Rare Rides: This Fox-Platform Ghia Concept Wants to Probe Your Bank Account
Our august editor Mark pointed out to me how I might bring some of the rare, quirky, and oddball cars I’m always posting to our internal Slack chat to you. So here we are, with a segment I’m going to call Rare Rides.
Here’s our first entry, from a Hemmings listing, is a fantastic looking Ghia Probe I concept from all the way back before automatic transmissions and air conditioning: 1979.
It debuted for the 48th annual Frankfurt International Motor show, and — unlike many concept vehicles — it actually works. It’s powered by the 2.3-liter engine from a contemporary Mustang. Many of you will undoubtedly take issue with this engine, then tell us all about why it’s so awful. The design managed a drag coefficient of just .22, which is both impressive and important in a post-OPEC Crisis world. For comparison, General Motors tells me a 2014 Corvette Stingray has a drag coefficient of .28.
Underneath all the glorious and dramatic coachwork, though, sits Ford’s familiar Fox platform. Sajeev should probably buy it and turn it into a Mark IX Ghia 3.5 EcoBoost. I know it’s possible.
More photos are available at Hemmings.
[Images: Scott Grundfor Co. via Hemmings]
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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Goodness that would look SO CHOICE next to TTAC's Ford Sierra. FYI: that's not the original motor. When that was new, the only 2.3 available had a blow thru carb. That motor is 1983-ish.
For some reason, I look at this and all I see is a Chrysler Daytona Shelby that mated with a GM EV1