(first posted 8/24/2015) I get it. I understand why personal luxury coupes were so darn popular in 1970s America. The days of high-performance were an increasingly distant memory, with rising insurance premiums, an oil crisis and government fuel economy standards dealing muscle cars a near-fatal blow. And nothing softens a blow like plush, loose-cushion, velour trim.
Cars were burning cleaner, but they were going slower. Domestic automakers were quick to embrace the personal luxury coupe. After all, if people couldn’t have power, why not luxury? Not to mention, these personal luxury coupes were nothing but tonier versions of existing mid-size vehicles, and commanded higher prices. Every profitable Brougham and Landau was helping to ease the financial pressure on the domestic automakers as they spent more and more money on downsizing their lines and meeting emissions and fuel economy standards.
For domestic automakers, personal luxury coupes were a gold [badged] mine. But when you think about it, weren’t personal luxury coupes just a little bit silly? Let’s compare and contrast to the SUV mania of the 1990s-2000s and the crossover craze of the 2010s, taking into account the context of their respective eras.
SUVs were spacious and had off-road and towing ability for those who liked to get away from it all. As a result, handling suffered and gas mileage was often abysmal. Still, gas prices were low throughout the 1990s and much of the 2000s and these vehicles made a visual statement in the same way personal luxury coupes did. They could also haul a family and a lot of their stuff.
Crossovers earn the ire of so many enthusiasts, but as fads go they make a lot of sense. Sure, they can’t really do anything a station wagon couldn’t do but if you compare them to conventional sedans – after all, the wagon market has been moribund for decades – you can see they are often cleverly packaged, can haul larger items and often can seat more people. If you compare them to conventional SUVs, their towing and off-road ability is reduced but their gas mileage is superior. As far as fads go, crossovers represent one of the more sensible ones.
Personal luxury coupes were decidedly less sensible. They were all about style and superficial luxury. Any pretence of sportiness was long gone: why bother looking or handling sporty if there was no power to back that up? Although these cars were often bought by families, they were hardly practical. Some personal luxury coupes were very space inefficient with compromised accessibility to the back, no roll-down rear windows and poor visibility. They were a poor choice for families, unless you were a parent paranoid about children opening the rear doors and bailing out of the moving vehicle. Fuel economy was improving but these cars were often still very heavy and large, which affected gas mileage and performance. It’s a little surprising there weren’t more 1970s cars in the vein of the Chevrolet Monza Towne Coupe or Ford Mustang II Ghia.
The personal luxury coupe era started in the 1960s but it was in full swing by the late 1970s. Full-size coupes like the 1972-76 Ford Thunderbird sold moderately well, but the sweet spot of the market was intermediate coupes. Oldsmobile’s Cutlass became America’s best-selling car mostly on the backs of plush Supreme and Supreme Brougham coupes. Cars like the Pontiac Grand Prix, Chrysler Cordoba and Chevrolet Monte Carlo were huge sellers. The only American passenger car brands that didn’t field a successful entry were Plymouth and AMC.
Ford may have created the Thunderbird, one of America’s first personal luxury cars, but they were slow to target the intermediate personal luxury market. Their first offerings were the 1974 Cougar XR-7 and 1975 Elite, thinly disguised Torinos with plusher trim.
The Cougar was a particularly weak effort. The dashboard was the same as the Montego, a rebadged Torino. Exterior differences were limited to an opera window, a mildly different front fascia and chrome trim on the taillights. Engine offerings were the same, too.
For 1977, Ford would reskin their intermediate line. It was a somewhat confusing time for American consumers. GM’s new full-size models arrived the same year and were basically the same size as these “mid-size” cars. The unremarkable Montego name was also discontinued, and all mid-size Mercury models were now badged Cougar.
Call it name debasement or call it a harnessing of brand equity (or call it both), but you could now purchase a Cougar as either a two- or four-door sedan, a wagon or as a two-door coupe which retained the XR-7 name. The Thunderbird and the Cougar were now closely related, although the Thunderbird was spared the ignominy of a wagon variant. The Cougar sedans and wagons were twinned with the Ford LTD II, differing only in front clips and minor trim details.
Engine offerings consisted of the 134 hp 302, 149 hp 351 and 172 hp 400-cubic inch V8s. GM may have been happy to sell you an intermediate coupe with a V6, but you couldn’t get a six even in the lesser LTD II.
The new Cougar sedans and wagon were better-received than the Montego, clocking 70,024 sales in their debut year. This represented a 27% increase in sales over 1976. But sales dipped somewhat for 1978, and by 1979 they were dead in the water: a miserable 8,436 units were sold.
The ill-suited wagon lasted only a year; it was the least convincing new Cougar, not just because of its unprecedented format but also because it retained much of the old Montego wagon’s sheetmetal.
It was the XR-7’s sales performance, clearly, that carried the Cougar line. In 1976, the XR-7 had sold 83,765 units. For 1977, that figured increased by around 40k units, and reached 166,508 for 1978. In its swansong year, the big Cougar still managed a commendable 163,716. These were the highest sales numbers ever for the Cougar, as more of the XR-7 model alone were sold in 1978 and 1979 than even the Cougar’s debut year of 1967.
Cougar XR-7 coupes were available with various different décor packages, including a unique and heavily-promoted midnight blue and chamois package with coordinating interior trim and a padded trunk lid. You could load up your Cougar with various luxury goodies like power seats and windows, a power moonroof, and a bucket/console setup. All XR-7s came with distinctive louvered opera windows, as well as unique rear styling that included a raised trapezoid on the trunk resembling a squared-off version of Lincoln’s iconic trunk hump. You paid $500-900 over a standard Cougar coupe for the privilege of owning an XR-7. Heavy-duty suspension and full instrumentation were optional, but rarely ordered. These cars were cruisers, and handling ability was as mediocre as in the Torino and LTD II. Buyers didn’t care: they wanted a plush ride, sharp styling and a comfortable interior, and the XR-7 delivered.
