After several years living in the big city, where the combination of an old car and public transit worked just fine, my family and I moved to an outlying suburb. An extended commute at higher speeds now meant a more reliable ride was called for. The Neon we’d recently sold would have fit the bill nicely, but in its absence I needed to look for something else. My mother had just treated herself to a lightly used Acura TSX (a six-speed manual, no less), so she kindly offered me her old Escort wagon.
My mother’s Escort had been a bit of an oddball with higher LX trim, its wagon body style and a manual gearbox and my father had ordered it for her brand new. In Canada at the time, Ford sold the wagon at the same price as the sedan, making the larger body-style the obvious way to go. I can’t recall why he went for the rather dull light brown color but my mother never liked it. In fact, it was likely the most forgettable car she ever drove. Perhaps its only memorable moment occurred when my younger brother got into fender bender with it while my mother was out of country on vacation. When he chose to drive it home with a crinkled hood at 80km/h, the hood latch failed, causing it swing up and smash into the windshield.
For a commuter car, it seemed to be a solid bet. This generation of Escort is more or less a revamped 1990-1994 Mazda Protegé under the skin. They both share a common chassis, the same front and rear strut suspension as well as identical brakes. This seemed to promise, at least in theory, a semi-sporty runabout. I’ll admit I haven’t driven a same vintage Protegé, but I suspect the Escort received a softer suspension tune as my mother’s car was anything but sporty.
While the chassis was shared with the Mazda Protegé, the engines were not. The sedans and wagons were fitted with the 2.0L SPI fuel injected four cylinder engine which was a refinement of the old CVH motor. It promised modest fuel consumption and delivered even more modest power than its 110hp rating would indicate. The five-speed manual gearbox should have boosted the fun factor up at least slightly but somehow didn’t manage to do so. The shifter had long throws and the clutch pedal had such a short travel it was almost binary. The engine just sort of softly moaned a bit more as you depressed the accelerator pedal (along with the driver). Being no stranger to small and cheap cars, I found the Escort’s engine rather lifeless and dull. The 2.3L four cylinder engine from the Ford Tempo my parents had previously owned felt more willing and you certainly wouldn’t see that motor on any buff book’s top ten list. Perhaps it was the added insulation and refinement over the Tempo, but I felt the gutless engine let the rest of the car down in a big way.
Not my car but imagine this with a manual gearbox
On the plus side, as a higher trimmed LX model, the interior was a reasonably nice place to be. The dashboard had hints of the oval styling that was thrust on the contemporary Taurus but it was toned down quite a bit for the Escort. The colors inside matched the boring brown on the outside. The small wagon body is style one of my favorites from a practicality standpoint, but it was rather wasted on us since with a larger minivan sitting next to it in the driveway.
I tried to like the Escort. I really did, but in the end I failed. In an attempt to spice it up, I even added a set of a first-generation Miata alloy wheels. They were not perfect cosmetically, so the previous owner had sprayed them black before the current trend of black wheels came along. While the Escort got me back and forth to work reliably, without any hint of mechanical trouble, I did encounter a major irritant. I could not see a darned thing at night. I suspect this issue originated in an inadequate repair after my brother’s accident, but it seemed like the headlights were too dim and improperly aimed into the pavement. I replaced the bulbs with a more expensive aftermarket set that promised a massive increase in brightness, but it didn’t really improve matters. I tried in vain to correctly align the headlamps, but it seemed to me the body man who had fixed the accident damage had already used up any alignment slack.
