Orphan of the Day, 06-11, 1970 (Mercury) Cyclone Spoiler

[studegary]

Unlike most Studebaker production, this car was built nine days earlier than scheduled and wasn't even a sold unit.

[studegary]

Back in the early nineties when we had our 1970 Torino Cobra, we were regularly parked near two 70' Spoilers (both orange) at local car shows and of course became acquainted with the owners. I recall them showing me that the gunsite grill projection assembly would rotate vertical when the hood was raised. Not automatically, but manually. Neither of the owners had any explanation of why it would do it or what the reason for it was. If any of you ever has the opportunity to check this out with another 70' Spoiler (71's are probably the same), maybe that owner has the answer?

When these were new, I remember the salesman at the local Mercury store showing me this "feature". I think that it had something to do with access to something.

[8E45E]

Then there is the Kar Kraft Cyclone Spoiler II





Craig

[spokejr]

When these were new, I remember the salesman at the local Mercury store showing me this "feature". I think that it had something to do with access to something.

While I bought my Cyclone used in '80, my mother bought a '70 Montego brand new in Sept of '69. The grill was the same layout and basic dimensions but only slats on the Montego. Anyway, we took a road trip come spring break to visit my maternal grandfather. When we got to Yuba City, we drove over to meet him at the Ford dealer where he was a salesman. He showed us the interesting feature that the Mercurys had with the "Bunkie Beak". That grill, sticking out like that made some of the headlight aiming machines un-useable without pivoting the grill up and out of the way.

So, now you know the rest of the story.

[Diego]

I had a '70 GT. The tail lights were different to match the hidden or hidden headlights. If the car had hidden headlights, there were 3 pods for tail lenses on each side of a central grill, without the hide away option, only 2 pods on each side and no central grill. Spoilers came with extra gauges spread across the dash pad, each in individual pockets, straight Cyclones and GTs could option them. I always dreamed of a Spoiler with four speed, a/c, console and rear defrost, basically loaded to the gills in just this shade of blue. Sigh...

I misspoke about something: hidden headlights were not available on the base Cyclone but they were optional on the Spoiler.

The taillights have nothing to do with the headlight configuration. Rather, the base Cyclone had two pairs of pods, the GT and Spoiler had three.

Craig is correct the color is Competition Blue, but that's Mercury's name –*Ford called it Grabber Blue.