1979 Ford Cortina Ghia from UK and Ireland - Comments

A big non event! The car has been totally reliable and a joy to own. No faults, no breakdowns and servicing costs to make a BMW driver think he was buying fish and chips for two!

The thought of driving around in a 21 year old Cortina by choice as everyday transport may not be everyone's idea of reliable motoring, but read on. The car has been brilliant, comfortable and now a slightly unusual sight on our roads. Fuel economy has been averaging out at about 29 miles per gallon which considering the performance on tap is pretty good. Back seat passengers find it a very comfortable way to travel and a thoroughly enjoyable way to travel.

I've owned new cars in the past and the only real difference between an old car and a new one is the size of your garage bills and the snob factor, or lack of it! Some of our neighbours assumed we were broke when the Cortina turned up, so we put them right. If you are prepared to get out and look there are plenty of Cortina's out there waiting to give years of trouble free motoring. Choose well and you will be rewarded with a car that is just as good as some of todays plastic clad, faceless machines that inhabit our roads. Go on, you know you want one...

There is no way you'll get 29MPG out of an old 2.3 V6!,there gas guzzlers!.25MPG is more realistic.

Otherwise I loved these cars & regret that I never had one.

Mk4 & 5 Cortinas suffered horribly from rust which is why you see so few now,pitty as they are good cars overall.

My 1977 2.0l Ghia had a few more problems than yours tho'. Useless heater, appalling "auto " choke , possibly the heaviest steering vehicle I have owned (I've currently got a Bedford CF and that's easier) and only 20mpg whatever I did with it.

Very comfy and the steering wasn't a problem on the move, just parking, and it handled better than it had a right to do.

I have a 1980 Cortina 2.3 Ghia and it is hassle free. No rust anywhere and it is only a gas guzzler if you put the boot into it. Otherwise its been fine. Power steering too, which makes it a really easy drive. PAS was standard on the late model 2.3's.

Servicing is cheap as chips and parts are still easy to get hold of.

I laugh at people who pay £15k for cars and look down their nose at me. When they are sinking in Debt, I'm driving my cortina to the airport for another holiday courtesy of the money I'm saving!

I love these cars and agree that a good one can be reliable. Biggest problems I've had with mine as the useless auto choke, non existent heater plus water leakage issues, the boot seals in particular are hopeless. Get a good low mileage one and you're laughing.

Fantastically cool cars though, and real head turners in 2007 with a cult following. Plus they are going up in value.

1979 Cortina. Is this the Mk4? If so, I think they look absolutely superb. They're like a breath of fresh air compared to modern cars. I'm heavily into art & design & my prefered area is minimalism. The Mk4 Cortina is a wonderful piece of sculpture. I'm genuine about that statement. There are a lot of stock responses when people mention Cortinas. People come out with the tired old cliches & the moronic mocking, but if they opened their eyes they'd actually learn something. The lines of the Cortina Mk4 are absolutely wonderful in my opinion. They're graceful, perfectly balanced & wonderfully understated. If these cars had a Lancia or BMW badge on the front grille they'd be changing hands for thousands. Put a Mk4 next to something like a modern BMW Z series & see the difference. The BMW is a mess! It's a clutter of lines, angles, swoops & bulges. It's awkward & fussy. The Cortina is wonderfully serene, fluent & free of any visual pollution. I'm sure the BMW would blow the Mk4 into the weeds when it comes to performance, handling & braking, but that isn't what it's about. I'm a huge fan of modernist style icons like Panton, Eames, Bauhaus & Joe Colombo etc. Astonishingly the MK4 Cortina is a thing of beauty in my eyes. Let the snobs, show offs & crashing bores have their flash cars that the marketing men tell them are wonderful. Leave the Mk 4 to the people who dare to be different. I don't own one yet because I'm having to spend money on restoring a house, but as soon as I have the funds, I'll be hunting down a Mk 4.

To the previous poster to whom the Mk4 Cortina is a thing of beauty - you could say the same for many models of the same era. Cars back then had character and you could easily tell them apart, unlike most of today's designs, which are carbon copies or clones. Sad part of modern life is that we will see even less individualistic car design as increasing legislation kicks in and all cars will need to conform to a set norm with the aid of computer-aided design.

What will result are either generically designed automobiles that are hard to differentiate, or butt ugly ones like the Bangle inspired BMWs.

While the Cortina Mk4 and others of its ilk were hardly the paragons of efficiency or safety, they had character by the bucket loads, unlike most of today's cars. What's more, a reasonably skilled mechanic could put them right at minimal cost, whereas with today's ECU managed cars, a diagnostic machine is called for, leading to a decline in serviceability at affordable prices.

I agree with you 100%. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I think the rot set in with the introduction of cars like the Sierra & its hideous 'jelly mould' shape. Once computers were brought in to help with car design, everything became bland & uniform. How I long for the days of yesteryear when cars were designed by someone with a fresh piece of paper & a sharpened pencil.

I had an Accident today. I ploughed into the back of a W Reg Cortina 2.3 Ghia. The boot was heavily smashed in, and the Owner says it is too damaged to fix. My Volvo just has a scratched bumper.

I have a 1978 Ford Cortina Ghia 4.1L and it goes like a dream. I have always had an eye for Corty's since I was a little kid. I am only young, but they are the best car I have ever had..