Most of the cars on the road today aren’t that memorable. They dutifully serve their owners for a decade or two before disappearing from minds and memories. One of those cars was the Ford Contour, a vehicle some might describe as one of the cars of all time. For just a couple of years, Ford made a version that should still live rent-free in your head. The Ford SVT Contour was the rare sport sedan Ford pitted against the Germans and its specs aren’t too bad today.
This story takes us back to the 1990s. Japanese brands spent the past several decades crafting identities of affordable and dependable transportation while the Europeans challenged Americans to think differently about luxury and performance. Mercedes-Benz and BMW drew Americans away from their Cadillac land yachts and into svelte sedans that turned down the chrome and cranked up the power and technology.
Since then, America has long tried to beat the Europeans at their own game. In 1976, Cadillac launched the Seville, a slimmer and fitter luxury flagship designed to draw young people away from the European competition. The Seville was such a game-changer for Cadillac that the vehicle represented a unique time in Cadillac history when its smallest vehicle was the most expensive rather than the other way around.
The Seville was a financial success, but it failed to pull buyers away from European brands. This wasn’t limited to the 1970s or to American brands, either. Lexus and Acura appealed to buyers who wanted a spiffy car but didn’t want to drop the kind of coin commanded by the European competition. I suppose you could also say AMC had a sporty European-style sedan of its own with the Renault GTA that was sold here for just a year.
Things started getting really weird in the 1990s. General Motors convinced itself that the Oldsmobile LSS, which was more or less a pimped-out Eighty-Eight, was really a car you would buy over an Infiniti J30, Lexus ES300, BMW E39, or Acura Legend. And who can forget Oldsmobile’s better effort with the Aurora? Meanwhile, the folks over at Dodge had the Spirit R/T, which was nearly as quick as a BMW M5 but without any of the luxury or status.
Ford had a couple of irons in the fire, too. Most car enthusiasts might point out a vehicle like the Ford Taurus SHO, which is loved even today. Then there’s this, the SVT Contour, a sort of baby brother to the big bad SHO.
One Of Ford’s World Cars
Ford has long loved the idea of a “world car.” The brand has more than once attempted to build a singular flexible platform that could be developed with various regional Ford outposts and sold around the world.
For example, Ford originally wanted the Escort of the 1980s to be developed across both Ford Europe and Ford North America to save money and the vehicle itself would have a common architecture and components. Unfortunately, the Escort program would diverge and instead of the European and American Escorts essentially being the same, they shared only some parts.
As Adrian Clarke wrote in a retrospective, Ford tried the whole world car thing again in the mid-1980s when a car called the D-FC55 evolved into a project to create a world platform for the United States, Europe, and Australia to use. To call this platform ambitious would be an understatement. From Adrian:
The thinking was one platform could provide the underpinnings for every sedan Ford sold worldwide – modular in-line engines mounted transversely of four, six, and eight cylinders. FWD and RWD. This was where the bonkers T Drive concept originated.
What’s T-Drive? I’ll let its inventor, Donald L. Carriere, tell you:
A four-wheel drive powertrain for a vehicle having an internal combustion engine mounted transversely with respect to the fore-and-aft vehicle center plane and a gearing mechanism having a principal axis forming a cross-axis configuration with respect to the axis of the crankshaft of the engine, and a rearward controlled-slip differential adapted to transfer driving torque from the gearing mechanism to rearward traction wheels.
This doesn’t sound as impressive today when everything has a transverse engine, but it was a pretty novel idea in its day. T-Drive would have allowed for a transverse-mounted straight-eight engine to power the rear wheels, the front wheels, or an AWD system. Ford ultimately abandoned the cab-forward D-FC55 world car project, instead, in 1986 it dumped money into the CDW27 platform, another world car, but not nearly as grand. CNN Money gives us more details:
In Ford nomenclature, the Mondeo is code-named CDW27. CD designates the size category, W stands for world, and 27 identifies where the project fell chronologically. Three disparate engineering centers took part. Detroit designed the V-6 engine, the automatic transmission, and the heating and air- conditioning units. Dunton, just outside London, contributed the interior, the steering, the suspension, the electronics, and the four-cylinder engine. Cologne, Germany, did the basic structural engineering. It also designed three sheet-metal bodies for the car tailored to different markets — so much for the elusive goal of a single car sold worldwide.