The Cougar was a much-needed success for Lincoln-Mercury dealers, but it wasn’t the best-selling personal luxury coupe. Its Thunderbird twin sold more than twice as many units in 1977 and 1978, as did the hugely successful Chevrolet Monte Carlo. The Pontiac Grand Prix, Buick Regal and Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme also outsold the Cougar XR-7, but the big cat did comfortably outsell the downward-trending Chrysler Cordoba in 1978-79 and decimated the Dodge Charger and Magnum.
Its rivals also didn’t have such sultry and stylish television commercials. Farrah Fawcett initially advertised the new Cougar line as she had its predecessor, before Cheryl Tiegs took over spokeswoman duties.
This XR-7 I spotted in East Harlem looks sturdy and rust-free, although the paint is looking a little dull nowadays. This seems to be an honest-to-goodness daily driver, and I wish I could have spoken to the owner.
The downsized 1980 Cougar XR-7 (sedans and wagons took a short break) saw sales more than halve. Certainly personal luxury coupe sales had reached their zenith, but GM’s offerings didn’t sink quite as quickly. Blame fussy styling most of all: while GM’s downsized coupes were generally fairly well-resolved, if much less ostentatious than their predecessors, Ford attempted to incorporate as many 1970s styling cues on a much smaller car. The end result was awkward, and the related Thunderbird saw a similarly catastrophic drop in sales.
Eventually both Cougar and Thunderbird sales would rebound with the aerodynamic 1983 models. Although they rode the same Fox platform as the poorly-received 1980s, they had much more attractive and modern styling. Also, they represented a return to performance as the domestic automakers began to figure out how to make engines that were both powerful and relatively efficient.
These 1977-79 Cougars were the biggest cars to ever wear the feline nameplate. They are as powerful a visual statement of that era as bell-bottoms and leisure suits, so you either love or hate them. The 1970s were the decade of the big personal luxury coupe, and these big cats were easily one of the most striking to look at. Sure, they don’t make much sense, but don’t you want one anyway?
Related Reading:
Curbside Classic: 1977 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme Brougham
They do look rather inelegant even when compared to the 71-73 Cougars. Maybe that’s the hallmark of personal luxury coupes of that size?
The 67 Cougar I liked but since that model I fail to see the attraction, they got major bloat issues then the stupidity factor kicked in and they became ridiculous. NO I dont want one.
These bloatmobiles were more like something the cat dragged home. After ’68, they were built too late. But they sold much better the the 1st generation. They were what many people wanted at the time. But I never cared for them when they were new or now. I think the Cutlass Supreme from this era was the best offered at the time.
I’m with you on that! I had a 69 Cougar, not the pinnacle of mechanical excellence, but it would run circles around my dad’s 78 XR7, which was so bloated that the hood jiggled when driven over a minor bump. The temp gauge consistently registered about 3/4 toward hot, hardly inspiring confidence while driving. It was slow and excessively thirsty, but it did have a comfortable ride when you ignored everything else. Sure, the XR7 looked svelte compared to a MK5 Continental, but still it was a corpulent slug with no power.
Several years later I bought a 78 Olds Cutlass Calais. That car was so vastly better than that bloated Cougar, it was nimble and not oversized, it had a very quiet cabin and, camshaft notwithstanding it was quite reliable. If I had been comparing them both when new I would have taken that downsized Cutlass in a heartbeat over the Cougar.
The Elite was introduced in 1974, as a sub model for the Torino. It became a separate model in 1975, simply the Ford Elite. The 1974 Cougar shared some sheet metal with the Montego, and none with the Torino. The 1977-79 Cougar used the same dash as the 1974-76 Cougar. I don’t know where you got the information about the Cougars rarely having heavy duty suspension or gauge packages. Most of the XR7’s around here had both, the heavy duty suspension easily identified by the rear sway bar. Most of the Cougars sold in these parts from this era were XR7’s.
The Elite also used Montego/Cougar side styling rather than the creased Torino panels.
You’re correct, the Elite didn’t share the Torino body line either, which made it have virtually no body parts in common with the Torino, even though in 1974 it was technically a Torino.
I always found that quite comical in hindsight, the Torino had the most exclusive sheetmetal of all the “luxury cars” based on it
As did the LTD II wagon. But they tooled new flat rear quarters for the Ranchero!
This is my favorite cougar of all time. It is truly beautiful. I also love the t bird version. I would want a top of the line xr7 with full luxury and 400 with decent gears in the rear end. I would say I would rather have a cougar or t bird than any other personal luxury mid sized coupe. Second choice would be Cordoba then 77 grand prix. This car is the most beautiful of all. Way better looking than a cutlass or regal or Monte Carlo. And these were dependable cars and comfortable. I don’t like the looks of the earlier cougar or t bird and I don’t care for the 1980. I also like the way you could interchange parts easily. You could put a 429 or 460 in place of the 400 or take a ranchero and make a cougar or t bird truck by switching front clips. It is almost like a mark v or a mark iv 1/2. Ford should do a retro cougar like this. I sure miss mercury.
