Our man on the streets in Budapest, roshake 77, continues to post cars that he found there and are a bit out of the ordinary, like this Ford Tempo. Were these officially imported to Europe?
It didn’t need to have its tail lights changed to include amber turn signals, as that’s how it was in the US too.
Nothing about this car meets “European” (international U.N.) regs. None of the lights, not the glass, not the reflectors or mirrors or seatbelts or (presumably) brakes, not the head restraints, etc. Some countries in Europe allow private import and/or onesie-twosie registration of US-spec vehicles, but the only country I can think of on the European continent that allows commercial import and registration of US-spec cars and European-spec ones equally is Switzerland. Russia used to, too, but I think they stopped quite a few years ago.
All to say: I think this car was privately imported to Hungary.
Daniel, most likely before or just after Hungary joined the EU when anything with wheels was imported. Could be ex-US serviceman’s vehicle. Not possible anymore.
Definitely not Euro-spec! I get a real chuckle out of the teeny, tiny licence plate that was specially manufactured to fit the inadequately-sized North American plate well. At least the front bumper surface is flat, so there were no issues lashing a proper-sized European plate to that end of the car.
Ford *seemed* to do a lot of things right in the 1980s, and one of those things was putting proper, amber-coloured turn signals on most of its cars (Escort, LTD, Mustang, Tempo, Taurus, Aerostar, Festiva, Probe). Yet a lot of the things they did right seemed to be undone by slipshod implementation, and that’s true here: These turn signals are so far inboard that they’re invisible around lines of traffic, and they might as well be ambiguous at a distance. I still think they’re preferable to the red turn signals that the Mercury Topaz (and nigh every corner-cut Ford product from the ’90s and ’00s) used, but that’s a low bar to clear.
Yeah, Ford have long played with turn signal colour as a styling gimmick, typically amber for the first year or two of a model (such as the ’86-’87 and ’96-’97 Taurus), then red (such as the ’88+ and ’98+ Taurus). Every once in awhle NHTSA, nominally the regulators for this kind of thing in the US, timidly ask if automakers would mind thinking about maybe using more amber rear turn signals. Ford and GM holler “NO!” with teeth and claws. Which sucks, because this matters, which is why most countries have required amber for many decades.
You’re also right about the signals being too far inboard. They would probably not meet the UN R48 requirement for the turn signals’ outer lit edges to be no more than 40 cm from the outboard edge of the vehicle.
Also this car, like many US models, lacks side turn signal repeaters (also required by most countries outside North America). I guess only Euro-weenies and Communists think it’s a good idea for people in the space a vehicle is moving toward to have, y’know, some advance warning.
(Not that I have opinions on the matter or anything!)
It clicked to me a couple of years ago that lots of cars seem to lose amber rear turn signals with an MCE. Ford may have done it, but Nissan has, too.
MCE. Mid-cycle…effluent?
(Yes, Nissan have done it. So have GM. And Chrysler, and Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Toyota, and Honda.)
I was thinking mid-cycle enhancement, but that really isn’t very accurate, is it? I think the worst example from a rear lighting downgrade would be the ’22 Bolt. I have a ’20, big red brake lights and amber turns down in the bumper with the backups and redundant brake lights. In ’22s, the old brake lights become tails only, and the redundant brake lights become the primaries with combined turns. A ridiculous cheapening and style disaster, too.
Same ol’ GM, full o’ laffs…! 😖
Ford did it to both the Gen 1 and gen III Taurus, losing the ambers for red in 89 and 98 respectively.
Interestingly the Mustang and Camaro for many years we’re kinda outliers, the Mustang II had ambers in the center, the 79 Foxbody switched to all red lenses, but gained them back with its first midcycle refresh in 83, and kept them for the 87 refresh on the LX with a clear lens and amber bulb (although the the cheesegrater GT taillights were all red IIRC)Camaro sprouted them in 77 and kept them to the last third generations to 1992, and then actually ADDED amber segments for the fourth generation’s midcycle refresh. Goes against logic that the all American muscle cars were probably the most consistent users of that touch in their lineups
Gracious, there must be an echo in here. 🤓
You know, I thought I had recalled the years they stopped a little too quickly as I was typing that! lol
European car drivers in the US never use their signals anyway, part of the prerequisites like leaving the fog lights on 😁
I had read in one of the car buff magazines that the then “Detroit Big 3” and specifically Ford, tried to lobby the E.U. and NHTSA to come to an agreement on ALL safety standards in an effort to cut the cost of importing and exporting cars and trucks. The amount of compliance changes now are insane! Even things like wiring and glass.