BESIDES SOLVING intricate international logistics problems, Ford had to create uniform worldwide engineering standards. For example, every specification had to be expressed in the metric system, with no conversions into English measure allowed — except for the car’s basic dimensions, which top management in Dearborn wanted reported in more familiar inches. The company also had to create uniform standards for raw materials and design, procurement, and manufacture of individual parts. The list of vehicle specifications fills two 8 1/2-by-11-inch books each three inches thick.
So with all that complexity, why did Ford create CDW27? Developing a single car for the world market seems to violate Nineties wisdom about getting close to your customers. Wouldn’t it have been cheaper and easier to develop separate vehicles, one for Europe and one for the U.S.? Almost certainly. But a global carmaker’s bookkeeping takes other factors into account. Ford says it was really looking for more bang for its engineering buck. By having one 800-person engineering team produce the car for both Europe and the U.S., Ford was able to deploy the rest of its people and facilities to other projects. Says Alexander J. Trotman, 59, the executive vice president who is expected to take over when Poling retires later this year: ”The product development team that isn’t doing the CDW27 is doing something else: a new truck, or a new Taurus, or a new Mustang.”
This whole world car thing was Ford’s obsessive mission to save a ton of cash. Ford wanted to save $75 per car, but the engineering team got closer to $150. If Ford sold 700,000 CDW27 units a year, they figured Ford could save in the ballpark of $100 million a year as opposed to just building two different cars.
At first, Ford planned on selling the European version of the CDW27 to Americans as a Ford and, slightly modified, as a Mercury. However, potential customers felt that the test car was more of a car for the moment, not a car for the future. In other news, the car was going to be old news by the time it came out. So, Ford reportedly spent the equivalent of an additional $25 million per year to make the American version of the CDW27 more friendly to our market. This included a more rounded look.
But things didn’t stop there. Ford initially benchmarked the CDW27 against the 1990 Honda Accord, but then the Infiniti G20 came around and raised customer expectations for handling and ride comfort. So, Ford decided to spend another $200 per car to upgrade the CDW27’s suspension, exhaust, and engine mounts for a smoother, quieter ride.
Other hits to development costs included renovating and retooling nine factories plus the development of two new engines and two new transmissions. As CNN Money notes, sure, those engines and transmissions would find a lot of use in other models, but the costs were still charged to the CDW27 project.
The CDW27 platform was touted as a way for Ford to save a ton of cash, yet it still spent $6 billion making it a reality. The car that came out of the other end also wasn’t anything like Ford’s previous world car ideas. The Ford Mondeo, which came first, the Contour, and the Mercury Mystique weren’t as versatile. Instead, they were pretty basic front-engine, front-wheel-drive cars that replaced the Ford Sierra in Europe plus the Ford Tempo and Mercury Topaz in America and the Ford Telstar elsewhere.
The Grail
The Ford Contour launched in America in 1994 for the 1995 model year. Unfortunately for Ford, the whole world car thing didn’t really pay off. Reviewers praised the Contour’s handling while also damning its lack of interior space. Here’s one from the New York Times:
I felt such oneness again on a jaunt through the upper Midwest in an “electric red” Contour SE. After several days at the wheel, I was impressed by the Contour’s world-class performance, but my legs were numb from being unable to stretch out and my neck was aching for lack of headroom.
Now I am a hefty 6 feet 1, but hardly a giant. I never felt so confined in a Honda, even though the Accord’s legroom measurements show only a slightly larger margin between pleasure and pain. And speaking of pain — I coaxed three adults into the Contour’s back seat; once in, thigh to thigh and scalps to roof, they had the pinched expressions of New York tourists stumbling into an S-and-M club.
Aside from concerns about interior space, the Contour may be the best small sedan Detroit has yet built. The SE’s body was rigid and rattle-free, its handling was sporty-car sharp and its new 24-valve, 2.5-liter V6 was as impressive for its silence and smoothness as for its ample power.
