The 1984–87 Continental Was a Missed Performance Opportunity

Put yourself in the shoes of a product planner at Ford during the 1980s. It must have been a great gig by the time 1985 came around, when this particular Lincoln Continental was in production. After all, your company’s stock price has tripled since the beginning of the decade. People wanted to buy these fresh-faced Fords over their competition, and your role at the company can take some credit for it.

Every year since 1981 had been a smashing success, and it was only a matter of time before everyone knew it. The 1981 Ford Escort “World Car” was a gamble that paid off with over 400,000 units sold in 1985 alone. The 1982 Continental was a brilliant blend of cost-engineered downsizing and flagship Fox Body engineering, with sales five times higher than the outgoing Versailles. (An admittedly low bar, but still a noteworthy accomplishment.)

The 1983 Thunderbird was a bellwether for the revolution of aerodynamic design and European-ish road manners, while the 1983 Ranger sold over a quarter million units in its freshman year. This was definitely a good time to work in Dearborn.

The hits kept coming. In 1984, something on par with the Ranger’s success happened for the Lincoln brand. The Continental Mark VII didn’t necessarily set the world on fire, but it provided a new baseline for how a personal luxury coupe should look and perform. To compare the Mark VII to a 4.1-liter Cadillac Eldorado is disingenuous. It’s an insult to mention one and the same breath as a K-car based Chrysler LeBaron. It was closer to a Mercedes SEC (C126) than anything from America.

Continuing that Ford truck analogy for Lincoln in the 1980s, if the composite-headlight Mark VII was a fresh-faced Ranger, then the wildly popular Town Car was akin to the iconic F-150.

That puts the 1984-87 Continental and its retro Rococo styling in a difficult spot, as its 1984 redesign wasn’t terribly different than the now-dated, neoclassic 1982 model. It threaded a difficult needle, getting lost in all the hype and fame given to other Fords of the era.

This is where I mention Project Valentino, as it has parts from a yellow-ish beige 1984 Continental donor car. The 1984-87 body style never did it for me, but it certainly possessed items that I needed for a restomod. The later Fox Contis are odd mix of give and take from my jaded viewpoint, likely best explained in a list of attributes. So here are the items Lincoln added to the redesigned 1984 Continental:

• Four corner, computer controlled air suspension
• Rear anti-roll bar
• EEC-IV engine computer
• Power front vent windows
• Power trunk pull-down
• A front end almost as ramp-like as the rear
• Bumpers that look suspiciously similar to the Mark VII
• Multi-function overhead console
• New door trim with (optional) real wood veneers
• Power recliners and (optional) seat heaters
• Rear seat heat ducts
• Push button electronic climate control

To aid the transition, here’s what they “took” from the 1983 model:

• Aluminum hood
• Engine temperature gauge
• External, backlit thermometer
• Spring-loaded chrome fender trim (to give the bumpers a wraparound look, but emerge unscathed in a frontal or rearward impact)
• Aircraft style, adjustable reading lights for rear passengers
• Bespoke cast iron front wishbone suspension

Those front wishbones were then donated to the European-influenced, turbocharged 1984 Mustang SVO. Knowing that fact brings some irony to the following Motorweek Retro Review: While it’s about the 1985 Continental, the video starts with the Mustang Vignale show car based on said SVO.

Was this brilliant work of foreshadowing actually an editing choice on the part of Motorweek’s Social Media team? Do they love 1982-83 Continental engineering as much as yours truly, or is this all just coincidence?

All joking aside, Motorweek host John Davis pushes hard on advancements “that few foreign cars can offer.” That might be a stretch to some, but he proved the point by discussing the innovative air suspension and spent an inordinate amount of time on the unique ABS brakes for 1985. The latter included everything from detailed explanations to brilliant B-roll footage of ABS in action.(Some literature suggests anti-lock brakes were a mid-year upgrade to 1985 Continentals and Mark VIIs, and only if they were not equipped with the BMW-Steyr turbodiesel engine. I suspect this Motorweek video was filmed closer to 1986, when the Corvette also received ABS as standard equipment.)

But the 1985 Conti’s hardware was never tuned for blatant high performance, so explaining all the interior gadgets that owners can show off to friends with flagship BMW and Mercedes products (with more austere interiors) was a smart play. Motorweek also noted the clumsy AOD transmission performance, and called the styling “neo-nauseous.”

Considering this is the era of the ballyhooed Ford Taurus, such a phrase is a journalistic sick burn worthy of a TikTok throw down. And Motorweek likely got away with it by Ford’s judgmental eyes, as the deck lid emblem on this particular 1985 Continental Givenchy designer series suggests it came from a Lincoln-Mercury dealership. (Continentals in Ford’s press fleet wouldn’t have an emblem on the driver’s side of the trunk.)

Watching this Motorweek Retro Review reminded me how the air-sprung 1984-87 Continentals had the potential to be so much more. It was a wasted opportunity for Lincoln, as 1985 could have been the year to add a legit “touring suspension” to the Continental. It could have blown away other efforts to add performance to the American luxury sedan, thanks to the magic of being based on Ford’s Fox Platform.

Witness the 1984 Continental Valentino in the photo above. It was a safety car when the radical Mark VII PPG Pace Car was made for the paint-company-sponsored IndyCar race series. Someone had the bright idea to make a souped up Continental with color-matched BBS wheels for the sake of safety. If only someone at Ford did this for the sake of mass production!

Indeed, there were a firmer set of air springs, shocks, sway bars, and wider alloy wheels for better handling just lying around in the Mark VII LSC parts bin. Not to mention a faster steering ratio for the superior road feel available on the Thunderbird Turbo Coupe. And don’t forget the high output 5.0 engine with tubular exhaust headers, dual exhausts, and dual intake snorkels already in production for the Mustang GT and Mark VII LSC. That provided a respectable 165 horsepower: Ten more ponies than a 380SE Benz and only eight less than the spritely BMW 733i. The motor’s extra punch could be multiplied by Ford’s selection of quicker axle ratios for that Fox body rear axle, not to mention a readily available “Trac-Lok” limited slip differential for aggressive corner carving.

Imagine you are that product planner from the beginning of the story, and the calculus it took to not make a high performance Continental the year after its lukewarm redesign. Sure, there’d be some validation testing and corporate hoops to overcome, but all the parts were just lying there at your disposal.

I coulda built a contenda I tells ya!

I couda scared Mercedes and BMW owners if Ford had the nerve to let me!

Considering the gravity of the risks taken elsewhere at Ford in the late Malaise Era, making a Hot Rod Continental feels like another no-brainer. It’s a shame that missed opportunities are just that, and that we can’t always get what we want. But now you know another reason why Project Valentino came to fruition, as wrongs must be addressed: Better late than never!

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