Cougar-chero, you say? Someone in Richmond has obliged you:
If it weren’t for the ridiculously out of place General Lee paint that doesn’t look half bad. The stacked light LTD II nose those Rancheros actually came with was utterly terrible. IMO The 77 Cougar nose was the second best front end this platform got (1st being the 72 Gran Torino)
There were an abundance of these still on the road in the early ’90s and I still see them in daily use on occasion. For a long time I didn’t even realize there was anything but the XR-7 as I had never seen one.
I’m going to play contrarian for a few sentences. When looking at these through the eyes of current context, these are indeed fuel hungry, slow, and have ponderous handling. However, how are those traits any different from the cars that had been available in the US marketplace in the prior decade? Unlike their predecessors, hese had appropriately sized radial tires, disc brakes (even rear discs on some larger Fords and Lincolns), and shoulder belts, so in some ways these were far superior to cars that preceded them.
If there was no appetite for these, people would not have purchased them – similar to the SUV’s and CUV’s.
However, thank you for prompting me to look at this Cougar in a different light. I’ve seen quite of few of them, but it’s simply never crossed my mind to take pictures of any.
Jason you make excellent points about cars from this era. I think the low power and the poor driveability from this era puts them in a bad light. I think about comparing my dad’s cars from the 1960’s and 1970’s. Comparing his 1965 Impala to his 1976 Malibu, the Malibu had better handling, better braking, better HVAC system, actual safety features, and far better longevity from the drivetrain. Now ask my dad, and he’ll say he preferred the looks of the 1965 Impala 2 door, but he’ll say the 76 Malibu was a much better car to live with on a day to day basis and better car overall.
Very nice article. As someone who was around in the 70s, my take on why these intermediate coupes were so popular was the dearth of sporty offerings at the time, coupled with the balance they struck between sport and luxury. That, and again given other alternatives, they didn’t look half bad. I was a fan of the Cutlass Supreme then and still am.
I thought these late 70s Cougars and T-Birds good looking – but a friend bought an 80 T-Bird and I remember I had a hard time stifling a laugh when he came by to show it off……it was one of the few cars I can say it was painful to look at…….
Most people who bought personal luxury coupes weren’t buying them with people or cargo hauling in mind so I’m not sure your comparison to SUVs and CUVs is valid. PLCs were just that, personal transport, something I see a lot of large SUVs doing.
Basically, these did take over for muscle and pony cars, as the write-up suggests, and also “went the way of the DoDo” when their owners married and needed something less personal.
What is a shame is that the death of the majority of PLCs didn’t cause a resurgence of wagons in the U.S. Instead, we embraced “the next big thing”….as usual, with minivans selling like gangbusters for nearly a decade.
I am not so sure they took over from the muscle cars. The muscle cars were sold mainly to the large youth market of the sixties. While for some of these, they grew up and into personal luxury cars, the personal luxury cars were aimed much older.
Personal luxury cars are still being built but when noone was looking they became Mustangs, Camaro, and Challengers. People think of these as “youth market” cars based on past reputation but they have gotten big and insanely expensive.
I agree that growing the pony cars for big blocks was a mistake. The E body Challenger or 71-73 Mustang were hardly luxurious places to be however.
actually, I think the current Mustang/Camaro /Challenger sort of combine the pony car, personal luxury, and muscle car idioms… funny how that worked out with the trends of car shrinkage, V8 elimination and the disappearance of the two door, isn’t it?
Thank you Matt that is what I was trying to say.
That definitely seems to be the case. I came to the realization that if I were to buy a brand new car to replace my 94 Cougar, a new Challenger is an almost identical package.
The thing is, I don’t know that people are necessarily buying crossovers or SUVs for their utility value either. Discounting some older buyers who chose small CUVs because they’re easier to get into or out of than a low-slung sedan, I’d say a lot of CUV buyers are primarily fashion-driven. So, in that sense, I think the comparison is valid.
I’ve always liked the front-end design of these Cougars, but that said, these Cougars don’t do a whole lot for me. I’d much prefer a Colonnade Cutlass Supreme or a Cordoba.
Thanks William for this interesting comparison to the BOF SUV craze. I am not quite sure the Cougar is the grandest Torino of all since the Mark IV and Mark V Lincoln and 72-76 Tbird also shared this rather preposterously marketed as mid size, full size platform.
I am much more forgiving of the personal luxury trend than you. Remember at the time it was still common that most family units were married with the husband being the sole bread winner of the household. This does still exist, in my household and others, but is just far less common. In this older world, the man left his family behind on his commute. That he would choose an oasis of calm away from the pressures that came upon him at work and home is understandable. While space utilization was poor in these cars, you could pile in as many as was needed when required. The car did it’s job. One thing that was not taken away by emissions was the feeling of instant torque and distant V8 sounds.
The Cougar sold well in the seventies, better than the sixties or the eighties. Even though the other decade models are more appealing now. This is more to due with how society changed than anything else. Today in many more households the mother plays the role of breadwinner, and with more duties at home, her vehicle of choice is the CUV. We too often sneer at what works for her.
Where these Cougars were let down was the poor state of engine tuning at Ford. The 250 6 was just too weak to serve as base motor. Even the 302, which should be an ideal choice for this car, was strangled down to 134 hp. Pathetic!
You’re absolutely right. Not sure why I picked that title… This is only halfway up the “grand” totem pole for Torino derivatives.
It’s okay, remember all the Torinos except the fleet special were “Grand”.
The Mark IV/V and the “Big Bird” weren’t Torino derivatives, unless I’m mistaken. 6″ more wheelbase (120″ versus 114″) and just generally larger, they were their own platform. The T-bird rejoined the Torino platform in ’77, but the Mark V held out on the big 120″ frame until becoming a Panther version for ’80.