Motor Trend also liked it:
As staff members began cycling through the Contour, ride quality and handling prowess quickly surfaced as standout features. The European influence is most evident in the suspension, which uses an independent MacPherson strut setup in front and a multilink configuration at the rear. The SE features a sport-tuned suspension with unique damper settings, stiffer springs, and a thicker anti-roll bar than the GL and LX trim levels. But beyond this bolstering, it’s the rear Quadralink system that gives the Contour its distinct corner-carving character, by creating passive rear-wheel steering. Also benefiting the SE are wider 15×6.0-inch alloy wheels shod with lower-profile Firestone Firehawk GTA 205/60TR15 tires. More than 95 percent of our surveyed Contour owners rated handling as above average, and they ranked it as the most liked attribute. A woman from New York wrote, “It handles very well on hills and holds the road really well in sharp turns.” Another owner commented, “The rack-and-pinion steering is wonderful. It gives a great feel of the road.”
The Contour’s performance inspired us to term the car a “four-door sport coupe” in a recent Long-Term Update, but this also referred to the limited rear seat room. While the Contour was positioned to fill the Tempo’s vacated spot between the Escort and the Taurus, at a humble 89.4 cubic feet of interior space it leans toward the Escort. Two-thirds of survey respondents felt that the rear seat provided better than average comfort, but our handful of vertically endowed six-foot-plus staffers found the Contour’s rear legroom to be quite limited.
The publication also noted a bunch of problems:
Overall quality was rated highly by surveyed owners; almost 46 percent judged it as excellent. Yet almost 35 percent claimed to have problems of some kind with their Contour. Like our surveyed owners, we found the fuel filler door reluctant to open at times, and the filler neck proved unfriendly to some gas pump nozzles, causing them to shut down midflow. We also had difficulty with the transmission, as did almost 4 percent of our surveyed owners. At 1000 miles, we experienced a malfunctioning overdrive switch. Our local dealer handled these problems under warranty, getting us back on the road in minimal time. Two months later, the automatic transmission would not shift out of Park; our dealer traced the trouble to a malfunctioning solenoid. A week later we returned with a broken rear brake caliper, which also was corrected under warranty. With these repairs handled, the Contour performed without fuss for five months until a suspension rattle developed. Simply tightening the rear shocks took care of the problem.
Ford would sell nearly a million Contours and Mystiques between 1995 and 2000, which sounds like a lot. However, that’s six model years and split between both brands. As WardsAuto reported in 1998, the CDW27 platform wasn’t a hot seller in America. WardsAuto pointed to the Contour’s small interior as the reason for its downfall. But Ford was also in a tough spot. It wasn’t like Ford could have made the Contour bigger without encroaching on the turf secured by the Taurus. It’s a shame considering how much the Contour was a technological tour de force. Even the vehicle’s 2.5-liter Duratec V6 was developed with Porsche!
Reportedly, a Ford executive told WardsAuto “If this doesn’t work, we’ll never try it again” in regards to the automaker’s world car strategy. This turned out to be untrue since Ford tried the world car thing again with the later Escort and Mercury Cougar. As for the Contour? It went out with a bang.
Ford wanted to deal damage to European sport sedans and it was going to do it with help from its Special Vehicle Team. The folks at SVT had already souped up the F-150 and the Mustang, but this would be their first four-door. It would also be their first front-wheel-drive vehicle. Ford Performance continues:
The 1998 SVT Contour was designed to compete against European sports sedans costing thousands more. It was SVT’s first front-wheel-drive and V-6-powered offering. Based on the sporty 1998 Contour SE, SVT added a large-capacity air cleaner, 34mm butterfly port throttles and unique pistons, as well as revised intake and exhaust camshafts, pushing horsepower from 160 to 195. The engine also benefited from an Extrude Hone Powerflow technology, a process that improves airflow in the upper intake manifold and the cylinder head’s secondary intake ports. Other hardware upgrades included bigger brakes, performance tires and suspension tuning and a dual-outlet exhaust system. Unique front and rear fascias and a specially equipped leather interior helped set it apart from the mainstream contour models.
What did this tuning do? Well, let’s look at what Edmunds said:
A triple-dose of fun, the ya-ya expunging Ford SVT Contour is the perfect remedy for those who have too much pent-up anxiety and energy. The SVT’s high-revving 195-horsepower DOHC V6 engine, slick-shifting manual transmission, and sport-tuned suspension allowed our drivers to experience the same level of excitement that a kid must feel when he finds out that he can spin around in a circle until getting too dizzy to remain upright. While we don’t recommend spinning the SVT in a circle until toppling over, we do recommend finding the curviest road your stomach can handle, and racing toward it with youthful abandon.
