7Mary3

Even so, still sounds odd. Numbers don't seem to add up. And a lot of those dealers are long gone too.

I was think more like the introduction of the Mustang II! What a dark day that was. You are right about the '71 Mustang having some similarities to the '70 1/2 Camaro. I didn't think the '71 Mustang was all that bad. Yes, kind of large and heavy. My old man had one for a while. It was a '72 Mach 1.

Very nice, and no doubt a usefull emergency vehicle. Unfortunately, I don't see it making up for the ambulance chassis business Ford has lost since the diesel Econoline cutaway chassis was discontinued. The City of Los Angeles Fire Department had bought Fords for many years, but now they are switching to Dodge Ram 5500's.

I hope it doesn't end up looking like that. Way too much like a new Camaro! Styling wise, it would be the fall of '73 all over again. Anyways, the new powertrains and IFS sound real good! Jensen is right, the current Mustangs are very close in size to the '64. And the weight is substantially lower than the competition as well.

For me, the LS was indeed a gimmer of hope.

No, Lincoln is a broken record of half-baked rebadges. Their most recent 'new' products are half baked re-badges. The only real contenders they ever had were the '56 and '61 Continentals. How much longer do we have to wait? But I will say this- it looks like they got the quality where it should be.

Unfortunately, it is hard for me to go to my local Lincoln dealer (which is a small corner of my local Ford dealer's showroom, nothing more) and not agree with Ackerson's remarks. I hope Ford realizes that a bunch of dolled up Fords with ugly grilles are not going to cut it. Lincoln is a big 'wait and see', that's it.

Now how does VW figure they can challenge Volvo and Daimler with no market presence in North America? Keep your eyes on Navistar!

True, I was using the Raptor as an extreme example. But, by 2016 it looks like NONE of the current F-150's, Ecoboost included, would meet the CAFE average by themselves. So, if Ford wants to sell F-150's in decent numbers, they have to move large numbers of cars like the Fiesta, Focus, and 4 cylinder Fusion. And naturally a hybrid that the EPA THINKS gets 95 m.p.g. (regardless if it actually does!) will mean the opportunity to sell a lot more (high profit) F-150's. Of course, it isn't just Ford.

Is the Volt available in your area yet?

It is not necessarily a question of if a particular vehicle is under the CAFE requirement, but a question of what is the average fuel economy of all subject vehicles sold by a particular manufacturer. I too am sure the current Fusion 4 cylinder meets the 2016 standard, but the F-150 Raptor for instance does not. The number of Raptors Ford will be allowed to sell under CAFE in 2016 will depend on how many cars like the 4 cylinder Fusion Ford is able to sell, thus influencing the average. Plug-in hybrids and full electrics really help here. The Volt is a first step. I think plug-ins will eventually constitute the majority of passenger cars sold in the U.S. within 10 years, unless bio-fuel really takes off.

Keep in mind Modica is an ex-Saturn dealer, possibly with an ax to grind. In any event, it wouldn't be a surprise if a crooked multi-make dealership chain would resort to selling Volts between franchises to collect the $7500 rebate. The Volt is selling, at least where I am. And if it wasn't selling, GM would not be increasing production. And, all you performance car/light truck fans better hope the Volt and cars like to do sell, because without their effect on CAFE you could just about kiss anything larger and more powerful than a Focus goodbye in a few very short years.

Like most myths, there is a little bit of truth in it. I remember the 'slip out of park' issue well. As was mentioned in one of the earlier posts, there were instances of Fords slipping from 'Park' to 'Reverse' that prompted an overy zealous N.H.T.S.A. (lead at the time by Ralph Nader protogee Joan Claybrook) to initiate a recall of pretty much every automatic transmission equipped Ford built in the previous 20 years, or something like that. What triggered the recall is that the N.H.T.S.A. determined that the Fords in question had a significantly higher instance of doing this than comparable GM and Chrysler products. No real root cause could be found other than driver error, but some thought that the Ford shift linkage (including the column parts) seemed to have more play and wore out faster than other makes. I seem to recall there were also questions raised about the distance between 'Park' and 'Reverse' on the selector, and something about the park mechanism in the transmission itself. I think it was a combination of factors that made it easier for an inattentive driver to think the car was in 'Park' when it actually was not compared to other cars. The 'recall' was nothing more than a warning label, but I think the point the book is trying to make is that the recall should have been more involved. However, if they couldn't find an issue, what was the recall supposed to be? As far as Ford automatic transmission quality is concerned, there were issues in the 60's and 70's. While the C-6 was a large robust transmission, the C-4 was a very small unit that was fine in a small car such as a 6 cylinder Maverick, but was marginal at best in anything larger. This was the same problem GM had when they tried to use the Turbo-Hydramatic 200's in full size cars. I would be a bit hesitant to call the C-4 a bad transmission, but in a Torino or F-100 it wouldn't last. I don't think the FMX was any good at all. It was really a re-hash of the old Borg-Warner designed Cruise-O-Matic, a design that should have died with the Edsel. I might read the book, but I don't think I buy the story!

