You won’t be seeing a reboot of Cop Rock or The Chevy Chase Show anytime soon; television failures do not inspire sequels. In that same way, cars that don’t live up to expectations rarely get a second shot at life. That’s why the story of the 1985 ½ Ford EXP is so rare in the automotive world.
If you can believe the numerous sources that I’ve found, the way this next-gen EXP actually came into being is an even more unlikely and inspiring tale of how almost anything is possible.
The EXPeriment Fails
With the death of the muscle car, during the early seventies the “fun” car market became increasingly dominated by imports, in particular small coupes like the Toyota Celica and Volkswagen Scirocco. After Ford stopped selling the European Capri after the 1978 model year, their legitimate presence in this hotly contested segment was a bit limited. Their main initial competitor honestly was supposed to be a “pony” car: the Mustang II.
As I’ve written before:
The 1974 Mustang II was actually downsized so drastically that it fit into the small coupe market and left the niche of larger Pony cars wide open for the Camaro to make inroads. The larger (and much better) 1979 Fox-bodied Mustang helped solve some of those problems, yet now the market for a smaller coupe needed to be addressed. Ford did just that in 1982 when they sort of gave us the “little” Mustang that I’ve been suggesting. The issue was that the car that they gave us to fill that space wasn’t particularly good.
The Ford EXP (and Mercury twin LN7) were coupes based on the Escort that had just been released the year before, and they had a bunch of strikes against them from the start. First, despite having a decent amount of room in back, the cars were sold as two-seaters only; after the 1955-57 T-Bird Ford of all people should know is marketing death for a mainstream car. Second, the performance of the Escort on which the EXP was based on was less than stellar, with a whopping 70 horsepower and a zero to sixty time of over 14 seconds. Worse than that, the EXP didn’t weigh any less than the five-passenger Escort so you were gaining absolutely nothing in performance and handling over the more practical car.
The styling wasn’t bad overall, but the front end proved to be extremely polarizing. The vast majority of viewers felt the frog-eyed face was not particularly appealing or just flat out ugly. Talk about a car introduced in an era where adding pop-up headlamps could have turned it into something potential buyers would have instantly associated with “sporty.” Of course, they didn’t do that.
I forgot to mention that the EXP shared the early Escort’s horribly boxy and cheap-looking instrument panel with a stuck-on extra set of gauges behind the gear shift, best read by lying down in the cargo area, if you could fit. Yes, somehow Ford ignored the fact that things like the Celica and 200SX had back seats.
Reportedly, Ford had hoped to sell upwards of 200,000 EXPs and LN7s each year, but combined sales were only 133,403 for 1982. This number dropped off a cliff to a mere 24,225 cars in 1983 with the Mercury version selling only a mere 4,528 units before getting the axe. Sales didn’t recover, and Ford pulled the plug midway through the 1985 model year.
Oddly enough, that wasn’t the end of the EXP.
Factory EXPloration
As the eighties wore on, the Escort finally received more powerful engines plus styling and chassis tweaks that didn’t exactly create a world beater but certainly made it more competitive with the Japanese onslaught. Despite this, the EXP variant never matched the critical and public acclaim of subcompact-based sports coupes such as the Honda Civic CRX. To many, the failure of the EXP was as plain as the nose on its ugly duckling face. If the front end was the most objectionable part of this little sports coupe, then that’s the first thing that needed to be fixed, but was it worth the investment in developing an all-new front clip? Probably not, but reportedly, a group of Ford factory workers who built the poor EXP didn’t want to see it die and had an idea for how to save it (more on that next).
You see, for mid-way through the 1985 model year, Ford introduced a revised Escort that featured a much more aerodynamic nose with flush composite headlamps and, on GT versions, a nearly blanked-off body-colored radiator grille. Cool new wheels and rocker treatments were also a welcome improvement, and it drove pretty well, too.
In a 1986 comparison test, the Escort GT came in fourth behind the GTI, the Acura Integra, and Toyota FX16, but five years earlier, it would have been unthinkable for any Escort to be competitive at all.
