1984 Escort wagon photo from the web.
The new Escort was perfectly sized for our growing family and the upright seating position was a vast improvement over our old Pinto. The 1.6L four-cylinder front wheel drive experience was a new one for me. The Escort was much better in the snow than any car I had ever driven –I had even high-centered the Pinto on the drifts in poorly plowed roads more than once, its low ground clearance and light weight over the rear wheels proved unsuited to Upstate NY winter roads.
Initially, we were very pleased with the Escort, it was more comfortable overall and Barbara drove it with the two children. That is until the driver’s seat collapsed when a bolt holding the seat to the frame sheared off unexpectedly while she was driving on the interstate. It was a terrifying experience for her.
Ford Fairmont wagon from the CC Cohort by Curtis Gregory.
Meanwhile, I continued to drive the C20 Chevy pickup until it would no longer pass NY state inspection due to the rotted body. My parents came to the rescue again. This time my mom gave me her 1980 Ford Fairmont wagon that she had been unable to trade in when she bought a 1984 LTD.
The Fairmont was pretty worn and it ran poorly. I tried to tune it up but found that the rear spark plug in the 200 inline 6 motor had broken off. I tried to replace it but it was seized in the head and no amount of WD40, penetrating oil, and brute force could loosen it. I was wary of stripping the threads and decided to drive it with only five cylinders.
Other than that it was trouble free except I had to change the oil frequently because of the unburned fuel collecting in the oil pan. Since I didn’t care and Barbara didn’t have to deal with it we took advantage of a “free” car.
The following spring I noticed the gas mileage was getting worse. One day a coworker stopped me to let me know there was a puddle of gas under the car in the parking lot. I crawled under to find that the fuel tank had come apart at the seam and the gas I had put in that morning was leaking out the split. I discovered that 5 gallons of gas was the limit I could put in without it leaking. When the annual inspection came due I didn’t bother to even try to get it inspected. We took it to the auto wreckers and sold it for scrap.
Plymouth Grand Voyager, photo by B. Saur
In 1987 we were in a difficult situation because our third and last child was about to be born. I had taken a job with similar duties at a larger company and was doing well professionally. The salary increase allowed me to stop working at night now that my apprenticeship was finished.
The Escort was perfect for two children in car seats but three was out of the question. A coworker had a Plymouth Voyager that he liked. I checked it out and took Barbara to test drive one and it was love at first sight. By 1987 Chrysler had refined the Voyager by adding the long wheelbase Grand Voyager and a Mitsubishi 3-liter V6 engine. There were significant upgrades to the interior appointments as well. For the first time buckling children in car seats would not mean performing a contortionist act. The van became our home on wheels since we could have the children sleep in it while camping and on vacations, we would pull out the middle seat so they had a play area to stretch out in on long trips.
Escort wagon photo sourced from the web.
I took over the Escort for commuting which was a big improvement over the Fairmont. My luck with Ford cars had not improved. A few months after I started using it to commute to work I noticed that it was using a lot of oil. A thorough examination located a leaking camshaft seal in the front of the engine cover. I was content to add oil weekly but when it became an almost daily routine I looked into having the seal replaced. I had neither time nor a place to do the work myself and was not in the mood to learn enough about front-wheel drive and overhead cams to attempt to repair it myself.
The quote for replacing the seal was over $1000 and I was told that I should replace the timing belt since it was deteriorating from the constant oil bath. I don’t know if that is remotely true but I was not about to put that amount of money into the car. A friend heard about my situation and offered me his 1978 Grand Am.
It was a beautiful car and a beautiful gesture. He had been offered scrap value at trade-in and it had been sitting in his driveway for a year. I was glad to have it. Everything worked, and he had maintained it well. I sold the Escort to a mechanic at work for $500.00 and he fixed it and gave it to his wife.
CC related reading:
Curbside Classic: 1981 Ford Escort – You Never Get A Second Chance To Make A Good First Impression
Junkyard Classic: 1984 Ford Escort GL Wagon – Alone In A Crowd
David Ramsey be damned.
Only the very rich can afford a POS car.
Even if you can do the work yourself, the time you spend fooling with it is better spent working OT or a second job.
The old formula was five years old for half price.
Now I’d go older but solid.
Something undervalued by the general idiot public.
A 90’s Park Avenue or possibly a pre-turbo Malibu, Impala, Equinox….
A great article while an all too familiar story.
Ours was the opposite end of the spectrum.
My father in law was convinced that new cars were the only way to go, and as such, my wife brought her 1 year old 83 Mustang into the marriage. I drove a 75 Caprice, trouble free. By 1985 or 21000 miles, the Mustang began shifting badly and I could smell overheating. Off to the dealer, where Ford offered to pay for half of the needed $1800 transmission repair. “ But” said the service manager, “ we have no idea why it is running hot. So until we get that fixed, don’t do the transmission.”
We traded it in for an inexpensive, 4 cylinder Mustang. That one was a lease and the black paint evaporated like water in the desert. Ford didn’t care since, per them, “ it’s only a lease. But that is considered excessive wear.”
So we paid to paint it good enough!
Then we were given her grandfather’s 85 small Marquis Brougham with only 11,000 miles in 5 years.