Broughams. Gag! The absolute nadir of Detroit, every company that brought one out should have gone bankrupt. They certainly did on the design and production fronts.
Syke I am sure many personal luxury drivers were looking at you on your motorbike and thinking the same thing, including USA bike makers. To each his own. It’s a big world.
Well, what can I say?
I always liked Farrah Fawcett.
Jaclyn Smith was always my favourite angel!
really?
They sure don’t seem to make ’em like that anymore! Beautiful in every respect.
For some reason, I found Kate Jackson more to my liking. Perhaps her look was more down-to-earth.
+1 on Kate Jackson.
I second that. She seemed warmer and more elegant than Farrah. Kate Jackson, despite my fetish for brunettes (see above sentence) did nothing for me. Shelley Hack was okay as was Tanya Roberts, but Jaclyn was always my favorite.
We now return to talking about the XR-7.
Farah was waiting for you back then at the sign of the cat. Of course it helps if you are the 6 million dollar man. That’s about 20 million Euros today.
Few cars capture the cynical and malaisey atmosphere of the 1970s more than the ’72 Montego/Torino and all of their derivatives. I’ve driven a few and they were fairly dreadful cars – bulbous styling, disappointing performance even with a 460, terrible fuel economy, marshmallow suspensions, cramped and pimpalicious interiors. The one positive was a quiet and comfortable ride on straight and glass-smooth roads. Even though I’m not a fan of GM Colonnade styling (with the sole exception of the Grand Prix), they were generally better cars to drive than the Fords.
As someone who grew up with both a Colonnade and Torino, and in fact drove them back to back this week, you’re somewhat off base. Both platforms are actually quite comparable in dynamics and space efficiency. They wouldn’t be far off comparing a later Ford Panther to a GM B-body. Ford’s base suspensions often were softer and tended to understeer more than the Chevy’s, but people make the stock Colonnades out to corner carvers in comparison. They weren’t, they were soft riding and floaty too, just a bit better balanced but this was mostly due to suspension tuning (ie spring and sway bar rates front to rear). Sure, Grand Am’s were decent very good handlers, but so was the Gran Torino Sports with competitions suspension. But how many Grand Ams were sold compared to your bread and butter Colonnades? When the Ford chassis was equipped with firmer springs and shocks they were quite competent handlers. It was that the chassis was fundamentally flawed in design, it was that Ford set them up for the ultimate soft ride with springs that were too soft and shocks that were too weak. The problem was most Fords that got the really good upgrade suspensions were they earlier models when some sportiness was still available (ie 1972-73 Sport models).
The base suspension in my 77 Chevelle was a crashy thing. It’d hit bottom just going slowly over a speed bump, rode nice, but dips and speed bumps appearing out of nowhere were heart stopping moments to see of the car could sail over them or crash hard onto the stops, and then compress the front tires to scrape the crossmember into the concrete.
I wound up replacing the base springs with HD springs all the way around, and that went from puckering up on that to, meh, but it made for a taxi-cab ride quality with the stiff rear springs.
You had to be there, I guess.
This was an era when two car families were still on a fast increase. Also, two door cars were very popular in post WW II U.S. through the mid 1980’s. Two doors in some lines (Cadillac for example) outsold four doors in the 1970s. Why? Style issues combined with the fact that the rear seat was still useful when occasional use was needed.
The personal luxury car was perfectly suited to single people, couples without kids, and families wanting a second car – this would essentially represent the entire population of the United States – so, the buyer demographic was huge to say the least. This is pretty much the same group that was buying large two door cars in the 1950s and 60s, the only thing that was really new was the term “personal luxury car.”
For two car families, the personal luxury car usually shared a garage with a full-size sedan, hardtop or wagon. That was exactly the situation when I bought my 1976 Cutlass Supreme coupe in 1982. The seller had it parked next to his wife’s 1978 Ford Country Squire.
I crossed shopped Cutlass with this era Cougar XR-7. The bottom line was I found a really nice Cutlass first, that made the choice for me.
My Cutlass was a plenty big and useful car. During high school, it would haul 3 or 4 of my friends and I to lots of places, sometimes a golf course and the trunk held 4 or 5 good size bags with zero trouble. We were generally around the 6 foot tall mark, and while the rear seat was a little low on leg room, we made it work.
For my job, I sometimes transported merchandise between grocery store locations in the event one store ran out of canned soup or bananas or whatever. The interior and trunk could move about a half pallet of merchandise – although the trunk lid was sometimes open but tied down.
I moved my sister to college in that car, it held all she needed. I also did several road trips in it, and the legendary 350 / 350 GM Oldsmobile engine / transmission combo was very pleasant to drive and fuel mileage was acceptable for the times – it even had a modicum of performance compared to the quite miserable cars that were to come during the 1980s. The air conditioning, sound insulation, AM/FM stereo and luxury touches that were abundant made it a nice place to be. And, as a two door it was suitably stylish for a young single man.
GM eventually introduced the compact (subcompact?) N car in the 1980s as the successor to my ’76 Cutlass. The tiny four popper car with a small trunk and mostly useless back seat was simply too small to offer the utility, practicality and comfort that my ’70s era “personal luxury car” did. The demographic that had been buying two door cars began to look for something different, and small to medium trucks and SUVs were waiting for them – offering a cool factor, conventional engineering and engines with some guts.
I absolutely HATED what had become of cars in general with all the faux-“luxury” bordello interiors, padded vinyl landau roofs, opera windows and such in the 1970s.