Photo credit – http://marythekay.typepad.com/.a/6a0120a86d37ac970b0133f1c3f3d5970b-pi
The lighting issue was very important to me at the time, as I was commuting via highway as well as on secondary routes. In Canada, for a good portion of the winter one leaves the house in the morning in the dark and by quitting time, it is dark (or at least dim) yet again. If you don’t get out for a big walk at lunch time, it is not unusual to miss sunlight altogether and the further north you get, the worse it is. So I swapped the stock wheels back on and sold the Escort wagon which proved to be a bit of a challenge given its brown paint, wagon body style and lack of an automatic gearbox. After all this bellyaching about misaligned headlights, you might expect that I finally went out and bought a perfectly practical commuter appliance. But you’d be wrong…
When I married my wife she had the same vintage escort wagon in “SE” trim with a auto. I can completely echo everything you said about it, especially that awful moan from the completely gutless motor. It did, at least, get exceptional gas mileage – but at the time I was driving a ’93 MX-6 LS and talk about polar opposites. Even though the escort had an entirely new suspension and tires, there was nothing sporty about the handling.. Ever.
That said, it was a fine car. I mean easy to work on, cheap to drive and I even kept it at work for almost a year as my “keep at work car” when bike commuting.
It also had the oddest cruise control.. Controls ever. Not sure what for was smoking when they came up with them.
It also had the oddest cruise control.. Controls ever. Not sure what for was smoking when they came up with them.
Oddly, I find Ford cruise control controls the best designed. They always have big, clearly marked buttons on the front of the steering wheel, and operation is usually intuitive. My 02 Escort and 08 Taurus X were both a snap to operate. My Jetta, on the other hand, has the controls on the turn signal stalk, which hides behind the steering wheel spoke, so most operation is by feel of it’s tiny switches and buttons.
Funny, I don’t like the CC controls on my Focus nearly as much as those on my Matrix. The Matrix has them on a separate stalk off the right side of the steering column and I can operate it with my thumb, never looking at it. Can’t do that on my Focus.
Toyota has had the cruise control location at the 4:00 position underneath the steering wheel for decades and is a great example of Toyota showing restraint and adhering to the adage “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”.
Other manufacturers all relocate the cruise control to the steering wheel spokes. While stylish, it doesn’t fall readily to hand like Toyota’s location (unless maybe you have freakish long thumbs).
With that aside, the worst thing about Ford’s cruise control wasn’t so much the location as the fact that, in an obvious cost-cutting move, Ford did away with the ‘cancel’ button. The only way to cancel a cruise setting and save the speed on a Ford was to hit the brakes. Not exactly a good feature on the highway.
I have always thought the same thing. The first time I drove a Toyota with those controls was a 199X Previa van and I liked them from the get-go. Since then I have owned a 1997 and 2006 Toyota trucks with those exact same controls. Intuitive and functional—amazing that they have been able to maintain that same setup for so long without unnecessarily redesigning them.
You don’t have to “hit” the brakes, just a gentle tap of the pedal does the job just fine.
I think it is a matter of knowing what to expect for cruise control, and other common controls. I love Toyota’s mini stalk, but I also love GM’s oft derided multifunction single stalk. Both are completely intuitive to me and I can operate them without taking my eyes off the road. My Altima isn’t too bad, but the on-off switch (which has to be turned on again every time the car is restarted) is a significant reach from the wheel. I have driven very few Fords, and can’t recall their system offhand.
Other manufacturers all relocate the cruise control to the steering wheel spokes. While stylish, it doesn’t fall readily to hand like Toyota’s location (unless maybe you have freakish long thumbs).
My thumbs are boringly normal, actually a bit small for a man.
Here’s a pic of the setup that my Escort had. Pressing the top end of the switch on the left turned it on and pressing the bottom end turned it off. The right side had a “resume” button on top, with a rocker below it “set/accelerate” on the top and “coast” on the bottom. iirc, releasing the coast buttom woud reset the cruise to whatever speed you were at at that moment. Pressing the “resume” button would bring it back up to the previously set speed. Only downside of “resume” is it wanted to accelerate so fast that it would usually provoke a downshift from the trans.
With that aside, the worst thing about Ford’s cruise control wasn’t so much the location as the fact that, in an obvious cost-cutting move,
The controls in my 08 Taurus X looked like this. The T-Rex was not subject to the cost pressures the Escort was. Buttons on the left are for the cruise: off/on on top, cancel/resume next, set/increase, then set/decrease on the bottom.
