Monday, June 3, 2024

Failed Facelift: 1st to 2nd Generation Ford Scorpio

Ford's Scorpio was produced in Germany 1985-1998 and sold in the European market, including the United Kingdom.  First-generation (1985-1994) Scorpios were branded Granadas in the UK, but second-generation (1994-1998) cars were called Scorpios, rather then Granadas.

I wrote about the second-generation Scorpio here in a post titled "Ford's Controversial Scorpio II in Context."

As I noted, that design was subject of a good deal of criticism.  And those cars are reported to have sold poorly.  That said, I could not locate any sales data via the Internet to validate that claim (though such numbers might be lurking somewhere).

From a styling perspective, I rate the 1994-98 Scorpio design as a major facelift rather than a new generation because key body elements were carryovers from the initial Scorpio 4-door sedan.  The only engineering change of note related to styling was a trivial wheelbase increase of 0.4 inches (9 mm).

The images below compare the 1994-98 design to the 1985-94 version.  The lack of good comparative pictures on the Web prevented me from showing details as clearly as I prefer.

Gallery

German Ford Scorpio Mark I - factory photo

German Ford Scorpio Mark II - publicity photo
Frontal styling is completely new.  The grille design seems to have been the main subject of criticism, thought the headlight assemblies added to a "fishy" appearance.  Keep in mind that serious wind-tunnel derived design was still a fairly new thing in the early 1990s when the facelift was styled.  Scorpios were not the only cars with soft looking front ends: think Oldsmobile Aurora of 1994.

1992 British Ford Grenada Mark III - Barons Auctions photo

1998 British Ford Scorpio - car-for-sale photo
Apologies for not showing cars facing the same direction, but these were the best side-views I could find.  Passenger compartment zones are almost the same aside from some window framing softening at the C-pillar.  The B-pillar door cutline below the beltline looks curved on the facelift rather than nearly straight on the 1992 car.  However, photos of other Scorpios indicate that there likely was no cutline change here for the facelift.  The facelift's C-pillar cutline seems to show a slight alteration above the wheel opening, but that's due to the wide-angle lens used for the photo: the cutlines are probably the same.

1990 British Ford Grenada Mark III - factory photo

1998 British Ford Scorpio - car-for-sale photo
Major shape softening at the rear.  On the passenger zone, the beltline shoulder was softened for the facelift.


































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