Rare Rides: The 1983 Ford EXP Handles All Your Malaise Driving Needs
Great handling, two seats, sporty styling, and coupe lines. No, we’re not talking about a Corvette Z06, because it’s another Malaise Day here at Rare Rides — and our topic of discussion is a shockingly orange Ford EXP.
I always thought those letters stood for EXtra Powerful, but maybe I was wrong. Let’s find out.
Ford announced its first two-seat vehicle since the 1957 Thunderbird, and set it for introduction at the 1981 Chicago Auto Show. Intended for the post-oil crisis customer, the EXP was light, sporty, and efficient. Imagine the sea of brown suits with large lapels which crowded around this new sporty coupe. Exciting!
Based on Ford’s successful CE14 platform, the EXP and its Mercury LN7 sister were cousins to the Escort and Tempo from Ford, and the Lynx and Topaz from Mercury.
Built in California, Michigan, and near Michigan (Canada), the EXP lived through two generations. The first was available from 1982 to 1985, and was lower and slightly longer than its Escort sibling at 170.3 inches. Ford went all-out in increasing the EXP’s length from the Escort, which measured 169.4 inches.
Due to the revised length and heavy rear hatch design, the EXP weighed roughly 200 pounds more than a regular Escort, but had the same 70 horsepower, 1.6-liter inline-four engine. Ford achieved its goal of efficient motoring here, as when Car and Driver tested an EXP in 1981, they found it managed 44 miles per gallon on the highway.
The EXP had much more standard equipment than the Escort. All models had full instrumentation, carpeting, rear defrost, power hatch release, model-specific rims, and, on manual transmission models, a sports exhaust.
EXP sales were strong enough to warrant a second generation for mid-1985 through the 1988 model year. Though it had more modern (and Escort-adjacent) styling, the second-gen EXP still did not find sales success. Lackluster performance and elevated pricing didn’t help the EXP, but the impending introduction of Ford’s new front-drive Mustang (you know it as the Probe) was already underway, effectively sealing the fate of the EXP.
Our example today is a well-preserved first-generation model with just 66,000 miles. Listed recently on Denver’s Craigslist (listing removed) as a one owner vehicle, the responsible seller (who enjoys excellent Porsches as well) was asking just $2,500.
Find one like it or the even rarer Mercury LN7 (1982-1983 only), and you too can drive an interesting, rare hatchback on the cheap.
[Images via seller]
Interested in lots of cars and their various historical contexts. Started writing articles for TTAC in late 2016, when my first posts were QOTDs. From there I started a few new series like Rare Rides, Buy/Drive/Burn, Abandoned History, and most recently Rare Rides Icons. Operating from a home base in Cincinnati, Ohio, a relative auto journalist dead zone. Many of my articles are prompted by something I'll see on social media that sparks my interest and causes me to research. Finding articles and information from the early days of the internet and beyond that covers the little details lost to time: trim packages, color and wheel choices, interior fabrics. Beyond those, I'm fascinated by automotive industry experiments, both failures and successes. Lately I've taken an interest in AI, and generating "what if" type images for car models long dead. Reincarnating a modern Toyota Paseo, Lincoln Mark IX, or Isuzu Trooper through a text prompt is fun. Fun to post them on Twitter too, and watch people overreact. To that end, the social media I use most is Twitter, @CoreyLewis86. I also contribute pieces for Forbes Wheels and Forbes Home.
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I remember the chief of polices son had one of these, I think it was a brand new 87 or 88.I always liked the look, kind of 7/10th scale Mirada, which I crushed on as a 10 yr old Incidentally, my fisrt car was a Mk1 GTI, silver/gunmetal two tone, an obvious respray by a previous owner , but otherwise was stock.I still think the unassisted steering was one of the most accurate systems I've ever driven to date, from a FWD chassis. It had the blue interior. It would cost over 10 grand to find a similar condition MK1 and let alone the difficulty of finding replacent parts.I gave up.
Hey Corey, just a tiny technical point on an otherwise enjoyable article: CE14 was the 1990 European Ford Escort (C for C-segment, E for Europe, 14 for project number). When the EXP and LN7 were developed, Ford hadn’t adopted this naming system (project no. 1 was the Aerostar, so logically 14 postdated that model, though there were exceptions). You could say it was based on the successful 1981 Escort and Lynx. If we're talking platforms, I don't think Tempo and Topaz shared one with the Escort and Lynx, at least not in the way we understand them today, but of course they were related.