Basic information on the car:
Make: Mercury
Model: Grand Marquis LS Colony Park
Model year: 1988
Manufacture year: 1987
Most recent entry: 15 Nov 2020
Mileage at the moment: 51 867 (627 miles driven so
Maintenance costs:
More costs, I mean, fuel:
spritmonitor.de link: https://www.spritmonitor.de/en/detail/1186576.html
All costs are calculated assuming that 1 USD = 4 PLN, and 1 EUR = 4.5 PLN.
So, after a successful introduction, I guess it's time for a more detailed story of my car - a MY'88 Colony Park that spent most of its life in Poland, and will seemingly continue it further, while most of the contemporary, large USDM wagons finished their lives as hearses, and were finally transferred to graveyards themselves. Let's start with some personal background, and then move to the car itself. In general, if one prefers to start from that point, head to the second post.
Ok, let's begin. I am not a really old man, but not a very young man, too. I was born in 1987, so my childhood happened to line up with the transformation (from a communist system into a something capitalism-like), and the post-transformation era. Apart from a lot of not-nice things (mafia clashes, gang bombings, collapse of the financial system etc.), there were some quite enjoyable: the TV decided to buy a lot of movies and series from abroad - mostly from the US, and Western Europe, but some Japanese anime were also imported. Some of them were aired starting from a random, not the first, episode, some of them lacked some episode during the seasons, some others carried completely irrational names ("A glass trap" for the "Die Hard" is a brilliant example, but eg. National Lampoon series were also massacred in the translation...). Nevertheless, these series and movies usually depicted a certain type of cars, not really seen in the central/eastern Europe: large sedans and wagons, in a boxy shape, with lots of dingling parts, lamps, and chromes. Not much of that could be seen on the roads. A typical car was something like this:
Or like this:
They were obsolete, crappy, non-reliable, you name it. They are valued now, but mostly by those, who didn't have the nightmarish experience of driving them, or being driven inside. My family got something a bit different, a Dacia 1310p:
So nothing really good as well. Rotting at an alarming rate... but getting a better car was beyond the financial reach of my mum. For me, the only chance of seeing these interesting, large cars, was to watch "Kojak" or "Father Dowling's Mysteries" on the TV. And, sometimes, there was an US stretch parked close to my home - I believe it could have been the workhorse of the US Consulate in Kraków, as the Consul himself lived nearby. I recall it had an ornament badge with the dealer's/body-maker's name, something like "Pontanim" it was? But nevertheless, getting an US car was not an option at that time. In fact, the Dacia has been replaced by something totally opposite: a Lada.
It wasn't t h a t bad. Needed a lot of force to turn the wheel (power steering is an ameyrikan-capitalist thing that is useless for a brave worker in a communist paradise, isn't it?), was dancing on ice in the winter, but was quite reliable. One thing that was always dead, was the onboard clock. Really dunno why, maybe it was just broken? This was the first car I tried "driving", when I was some 17 years old. It was the last communist car we owned, and when the engine started to show an excessive wear, it was decided to phase it out. Mum wanted a large sedan, or a station wagon. The initial try was a VW Passat B3, which my mum liked for its blobby shape, but they were too expensive. Another option, that we aimed at, was a Volvo 740/760. There was one sensible car, but Mum assumed that a 2.8 engine will burn a lot of fuel. Well, I own one now and no, it is not an excessive burner. Similar to that one thwack, which was finally bought - the one like that below:
It was battered. It was worn out. It was burning a lot of fuel. It was maintained poorly. A three-port joint is broken? Hey, let's short-connect the two most important ones, and put a l a r g e s c r e w to block the remaining one. And more like this. The car was a total crap - and it ended crashed into a trunk of some idiot, who decided that using turn indicators is something he does not need to do. Finally, mum got her Passat, which then stayed with us till... well, it is still in the garage, lol.
Looks like I have no current photos of the actual car at hand. Will have to make some... The Passat served as a main family car from 2005 to 2014, when it was replaced by a small A2. But for now, let's get back to mine car tastes. Right after finishing the driver's licence training, I started looking for a car for me. It wasn't an American one, but it was quite close enough: I was looking for a boxy sedan, namely the Audi 100 C3. And, for the first time, I have encountered the US version of an EU car. Unfortunately, I assumed that it was not in a very good shape... and settled for an EU one that was also a total crap, and was modified a bit to resemble the USDM one. With the 5mph bumpers, especially!
I drove it for a couple of years, finally changing it for an A8 as the "long distance" car. The idea of getting an USDM car was dead for a couple of years... till I made a decision that the Passat has to be phased out, too. It served as the basic "heavy duty", daily car tirelessly - but it was getting a bit obsolete, and "not fun". No air conditioning, just the basic instruments, no ABS... driving it during a snow storm was quite a problem! I turned my eyes to a missed opportunity, the Volvo 700/900 series... but describing them would be quite a lengthy thing, so let's say I will save it for another forum section, and another day. The two drive-able Volvo's have their own topics on the TurboBricks forum, so if anyone wants to learn more about them, I will gladly share a link.
And I am out of space for attachments. Let's close this one and start a new post...
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