Those cars were obscene to me, especially the mid-sizers on what they had become, and multitudes scarfed them up!
The Ford products were in my mind the worst offenders because everything looked tacked on, especially those chrome tail light surrounds on the Mercury above. I couldn’t take my eyes off them every time I was stuck behind one because they appeared to be ill-fitting and straight out of the J.C. Whitney catalog! Reminded me of my aluminum step ladder!
Of all those personal luxury coupes, the ONLY model that appealed to me was the Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme – brougham or not – the most beautiful of them all and the least obnoxious. All the Ford designs somehow looked ungainly and seriously out-dated and tossed together from different parts bins.
I sooo wanted a 77-79 when these were new, especially the navy/tan combo that was heavily advertised. Unfortunately I was a teenager and had no money…and the family cars in those years were Ford or Chevrolet station wagons. Even one of those would be nice to have today.
Whether or not the luxury was superficial depends on what you want out of a car I suppose. These were certainly capable of putting on hundreds of miles out on the interstates in quiet and competent comfort while also smoothing out potholed roads. Much more so than many of today’s “luxury” cars, which tend to be too aggressive to deliver true luxury IMO.
The sales figures for the ’77-’79 XR-7 were impressive. In fact, they were the best ever in the history of the Cougar. Intermediate luxury coupes were all the rage at the time and Monte Carlo, Cordoba, Cutlass and T-Bird all did well. Some, like the T-Bird, set historic sales records. They were all big, heavy, slow, cumbersome and inefficient, but Detroit had yet to figure out how to deliver power with efficiency, so they larded on the velour, vinyl roofs, opera windows and other broughamistic touches. America ate it up and all of these cars thrived.
Looking at this generation XR-7, it has many of the styling cues of a Continental Mark V. At thousands less than the Mark, no wonder it was so popular.
Ok, *rant button pushed*
can haul larger items and often can seat more people.
Yet I have yet to see one with more than four occupants, and the vast majority of the time it’s just one or two
If you compare them to conventional SUVs, their towing and off-road ability is reduced but their gas mileage is superior
Yet the gas mileage is still shittier than a real car. Neither fish nor fowl.
As far as fads go, crossovers represent one of the more sensible ones.
Because they put up a false flag of practicality while being nothing more than a bloated and lifted C/D segment car underneath?
At least bloated brougham personal luxury coupes were honest in their retched excess, CUVs I’ve heard nothing but rationalized excuse after deluded excuse after another regarding their place in the automotive world, and it’s always going to be of nobile practical purpose. Just admit you like having an egotistical “commanding view” of the road and stop acting like you haul oil drims to the dump on weekends. My God, the vast majority of American society can barely lift a finger by themselves anymore, let alone do any activity that requires “cargo” only a giant hatchback can provide, yet there they are, every other house in suburbia’s got one, I’m sure the parents two kids struggling to climb into them go camping every weekend…
Don’t get me wrong, Personal Luxury Broughams were faddy cars for shallow people too but they at least matched they had no pretensions other than looking pretentious.
I am not a CUV fan, but wanting a commanding view of the road is not really egotistical. The seat height of CUVs offer improved visibility and are easier to get in and out of…especially with kids in carseats. All wheel drive is also a very nice thing to have in snowy climates. Those are practical considerations.
So in that sense they are indeed somewhat sensible as far as trends go.
You seem to have your jimmies quite rustled, friend.
Yet I have yet to see one with more than four occupants, and the vast majority of the time it’s just one or two.
Isn’t that also true of any other automobile in the US?
Yet the gas mileage is still [NAUGHTY WORD!] than a real car. Neither fish nor fowl.
Ignoring that you have categorized (quite arbitrarily, I assume) cars into “real” or “not real,” the comparison was with SUVs because that’s what everyone had before they went to a CUV. In this case, it is far, far better that someone trade in their BOF V8-powered SUV for a unibody V6/I4-powered CUV if they weren’t going to use it off-road anyway.
I’ve never seen a child struggle to climb into a CUV, but I’ve seen older people slide quite easily into a CUV vs. struggling to get into a sedan. Long and low looks cooler, but short and high is infinitely more practical in most cases.
If anything, we should rejoice that such a surfeit of choices available today. The future looks bright.
From a packaging point of view, CUVs represent a return to the 1930s, with their higher stance, higher seating, (sometimes) easier access, etc.
I’m just knocking CUVs down a peg, as being touted practical and actually being used in a practical are mutually exclusive. For the vast majority of owners there’s really nothing their day to day tasks require that a CUV can do over a personal Lux car did for them in the 70s. They look like an active lifestyle vehicle, but aren’t, much in the same way a Personal Luxury Coupe was designed to look like a luxury car of the golden age, but weren’t. I’m not saying one is better than the other, but the whiff of faux practicality really seems to paint the CUV as a “better” vehicle segment, and I cannot help but retort to that notion.
And Yes, AWD can be useful in bad conditions (except braking), but by far CUVs are 2wd, and more often than not the car they are based on(the “real cars” I arbitrarily christen them as, since CUVs are in fact derived off them, not the other way around…as of now anyway) also come with an AWD option. This isn’t the 1980s, there’s more than the Quattro and Eagle for 3 box cars that spin all 4 wheels if so desired, and not every tall 2 box vehicle is a 4WD Cherokee descendant.
And I stand by the mileage take. SUVs were the Cigarettes and CUVs are the Nicotine Gum. You don’t go chewing Nicotine Gum if you’ve never picked up a Cigarette, yet I doubt every current CUV buyer is coming down from an SUV.