The SVT Contour is simply the best handling front-wheel drive sedan sold in this country. The SVT’s tires and suspension produce prodigious grip, allowing drivers of this Ford to pick a line and hold it through turns that would humble lesser cars. The Contour also has a communicative quick-ratio steering setup that allows drivers to change direction quickly and accurately. The SVT’s shifter snicks into each gear eagerly, saving drivers from having to hunt through sloppy detents, thus optimizing an already impressive power delivery.
The heart of the SVT’s dominance of this sport sedan showdown must be attributed to the car’s awesome engine. The 2.5-liter unit found in the belly of this beast differs greatly from the workaday motor found in the standard SE V6 thanks to extrude-hone polished ports and a lighter flywheel. The result is a quicker revving engine that makes 24 more horsepower.
Car and Driver pitted the SVT against a BMW 318ti Sport, a Honda Prelude SH, a Mazda MX-5 Miata, an Eagle Talon TSi AWD, and a Chevy Camaro Z28. The SVT Contour placed fifth, beating only the Eagle Talon TSi AWD, but the worst complaint levied on the SVT Contour was that it had a soft suspension. The fact that it was even able to hang with cars like the Miata and the 318ti is sort of impressive.
The performance metrics were pretty good, too. In Motor Trend’s hands, the SVT took 7.5 seconds to hit 60 mph and the quarter-mile came up in 15.7 seconds at 88.7 mph. The SVT Contour wouldn’t be much of a sports car off of the line today, but it wouldn’t be holding up traffic, either.
So by most accounts, it seems like the SVT Contour is just an aftermarket suspension away from being a genuine sport sedan. Yet, just like with the regular Contour, basically nobody bought them. Just 11,500 examples were built between 1998 and 2000 and sold for $22,900 compared to $13,310 for a base Contour.
Unfortunately, as Hagerty notes, these cars weren’t exactly reliable or easy to work on when they were new and they still aren’t today. For example, Mark Rowe, a former member of Ford SVT, explains what is like to change a simple alternator:
“Changing an alternator is the most absurd thing,” says Rowe. “Owners came up with ways to do it, like stacking a bunch of extensions on a ratchet, taking off the driver’s side wheel and going in that way to get to the back side of the engine on the passenger side. If you’re not going to do the work yourself, it can be quite the expensive little car to maintain.”
Rowe also notes that the SVT-specific parts are going to be hard, if not impossible to find and everything in the engine bay is so tight that injuring yourself will be a common thing.
In other words, these cars are like Volkswagens: Lovely when they work, a nightmare when they don’t. The good news is that it seems few people are collecting these cars, so you shouldn’t have a problem finding a decent example for around $5,000 or a little less.
It’s now been 24 years since the SVT Contour died and while it wasn’t the best sport sedan out there, it’s still a reminder of a different time. As it is, Ford won’t even sell you a sedan at all, let alone a sporty one. So, cars like these are pieces of history, when family cars meant sedans and it was a big deal when you souped them up. The SVT Contour may not have been a good world car, but maybe it’s a type of car the world should appreciate again.
(Images: Ford, GM)
I drove the Mondeo a few times in my late 90’s travels in France, was a fun great handling car. The funny thing is every time I went to France the Budget rental car counter kept trying to put me in an automatic! I had to keep reminding them that yes some American can drive (and prefer) to drive stick.
These were nice driving cars, but as a Ford tech from 98-01, the V6 Contours were probably my least favorite cars to work on. The engine bay was 10 lbs of crap stuffed in a 5 lb bag. I remember it took like twice as long to pull the transmission from one of these compared to a Taurus.
Contours are just one car I NEVER see anymore. I honestly see Tempos more often than I do Contours.
I had one of the 98 SVTs, and it remains my favourite. There is something about a car that seems to egg you on, like a little devil on your left shoulder, whispering that no one’s watching, and going a little faster will be fun.
Then you punch it in 3rd, the secondaries open, and you found you’ve happily sold your soul.
It had it’s bugaboos to be sure, but the Contour.org community made it easy to sort them out. The oil starvation issue could be avoided with an extra half litre in the pan. The alternator, as mentioned, could be changed by extending your extensions. And the cupholders could be fixed with…well, just don’t drink in the car, OK?
