I’d noticed the Continental sedan before, in the driveway of this house nearby. But then the other day, walking to one of my rentals (they’re all conveniently within eight blocks of my house), I noticed it out front, along with a similar vintage Mark VIII. Hmmm; adding a stablemate? Actually, more like the opposite…
The owner saw me shooting, and wondered if I was here to look at the car for sale (the Conti). Its place in the driveway has been usurped by a gen2 Acura Legend. And the red Mark? Dad is in town for a visit. Looks like both of the Lincolns are suffering from air (suspension) sickness, a common malady with these cars. One rarely sees one of either of these sitting level, and/or at their proper ride-height, unless they’ve been converted to steel springs, anyway. “No thanks; not my thing…I just take pictures”. Keeps life simpler.
Once, a friend complained about his Town Car’s air suspension not working. Since I knew nothing about it, I suggested that maybe it was a fuse. 50 cents later and it was working. Just had to figure out where the fuse was (under the hood).
True. I have a neighbor who has a Mark VIII exactly like the one in the photo, even the same color, and it has been sitting for almost 6 years now at her driveway. She says that the air suspension blow out when she was driving home, ending a 160-kilometer trip from the mountains when she felt she was brushing against the road. She also said that there’s no money to fix the suspension. Most of the shops in Chihuahua charge from 20 thousand to 40 thousand pesos (1,500-3,100 dollars) to repair it. The car’s value in this city is about 10,000 pesos (775 dollars), and she thinks that the cost is way too much for an old car, but she refuses to sell it to no one, much less to the junkyard!
Sorry no sale-The Mark VIII doesn’t do it for me-I’ll take a MKVII any day,
as for the Cont, compare the syling of this lump to a concurrent Seville.
No comparison. I will contend that this generation of Conti is more reliable than it’s Taurus based predecessor, but that’s not saying much.
The only true Lincoln is the Town Car anyway. Why they let it whither on the vine and allowed it to become taxi fleet and rental fodder, I’ll never understand.
Agreed on the Mark VII. Love the 5.0L and more aggressive stance of the Mustang suspension (Cobra?) on Turbine wheels.
This vintage is still Taurus based at heart isn’t it?
The Conti is yes. Before this series too, but that was V6 only. Think of this model as more of a SHO Lincoln. It was a 4.6 Mod, but a little less HP (260? I think, Mark VIII was 280-290) due to FWD.
I think the 99+ refresh was better looking, and 275 HP.
Why did the Town Car wither and die? Because as far back as the early 80s its customers averaged late 60s in age, and that number continued to rise through the 80s and 90s. Bluntly put, the potential market for the Panthers continued to shrink, year after year, as their customers died off and weren’t replaced by younger buyers. They were viewed as old men’s cars, and we’ve all seen Bunkie Knudsen’s comment about being able to sell an old man’s car to a young man.
By the mid-late 90s, 90% of Town Car deliveries were to livery services because that was where the market was. The remaining deliveries (many of which went to employees at A-plan prices or to managers for low lease prices, or to executives for free)), were about what the demand was for an old-style large American luxury car that demands to be driven sedately.
I had a 1997 Continental when I was in college that I absolutely loved. It ended up getting sold due because the suspension was sagging in the back like that. They’ll air right up to level when you start them, but leaks in the bags cause it to settle like that. The problem is the compressor can only do that for so long before it gives up too. I wasn’t willing to convert to steel springs, the self leveling and fully adjustable steering and suspension was the best part of a beast that size. Between the 275hp DOHC V8, air suspension and FWD, it could really move in ways you wouldn’t expect.
Drove mine from Oklahoma to Quebec and Maine,then down the coast to South Carolina with two friends in college. 5500 miles in 15 days. Short of an RV, the Continental was the perfect car for trips like that.
From what I’ve heard on the Panther forums it is not that expensive to simply replace the airbags with higher quality aftermarket units and is actually less labor intensive than coils. YMMV.
Plus from what I’ve heard the coils make the cars ride horribly.