Beyond the GT’s revisions that I mentioned, the rest of the bodyshell remained essentially the same, with the new body parts bolting right onto the old car. When I say “old car,” I mean any pre-1985 Ford Escort or Mercury Lynx, including the EXP.
The two-seater coupe was not without fans, and a number of them were apparently personnel on the line that built the EXP alongside the other hatchbacks and wagons. As the possibly apocryphal story shared by Hemmings and Paul Niedermeyer at Curbside Classic (among others) goes, a group of Ford factory workers saw the new Escort body and mechanical components, heard that the EXP was heading for an early grave, and decided to literally put two and two together.
As a kid, listening to the silly Johnny Cash song “One Piece At A Time” about a Cadillac assembly line worker who sneaks parts out of the factory in his lunchbox, I always assumed that these individuals had some mad skills. The individuals employed on the Ford Escort line apparently did possess such abilities to some degree. Supposedly, an EXP was taken from the line and a same-color new 1985 ½ nose grafted over the front.
Also, the EXP by then had the “bubble window” hatchback taken from the short-lived and now-dead Mercury LN7 version of the EXP. Unlike the notchback of the early Ford car, this hatch formed more of a fastback roofline that suited the car far better.
The formerly sleepy-eyed EXP took on a new, awake-and-ready-for-action appearance that reportedly caught the attention of upper management. This sort-of-prototype was eventually viewed by none other than Ford President Donald Peterson, who went ahead and approved the new EXP for production. Why not? Compared with the release of the upcoming Taurus at the time, this revived car likely cost next to nothing in tooling and development and could get more years out of the EXP body shell that was only three years old at that point.
I have no trouble believing this often-told story. Truth be told, when I first saw the 1985 ½ EXP, it looked less like something the Ford designers came up with and more like a front-end swap that a body shop might have accomplished. Or, you know, crafty factory workers – so I feel the story is highly plausible. If so, it’s a great anybody-can-make-a-difference tale about beating corporate bureaucracy.
The new EXP received its own symmetrical grille with a single slot at the bottom to differentiate it from the asymmetric Escort GT. The rest of the body shell remained essentially the same, suffering from the same visual issues as before. You see, the firewall and lower door height of the EXP had to be shared with the more upright Escort, making the body below the beltline seem especially thick. Ford tried to alleviate that with flat black trims below the side windows to fool the eye into thinking the glass was bigger; it works, but only sort of.
Naturally, the modification shared with the new Escorts made for a much better driving car. This white one shown is the “Luxury” version that had a 1.9-liter four making 90 horsepower, or 20 up from the original car.
Still, the EXP to have had was the “Sport Coupe” model that was adjacent to the Escort GT with the upgraded suspension and brakes. The engine received multi-port fuel injection for a bump to 106 horsepower; this would raise to 115 by 1987, which was still admittedly five short of output of the short-lived ’84-85 EXP Turbo (but without the dreaded lag). Here’s the EXP Sport Coupe right next to the Escort GT to give you a good idea of the similarities and differences:
With the 15-inch wheels and ground effects, the EXP still wasn’t exactly something that would have wowed them in Turin but it was a much more palatable mix of ingredients than this little sport coupe had ever been before. The interior of the Sport Coupe had Recaro-like sport seats with the donut-hole headrests:
The 1984-on U.S. Escort dashboard was way, way better than the 1981-83 version with more rounded shapes and better detailing:
Personally, I never really hated the original EXP’s funky “eyelid” nose; remember, we’re the Autopian where funky is good. I always accepted that the “new” front end was more conventional and easier to accept at first glance but lacked character. Still, how did the public feel about it?
EXPired Again
Despite getting a warmer reception than the “toad eyed” original, the revived EXP still didn’t become the success that Ford wanted. Sales went up slightly in 1986 to nearly 31,000 cars compared to previous year’s 26,462, but they dropped again in ’87 before Ford once again pulled the plug on the EXP, this time for good, in 1988.
Still, Ford moved over 60,000 examples of the updated coupe that never would have sold had the EXP been left for dead in ’85. The revived EXP kept their seat warm in the compact front drive sports coupe sector; a market that they would fully capitalize on right after the EXP’s demise with the underappreciated 1988 Probe: essentially an American-made Japanese Mazda sport coupe.