The big flaw that killed a lot of these was the wiring harness. The sheathing used basically started to biodegrade after a while. Cougar harnesses could be modified to work, but If I ever buy another, it is with the knowledge that I will likely have to repair or rebuild an entire harness at some point.
They were small cars. Ford could call it midsized all they wanted, but that thing was NOT roomy. I fit in mine when I had it, but after a few years an many snacks? No chance.
Oh, and the sales numbers for the SVT were low because it was a limited production car: they were only going to build 2500 a year for the US market (250 for Canada). They exceeded those numbers, but not by much. I wish there were.more of them, though, because I love these cars passionately.
The jesus gear! I used to get crap for my ’00 from friends (dude, you drive a Contour??). Then I’d do a flyby/give them a ride with the windows down and they’d usually admit how good it sounded and pulled.
I gave up on it when started falling apart and realized parts were getting difficult. I remember people hoarding jack point covers and other parts….I really loved that car but having to drive/street park it in Philly every other weekend did a number on it.
I met some great folks here in Ottawa on the contour.org forums. One guy would always come outside when I left so he could listen to me drive away. Never had that with ANY other car.
He had a 96SE with a 3.0 swap. Nice car.
When I was thinking of buying one, my brother, a car guy, gave me crap. I asked him if he had driven one. It felt sharp where most American cars of the era felt dull, nice turn in, etc.
That is the funny thing about world cars, no one really likes them because the tastes are too far apart to really work.
(Unless we talk about premium cars, but that is a different story)
This is the same 2.5 that was in the later Cougar. Those also had all kinds of problems and were hard to work on. The fuel pump failed on quite a few of them as I recall. The alternator remained a PITA on all iterations of FWD car that used this engine.
I remember trying to shop for one of these back in the day. You had to find a special SVT dealer. They were used to selling mustang Cobras and Ford lightnings. They didn’t have one of these on the lot and the salesman basically told me good luck ever finding one.
It was weird lull in the climb out of the malaise era. Some of the promise of late 80s and early 90s petered out (was it recession?) by the time 2002-3 came around the speed started piling on. This car was in that gap.
I’ve driven that generation Mondeo a few times and been a passenger in the back as well (they were a popular taxi choice in the UK). I’m 6ft 2″ and didn’t have any complaints about interior room.
I do think that we have slightly lower expectations for interior room here in the UK, so that doesn’t surprise me.
We had a 98 V6 Contour and for the time, it was fairly sporty and toss able for a sedan. The handling was pretty great. I’d say it probably handled better than any car I’m owned until I got the 3 series or my Miata. It was really small though, especially in the back, and the lack of space for car seats meant it didn’t stick around long for us once we started having a family. That V6 was really crammed into the engine bay. A coworker had an SVT though and really loved it.
It is funny to read the American take on what was essentially a staple of the European landscape; the Ford Mondeo.
Great handling and spacious enough. The ST200 was just the cherry on the cake.
A shame Ford decided to stop making cars.
It’s kinda crazy the ST200 wasn’t mentioned here. It’s the same car as the US SVT Contour, and, essentially, the only reason the SVT Contour exists. The Engineering was already done overseas, making it a cheap addition. Extrude hone and mild tune on the V6 for and extra 30hp, tweak the already good suspension, add 16″ wheels and a late 90’s body kit and Voila.
Parents had a Mystique V6 I learned to drive in. Loved that car. Sounded great, plenty of power (for the 90’s), but when it broke, it broke BIG.
Maaaaan the breakdown was cool n all but I wouldn’t call this a grail. There’s a reason nobody collects these: the performance has long been surpassed and the bodywork isn’t appealing at all. There’s zero reason to get one of these over say, mid aughts beater Si. Those will be easier to work on too.
Nope, this is a not a Grail of any kind. Contours (and all versions) are shit. I bought into the hype of the “world car” in ’97 when I bought a new black V6 5-speed SE. That car was absolutely the biggest POS I have ever owned (and I’ve owned a LOT of cars). A/C broke the first night we took it home, spent 85 days in the shop, four transmissions, paint fell off, burned oil from 20k on, door seals would stick to the doors and peel off, gauges malfunctioned all the time, and on and on. I sued over lemon law, won, and have never darkened a Ford stealership since.