Both the E.U. and NHTSA responded very quickly, 1st by each claiming their regulations were more effective than the others’. Then they tried to (I guess) soften their stance by saying cars are driven in different environments in the E.U. and North America and need to confirm to different standards (?). I didn’t know cars and trucks crash differently in different regions. I still don’t buy that.
That’s…not how it happened (surprise, the buff books got it wrong). This has been a much more complicated, much longer-running, much more two-faced game than that. I have written extensive analysis of it, and I’ve had at least one request to put something together about it for a post here on CC, which I will probably do.
Quickie nutshell vignettes:
• A global technical regulation for lighting equipment was devised—what lights would be required, where mounted, what colour, leaving the detailed performance requirements to be harmonised (or not) in another effort. It would not have been a mandatory standard, but an optional one automakers could meet if they wanted to have one lighting system configuration acceptable all over the world, so it appropriately included the good stuff and excluded the bad stuff from both the US and rest-of-world UN standards. That makes sense as a sort of quid pro quo: Okeh, automakers, we’ll make it easy for you to save on duplicative design, engineering, tooling, production, and parts-management; in exchange the global standard will be more stringent in some ways than either of the two separate standards. One such point was that rear turn signals would have to be amber (naturally; it was already a colour acceptable around the world). The Ford guy on the US delegation singlehandedly killed the whole effort: “It’s the only light on the rear of the car that blinks; it doesn’t have to be a different color. The rest of the world will accept red turn signals or we won’t allow this to go forward”.
• A great deal of rigourous study was put into headlight beam patterns, the biggest such effort in many years, and a beam spec was devised that required objectively better performance than either the US or the UN (“European”) spec. The spec was designed to accommodate a wide range of philosophies and preferences, so it would not have disrupted anyone, anywhere. Agreement was reached that four common intensity test-points would be incorporated into the US and UN beam specs, thus removing barriers that made it difficult to make high-performance headlamps that meet both standards at the same time. The US incorporated the test points. The UN never did.
• Automakers talk out both sides of their mouths. They say they want global regulations, and they vigourously fight against global regulations. This is because different rules on the North American regulatory island enable them (“them” being US-based automakers and US operations of global makers) to keep control over what vehicles do and don’t enter this market. Tariffs and local-content laws are out of fashion, so trade barriers are disguised as safety regulations. It’s politically brilliant; argue against it and you get painted as some profitmonger trying to degrade the safety of cars in this market.
• There are valid reasons, having to do with the structure of the US legal system, why the US cannot sign onto the international treaty that contains the UN Regulations. There are also valid methods by which the US could apply the UN Regulations while avoiding those problems—numerous other countries have done just that.
This whole thing is really too bad. I bought a 2017 Honda Pilot. The turn signal/brake light design is terrible. All red. The turn signal is a small lamp surrounded by an LED brake light. When one turns on the signal and one hits the brakes the turn signal get drowned out, especially daytime. I found that out following another Pilot like mine. On the refresh they did go to amber rear turn signal lights, but even then it looks marginally better.
You are exactly right about the turn signals being impossible to see if you’re also braking. Fortunately, all you have to do to fix it is pick up a pair of the ’19-type outer taillights!
This is really bad. The one North American Ford guy was quite arrogant. There are cars made here and in Europe that couldn’t be imported/exported at all because the engineering changes would make the vehicles too expensive for the target market and to make any profit. That would be a loss of revenue for Ford. What was this dude thinking?
He was thinking exactly what he was hired to think: protect the non-tariff trade barriers that allow the likes of Ford to control what vehicles do and don’t enter the North American market, while keeping the US regs as cheap to comply with as possible.
The Tempo actually started out with all red rear lights in 1984. There was a slight update (aero headlights) in 1986 and the rear gained a very tiny amber turn signal.
For the 1988 refresh, the 4 door a completely different rear end and didn’t share the rear lights with the 2door. The 4-door kept an amber indicator in the rear, as did the 2-door. The amber portion looked larger, but still retained the tiny indicator bucket from the 86-87. This would remain through the slight tweak in 1992. On 1992-1994 4-doors, the lenses were tweaked to have a red portion that extended from the brake/parking light over the indicator and reverse lights. However, the buckets behind the lenses remained the same so if you looked closely when the turn signal was on, you could see mostly amber but a tiny bit of flashing red at the top.