The second generation EXP was a better mock-import coupe than the first one, but sometimes the only way to beat them is to join them.
Top graphic image: Ford
The second version was a handsome car.
I was peak High School car-nut when the EXP and such was a thing. I was also still “Buy Merican Dammit” (but my POS V-Dub phase was about to begin). The Escort held a lot of promise at the time for being a Honda-Toyota alternative but one could tell, they were not vehicles that would be on the road as viable transportation much more than the payment book. Seeing an Escort GT was cause for some envy but the frog eye XP was not. It just looked bad. – – –
A pal had a ’66 Mustang GT Fastback as his first car (originally his father’s) but was totaled when he was t-boned by a drunk driver. Insurance cut him a fair check but his parents gave in to reason and bought a new Escort. He was no longer a car guy, just a guy with a car BUT, he could catch air in it, loaded with 4 guys, if you braved heading down Spacek Rd and went at least 40mph over the train tracks.
The GT and 2nd gen EXP were one of the few times in the 70’s or 80’s when the Big 3 got a small car right. But Detroit never stuck will small cars in any meaningful way and it would be years until they made another good one.
I always liked the second gen EXP as well as it’s sister, the Escort GT. Considered it as a poor young man’s Mustang GT. I’d not mind having a second gen right now. It would remind me of a time when Ford was on fire, with it’s V8 GT, Thunderbird Turbo Coupe, Mustang SVO and Bronco II. Ford Motorsport for aftermarket parts for your ‘Stang. Competent car guys at the helm in Donald Peterson and over at SVO, Michael Kranefuss. IMSA Mustangs with tiny turbo’d 4’s breathing fire out their exhausts. Ford at it’s very peak of competence and quality built, enthusiasts cars.
I like these. I’d drive one
The guitarist in a basement rock/metal band I was the bass player in had one of these and liked the fact a Marshall 4 x 12 speaker cabinet would fit quite nicely in the cargo space under the hatch
Straight or slant cab? Those are big.
You can get it in. You can never get it out.
Slant cab 4×12, though he never complained about getting it out
On a side note, in another basement band I was in the that guitarist could fit his Marshall slant 4×12 into the trunk of his mid 90’s Ford Thunderbird
I believe that. Those were not small cars.
I still have 4×12 cab but it’s likely never leaving the house again due to persistent back problems. Carrying the amp head up some stairs caused a herniated disc, so the whole rig stays inside now.
My sisters shared one of these (in red), and I definitely took several rides in it by laying down in the enormous cargo area.
Cars that appear to be big enough for back seats but don’t have them are almost as big of a pet peeve of mine as cars that look like hatchbacks but aren’t
The CRZ, modern Z cars, and Reatta are all sort of in that list, along with the EXP.
The final Karmann Ghias, too, although I understand that was because Volkswagen engineers couldn’t figure out how to fit seat belts in the back. But, I mean, how hard did they try?
I think I recall reading once that the original version, much like the Bugeye Sprite, was designed to incorporate pop-ups, but cost-cutting nixed them in the 11th hour
There was an EXP concept with pop ups that I’ve seen.
My Grandpa bought a 1982 EXP. I helped him drive that pos 700 miles to see my Mom.
That piece of shit vapor locked like 6 times even though it was brand new.
We finally made it to Mom’s.
He stayed there a week. As soon as he got home it was traded in on a new Honda Accord.
And life was good again.
We definitely didn’t cram 7 people into one of these (three on the back shelf, two in the hatch area) going to high school in the mid-90s. My buddy bought an ’87 from a neighbor for $400 and we all beat the brakes off that poor thing. Absolute legend in our hearts.
Yeah, My Buddy Steve was a September Birthday dude. He got his dad’s 86 EXP for a first car. it was similarly a clown car for catching rides home until we were all old enough to drive what we could get a hold of.
I’m sure I’m alone but I prefer the original face. It has more character.
You’re not alone.
