The Etceterini Files Part 25: OSI-Ford 20M TS, The Anti-Fiat from a Fiat Ally

This OSI-Ford 20M TS is a hard car to categorize.  It's not a Ford Motor Company offering, as the name hints.  Note that "OSI" precedes "Ford", indicating that something else was going on here. In 1965, when Ghia's Sergio Sartorelli produced the design for Officine Stampaggi Industriali, the Ghia offshoot had been producing bodies for the Ghia-designed (and labeled) Fiat 2300S coupe for 4 years.  But OSI, founded in order to provide stampings for series production cars that Ghia's small facilities couldn't handle, must have been looking for new contracts.  The Italian coachbuilding scene was a very competitive one, and perhaps Ghia, and thus OSI, were aware they'd not be getting the contract for the Fiat 2300S replacement that would appear in 1966. Indeed, the Fiat Dino coupe contract went to Bertone, while Pininfarina got to design and build the spiders.

So perhaps knowing that orders for the 2300S coupe would soon end, OSI built a prototype coupe using the German Ford Taunus 20M 2 liter, 60 degree V6.  An interesting choice, as the upcoming Fiat Dino was also a 2 liter V6, but a more powerful, complex design.  When the OSI-Ford 20M TS went into production for 1967, it was in direct competition with the Fiat 2300S coupe, which OSI was still producing.  Soon enough, the more powerful, 125 hp 2.3 liter Ford V6 was offered, which must have made Fiat management unhappy.  The fastback lines of the new car were clean enough, with functional air extractor vents taking the place of decorative chrome.  The front fender vents on the prototype shown here were deleted on most of the production cars.

Size and weight were similar to the Fiat coupe shown below, with the wheelbase 2 inches longer at 106.4 inches. The OSI-Ford's design cannot, however, be rated as any kind of brave  leap into the future.  If anything, the front of the Ford was less distinctive than that of the Fiat...

…while comparing the rear views of the Fiat above with the OSI-Ford below reveals that the glassy greenhouse of the Fiat sits more happily on the lower body.  Note that on the Fiat, the rear window meets the deck where the roof slope ends, providing good visibility to the rear as well as visual clarity (the designy kind). On the Ford the backlight ends too high for good rear vision, and the roof slope takes another window's-worth of space to reach the short, visually-indecisive horizontal surface of the deck.  And as the side profile (3rd from top) reveals, the blunt front end and the roof proportions place visual weight over the front wheels rather than the rears, odd for a rear-drive, fastback design.

The grille enclosing the quad headlights is tidy, but looks like lots of other cars from the period. Still, the car was reasonably popular during its two-year production run, with at least 870 of the 2.0 liter model produced, and 409 of the 2.3 liter.  Some sources claim that as many as 2,200 of the OSI-Ford were built, but the marque club's figure of around 200 survivors casts some doubt on the higher total. OSI produced at least one convertible prototype, and the top, when erected, seemed to have a happier relationship with the lower body.  Sadly, the OSI facility closed after 1968, when production of the Fiat 2300S and its upstart competitor, the OSI-Ford, ended...

The convertible survives, along with a couple hundred coupes, a variety of OSI-bodied Fiats and Innocentis, as well as the wildly innovative OSI Silver Fox*, a twin-hulled, mid-engined (well, sort of) competition prototype, and the Scarabeo, the mid-engined prototype OSI built for Alfa Romeo before closing down. That car, along with a couple of other Ford-powered entries in the etceterini hall of almost-fame, will be the subject of a future chapter.

*Footnote:  For a detailed look at that last, radical OSI-designed and built concept car, see "The Etceterini Files Part 23—OSI Silver Fox:  And Now for Something Completely Different", posted here on Feb. 9, 2021.  Several other designs by Sergio Sartorelli for Ghia bodies on  chassis ranging from VW to Maserati were posted here in "The Italian Line: Ghia Part 2--- From Custom to Corporate" on October 31, 2020.

Photo Credits:
Top thru 3rd from top:  Officine Stampaggi Industriali (OSI)

4th & 5th (Fiat 2300S):  the author

6th & 7th:  wikimedia

8th:  OSI

Bottom:  osi20mts.com