And Old Pete, you’re spot on, it is a regression to the 1930s. I’ll finish that list though – …their higher stance, higher seating, (sometimes) easier access, *and lack of distinction other than grilles/badges. I guess one form of 30s neoclassical is better than the other…
I’m pretty sure that more often than not, the cars CUVs are based on do not come in AWD varients. Camry, Accord, Civic, Corolla, Sonanta come to mind. Subaru and Ford do offer AWD variants, but at a similar cost as a CUV. Only one minivan offers AWD, and it requires giving up the spare tire to get it. More importantly though, most of today’s cars don’t offer enough ground clearance to clear a parking curb which really hurts their ability in anything other than ideal conditions. And I don’t know where you live, but here in the upper midwest 2WD CUVs are fairly rare.
Look at the bumper height on the Cougars above. Despite the low-slung looks and large overhangs, they still were able to make it to the campsite or through a snowdrift with no problem. And they certainly wouldn’t be damaged by a parking curb.
But again, that’s a minor point. They are bought mainly for their visibility, ease of entry and exit, comfortable ride, and more upright seating positions. Now that they are getting 30+ MPG, economy isn’t a big deal.
It’s not that I like CUVs. I despise that they killed the market for more capable and utilitarian SUVs. And many have such small cargo areas the utility is laughable. But today’s butt-on-the-floor cars with a few inches of ground clearance aren’t all that appealing either, at least not to me.
Granting, as I said earlier, that there are people for whom CUVs’ more upright stance is easier to manage entry and exit-wise and that there are a handful of buyers who genuinely need extra ground clearance, but not actual off-road capability (I’m remembering some family friends who lived down a 2-mile gravel road that would have been no challenge at all to even the smaller CUVs, but really took its toll on standard-height sedans), I would mostly agree with you.
The dilemma when it comes to evaluating the CUV is it’s designed to be a more rational application of what’s basically a pretty irrational idea. On the other hand, I try to remind myself that the same thing could be said of the sporty coupes I like, so I suppose there’s that.
As my wife and I own both a CUV, (2014 Mazda CX-5) and a longer, lower, wider luxury sedan, the 2006 Lexus GS 300, I have some real-world experience to share. While the GS is not exactly a ’75 Grand Prix, it sacrifices a fair bit of practicality for the sake of style, so please bear with me as I use it for this analogy. I’m no SUV fan, I agree that most people bought them based on vanity rather than actual need, but CUVs really are a different breed. And the CX-5 just blows away the field, with a few nitpicks we couldn’t be more pleased with it.
Overall, the CX-5 is 1000 times more practical than the GS, especially with our 7 month old baby. The CX-5 is shorter, much taller, and narrower than the GS. We put the baby seat in both cars, and you can latch it practically standing up in the Mazda. My 40 something year old back appreciates this, putting her into the Lexus is like asking for a trip to the chiropractor.
With our front-drive CX-5 (it is also available with AWD) we get about 27-29 mpg in the typical summer suburban endless stop-n-go environment, AC on 100% of the time. It’s a decent performer too, with the 2.5 motor. “Skyactive” may be silly marketing moniker, but the system does deliver better real world gas mileage than some of the more expensive, heavier, hybrid alternatives. The GS is a rwd based sedan, mine happens to be an awd model. I’m getting about 20 mpg under the same driving conditions. Yes, it’s a lot faster, smoother and quieter than the CX-5, but it’s not worth 7 MPG.
What’s more, I swear that with the Lexus’s 18″ wheels and 245/40ZR Kumho Ecsta tires, the Mazda has less impact harshness rolling on 17″s and towering sidewalls. Sure, the GS corners flatter, but the Mazda actually has more steering feel. The bottom line is, the GS just doesn’t ride very smoothly at low speeds. It really crashes over manhole covers and potholes. This may be due more to its age and mileage (90K) but I was hoping for more from a Lexus.
If we have to haul anything bulky, the CX-5, despite having a much smaller footprint than the GS, is easily the vehicle of choice. Between baby and stuff and backyard projects, we have this need at least once per week. The GS, with its swoopy semi-fastback and resulting very short trunk, looks delicious, but leads to a mail slot sized trunk opening. The trunk itself is nothing to brag about, either. It’s 2 cu.ft. smaller than a Camry from the same year.
When it came time to get a new car for the baby, we didn’t want another sedan. My wife had an old, beloved Corolla, but it was time to move up a size. I briefly considered the small/midsized wagons currently available, but the only true wagons left are the Acura TSX (interesting, but too pricey and not practical), the Volkswagen Golf or Jetta SportWagen (not reliable), the Volvo V60 (too pricey and not reliable), the BMW 3 series (far to pricey and not very roomy), and the Mercedes E-Class Wagon (the MSRP looks like one year at a good private college). Everything else, from the Toyota Vensa to the Ford Flex, to the Subaru Outback and so on is really pushing into crossover country anyway. So why not get an actual crossover?
When you make a car taller, you gain greater interior volume without requiring a larger footprint. If you aren’t building a body on frame chassis with heavy duty 4WD truck based hardware, (of which there are fewer and fewer each year) found in a ‘traditional’ SUV, you can devote more space to the people inside. The CUVs have short hoods, and yes, my wife has grown to appreciate her commanding view of the road. She hadn’t driven my car for a while after driving the CX-5 exclusively for a month or so, and her comment was “I feel like I’m driving lying down in your car.”
So I don’t agree with the gas mileage or false flag of practicality rank you gave CUVs. At least not for the CX-5, it really is a breakthrough design. If we have another child, I’m not 100% sure it will still be roomy enough for us, but the CX-9 is too big and expensive. I hope Mazda either upsizes the CX-5 a notch, or decides there is a market gap and builds a CX-7.
