sporty, unique, and had a retro vibe. We also wanted something that we could comfortably drive pretty much where ever we wanted to. So, a retro T-bird fit the bill.

After looking all over the country, through many car sales websites, we found one in our local area, Frisco, TX. There were a couple others we wanted to look at there as well so we planned a day to explore.

This one was for sale at a Ford dealership. When we drove in, a nice young man approached us to show us the car. It was his first week on the job so we were kind to him….. I shared some of my own experience selling cars at a Toyota dealership back in 2012.

We discovered that this car was a local car when new and had only two owners. It was regularly maintained at Ford dealerships, had only 62,000 miles and was super clean. So, we made the deal and drove it home.

Wiki says this about the retro-bird:

The eleventh generation of the Ford Thunderbird (internally codenamed M205^[1]) is a two-seat convertiblemanufactured and marketed by Ford between 2001 and 2005 for model years 2002 through 2005. Designed to evoke the first-generation Thunderbird that had been made from 1955 to 1957, the eleventh-generation Thunderbird came with a removable hardtop with prominent circular glazing, a power folding top, and a vinyl tonneau cover. It borrowed its mechanics heavily from the Lincoln LS, being built on the Ford DEW platform with a front-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout and powered by a 3.9-liter (240 cubic inch) V8 engine with a five-speed automatic transmission.

Part of a retro-styling boom in the late 1990s and early 2000s, the eleventh-generation Thunderbird’s concept was introduced by Ford in 1999 to replace the tenth-generation Thunderbird that had been discontinued in 1997. The production model debuted two years later to critical acclaim, winning the Motor Trend Car of the Year award for 2002. Despite this auspicious introduction, it struggled in sales after its first year and Ford discontinued production in 2005 after introducing several concept cars to improve it, including the Lincoln MK9. No further generations of the Thunderbird have been produced, and with Ford ending production of all passenger cars in North America aside from the Mustang in 2020 due to increased sales in SUVs, will likely not be revived in its traditional form in the foreseeable future.

Retrospective reviews of the eleventh-generation Thunderbird tend to be mixed. The styling has been praised for its elegance and beauty, while its interior has been criticized for its extensive use of plastic. Its engine and powertrain have been considered mediocre and disappointing as well as too similar to the LS. It is considered a collector’s item, retaining its value very well for cars of its age.