The owner of this 1972 Ford Gran Torino put it in an open garage bay 20 years ago, and it sat there ever since. Now, the folks at WD Detailing drag the forgotten personal luxury coupe out of the resting place to give the vehicle a much-needed wash.
While it was partially covered, this Gran Torino still looks rough. There’s dust and grime on the body. The interior is filthy. According to the owner, a raccoon got into the engine bay at some point and tore things up.
WD Detailing focuses on cleaning the car, but the team also makes sure the engine still turns over. It does, but the Ford needs lots of work before the powerplant gets running again.
Rather than starting by washing the body like usual, the detailers begin with the cabin this time because they plan on dyeing the carpets. The upholstery on the seats is also filthy. There’s a massive mouse nest under the rear seat.
As usual, just washing the body goes a long way toward making this Gran Torino look better. Instead of using wash mitts, the crew wipes the body with sandpaper to remove the oxidation from the paint. While unorthodox, the tactic works well here.
At the end of the cleaning process, the Gran Torino looks significantly better. There’s still some patina on the body with some chipped paint and less-than-shiny chrome. Inside, there are big holes on the driver and passenger side of the front bench. Plus, there would still need to be lots of mechanical work to make the car road-worthy.
Ford introduced the Torino name in 1968 as an upmarket subseries for the Fairlane. In 1970, the Blue Oval swapped the nomenclature by making Torino the primary model and Fairlane the submodel. For the 1972 model year, the Torino entirely took over, and the Blue Oval introduced the Gran Torino moniker.
Ford offered the ’72 Torino with an inline-six and a variety of V8s. This one has an eight-cylinder powerplant, but we can’t see enough to identify which one.
The show Starsky and Hutch made the Gran Torino a TV star. The characters drove 1975 and ’76 cars with a white stripe along the side. A ’72 Gran Torino was the eponymous machine in the 2008 film Gran Torino.