Relatively small compared to the giant red brake/tail area of the lens, sure, but it wasn’t all that tiny—automakers hadn’t yet started disregarding the American regs’ requirement for 7¾ square inches (50 cm2) of lit area to the brake lights and rear turn signals. That requirement still exists, but now automakers just pretend otherwise. There is no way the brake lights on a Tesla 3 or Toyota RAV4 (among others) come anywhere close to 50 cm2.
The grass truly always is greener on the other side of the fence for forbidden fruit such as a Tempo to be someone’s ride of choice in Europe, and especially Hungary, where it would seem that pretty much anything goes and the choices would be vast.
Most likely a US Service Member brought it over to Germany and then decided to not take it back or replaced it with something more, well, let’s just go with more…Then it got wholesaled off to someone who took it to Hungary, not uncommon.
I suppose it looks in decent enough shape and these latter models were the most visually appealing (to me, anyway). I don’t recall them driving appreciably better than the early ones or much else for that matter. But they seemed to serve lots of people faithfully, so there’s that.
…”Most likely a US Service Member brought it over to Germany”…
Most likely indeed. My brother’s 1977 CJ7 was originally owned by a US Service Member, stationed in Germany.
That’s the only likely explanation I can think of. Guess he didn’t want to wait till he was at his new post and buy a better car there. What would the European equivalent have been, a mid-trim-level Sierra 2.0?
Yes, or this (if it had to be a sedan):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Orion
The reason for this being there (Central/ Eastern) Europe could be even more banal. There used to be a time that importing used cars from the US into Eastern Europe used to be a bit of a bargain compared to importing used cars from Western Europe, due to the exchange rates at the time (relatively overvalued euro and under-valued USD). Suddenly you saw 1rst gen Chrysler Pacificas and things like this appearing in countries like Poland.
…and ex-US fleet trucks like Freightliners, Peterbilts etc. pressed into service with their original paint schemes.
Fun to see this here—I’m sure there’s a story behind it! I know nothing of Euro-spec matters, but was unable to find any Ford/Europe/UK brochures for it, so I’ll figure it was “unofficial.” Who knows, it might still be on the streets years from now.
It makes me a bit nostalgic for my Topaz, gently used by previous elder owners, that gave me zero trouble in years of use……
Doesn’t matter what color the turn signals are, nobody uses them.
The other time the turn signal is used is when you pass about 50 cars and then try to horn in just before the lane is closed.
Also when we do use our turn signal we expect you to see it even if we our next to you.
Local authorities did clarify that you do need to use your turn signal when you are in either a left turn or right turn lane.
OK enough sarcasm.
Some of the turn signals are pretty low on some vehicles.
Perhaps we need an amber arrow added to each end of the third brake light to indicate drivers intensions.
Our plow trucks have three turn signal lights at the front and rear for left and right turns.
The lights are at three different heights to alert traffic further ahead or behind the truck as to what is happening.
The other new idea that may come on board is the ability to shut off all flashing lights on the left or right side of the truck when a turn signal is turned on.
This is being looked at because a turn signal light may not be noticed when all the emergency flashing lights are on.
Another thought is to use a direction arrow lens on turn signal lights.
We have a lot of people running into the rear of highway maintenance trucks despite traffic cones, signs and enough lights for a Christmas tree.
Where does the owner get parts for the car?
Probably on the internet.
hope he stocks up on head gaskets, because he’ll need ’em
Matt: You Cougar guys just luuuuv yer turn signals – you make turns just to use them so you can show off. It took me all of 10 seconds to find a youtube video solely about Cougar tail light turn signals… and with slow motion video no less… ME? Uh, I drive a BMW… and uh, well, do you have any idea how -expensive genuine German replacement turn signal bulbs are? I am scared to death of wearing one out…. 😉
Daniel: I have a question for you please- were yellow rear turn signals ever -illegal- in the U.S.? I ask because my 71 Alfa Spider came with a set of red rear turn signal lenses, while the rest of the world used yellow lenses. They seem to be rare; I have seen a few other 71’s with them but never on newer years. Don’t worry, since they are unobtanium and yet still essentially worthless both in value and performance, I have put them in a box and substituted rest-of-the-world yellow lenses backed with ballast-resistor-equipped yellow LED bulbs.