Screw the Craptour and everything related to it!!!!!
I had one of these back when I graduated from college. It was my first real purchase after getting a full time job.
I can confirm pretty much everything said here. To this day it’s still one of the cars that I recall with the most fondness and hatred of any car I’ve owned. Everything said about the handling is complete true, it was a joy to drive every day and I loved taking it out for a weekend blast up into the mountains. The interior was also small and the seats very confining for anyone beyond ‘average’ size. Luckily I’m only 5′-10″ and was skinny back then. I’d never get comfortable in those seats now though.
Can also confirm all the quality issues and how horrible it was to work on. Seriously, that engine was a miracle of modern packaging, you couldn’t fit a playing card in that engine bay without having to remove something to make space. I tried to do some of the work myself but I was an apartment dweller back then so it ended up going to the shop for most things. And there were a lot of them, constantly it seemed, and the labor costs (even at my small, local shop) were killer.
The final straw was when one of the oxygen sensors failed but I didn’t know it because the check engine light bulb had burned out (that tells you a little about how often it came on). The engine defaulted to running too rich and eventually clogged up the two smaller, initial cats which were mounted to the manifold. The front one wasn’t too terrible but the back one was potentially going to mean removing the engine to get it out, or at least unbolting enough stuff to to rock the engine forward and get it out. I gave up at this point, and traded it on on a Legacy GT (taking a huge bath in the process).
I still love and hate that car.
It is still funny about the Americans “need to be able to work on the car myself”.
Despite the world car claims, this is essentially a European cars. The space is fine for us and we take cars to the dealer for servicing.
But handling is important to us. So that is what the Mondeo had.
Handling is important to some of us Yanks too. Maybe it depends on where one lives here, when I lived in the Appalachain Mountains handling was always my number one priority in a car. Or off-road capability in a truck, I did a lot of that as well. Now I’m out here on the Plains, and handling doesn’t seem too important when every road is straight as an arrow, if Cadillac still made land barges I’d look into one.
The difference is that in Europe pretty much everywhere handling matters. The continent is mountanious pretty much everywhere and roads and streets are tight. Oh and petrol is expensive.
So we spent our resources developping suspension and brakes. But engines were small and underpowered.
So our “excellent cars” are just a byproduct of our conditions.
Saw one of these crash and rollover several times at an autocross at a go-kart track in Marshalltown, Iowa in 2001 or so. Just tried to find it on YouTube but no luck.
https://youtu.be/AYaO2OyuQ_A?si=TSFMTLXpJTudu8zY found it! Great success!
Well, that was a spectacular DNF.
At least he was able to walk away.
When I had my first kid my wife had a 240SX, that was our “big” car, and I had an RX7. We wanted something a little more family friendly and started looking. I drove a V-6 Contour SE with a 5 speed and loved it. The power was very good (for the time) and the handling sharp and nimble. It was a bit small on the inside, and we ended up getting a Mazda 626 ES, which was better built, felt much fancier, and suited our needs better, but wasn’t near as much fun to drive as the Contour.
Fast forward a few years and I have had a first generation SE-R for a while and am looking for a sporty 4 door. I drove a number of cars including a Contour SVT. The car I drive wasn’t holding together that well, what I generally describe as clunky. Things made noises that shouldn’t have, suspension, drivetrain. My standards of fast had changed a bit and it didn’t seem all that fast either.
The Contour was a nice little sports sedan, but people want their four door Fords to be roomy and practical, the Lemon sucking face didn’t help any.
This was designed from the time Ford Europe decided handling mattered. Cars like Puma, Focus and this emerged from that period.
Everything else was tailored to European needs. And then passed on to the rest of the world.
A bit like the Taunus / Cardinal of the sixties, but the other way round.
When I was growing up a buddy of mine went on vacation, and when he got back I asked how it was.
The first thing out of his mouth was how his parents rented a Contour and he had to sit in the middle seat (he was an only child) the whole time because his head kept banging against the C pillar.
As a passenger he really hated that car lol.
I had the 1995 SE with a manual. Much of the driving character of that early SE applies to the SVT, which I have driven. That “soft suspension” really shined on the very fun but often shitty back roads of Appalachia. I drove like a madman and still never hit the handling limit. Small inside? Yes. But it drove small too, one of those cars that seemed to shrink around you, also a plus.
