1988 Lincoln Continental Signature review from North America

Please read carefully: I am recording the things that DID NOT go wrong. EVERYTHING ELSE BROKE!

1) Transmission

2) Exhaust.

I get a great deal of pleasure reading Internet feedback on ownership of the 1988-94 series Lincoln Continental. Misery loves company! Incredibly, I kept this car for 7 years/45,000 miles. I think it was some sort of Socratic (who had his Xanthippe) discipline for me. Someday I may write an essay about this car. That Ford Motor Co. could have produced such a junker in the 1980s explains why Toyota/Honda/etc. are taking over the industry. Just two examples of the incredibly poor design: The driver's exterior door handle broke off. It was made of pot metal. I reasoned that the driver's door was used 10 times as much as any other door handle, so after replacing that I assumed there would be no more problem. No, the next year the PASSENGER door handle broke the same way! And replacing the handles requires having the painted to match the car. Second example: the 1988 ABS, believe it or not, does not use a master brake cylinder (I believe this is unique to 1988). If electrical power is cut to the the high pressure brake booster motor, THE BRAKES DON'T WORK! In my car, ignition switch was faulty and when the temperature/humidity was high, the car would start, but the circuit to energize the brake motor sometimes would not close. Result: no brakes. Turning off the car and restarting usually fixed the problem. If you are a mechanic you may think I don't know what I'm talking about, but I promise you it is true. I wrote Ford Motor Co. but the letter never made it to anyone who understood the problem. After several years of scary incidents I decided to replace the ignition switch. The problem never recurred. Final war story: The float in the gas tank used to stick if the tank was completely filled with gas. Result: THE SPEEDOMETER WOULD NOT WORK! How crazy is that? We learned not to completely fill the tank (and finally replaced the gas gauge float sensor, which fixed the speedometer problem). Hope readers get a chuckle out of these completely true anecdotes, as I have chuckled over others'!