The First Power Hardtop Drop Top: Ford's '50s Skyliner A History of Hardtops
It is easy to remember when the features we take for granted first made an impact.If you owned a car in the 1980s that had anti-lock brakes, fuel injection, or a turbo, you should be proud of it.The word "Automatic" was written on the back of slushboxes in Europe and Japan in the '60s and '70s.Some innovations are hard to pin down.Hardtop convertibles have a long history, even though they came into vogue in the 1990s on cars like the MercedesSLK.
They are usually seen on high-end cars like the BMW 4 Series and Ferrari California T, but hardtop convertibles still have a certain wow factor.The first power hardtop convertible came from the most gee-whiz of decades, the 1950s.The car was called the Ford Skyliner.
The cars were pioneers in many ways.In the early 1950s, Ford was neck-and-neck with Chevy as America's best-selling automaker thanks to its aggressive pricing, handsomely styled cars, and cutting-edge Y- Block V8 offered at a time when Chevy didn't offer a single eight- cylinder engineGM may have stunned the world with its 1953 showcars-come-to-life Cadillac Eldorado, Oldsmobile 98 Fiesta, and Buick Skylark, but Ford introduced the Skyliner to bring some of that concept car to the forefront.
The range-topper for the Ford lineup is the ’54 Crestliners, and the name that went on to grace Ford vans and countless diners was the Skyliner.Instead of offering an open-air driving experience, the Skyliner had a green-tinted acrylic glass panel across three-quarters of the roof, giving drivers a "freshness of view" unlike any production car that came before it.Like the Model X, all that glass made the car incredibly hot and made sun glare a nightmare.Ford carried the idea over to the Fairlane Crown Victoria.The company used darker tinted glass, and offered air conditioning and a snap-in sunshade, but the pricey, hot "Glasstop Vicky" never quite caught on with the rest of the population.
Ford raised the stakes even higher instead of throwing the Skyliner name out with the glass roof.The 1957 lineup was a turning point for Ford.Its cars were all-new, it would outsell Chevy yet again, and it had reinvented the Skyliner to wow Americans in the age of Sputnik.Just before the project could be completed, the beancounters pulled the plug on the hardtop convertible.Ford didn't want the technology to go to waste, so it kept it for its range-topping model.
It makes sense that the Skyliner is from the Jet Age.The Skyline's roof opened and flew back into the trunk in a matter of seconds, because it was longer and lower than standard Fairlanes.It took six motors, four lift jacks, a host of electrical relays, 10 solenoids, and over 600 feet of wiring to accomplish this balletic feat.The mechanism proved to be reliable and robust.With the Blue Oval moving 20,766 units, sales of ’57 models were strong, with a range-topper costing over $1,000 more than a base Ford.The Skyliner was not a sports car because of the three V8s that were offered.
Things began to change in 1958.The new styling of Ford, with quad headlights, a fake hood scoop, and even more chrome, was less popular than the ’57s.Buyers were skeptical of the new technology, bristled at keeping their luggage in a small footlocker inside that massive trunk, and nearly three, even though the high visibility looked great on TV and in advertisements.