All well and good but you DO realize that this isn’t a Panther, right?
@roger628, You DO realize that this being Ford during one of it’s most cost cutting bean-counting eras that its not all that likely that they designed really really specific parts for each application right? More likely that they simply changed computer codes to achieve stiffer and more controlled settings for various applications.
You’d be very surprised by the sheer amount of parts that won’t interchange from this era. Ford had the most diverse platter of completely unique platforms in the 90s than they ever did before or since(under the F.L.M. umbrella that is). Maybe that’s why the bean counters were so noticeably proactive lol
The funny thing is how much of the MN12 carried over to the FN10. Suspension bits especially. FN guys buy MN parts because they’re cheap and MN guys buy Mark parts because they’re lighter and Merkur guys want the FN rear diff because it’s an aluminum
housed 8.8.
I’m not sure if I’d prefer a Mark or a Super Cougar. Something about that blower whine just gets me.
My father-in-law has a ’95 Conti. Bags developed leaks. Replaced them with coils. Rides horribly.
The most common problem with the air suspension it the o-rings on the solenoids. A 15min job and the parts are only $8. The bags rarely fail on the Panthers or the rear of the Mark when they do aftermarket bags are about the same price as steel springs. Now the front of the Mark with air over shocks and the Conti with air struts all around are more expensive but again no real savings going steel since you need new struts/shock. Now if you’ve driven it leaking for months and months then it may need a compressor in which case steel springs are cheaper than a full set of bags and compressor.
If you’d have asked me ten years ago, the Mark VIII seemed soft in all ways compared to the Mark VII, especially if the latter had the right wheels/tires 5.0 EFI etc. But now, and maybe thinking ahead to a Curbside Classic perspective 20 years from now, I’m starting to see something appealing in the Mark VIII.
The Mark VIII is where Lincoln began its steep downward spiral, I think.
The exterior styling was interesting, and the 32V (InTech?) engine was awesome, but the interior was a decidedly cheap mix of Ford parts bin items (steering wheel, radio, switchgear) wrapped in one of the most ridiculous and downscale dash designs I’ve ever seen, second only to the last-generation Riviera.
They looked the part driving by, but once seated inside it was clear the Mark VIII was just an even more bloated T-Bird, and not a luxury vehicle, IMHO.
No, Lincoln started its downward spiral in 1968. Flywheel gears that would need to be replaced often when because the engine would always stop with the gear in the same two or three places; plastic gears in the power window motors; needing to have the a/c on all the time in damp weather to keep the windows from fogging up. I had 1960, 1962, and 1968 Lincolns, and the ’68 was by far the worst.
the VIII weighed less than Tbird; alum drivetrain and IRS, plastic, etc…
only Fomoco product Ive ever owned. huge improv over the VII…
I’d say neither have problems with their air suspension. The Conti looks like the owner adjusted the sensors to get the desired ride height. The ad does list the “problems” but air suspension is not one of them but then again it doesn’t specifically say it has been lowered.
You’re right; there’s probably just a bunch of helium balloons in the trunk of the Mark.
(re Mark VIII) The front seems about right, the rear is high, they can be adjusted. Or the rear may have a coil conversion.
I think he made the right choice, personally.
As far as I’m concerned, there’s not been a “real” Lincoln since 1979. I’ve never owned one, but test drove a new 79 Mark. Nothing comparable.
I couldn’t disagree more. The interior was futuristic, simple, yet elegant and very comfortable. A friend of mine who rode in mine often (a 96 Mark VIII) still says they were the most comfortable seats he’d ever sat in.
The 4.6 32 V In-Tech was great! It was a detuned Cobra motor (280-290 HP vs the 305 HP in the Cobra) due to the automatic and Lincolns being smoother. I once did a burnout, smoke billowing out of the rear wheel wells…….but it was totally silent.