Yeah, I agree on that, the Mk1 was at least distinctive, looked a bit less like the cut down Escort it was
In 1984-early ’85 Ford offered the Escort LX on the lines of the LTD LX. Basically a 4-door (or wagon!) Escort GT. This grille looks like it was meant for a continuation of that concept. In the end they kept the designation but debased it to just a plusher base-engine car.
I worked in the body shop of a Ford dealership in the late 80’s.I don’t remember who did the work but we actually had a new one that was a convertible.It wasn’t done very well but it sold pretty quickly.One of my co workers was a body builder and he used to love showing off how he could lift the rear of those EXP’s.It was actually pretty impressive to a 16 year old.
There are a few pictures online of (maybe all the same car) them. One says something like convertible made by Dynamic Conversions of Hillsdale MI. The windshield frame looks about as sturdy well done pasta and the windshield glass oddly looks like a flat panel of glass. It could just be the top frame of the windshield with a flat trim piece to easily accept a cheap convertible top.
I bought an ’87 5-speed EXP in about 1996 to commute in, I loved that weird-looking thing, put 100K miles on it without anything breaking other than a fuel pump and timing belt(non-interference). It got excellent gas mileage and kept up with traffic fine as long as you beat the crap out of the poor TBI 1.9L, I would have loved the port-injected GT motor, but alas.
With it’s huge hatch glass and giant Merkur-esque rear wing, the hatch was incredibly heavy; the hatch struts were starting to tear the sheet metal where they mounted to the hatch. I had to weld up the sheet metal while being terrified that some errant slag was going to shatter the rear glass, those were hard to find even in the late 90’s. The cargo capacity was fantastic, I moved appliances and highboy dressers with it.
If i found a clean one, I’d buy it just for the nostalgia, but I’m sure they’re all gone by now, I haven’t seen a non-frogeye one in ten years.
The lack of a backseat is my favorite part of these things. I’ve always thought Ford knew of the forthcoming Fiero and figured offering no backseat but a cargo area was a way to split the difference and draw buyers away from GM.
My first car was a white 1982 Mercury LN7 with a blue interior (bought used in 1988). It was such a rebadged Ford that it still had some Ford EXP branded trim bits inside. My friends enjoyed lying in the back and looking out the bubble window when I was driving us around, though.
1) Ford would do a much better job with the ZX2 coupe later, which had a backseat and the much better Zetec engine. The 03 one-year-only ZX2 fascia still fascinates me that it existed. 2) The 85 refresh really was much better. In my neck of the woods EXP’s were kind of an upper middle class (for the region) teenage kids car, usually girls, whereas boys had Escort GTs. 3) I remember a magazine review (probably MT) with a headline something to the effect of “If You Absolutely Must Have a 2-Seat Car”. 4) In high school I worked at a drive-thru restaurant and a retired couple were frequent customers and had one of these, always spotless. I remember them because they were cute and “active” seniors, not like the fat decrepit ones that predominated. They played tennis, were fit for their age, often wore cute sporty clothes, and you could just tell from the way they looked at each other and interacted they were still getting it on. Regularly. That’s the kind of senior I want to be. 5) mid-80’s Ford seemed really on top of their game and almost radical, vs. stodgy GM. This car was a decent job of tidying up earlier work that wasn’t so good, but at least they put forth the effort.
Thanks for the good laugh about old people doin it…
The real trick is finding someone and trying to visualize what they may look like 40-50 years down the road.
Nah. Just fall properly in love with each other and share that affection through small moments of kindness and open appreciation every day. If you meaningfully hug someone every day, that is a solid foundation.
At that point, the love is way more than appearances.
Good point. I should have indicated my sarcasm. My bad.
They were really sweet! Like teenagers on a date.
Aww!
You’re right about the ZX2. It was marketed as the “Escort ZX2” for its first few years of production, and then as plain “ZX2” its last year of production after the regular Escort had gone out of production in the U.S. The ZX2 was probably what the EXP should have been from start. I remember them as being surprisingly popular when they were sold new, but then so was the last generation Escort that was sold in the U.S.