Again, all reachable by my very normal thumbs without letting go of the wheel. The T-Rex had an extra little benefit: the labels on the buttons were individually illuminated. Sweetest cruise set up I’ve ever used.
I find that both types of cruise-controls are equally easy and intuitive; it’s moving from one to another, like from my Mazda Tribute to my sister’s Kia Sportage, that’s the problem.
Exactly. I just had to relearn the cruise controls getting out of a a Ford Windstar and hopping into a Pontiac Vibe (=Toyota Matrix). In the Ford you set the speed withe the + button, with the Toyota you set the speed with the – button.
Scotch on the rocks: stirred or shaken.
I had a ’93 automatic…I can certainly echo your thoughts on the lack of power. It was pathetic on hills. Plus, it didn’t really get that great of mileage most of the time, right around 30 or so was pretty normal.
Mine had even less horsepower than yours–something like 88. Still, it was a fun, dorky little car that I didn’t mind all that much at the time.
I briefly owned the previous gen Escort (mine was a ’96) 2 door hatchback with a 5-speed. It was a different animal altogether, but I remember being impressed by its nimbleness and back-to-basics personality. Since I commute upwards of 70 miles each day, I’ve been thinking of buying an economical beater to drive to work while parking my Volvo V70 T5 until the weekend, since it gets a mere 20-21 mpg with my heavy foot on the accelerator. It would seem my old ’96 in wagon guise would be the perfect throwaway car for the occasion, but have no experience with this gen of escorts. There’s a rusty ’97 on craigslist right now for $700 that’s been listed for over 2 weeks and advertises new brakes…wonder if it’s worth it. Since I drop my kids off on the way to work safety is an issue, so not sure.
There’s a rusty ’97 on craigslist right now for $700 that’s been listed for over 2 weeks and advertises new brakes
It’s probably due for a timing belt. iirc replacement interval for 97s is 60,000 miles. A coworker of mine broke a belt on the 1.9 in his 96, and it survived, but I don’t know if the 2.0 would survive.
The struts on mine were OK around town, but went funky on the freeway at 40,000 miles. If it was warm outside, they were OK, but well below freezing it seems the gas in the struts would contract so much there would be no pressure on the fluid. The wheels would bounce so much I could barely keep it on the road until the agitation warmed up the struts enough for them to start working again, which usually took about 75 miles. I replaced them with Monroe struts, which started the same routine after another 40,000 miles. More strut replacement fun, Escorts like to break springs. The guy at Sears said “every Escort we put struts on has at least one broken spring”. I asked the service guy at the Ford dealer about this and he confirmed “the springs rust, then they crack, then they break”. My springs were fine, but then my Escort was quite young when I had the struts replaced.
Not a bad little wheezer overall. Engine produced more noise and vibration than power. The automatic trans tended to pick the wrong gear. But I never felt guilty about leaving it outside in bad weather or driving in road salt. And, best of all, I felt totally invisible when driving in a sketchy neighborhood, like downtown Detroit.
Really? Downtown Detroit is the LEAST sketchy neigborhood in all of Detroit. It’s the residential (or formerly residential) areas that you need to worry about.
On a related note, probably half of these final Escorts were sold in Michigan alone. I NEVER saw them while living in California for 3 months (no Cavaliers either). For small cars it was Civic/Corolla or nothing, with the occasional a Sentra or Mitsu/Mazda. Obviously things tilted Japanese in every size class, but domestic compacts were non-existent out there. Focii weren’t common either, and they were always beat up.
Really? Downtown Detroit is the LEAST sketchy neigborhood in all of Detroit. It’s the residential (or formerly residential) areas that you need to worry about.
Outside of paddling a canoe up the river, the only way to get to downtown is through the sketchy neighborhoods.
The freeways are not very direct when I get tagged for jury duty, so I go surface streets, and actually make pretty good time. My route is Ford Rd, to the Dearborn/Detroit border, then jump over to Michigan Ave, around Campus Martius. Lots of abandoned/burned out buildings on those mean streets, before you get over the freeway to the core business district.
