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Old 30th Apr 2018, 17:15
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India Four Two
 
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Manchester MAN
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Lots of the examples above are cases where the car came first, so was not named after the aeroplane! e.g. Standard had a Vanguard in production in 1948, 11 years before Vickers flew their Vanguard
.... but Vultee produced the little known P.48 Vanguard.

I was reminded of this while looking through my wartime copy of "Aircraft and the Air" by Eric Sargent, which I have just retrieved from storage.

I also found the Rearwin Speedster which predates the Porsche 365 Speedster.

I knew about the BSA Thunderbolt, but I thought surely someone had used the name for a car.

Sure enough, the 1964 Ford Thunderbolt, a 500 BHP drag racer.
Though technically legal for street use, the Thunderbolt was too raucous for the public roads. Just over 100 were built, and every one spent nearly every minute at the drag strip.

As Hot Rod warned, the T-bolt was "not suitable for driving to and from the strip, let alone on the street in everyday use."
https://musclecars.howstuffworks.com...hunderbolt.htm

Last edited by India Four Two; 30th Apr 2018 at 17:33.
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