While in for a recall, the dealer said “ this car has serious driveability issues that we can’t figure out.”
At 19k the Essux engine was rebuilt only to have the intake leak oil right after warranty. That was it!
I sold that ( the man told new that it stalled every time he turned left) to a man and bought a 1980 Buick Park Avenue, with 99,000.
Other than a tune up and exhaust replacement, we drove that car, without incident, to 179800 miles before the electrical system was shot.
Now, we buy decent quality used cars, such as an 04 Grand Marquis, a couple mid 90’s Buicks and even a 95 Town Car. All with less trouble than any of the new stuff!
We did pull the trigger on a 24 Rogue this summer when the transmission on our GMC Sierra went out ( like so many others!)
Great article
Should have given the Escort to the mechanic. Good karma in the bank!
” … and I was told that I should replace the timing belt since it was deteriorating from the constant oil bath. I don’t know if that is remotely true … ”
There could have been something to it. At least it would have been a sensible precaution.
I can’t comment on that particular belt arrangement, but the logic is sound. Oil kills rubber belts.
Ford apparently failed to grasp this, the 1.0 Ecoboost has two toothed belts that are immersed in oil by design, and fail a lot.
I remember driving an early Mercury Lynx version of your Escort. My mother had bought a new Plymouth Horizon the previous year, and I found that a far better driving car than the Lynx. The L body felt much more planted to the road. As for your poor history with Ford, that was not a good time for them. And we wonder why so many Hondas and Toyotas found buyers in those days. Sometimes I wonder if anything has changed.
1984 Escort had 1.6L 4 cylinder. 2.0L version of the CVH engine didn’t debut until 1997. Fairmont had 200 cubic inch 6 cylinder. 250 was never offered in any Fox platform car.
Thanks. I’ve corrected the text.
I had a seat bolt shear off on me once, too. Fortunately, I was in my driveway when it happened. Suddenly, I was on my back looking at the headliner.
I never warmed to the styling affection of having a hatchback with a quasi-trunk-lip, of which the 1st gen Escort/Lynx seemed to be one of the first. Others were the Dodge Caliber and Chevy Malibu Maxx. To that end, if there was a conventional station wagon version, it looked better (as well as being more practical).
I can only surmise that the point was to have a cover over the rear cargo area to keep items from plain view, rather than having to attach some sort of cover panel that opened and closed with a normally styled hatchback that was pushed out all the way to the back of the vehicle.
Experiences like these are what drove Americans away from the domestics en masse. Was Honda/Toyota/Nissan vehicles perfect? No, but the chances of them lasting a long time with minimal repair was far greater.
This is what surprised me most about the article. While I realize many American cars at the time weren’t great (like the ones my family owned…), the author describes a 1980 car that was unable to be traded in… in 1984. By 1985, if I caught the dates right, it was so thoroughly used up that repair wasn’t an option for an author who by his COAL series has kept every single vehicle on the road down to it’s absolute last mile.
I’d hate to be my parents shopping for cars 40 years ago. Used American cars needed too many repairs & used Japanese cars had already rusted away. No wonder families were amazed to buy a Toyota Camry, a car taht seemed to mostly solve the rust issue & run forever while being comfortable.
I think the quasi trunk lip was for styling purposes only to differentiate from other cars. I think most Escorts had a cargo area lid.
To Rudiger’s point about the hatchback, I believe that these are the cars where I recall seeing the hatches pretty much constantly rusted…to the extent that I generally equated Escorts with rust. I mean, everything rusted in the 1980s, but somehow it seemed worse with Escorts,
Great article. It does bring back memories of a time when there were just so many sketchy cars on the road and in our driveways. Driving a car on 5 cylinders because the spark plug broke off, disintegrating gas tanks, adding oil weekly, a busted off seat rail bolt!!??? There’s just something decidedly last century about that, and I don’t think it’s ONLY because many of us are now in the financial positions to drive cars that are not constantly falling apart.
Beater cars can be cheap transportation but you need the resources to support them. My son has a fleet of three and at any given time two are running, and one can be in the garage, where he has the tools and skill to fix them.
I’m glad I missed the first generation Escort, we had a 95 which was Mazda 323 based that we bought in 97 with 50,000 miles on it. We ran it until 2012 when I worked out it was cheaper to take the train to work than repair it. We lived in Beaverton Oregon so it was still rust free when we scrapped it, although there was a small ecosystem in the rain gutters
“50k” on the clock from “95-“97”? That car must have never parked!
Yes, as a retired ASE master tech changing the timing belt is a must if it has oil on it. Even a good quality belt would likely be under $20.00 most cars.And be sure to change as much as possible while things are apart.
I can still remember the Fords my parents ran to this day. 1960 Falcon two-door wagon. Three on the column. 1968 Falcon four-door wagon. Same trans as the ’60. 1967 Ford Falcon four- door sedan. Automatic. This one was the best of the four. 1968 Ford Fairlane four-door sedan. Automatic with six cylinder. Drastically underpowered. All three had to have major repairs performed at one time or another, including four engine-transmission combinations removed or replaced.I would give my right arm to have the ’67 back again along with my parents, but they are both gone now along with the car.