Filed Under: News
We all tend to take things for granted, whether it be life itself, our loved ones, our cars and invariably other driver’s.
I was talking to a friend who was a ships communication’s officer, not a small ferry type but one of the giants of the oceans, a 200 thousand ton oil tanker, apparently this monster is so long they have very few places where they can dock.
Loading and unloading is done far out to sea, even for crew changes a helicopter is used, my friend was telling me that on one mission they spent 11 months on board travelling between Port Harcourt in Nigeria and Philadelphia on the US Eastern seaboard.
However some of the time was spent drifting around in mid-atlantic, the rudder had fallen off, not a mal-function, the only method of steering this monster was lying at the bottom of the ocean.
Naturally they needed urgent assistance, boats unfortunately move incredibly slow, a tug was summoned by the owner’s, which was moored up in Rotterdam, if you look at the map it is not a short hop.
It took the tug eleven day’s to reach the drifting leviathan, so that should have been the end of the story, oh dear no, the tug was compared to a mini coming to tow a double decker bus, despite massive efforts it was no help.
There was only one other course of action, another tug, go on you might have guessed, it had to come from Rotterdam again, another eleven days wasted.
With two tugs they were under way, it took a further 33 days to tow into the Virgin Islands, the nearest dry dock for repairs.
One would never have even given such a happening a thought, we would have taken it for gran ted the boat, especially carrying such a volatile cargo would have been well maintained.
It is the same with car manufacturers, if a car is made in Dagenham, a Ford of course, it is considered English. The Consul/Granada was launched as a replacement for the Zephyr and the Zodiac models, at the same time the German Ford factory in Cologne was turning out the same cars which replaced the Taunus.
In 1972, there was still the feeling of British Patriotic duty, buy British, which many did, and of course there was the die hards who would not contemplate buying a German car.
However, maybe not dodgy dealing, but for reasons unbeknown to the general public, Dagenham stopped making the Consul/Granada, and imported the Cologne made version.
Now consider this, where did Irish Consul/Granada’s actually arrive from, the UK or Germany? Was our Ford ex-UK price or Ex-Germany, given continentals tended to be cheaper than UK made?
Before getting down to serious tech talk, Ford used the Granada name in various markets for unrelated models, I think Confucius might have a few words to say about that.
One such model was sold in North America, then to make matter’s worse the Granada name was dropped in Europe, the Consul had already gone by the way, now our car was the Scorpio.
We know Ford is a global company, however they assembled Granada’s in Taiwan, a country well known for car manufacturing, I don’t think, so vere did vey send velly well made cars?
Ford also sub contracted Hyundai to assemble Granada’s for Korea, the text I was reading said the eldest son of the owner of Hyundai was killed in a Granada, which was very sad, but the article lacked any info as to the cause, however the very next line said “additionally hearses were offered”, tactful comment, certainly not.
A figure was quoted how many Consul/Granada’s were made, which was in the region of 1.5 million units, though it is difficult to know if this was the world wide production figure or not.
One assembly not included was the South African Granada, the Piranha a monster V8 which developed a mind bogling 252bhp at 2600rpm. The assembler is said to be David Green motors.
There was some strange laws about imported cars into South Africa, they were supposed to have some local content, as a result the cars were not mainstream models as we know them.
The Consul was at the bottom of the pile, it was essentially a basic model, though engine configurations, 2litre V4’s or 3litre V6’s, the car had a great career, fleet car, reps, taxi and police forces, and of course the man in the street looking for value for money.
We were at one of the British motor industries crossroads, Austin and Morris were going down the pan, Chrysler had taken over Rootes, famous names were fast disappearing, and the Japanese invasion was getting into full swing, Continentals found the UK an easy market,
Yes Rover, Triumph and Vauxhall were there with some fine models, however Ford dominated, perhaps dropping the Consul name was a great marketing ploy, leaving Granada as the top model.
Perhaps the Granada is remembered as the car used in TV series “The Sweeney”, a veritable police, well flying squad story with John Thor as Inspector Jack Regan and Denis Waterman as his partner, the series was a brilliant advert for the Granada.
The Granada was a familiar sight speeding up and down the motorways the boys in blue had a fair chance of catching speedster’s and crooks.
The Consul was lower spec than the Granada, though the body shell was identical, the trim was different, headlamps, radiator grill, boot and side panel and bumper styling.