Interesting trucks! Not sure what exactly the situation is in Turkey with Ford, but Chrysler still markets heavy duty Dodge trucks in Turkey. Chrysler's operation is Turkey started as a joint venture with a Turkish company, but over the years Chrysler sold it's interest to the Turkish partner. If Chrysler still has an interest in it, I assume it is very small. The Cargo cab would make an interesting story. I think Freightliner still ownes the tooling and rights to produce it in the U.S.. Iveco ended up with it in Europe. The rest of the world where it is built, who knows? Class 6 and larger cabovers are dead in North America except for refuse hauling. I don't see them coming back unless length laws are reinstated, and that isn't too likely. If Iveco makes good on their promise (or threat?) to come back to the U.S., it will likely be with Australian produced conventionals.

True on both points. I know of a fire department that was having nothing but problems with some 6.0L Powerstroke powered E-350 cutaway ambulances. Ford offered to extend the warranty and threw in an ESP at a very attractive price. The department decided to purchase more of the E-350's because with the warranty and ESP, the costs of that vehicle became predictable.

There won't be any commitments until there are enough examples provided for testing. LASD is one of the first to do comprehesive testing on the Caprice, and the Ford PI too for that matter. You will start to see significant orders after the Michigan State Police and California Highway Patrol conduct their testing. Those two agencies are considered the 'standard' in police car testing.

Wow, someone with some fleet vehicle spec. writing experience! Never ceases to amaze me how many REAL experts lurk around here. Anyway, absolutely true, particularly with municipal fleets. You write your spec., you test the vehicles, and cheapest one usually wins. In a private fleet, you usually have the luxury to say "I don't want to buy that one because it's a POS, case closed". However, in a municipal fleet you have to justify buying a more expensive vehicle. In this case, that's what happened. The Charger's excess operating costs and the savings of using some existing equipment in the new CVPI's justified the purchase of the more expensive Ford. BUT, note that they had to try the Charger to get the hard data to be able to say it indeed had higher operating costs. So, the two ways a municipal fleet can pick what police car they want to buy is to get creative with the spec. and/or try the one they don't want and *hope* it has problems. Case in point at one time the LASD didn't want any Diplomats or Gran Furys because of front suspension trouble they were experiencing with those cars. So, next purchasing go-around they actually wrote into the spec. that cars with transverse torsion bar front suspension would be ineligible to bid. A place I worked at wanted only GMC and Ford medium duty trucks, no Internationals. They wrote a spec. that required a gasoline engine of between 425 and 430 cubic inches. GMC had a 427, Ford had a 429. International only had a 404 and a 446, so they were disqualified!

Good points, but I think the CV PI's biggest advantage in the police car market was that it was the only available large RWD car for many years. The LASD favored Chevys most of the time (and in fact was largely responsible for the 1976 9C1 Nova) and bought Caprice's right up until the end in 1996. Not to say they didn't give other makes a chance, the Diplomat and the Fox platform LTD II were tried with generally poor results. When the old Caprice was available, the police car market was roughly 45% CV, 45% Caprice, and the rest Intrepid/Lumina/Mustang/Camaro. You couldn't really say the either the CV or Caprice had an advantage. As soon as the old Caprice was gone, Ford's police car share shot up to around 85%, which says to me the large RWD platform was more important than any sort of brand loyalty.

Again, it is an issue for some departments. Tell me, how well did the Impala PI do against the CV PI sales wise? Or how about the old Taurus police car? The Intrepid?

Sure, most officers find out during briefing if they will be involved in a pursuit that day. Makes choosing a squad so much easier.................

Souds like this comes from someone who has been there, and done that. Regardless, I think the AWD PI is a contender. I am not sure about the FWD PI, though there are probably some departments that could use it. Mayberry, for instance...........

The reasoning is you don't want an LEO to have to think about what kind of vehicle he is driving while he is in the middle of a pursuit or trying to get somewhere Code 3. As an example many departments prohibit officers from driving SUV's on duty unless they have had the special driver training class for that type of vehicle, and even then in most cases those vehicles are not to be used in any type of pursuit, only Code 3. Many departments consider it a safety issue. Maybe in other states departments feel it isn't an issue, but here in Southern California it is. How many times does an officer have to drive fast in a urban area? Once might be enough. Over time we might see departments move away from this policy, but it still seems pretty well entrenched at this point. FWD patrol cars have been tested, but as of yet none have been purchased by the major departments for anything other than administration work. I have relatives and friends at the LASD, and I have been following their testing. It will be interesting to see what they decide to purchase.

There is a big reluctance here for agencies to adopt FWD patrol cars due to their different handling characteristics compared to RWD patrol cars. AWD cars are viewed more favorably.

The track and ambient temps. during the 32 lap high speed vehicle dynamics evaluation were significantly higher when the Caprice was tested compared to the the PI AWD Base. Considering the length and speed of this particular test, I think track and ambient temperatures were more of a factor in this test than the other dynamic evaluations. Caprice temps.: 79-80 degrees ambient, 84-91 degrees track (page 36). PI AWD Base temps.: 65-70 degrees ambient, 69-80 degrees track (Page 60). I think the Caprice and PI AWD Base are the two most likely vehicles to be considered for purchase by the LAUSD. It was also interesting (but not surprising!) to see which car the maintenance people favored!

The B-61 was one of Mack's best, no question. One fleet I used to work for had an R-685. That was a nice driving truck, 237 horse Maxidyne and a 5 speed. I remember a lot of guys saying a Ford L was a poor man's Mack R!