It's not all that rare to see a clapped-out old Lincoln Continentals of mid 70s vintage coaxed into service out of desperation or the novelty. What is rare is to find a mint condition, fully loaded Mecury variant of these Ford vehicles. That's exactly what just rolled into Dave the Car Wizards shop.
Nowhere near as many of these vintage Mercury Grand Marquis were sold as the more popular Lincoln "Conti." What that translates to in 2022 is dollar signs on top of dollar signs. Even with only 17,000 miles and change on the odometer, there are going to be a few things that fail on a car this old. In this case, it appears to be part of the HVAC system with a pully seized solid.
Apart from that one small fault, there's so much to admire about a car this old but in this remarkable shape. Factory paint and hand-crafted exterior trim pieces all too often falling apart or rusting in some Lincolns are uncannily new-looking to the untrained eye. Amazingly, the engine belts on the quad valve 460 cubic-inch (7.5-liter) V8 appear to have their serial numbers stamped onto the rubber instead of printed. That could only mean they're exceeding 45 years old.
Dave and his wife/ trusty filming sidekick takes us through the interior of this immaculately preserved luxury coupe. When we say the interior quality was the highest of its time, the other side of a Bentley or Rolls-Royce is true in every sense. It turns out when these interiors are not abused as they often are, they truly can last the test of time.
It's more than a good laugh watching Wizard and his wife break out the tape measure to get mark a confirmed length of over 19 feet. For comparison, a modern GMC Yukon XL is only 18.8 feet long. We just can't seem to do excess the way we used to in America, it seems.
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