Inside the Consul had bucket seat and well contoured rears, gauges were blac k non reflecting dials for speedo, fuel and temperature, the gear shift was on the floor, proper place for them.
The dashboard was padded, the passenger had an open shelf and a lockable glove box, you could upgrade to an “L” pack and get more goodies, special seats, colour keyed loop pile carpets, vanity mirror, heated rear screen, clock and trip mileage recorder.
If you were really flash with cash a GT or Rallye pack option was available, this was the bees knees, a larger engine, uprated suspension, sports road wheels, hav e no idea what they would be, they would have said alloy’s had they been, even more a sporty steering wheel, black grill and halogen headlamps, this must have almost been a first for a bog standard production car.
Of course as one would expect the Granada was full of up market gizzmo’s, it was also the first European Ford to carry the Ghia badge.
The Granada had extra sound deadening material built in to provide better environmental conditions, like not having to turn the radio up to listen to your favourite programme, I am sure we had not got to the CD at this stage though I do remember 8 track tapes.
The instruments were without saying more comprehensive, in addition to the basics on the Consul, there was a rev counter, oil pressure gauge and an ammeter, I can never understand why ammeters were replaced.
You could get a GXL model, which gave even more goodies, tinted glass and a steel sliding sun roof, rear seat passengers got their own ventilation system.
Both the Consul and the Granada got headlamp flasher’s, Volvo had them as standard way back oh what fun they were, got to tell you this little story, because there was not an abundance of Amazons on the road, it was customary when meeting one travelling in the opposite direction to flash the headlights, normally you might meet two or three at the most, well this particular morning on the road from Hampton Court past Sandown park racecourse we met at least six or seven, unheard of.
Without warning the car in front stopped rather abruptly, the driver jumped out and proceeded to tear at his hair, he ran back and cried why is everyone flashing lights at me, he was not too amused when we told him it had nothing to do with him, it was a Volvo thing.
Right back to where we were, you had a choice of eight colours and six metallic and black.
In April of 75 a new engine was added 2 litre overhead cam unit, by October the Base L and S Granada took over from the Consul.
Surprisingly the oil crisis of 73 and 74 made little difference to the sales of these large Fords, and production peaked in 1976.
We then come to the Mk2, it is now 1977, no longer an English made car, German, even the engines known as Essex had gone and now Cologne versions appeared, the body style was crisper and for the fleet operator a diesel 2.1 litre was added to the range.
Ford did not stop upgrading the car and it became the benchmark for other manufacturers, it was a great car for value for money.
In 1978 central locking was fitted to all GL and Ghia models, the Ghia acquired headlamp washers and halogen foglights and the inevitable electric windows, which do save a lot of finger twisting but not much use without the ignition turned on.
By 1981 Ford had opted for longer life exhausts, UK roads are liberally coated with rust inducing salt at the first signs of frost, power steering was improved as was the brakes.
You won’t believe this but I have never been in a Granada, nor the Consul, though a friend has a 1978 model, must have a quiet word.
Various Special Editions were made, the Sapphire, The Talisman and the Consort, there was though it gets very little mention a Chasseur Estate, there was a stretch limo and a hearse, it was actually quite popular for that last journey, I remember going to a funeral down in Galway , the funeral started in Thomastown, I actually could not keep up with it, and only found it when they stopped for obligatory drinks to wish the late well.
It was a very strange affair, the cemetery was near the sea, the priest arrived with a sailors cap on and his dog, who was very good didn’t bark once, I wasn’t sure but I believe the priest arrived by boat, any way I suspect most of the hearses have found their way to the junk yard in the sky, though in the UK there is a Hearse club, any body is welcome, sort of dead or alive.
The Mark3 was similar to the previous model but bore more of a resemblance to the Sierra, it soldiered on until the early 90’s, it was the first European production car to have anti-lock brakes, Ford still killed it with the Scorpio, which had been used on the continent for some time, the UK and Ireland being the last countries to have the Granada name.
Unfortunately for Ford the Scorpio was not really liked in this part of the world, the cost was not prohibitive but people were looking for that something different, BMW’s and Merc’s and Jag’s, they believed in showed that they had impeccable choice.
We sort of laughed at people having Merc’s and Jag’s, but the other day someone said about their Landy, what on earth is a Landy an upmarket Lada, no a Land Rover of all things.
Well I am just off to clean the dog, Rover.
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