As for the suspension, I had the front bags replaced with the improved 97-98 bags, NOT though a dealership, it wasn’t too expensive at $600 for the pair. Go to http://www.markviii.org/htdocs/dc/dcboard.php
http://www.lincoln-suspension-parts.com/lincoln/lincoln-mark-VIII-8-suspension-parts.html
To each their own. That’s a gorgeous car in your pic, but I’ll never consider the interior worthy of the ‘luxury’ label. You can find good seats in a lot of cars.
Well, I loved it. It was very cockpit like. There was just enough wood on the console to warm it up, unlike the 94. The SC400’s illumination looked cooler, the VIII’s dials/gauges were too conventional<<<<my only complaint.
It got better as it went along, the first ones lacked any wood or chrome, and the steering wheel is almost if not the same one used in a Taurus, later they added a little chrome here and there to break up the “monochrome” look, they added wood and a rear armrest too, by the end of the run of the MK8’s the interior was much better.
I almost bought a pearl white LSC Mark VIII once, it was a nice car.
Isn’t the Mark VIII the one with essentially unobtainable headlight bulbs? I’m not sure I’d want a car that requires converting the headlights when one burns out.
There are HID kits available now. 93-96 were halogens with HIDs optional in 95-96.
I find the 97/98 interiors much better than these. Lots of extra stitching on stuff like armrests, switches not found in other Ford/Mercury products, way nicer door panels, better fake wood, better gauges, better everything IMO Though I’m none too fond of the actual Starship Enterprise look the dash shape(or really the whole car) reminds me of.
I’d take a mark VII overall. They just have a stronger more intimidating look to them. As for the Mark VIII? Put the driveline of it into the lighter/better looking Tbird/Cougar it’s based on 😀
The Continental is miserable though. I used to car pool in one and it was fairly quick for a cheap barge and interesting to hear the V8 burble from a transverse FWD car, but it really seemed cheap inside/out, even compared to 90s GM standards. I really don’t care for the styling either, I’d dare say the V6 predecessors were more attractive.
Lincoln styling had me hooked from the 82 Continental to the 92 Mark VII (with an ever slight glimmer with the 97/8 Mark VIII). After that? Blah. Went right for the jugular of the geriatric car buyer.
All the wood was real……a very thin laminate.
A Continental of this vintage was my father’s last car. His was that strange pearl white, which I once heard from a bodyman was the hardest of all colors to match in a collision repair.
I drove Dad’s Conti a couple of times, and with the V8 it was plenty powerful (certainly for a car of that era). The electronic instrument panel was quite cool looking. One of my brothers drove it through the car wash on the morning of Dad’s funeral and the windshield cracked. He is a great salesman and sweet-talked a local shop into a while-u-wait replacement before the funeral service started.
I had a chance to buy it, but decided not to. I had understood that these had some expensive bits to repair, and it was still new enough to be fairly pricey. When Dad bought it, he considered this car to be modern and advanced. He considered the Town Car to be for old geezers, and he never considered himself to be one of those.
His was that strange pearl white… my wife (at 29 yrs of age) automatically refers to that color as “the old man color” like there’s an automatic requirement to purchase a car in that color once you hit 60.
My 1997 was a pearl color creatively called “Opal Opalescent”. It was a pretty typical pearl tone. They also offered Ivory Opalescent which was much “pearlier”, almost a yellow or gold color.
Cadillac had a “Pearl Flax Metallic” in the early 90’s that was sort of a pearl white with a tinge of yellow.
The yellowish pearl white is the old man color to me. Opal opalescent is more like oxford white with a layer of metallic over it.
When I worked at Dahl Ford in 2011, an Ivory Parchment ’96 Continental came in on trade. It had a matching ivory/pale yellow leather interior, and was near mint. I got to drive it around the lot on a couple of occassions, and it had good acceleration, nice brakes and cushy seats too. My kind of car; I actually thought about buying it, but it wasn’t practical.
I may be the only one, but I like that yellow/ivory pearl color. But then, I also like the pale yellow used on Caddys from the ’60s to the early ’90s, like the ’83 Eldo I did a CC on.
the VIII was the best Ford of the 90s, incl SVOs and Fox redux.