1965 Falcon Sprint

That looks to be in really good condition. Better than me and I’m 4 years younger 😂 I will be following the journey 😎

Very cool.

Mine was a 64'




Yours looks straighter than mine was...

So i arrive at a very interesting property to be greeted (after he unlocked fort knox) by an 83 year old eccentric gentleman.
I pulled in to see, a few mustangs and a rather lovely 63(ish) falcon.
It was chucking it down so he hussled me straight into one of his sheds which housed a fastback mustang and an allard, he showed me pics and info on some of his previous cars- some very well known.

I was itching to see what i had came to look at ( plus i said to my wife i wouldnt be all day) but he liked to chat cars...

The description in the advert was very vague with only a couple of pics and to be honest i wasnt all that impressed with the falcon at first sight in the flesh as the front had been treated to a very reasonable paint job - what the paint is hiding remains to be seen. The rear of the car plus the roof was still in old paint. Its not its original colour by the way. Oh and I'm not that keen on red!

After having a good look round the car here's a run down of the conversation.

Me: can i hear it run please
Seller: um, well i drove it off the trailer and it ran lovely, its a roller cam motor.
Me: Great, can we start it then please?
Seller: its got no water in it.
Me: ok, why?
Seller: i didnt want it freezing up over winter, plus the original rad leaked so i put this one in there.
Me: Id like to hear it run, can we just fire it up briefly?
Seller: we can try

Off he toddles to find a battery and some fuel.

Battery connected and some fuel thrown down its neck

Me: no, that doesnt sound like it wants to fire does it.
Seller: no, but it ran lovely when i drove it off the trailer.
Me: Ok, not to worry.

Me: (thinking I'm not really sure i want the car) How much would you accept, really just making conversation.
Seller: Well the asking price is what i want.
Me: Ok thanks i think il pass, its not for me.

I go off to my car and go to get in..

Seller: So what would you pay if the car was for you?
Me: We couldnt get it running so that was a shame and the body is painted one end and not the other, so for me these two things devalue it for me, but on that basis id pay XXXX, (way less than he was asking)

A little bit of haggling took place

Seller: Ok, a deal then, id rather know it was sold than have a line of timewasters/idiots/whatevers coming round.

So that was that, id bought it. I think at 83, he probably didnt want the hassle of dealing with the unknown scallywags that may have looked, he said he made £700 all in with me buying it at what we agreed....he still imports and sells stuff as a little earner.

About 20 years ago, at the end of my 10 or so years of owning it  (time flies... )

Its the 1st car I bought after I moved to the States from Europe.

I bought it partly because the Mk1 Escort Estate I had before I moved ( full 1600 Sport running gear, twin Webers, uprated & lowered springs, revalved Koni's by the Koni race dept ) was the best street car I'd ever owned, and partly because I knew about the Alan Mann Falcons.

It was a 260 V8, 3 on the tree, bench seat Sprint that I got in Atlanta Georgia, where it must have done some street racing ( or at least it was rev'd hard enough to get the valves to kiss the pistons...)

I put a souped up 302 & 4speed toploader in it, 9" rear, LSD, Springs, Koni's, Shelby quick steer, etc...

I modified the suspension with some tips from Julian Balme, who had done a couple of articles about his ( I tracked down his phone # and called him, and he was nice enough to take some time to talk to me ).

Sadly, being a thinly disguised circuit racer as a daily driver on a seriously low budget it was a hard car to live with.
( for instance, I permanently messed up my left knee with the racing clutch and twice daily rushhour traffic across Tucson, Az.)

I ended up selling it, bought it back after a couple of years, and sold it again.

I saw it one more time in a local Craigslist ad, was tempted, but didnt call.

Maybe I should have.


It was a good car.

And a lot of fun when it ran right ( it did full opposite lock slides like an old Escort... )

If it wouldnt have been my only car, and if I'd had the time and money to do it justice, it definitely would have been a keeper...

I have more pics, but not scanned...



I was nostril deep into Falcons for a while, my wife still has her '63.

( originally a 6cyl auto, now completely converted to V8 spec with a rare mildly souped up 5 bolt bell 289, C4 auto, front discs, etc.)

In this pic between my '23 Roadster Pickup model T ( long gone ), and my '60 Ford truck ( still have that )

The Pima air museum is great.

I go there at least once a year, and I even seriously considered becoming a volunteer in the resto dept. ( finding the time to do that is a problem...)

I also go to the Titan Museum at least once a year, the effort and resources spent on that is just incredible to see...

DM is cool for the boneyard...


www.airplaneboneyards.com/davis-monthan-afb-amarg-airplane-boneyard.htm


BTW, its great to live in a airplane town when you , say, need to get suspension parts for your racecar cracktested...

Yeah i know what you mean.  Thanks.

Hi John, i hope so!

Sounds cool, I hope i can live up to that!

Could this be the reason you want a Falcon,

Another Falcon owner here.



Reading your purchase story it sounded familiar and I went back and looked at your pictures and recognised the location!
I went to view a Ranchero there before I bought my hardtop.
Same deal didn’t really know anything about the car but it had a “roller” motor!
It was all complete and running, I was a serious buyer so of course I wanted to test drive it.
Oh no, we can’t take it on the road.
Well that was a deal breaker for me and made it clear it was.
He eventually agreed to a test drive to the end of the driveway.
I pulled away in it at about 5mph and had gone about 15ft and he suddenly had a complete freak out in the cab like I was completely out of control of the truck and he feared for his life!
This overreaction continued the whole length of the driveway, I’d barely gotten it out of 1st gear, until we got to the public road at which point he was a nervous wreck.
I just wanted to burst out laughing, I thought it was a wind up but he was genuinely in massive distress!

Really nice guy, super chatty and awesome cars but I don’t think he’d ever driven any of them or had any attention to do so.

Yep, they arent a huge car, i just googled dimensions and it is smaller than a mondeo estate.