Mazda does make the CX-7… It’s basically, just the CX-5 in the US market.
The CX-7 was phased out after 2012. The CX-5 ostensibly replaced it for 2013.
http://www.edmunds.com/mazda/cx-7/
I suppose to avoid confusion, they could call it the new model CX-6. The 7 was not a competitive product, but I think Mazda learned a lot about how to build a CUV. Then they really got it right with the CX-5.
I’m no fan of the CUV either–but is it wrong to want something with some practicality that isn’t a minivan or a truck? My wife and I bought our first home this year, moving in at the beginning of July, and several times since then I’ve found myself cursing our lack of vehicular carrying capacity (we currently own two coupes and a sedan). It’s NOT EASY to fit an assembled lawn mower in the trunk of a Crown Vic. Or a boxed closet organizer unit. An armchair, or a ladder, or a large charcoal grill? Forget it, and pay for delivery. Now, I personally plan to replace the sedan with a wagon to rectify this situation. I like wagons, and I think it will do what I need it to (carry bulky items, and once we expand our family, carry child paraphernalia) just fine. And I’d rather have the lower center of gravity of a car, plus if I’m lucky, some performance (going used, at the top of the list would be a Volvo V70R). But lots of people right now opt for the crossover instead, and while I personally agree with a lot of your criticisms (poor gas mileage, blobby styling, extra ground clearance for no good reason) I can’t fault them too much.
A minivan may be the most eminently practical vehicle out there, but that’s just a bridge too far for most. Myself included–for selifsh reasons I don’t want to accept the connotations that come with a minivan. And for those people who still have an outdated bias against wagons, I’d rather have Suzy Soccer Mom or Bob the Boy Scout Leader driving a Highlander or an Edge than I would have them driving a Tahoe or an Armada.
Of course, take all this with a grain of salt, as I once owned a later iteration of a personal luxury car (’96 Mark VIII) so perhaps I have no room to speak!
The ad copy for the ’74 Cougar is a big marketing miss. If you directly mention the competition, you lose. First, they gave the Monte Carlo and Grand Prix free exposure. Second, they subconsciously tell the customer that this ’74 Cougar is late to the market by referencing these established, wildly popular personal luxury cars. Third, they use this very vague blurb:
“In every other way, it’s like nobody else’s car”. Then they go on to disprove that in the fine print down below that states the Cougar has power brakes, steering, and an opera window. Great, so do the Monte Carlo and Grand Prix. The only distinguishing characteristic listed were the standard bucket seats and floor shifter. So this means I can’t get a bench seat and column shifter if I want one, in an intermediate American car, in 1974? That was still the most popular configuration back then. If I’m a typical, late middle-age or senior citizen and I want a piece of the personal luxury pie but find bucket seats just a little too hard to slide in and out of, I can’t even consider a Cougar.
Or maybe I’m wrong, and they actually sold a boatload of them. But there’s no way the ’74-’76 Cougar was better looking than a Monte or a GP. And styling was hugely important in this class of vehicle.
In ’74, XR7 was a trim level and there was a regular Cougar (coupe only, no sheetmetal differences) that you could get a bench and column shift on.
I don’t believe that was the case. All 1974-76 Cougars were badged XR-7.
XR-7s could also be ordered be a split-bench. It was a no-cost choice in ’74-’75, in ’76 the beancounters downgraded the free option from a split bench to a Flite-Bench (lower section solid all the way across)
Then downgraded to this
What about the AMC Matador Barcelona II?
I had a ’78 Cougar in grad school. Not an XR-7. Black with red interior, no power windows or door locks and no cruise control. Philco AM/FM radio. It had the bog slow 351 Windsor mill although I believe there was also a 351M/C with the same power rating as an alternate when supplies ran low on the line. I can’t imagine how excruciating a 302 would have been. My ’76 XR-7 had one of those and it wasn’t any better. I agree about the handling, it inspired no confidence at all in the twists. I finally got used to the brakes, but they were a bit touchy and overboosted. Pleasant and mostly noise free.
I found a shop that would install hooker headers AND dual exhausts with a crossover while quietly forgetting to reinstall the converters. That woke up the motor a bit, so I put on an Edelbrock Performer and 600 Holley. It woke up a bit more. My mileage went down a bit. I once recorded 9.9 mpg on a trip at 65 mph. I had plans for replacing the camshaft and getting the heads redone, but it caught fire and died a pyrrhic viking death two weeks before I married my 1st ex.
My most memorable moment was when I was cruising down the interstate at about 10 over the 55 and spotted a trooper heading towards me on the other side. We locked eyes as we passed and sure enough, he lit up and started to cross over in the grass median. By that time I had already buried the needle past the 85 in the federally mandated speedometer, it had awesome kickdown, and was about to take an exit just past the crest of a hill. Ran down the offramp, front end bobbing like these cars did in every Barnaby Jones episode at the stop sign. I turned right and then turned right again. I parked behind a landscaping wall in a defunct shopping center. Sure enough, he screamed by and I waited until he was out of sight and got the hell out of there.
I must say, in the context of the era, the 77-79 Cougars weren’t bad, They’re far more restrained than the Tbird, have way cleaner lines than the Monte Carlo and that front end is actually one of the better executions of the era – That Monte Carlo’s backside conveniently hides it’s absolutely awful stacked headlights that were updated the same year. It’s kind of bizarre to see how poor the regular non XR-7 sales were in comparison, they represented an entire segment of the Mercury division for 3 model years(5 counting the 81 & 82) but few people other than us car guy/historians really know they exist now a days.