Anyhow I find it odd that Alfa specifically made red turn signal lenses for the U.S. market cars if they didn’t have to, so I was wondering if it was a compliance matter in 71.
Yellow rear turn signals became unconditionally legal throughout the US on 1/1/68 when Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard № 108 took effect. Before that, vehicle lighting was regulated by each state. There was broad, rough consistency—there were no states that required green turn signals or prohibited red brake lights or mandated three headlamps or anything like that. But there was still a patchwork of regulations, and each and every item of vehicle lighting equipment had to be approved by each and every state.
SAE standards were (as they still are) the major reference for state vehicle lighting codes. At least as far back as 1956, which is the oldest I have easy access to, SAE standards permitted rear turn signals to be “red or amber” (and brake lights to be “red or amber, preferably red”). Many states’ codes contained this same language. It’s possible there might have been a state—it would have taken only one—with a lighting code that required rear turn signals to be red. It would be an enormous amount of tedious work to dig back through all the states’ codes to see what they required and allowed in 1967, and I don’t imagine anyone’s fixin’ to pay me to do it, so that question probably won’t be answered definitively. It’s also possible some imported cars had red rear turn signals because their home-market yellow ones couldn’t meet the US (SAE) intensity requirements, which were/still are quite a bit higher than the European requirements. Or, maybe it’s just that’s what was considered usual and customary in this market. Or maybe automakers then, as now, liked saving a few cents per car by having one less colour to mould in the lens.
When FMVSS № 108 came in, it preëmpted all conflicting aspects of all state lighting codes. So for example, if there was a state that required rear turn signals to be red, that requirement was null, void, and unenforceable because the federal standard allowed red or yellow.
Worth noting that a lot of European imports switched from red to yellow around ’68-’69. Volvo, BMW, and Mercedes come to mind.
Thanks for this question, Lokki. The depth and breadth of vehicle lighting-related crapola crammed in my brain can be a bit of a curse—and I mean it! It’s refreshing to be able to go “Huh, interesting question; let’s go see” and dig through the books and archives every now and then.
(careful, most “LED bulbs” are fraudulent, unsafe junk. There are a few that work acceptably in some lamps, but you really have to be thorough in testing how well they work—a quickie visual looks fine to me isn’t good enough. There’s a pretty good DIY test method described here)
Daniel;
Thank you for taking the time to research and answer my question. I also appreciate the link to the page with the test information. I’m going to invite a buddy over to perform the test with me, and perhaps drink a beer. It’ll be interesting to see the outcomes. I did know about ballast resistors, and about using red bulbs with red lenses and yellow with yellow but I have not actually performed any even remotely objective tests. Sadly, I also have learned how much junk there is out there, and I got a great lesson in light dispersement patterns when I tried LED lamps in my instrument cluster. Even the bulbs which claimed 180 degree spreads would not cast enough light horizontally to light the gauge faces. I took them all out.
I experimented with LEDs too with mixed results, I tried Sylvania ZEVOs in my Cougar’s brake/taillights with surprisingly good results I’d say(they pass the visual tests from that forum link in my housings anyway) but when I tried the same ZEVO LEDs in amber up front they were abysmally bad, you could barely tell they were on in certain angles!
As the above images prove, American cars are quite reliable (and desirable) when people take care of them. The car’s 30+ years old and still looks great.
My 90 year old mother has since stopped driving, but the car she owned the longest was…a 1988 Ford Tempo, through 2009 (it was let go in a state version of cash for clunkers). Hers was a 2 door, though.
She’s 100% Slovak though born in the US (both parents emigrated) , and in the early 90’s we took a trip there to visit relatives…we side tripped through Hungary (Lake Balaton, BudaPest, Miskloc) and at the time were surprised (shouldn’t have been) to see US Troops on maneuvers on one of the roads. We briefly talked to them, and of course they were involved in the war when Yugoslavia was split up following Tito’s death. They were driving Hummers (they stood out). So could be some serviceman was over there and left his vehicle that had been transported there?
I get a kick out of the US sized rear plate ….didn’t know they had that size for Hungary….how many US cars might be over there? Probably not too many.