Wow this is actually a pretty good ad for an Escort. Want to be cool and fit? Buy an EXP or Escort GT? Never mind the power steering fluid squiring everywhere and the tie rod that broke off again.
I lived in Michigan at the time. The combination of “buy local” and Friends & Family discounts and the jacked-up prices on Japanese cars made possible by Voluntary Import Restrictions made the EXP a viable alternative to something like the CRX. Remember that the base CRX wasn’t any more powerful than a Civic.
Back in high school a friend of mine was looking to buy a car, and told me he almost bought a Mustang*, but passed on it because it didn’t have a backseat. I pressed him on this because Mustangs always have backseats. Some used car lot dealer was advertising an EXP as a Mustang EXP. I also had basically an aunt offer to take me for a ride in her roommate’s Mustang, it was also an EXP. People were confused in the 80s.
*He bought an 87 Monte Carlo SS that he still has today.
Does he still have the mullet that was included with every 87 Monte Carlo? 🙂
He never had a mullet, half of my quick-lube co-workers did though.
Round these parts Monte Carlos were pretty ubiquitous, only one of the people I knew that owned one sported a mullet at any point. Which out of a sample size of like 15 is pretty representative of the population in general at the time.
What alternative 1987 timeline were you living in? I even tried to grow a mullet but my hair wouldn’t go further than halfway between my neck and shoulders. It was like nope, I’m done. Future you will thank me one day for no embarrassing photos.
The alternative timeline of the 1990s.
I had an ’89 SHO in the early 90’s with the basketweave wheels. I really liked the Thunderbird Supercoupe twist wheels, and mused to my mom about seeing if they would fit my car. She said that if I did that, all of her friends would think it was a Thunderbird. As a car guy, that was an eye opener about how casual car owners see the car world. How do you mistake an obvious Taurus for the swoopy Superbird?
For additional reading, Collectible Automobile recently had an article about these. I’m not near my copy, but I recall they recounted the same story about the redesign.
Officially, the 2nd gen EXP was called the Escort EXP, just in case people couldn’t tell it was related the the regular Escort.
A kid in high school pretended his 2nd gen EXP was a Mustang and refused to accept it was just an Escort. I liked the look of the car, but it was definitely an Escort in everything but appearance.
Oh that reminds me of a kid who had a Cavalier Z24 that he constantly referred to as a “Cavvy.” He didn’t pretend it was anything it wasn’t, he just really liked talking about the Cavvy.
I always thought the original frog-eye was kinda cool. What do I know?
I also assumed they just renamed the Escort to the Escort EXP and added a badge plus stripes or something.
I was in the Navy in ’86 down in Orlando and the subject of our cars came up. Someone said they had to buy special oil because they owned a sports car. I asked what they had, ready to hear a Triumph or something. He said a Ford EXP.
I liked the EXP back in the 80s. (low bar)
My neighbor was going to buy a new car for her granddaughter who was a year younger than I. I suggested the exp as it fit only one more teenage girl in it but no she got her an Escort GT and it had 300 miles on it at the end of the first day. It was totalled with a year.
Same thing happened to a girl in my high school. Care to guess how many guys could fit in the back on a Friday night. Answer, more than you think.
There was a house we passed on my bus ride home in high school that had not one, but two EXP’s in the garage. There must have been some fans out there. I also agree about the original nose. Looking back on it now I don’t find it objectionable, but it was “weird” in the early 80’s.
Count me in for preferring the original EXP nose and flat rear glass. It was funky, angular and futuristic in its own way. I once built an MPC plastic model kit of it.
I will say that the revised, Escort-derived front harmonized better with the LN7’s bubble-back window.
Footnote — I know that there are complaints about some modern cars that require the front cap to be removed in order to service the headlights, but it’s not a new thing. I recall the EXP’s manual stating that to change out a headlight (they were sealed beam units) you had to un-bolt and remove the entire urethane nose of the car. Just one more strike against it, really, that was rectified in the facelifted version using more conventional Escort-derived parts.
Of course, if you removed the front to change a headlight, it was of paramount importance to make sure it was properly bolted back on or risk re-enacting this infamous skit…