And now the powers that be want to move the courts out to the former state prison on Mound Rd and E Davison.
Did you try a headlight restoration kit (i.e. 3M)?
iirc, some review knocked that generation of Escort for weak headlights. I never noticed mine being particularly bad, but then I was usually driving in suburbs or on a freeway that had plenty of other traffic to light things up. They were not the equal of the lights on my 98 Civic though. I’m sure of that.
I think it was the aiming of the headlights rather than the lights themselves. The lenses looked good. I think they were pointed downward as a result of the poorly repaired accident damage. It was odd.
I take exception to the overall conclusions of this review. This model was designed to be an economical family hauler. There were never any sort of sporting aspirations, real or implied, to this car’s design or marketing. As such, any review should instead reflect on the whether or not the car lived up to its purpose.
My neighbor, who is not mechanically inclined in any meaningful way, owns the same car–same color, same 5-sp manual. In it, he has delivered all four children to countless days at school, karate practices, hockey practices, marching band competitions, etc. It has hauled home tens of thousands of dollars worth of groceries. It has served as the platform for driving lessons for two teenage boys. It has likely been the venue for a first kiss or two. It has logged more than 300k miles of suburban family duty. It has gone through a clutch, but not a single non-normal wear “major repair”. The owner is very satisfied with the 30mpg it delivers on trips.
The car is now thoroughly clapped out, engine top end is fairly ‘tappety”, but the car soldiers on with a minimum of maintenance.
Given the long “life history” described above, I don’t know how anyone can describe this model as anything but a damn fine car!
I owned a newish one only short term–and merely found it to be as modest, competent and dull as others have said–but I keep hearing about folks running up lots and lots and lots of cheap miles on these. I’m sometimes amazed by what CL sellers are asking for one with “only 130K,” but that must mean they know about its dull-durability reputation.
What about getting a pair of HELLA fog lights? Then again if you do not like a car why try to improve it. My 95 Voyager had pathetic headlights above 90-100 KPH so I installed auxilery lighting in front of the grill cover. I already had good enough forward vision I just needed to be able to see 50 or so feet off to either side since I lived in the country.
“The engine just sort of softly moaned a bit more as you depressed the accelerator pedal”
That is such a perfect description of the driving experience. A good friend in HS had one of these, a ’98 automatic sedan in that medium forest green color that 80% seem to be painted in, and I remember it well.
I only drove it a few times but I rode in it extensively – the suspension is definitely much softer than any Protege, as these were geared towards everyday commuters more than enthusiasts. It was fine for basic transportation, but it was absolutely basic transportation. Apart from the Civic of the era (haven’t driven a Protege) I haven’t driven a ’90s compact that wasn’t horribly dull, soft, sluggish, and plastic-y. This size class really took a quantum leap in refinement and design from about 2000-2005. The Corolla, Cavalier, and Sentra of the late-90s era were equally chintzy and bland.
The Escort finally died one day when the brake pedal suddenly sunk to the floor – the lines had rusted out, and it was promptly scrapped. I think it had about 170,000 miles at the time of death, so it did its job.
Apart from the Civic of the era (haven’t driven a Protege) I haven’t driven a ’90s compact that wasn’t horribly dull, soft, sluggish, and plastic-y.
The thing is, the late 90s Civic was nice. My aunt had a 98 LX sedan, built in East Liberty Ohio. If Honda could do it, the other’s failure has to be put down to phoning it it.
I would have a ball flogging one of those to within an inch of its life on my commute.
I’ve owned quite a few cars – this one wasn’t even fun to flog.
You did not mention the one of the most interesting(or the most anger inducing) features of this car: The weird radio/ HVAC pod. Like the taurus/Sable of the same era, the radio only came with tape deck(though you could get an optional CD changer in the center console. But nobody really ordered one of those because Ford over priced them) and to add insult, just like the 96-2007 Taurus/Sable, the dang radio was in the trunk and the radio like thing in the dash was simply the control unit. So when aftermarket radio places offered kits and harnesses to use an aftermarket radio, they were very expensive as you had to run about 4 feet of wire from the front to the back and the kits looked ugly.