Also I’m having a hard time keeping a straight face looking at the chuckling couple wearing matching sweaters and turtle necks in the Cutlass Supreme ad. If they were more prominent in the photo they’d be worthy of a meme.
To me the ’77-79 Cougar “face” is half a generation ahead of the T-bird and LTD II/Ranchero, maybe because the Faux-Royce grille and horizontal quad square headlights reappeared in almost exactly the same form on the box-Panther Lincolns. I wonder if that was an issue for L-M dealers trying to sell new Lincolns that so resembled aging Merc trade-ins.
“The days of high-performance were an increasingly distant memory…” “After all, if people couldn’t have power, why not luxury?”
Reality is that most buyers of Personal Lux cars never went to a drag strip in their life. They traded in common Impala four doors or station wagons for a fancier coupe. No way was a 1965 Chevy with 283 V8 with a Powerglide a “muscle car”.
Not every car sold in the 60’s was a ‘muscle car’, and even when the era ended, there still was a huge aftermarket for performance equipment. The US was not all performance cars between 1960-70, and then “suddenly” people switched to plush-mobiles on Earth Day.
Also, most of the “muscle cars” had poor handling and braking.
it was mostly insurance that killed the muscle car. they were dropping in sales by 70-71, before the govt. regs killed them completely. the cost was just too high for their younger target market to pay.
I was born in ’74 and when I was a little kid becoming aware of/obsessed with cars so, so many of my relatives, parents’ friends and friends’ parents owned this type of car. Within a few years between my fifth and eighth birthdays they were all replaced by subcompacts, mostly FWD Rabbit clones (apart from the odd RWD Japanese 3-box or Chevette, and mostly not actual Rabbits which I now know were pricey) and usually in the 4/5-door model. Between the improved outward visibility, opening rear windows and decidedly un-floaty ride they were a lot less carsick-inducing. I fell in love and my automotive tastes have run towards the unashamedly small and functional ever since.
I can’t decide if I like the midnight blue and chamois interior or find it appalling. I think I might like it more if the chamois were a little less orange, but the seatback straps are OTT. I also have to question the inclusion of the little buckles — I don’t have any seat time in these cars, but generally, having little plastic or metal gewgaws on the backrest means that after a while it’s going to be digging into your back, particularly if you’re wearing a thin shirt or dress.
My 1984 Fox Mercury Cougar GS… I got rid of due to a broken shifter cable. I sold it to a salvage yard, 2 years ago.
I wonder if I did the wrong thing, by getting rid of it… It was GREAT in the snow, even without snow tires. Not bad for a RWDer.
I miss it. 🙁
Stylistically, I do like these XR7s. Far more attractive than just about any colonnade, to my eye. (I think I’d prefer a Grand Am, but that’s about it.) Objectively? Nah, not a good car by really any metric. But at least they looked good, compared to the miserable heaps that replaced them.
Around 85-87 I was in my mid 20’s and had a 70 Mach 1 with a Cleveland/4 speed combo as my daily in South Texas. Mostly original right down to the hubcaps it was loud, hot, and fairly rough on the freeway. I didn’t think I minded that at all until I picked up a 78 XR7 as a beater so the Mach could take some downtime for some planned upgrades. It was nice to just bump the starter and have the Windsor fire off almost silently with only a slight side-to-side rock of the car on the tires due to the torque reaction. Followed by almost silent and seamless acceleration as you powered up the window and turned off the world. So remarkably different from the Mach 1 and I really haven’t found an equal in those virtues since.
I remember the “sign of the cat” emblem also being used on early Lynxes and on Fox Capris. They waisted an opportunity not spreading it to the entire lineup, it was the only time that Mercury even came close to feeling like it had a distinct identity from Ford and Lincoln
I worked for Hertz as a transporter in ’77 and ’78, which back then was predominately a Ford purveyor, I drove plenty of LTDII and Thunderbirds, some Granadas, and in 1978 Fairmonts. No Mavericks nor Pintos, for whatever reason (our location didn’t stock them) but we often had to pick up a bunch of cars, often in different locations, seldom were they on the way to each other, so we used whatever could hold the most people, one of which would drive and drop off drivers as we progressed to the various locations that had a car we needed to drive back to the home location. The reason I mention this was that I remember a Cougar Wagon (green) often was used in this role. We didn’t have SUVs (which don’t really hold that many passengers) nor E series van at our location, so the Cougar could hold about as many people as anything our location had. I think it was the only Mercury we had, don’t remember any Cougar Coupes (though we had plenty of Thunderbirds) nor any other Mercuries.
My parents had a 1973 Ranch Wagon at the time, which I of course also drove on occasion, which was pretty large, and even though the LTDII was about as big as was available it was still a bit smaller than our Ranch Wagon. I was also familiar with how Fords drove, but by the end of 1978 my Dad traded in the Ranch Wagon for a ’78 Chevy Caprice Classic wagon. It seemed pretty small compared to the ’73 Ranch Wagon.
The LTDII’s drove fine, but they were such a common rental that I didn’t think much about them back then. I think that was probably the first car I ever drove for Hertz, up to Dorval airport in Montreal (we did that trip pretty often, as Montreal was the nearest big city to our location, Boston and NYC were substantially farther away. The shortest trip was probably to Montpelier, about an hour away, so lowest compensation (we were paid by the trip, not by time, such that I think I actually got less than minimum wage, I was never much of a leadfoot, and it cost me in that job (but they still kept me busy with plenty of trips during the week).