And I agree, fuck that alternator. Also, fuck the right-hand sweeper oil starvation issue; the 3.0l conversion with the upgraded oil pan with baffles is a thing for a reason, and I highly recommend it for anyone interested in one of these cars. Fun little fuckers for cheap, just be ready to work on it because dumb shit will break often (wheel bearings out the whazoo, handbrake line a few times, two alternators, etc).
20-year-old me test drove a manual SVT back in 2000-ish and I remember it pulling pretty hard, looking/feeling premium, and handling/shifting like a champ. I was driving a 2001 base Tiburon 5-speed, which was bare bones but sporty and fun. I have a feeling my opinion wouldn’t be the same in 2024. Some things are best left in the past.
A friend-of-a-friend had one of these back in the late 90s. It was black on black, which was a bold choice in the south Texas heat, but the thing was an absolute blast to drive. Not super reliable, but it looked good and drove good, and I’d be lying if I said I haven’t been keeping an eye out for one all these years.
I’ve never worked on one of these, but in my experience, working on *any* car with a transverse vee engine is a nightmare – but some nightmares are worse than others.
This era Ford was terrible. My brother’s and I both had troublesome Escorts (1986/2000), a mistake which we swore never to repeat.
On the flip side, my 1986 Escort Pony (4 speed and no options whatsoever) was maybe the most reliable car I have ever owned. And I did absolutely horrible things to it.
My friends hated my Escort, every time we stopped for more than 30 seconds we had to blast the heat (in 95f weather) otherwise it would overheat. It would overflow coolant everywhere, and the thermostat was replaced far too often. It probably needed a new radiator, but I was 16 and knew nothing about most things.
I genuinely liked the mondeo’s of this generation when I drove in England. I remember my dad having a contour rental for a week or so while he decided what to buy after his truck crapped the bed. He went with another truck instead
I used to own a V6 Contour that liked to eat its drive-side CV axle. It was about a once every 1-2 year replacement interval. Although, to be fair, I drove that thing hard. With a Diablo performance tuner and governor delete, it saw lots of back road use at 120+ mph.
I do enjoy your unexpected automotive tastes. Though these were pretty decently aero, no?
The car was a hand-me-down from my father when he upgraded to the Audi TT, mostly because the Triumph GT6 I obtained as a project(converted to an EV, as originally intended) was NOT at all reliable enough to daily as a gasoline burner.
The aero of the Contour was about as good as most other sedans of the era, meaning, about twice as much drag as it should have had…
The ST200 was rated at 141mph, so not unexpected.
“Mercedes-Benz and BMW drew Americans away from their Cadillac land yachts and into svelte sedans that turned down the chrome and cranked up the power and technology.”
Have you driven a W116 S Class? The Mercedes-Benz that Cadillac thought their Seville would draw buyers away from?
That Mercedes had as much chrome as that Cadillac – it even had stacked sets of double chrome bumpers! It had the same horsepower as the Seville’s Olds V8 – just from a smaller engine. And it had fewer creature comforts – No power seats, no auto-dimming headlamps – not even a tilt steering wheel!
The E23 BMW 7 Series did have less chrome – but it also had similarly minimalist creature comforts, and a bit less HP than the Seville or 450SEL from it’s inline 6.
It wasn’t til the 80’s – after Cadillac had transitioned to the bustle back Seville that MB and BMW went to slightly more creature comforts – tho for MB, HP also dropped significantly for several years.
I got to sell these in the 90s. You are right on both counts-they were great fun… and nobody cared
Extrude hone, haven’t heard that since the 00’s.
A friend had an SVT that he used to autocross. Nice car, but reliability wasn’t that good. He only owned it for a couple of years before he sold it and got a 240SX.
Yeah, is extrude honing still a thing?
Everything is molded plastic now, so don’t have to deal with rough cast metal intakes anymore.
This certainly takes me back – my mentor at my job then had one. Even the lower end Contours were fun to drive, and a big part of that was Ford was still offering manual transmissions in them, across the line. Think about how crazy that sounds now, a mid-sized domestic sedan with a stick!
Silly fun fact I always liked: those black panels on the c-pillar differ if it’s a Contour or a Mystique – the Contour’s has dots, the Mystique’s has lines.