The other damning thing about this car was its engine had a habit of dropping valve seats in cylinder number 4 with no warning and no amount of care of the car will stave it off. Whether you baby the car or flog the f%^k out of it, it still will drop the valve seat sooner or later.
Besides those things(and it was the SPFI 2.0 that was the problem which carried over to the Focus LX), the car was nice enough and it was one of the first entry level cars that you could get remote entry(at least on the drivers side door(the remote actually said drivers door only) ) which was still considered a luxury item at the time.
I am surprised you did not take it in to have the headlights looked at as it might have simply had crap aftermarket lights that ether were missing the reflector in the light or the lightbulb hole was drilled at a downward angle.
I actually like the 91-96 Escorts better as I did not like the 97-2002 Escort’s mini 3rd gen Taurus styling
Bought a ’97 Escort LX Sedan new and put 226k fairly trouble-free miles on it, before rebuilding the top end and giving it to my daughter, who promptly totaled it on her way to her first day at college. One thing about it I can say is that it had the coldest blowing AC I’ve ever come across.
True. The A/C was ice cold for a little four cylinder car.
This is the type of car I’d like automakers to make again. Small, fuel efficient wagon for those of us who want to be able to haul kids and 2X4’s from time to time.
The newer hatch backs, like the Honda Fit, are nice but they are too darn short, in my opinion.
In 1999, I rented a Mazda Protege of this generation for a trip from LA to Vegas. I don’t recall being impressed by its quality or performance. It was also the dirtiest and worst smelling rental car I have ever had.
I was a passenger in the Escort version a few times. The thing that always stuck with me was how thin and cheap feeling the interior door releases were.
The stick shift/wagon combo might get me into one of these, but that’s about the only way. I cannot look at that color without remembering hours and hours spent scrubbing tar accumulations off the lower body of my 94 Club Wagon. I made a note to myself, if I ever got another big van, the top part will be light to assist the air conditioner, and the bottom part will be dark to hide the tar spatters. That Mocha Frost on the bottom sure showed off the tar.
I used to own an 86 Escort wagon(the true Escort… not this round thing).
It was reliable, but bogged down while I was driving it in the rain… then drove good again, when I pulled over for a few seconds. Weird.
Funny, the interior looked the same as the interior of my current 88 Mustang LX 5.0 notchback… I guess ALL 80’s Ford interiors look exactly alike, whether it’s a Mustang, Cougar, LTD, Thunderbird, Lynx, Marquis or Escort. lol
As I have consumed 2 Tracer 4 door sedans and a 3 door Escort LX (which was only a part donor), these days I caught my eyes on a dark blue Tracer Wagon which sits peacefully only a street away…on a curbside… As autumn fall is already here, the car started to collect yellow and red leafs on its bonnet and top as with the dust… Is it something wrong with it??? A pal of mine knows personally the owner…as they are kind of colleagues in a nearby research institute… So we’ll see if that likable lil’ wagon shall be mine?
I am going to buy a 2002 sedan from a friend in a few weeks. I like this car, simple and reliable. It is going to be my daily driver until I pay my mortgage. I know I will miss the ZX2 with manual transmission, but it is going to be nice a car where I can enter and exit without doing gymnastics.
1999 Escort Wagon in Brown was given to me with 20k on it. I drove the car because it was the only thing I had, got good mileage, and I transported very expensive equipment in it that I new no one would think twice about braking into the car. It was that uninteresting. At right about 300k miles, the engine gave out. Everything else had still worked on the car. All the power windows, the gauges, the clock, the interior light, everything. The body was strait with only slightly faded paint. It was then that a friend called that he had a 351w and an AOD transmission he was getting rid of. I spent the next couple of years on weekends and evenings putting a chromoly chassis together and inserting the V8 in the little wagon with an 8,8 rear four link out back.