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Junkyard Gem: 1981 Mercury Cougar XR-7

The story of the Mercury Cougar involves more plot twists and unexpected digressions than that of just about any other Detroit car, with successive Cougar generations based on the Ford Mustang (1967-1973), the Ford Torino and/or Thunderbird (1974-1979), various Fox Fords including the Thunderbird (1980-1988), the MN12 Thunderbird/Lincoln Mark VIII (1989-1997), and the Ford Mondeo (1999-2002). There were wagon and sedan Cougars for brief periods, just to confuse everybody, and the rakish XR-7 Cougars sometimes lived on different platforms from their ordinary non-XR-7 counterparts. I think the Late Malaise Era Fox XR-7s are among the most interesting of the bunch, so I was quite excited to spot this tan-over-gold '81 in a Denver yard. I tried to count the number of screaming-cat badges on and in this car and gave up once I hit a dozen. The steering wheel, door panels, C pillars, center console, and — of course — the hood ornament all boast snarling felines. Earlier Cougars had emblems showing full side views of stalking catamounts, but the Cougar logo for the 1980s showed just the head. This car got the optional center console, which I hear is quite a rarity. You had to pay $174 extra (that's around $513 in 2020 dollars) for an AM/FM/cassette audio system in the '81 Cougar, but at least the air conditioning was standard equipment. Believe it or not, thieves used to steal these radios. Kumpf Lincoln-Mercury still exists in Englewood (as Landmark Lincoln), and the yard that now houses this car can be found just 15 miles up Broadway on the north side of Denver.  The padded landau roof hasn't fared so well beneath the fierce Colorado sun, but overall this car seems very solid. Sadly, only the Mustangs and (once in a long while) Fairmonts get much love from the Fox Ford crowd these days. Three Mercury "wire wheel" hubcaps and one from a Lincoln. The base engine in the 1981 XR-7 was the "Thriftmaster" 200-cubic-inch (3.3-liter) straight-six, but very few XR-7 buyers would have refrained from checking the box for one of the two optional Windsor V8s. I can't tell if we're looking at the 255-cubic-inch (4.2-liter) version or the 302-cubic-inch (5.0-liter) one here, but real-world drivers might not have noticed the difference between the 120-horse 255 and the 130-horse 302, anyway. The non-XR-7 Fox Cougars had five-speed manual transmissions as base equipment (which nobody wanted), but all 1981 XR-7s had automatics.

Junkyard Gem: 1973 Mercury Montego MX Brougham Sawzall Convertible Edition

You know how it goes— the weather is warm, you want to do some top-down driving, and you lack a proper convertible... but you do have a hooptie Detroit car on one side of the garage and a big ol' Sawzall on the other. Put the two together and you have a Sawzall Convertible, which generally lasts for about one summer before it gets scrapped. Here's a fine example of such a car, photographed in a San Francisco Bay Area self-service junkyard. Most Sawzall Convertibles (yes, it should be called a roadster, but nobody does that) have raw, ragged metal edges, or maybe duct tape over the stumps of the amputated pillars, but someone went to the trouble to weld nice smooth metal covers over the hackage on this one. The windshield is gone. Instead, the windshield frame is ringed by tongue depressors held in place by gooey roofing tar. No, we don't know why. The Montego MX Brougham was a hot-selling personal luxury coupe in its day, selling for $3,041 in 1973. That's just under $17,000 in 2017 dollars. It must have been fun, cruising this thing on Bay Area streets with no roof and a rattle-can spray-bomb job. This one has the optional 400-cubic-inch V8 engine, rated at 171 horsepower. What would this car's original buyer have thought of its fate? This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. It's like a Marquis Brougham after you squish it in the car crusher! Featured Gallery Junked 1973 Mercury Montego MX Brougham Sawzall Convertible View 22 Photos Auto News Mercury Convertible Luxury Classics montego

Mercury Cougar from Bond film 'On Her Majesty's Secret Service' is up for auction

To a James Bond fan, this is a very cool and important car. This 1969 Mercury Cougar XR7 up for auction by Bonhams was one of three used during the filming of 1969's "On Her Majesty's Secret Service," the one-and-done film starring George Lazenby that's a dark horse favorite among many Bond fans (this one included, there's a Japanese-market 'OHMSS' poster hanging behind me as I type this). However, this was not James Bond's car in the movie. He drove an Aston Martin DBS, including in the film's pre-titles sequence when he follows Tracy di Vicenzo driving her bright red Cougar. She would go on to rescue him with it in Switzerland (hence the skis), sacrificing its pretty red paint and body work in a demolition derby on ice that they use to shake Blofeld's Benz-driving goons. Later, after getting caught in a blizzard, they seek refuge in a barn -- a pivotal scene in the film and one where this particular Cougar was apparently used.  ON HER MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE | Ice Car Race However, even without the Bond connection, this Cougar is a very cool car. It was one of only 127 in 1969 to be fitted with the top-of-the-line 428 CobraJet Ram Air V8 rated at 335 horsepower. Tracy had a serious muscle car. Bonham's doesn't seem to have thought to provide a Marti report, but I'm guessing the build of XR7, convertible and a color combo of matching red exterior and interior wasn't exactly a common one. Well, we know there were at least three. With skis and French number plates, too.  As for the '69 Cougar itself, this was the only year it looked like this: it got a new body for '69 that would last two years, but the horizontal grille slats that extended over the headlight doors (so cool!) didn't carry over to 1970. It looked worse, and it could easily be argued that it was only downhill from here for the Cougar.  The auction is set for December 16 and Bonhams is estimating a sale price of between $130,000 and $200,000. That certainly makes sense given the rarity of a CobraJet Cougar, the film connection and the complete restoration undertaken by the man who found it in a classified ad in the late 1980s. He originally just wanted it for the engine until he discovered the Bond connection. I actually saw this very car at the 50th Anniversary "Bond in Motion" exhibit at the Beaulieu Motor Museum in England back in 2013 (pictured below). There's also a model of the thing sitting next to me.