Anyone with car knowledge here?

Thats one car I hate more than others. But I will never have a problem admitting its probably the best built car out there.

 

Thats my point. It was only 98-02 that it was a FWD hatchback. The VW was always that layout. American cars like to recycle names. Like when they slapped the word Hemi on the new dodge engines. Its nothing like the old hemi. And considering nowadays a hemispherical combustion chamber is common its not even a big deal anymore. But the name is retro and sounds cool for sure.

 

what no bobbleheaded dog in the back window?

 

I personally think hondas are over hyped. I kniow several used to be die hard loyal hondatypes to switch to other brands because the hondas have declined on build quality.

 

Yeah, the US companies get all nostalgic and do recycle names, but only that 4 year streak sullied the cougar's name and made it a fwd.

Don't get me started on the hemi name. Ford had hemispherical combustion chambers before Chrysler did.
One very smart marketing move was for them to use the hemi name again.

 

My bimmer has a few modifications like CAI, chip, exhaust etc.....will have her supercharged hopefully by the end of summer.

I will give you the standard bimmer answer for mods:

Needs clears and a drop. LOL!

 

The newest generation of cougar is not really a cougar. I mean it is but it isnt. Let me explain. It is esentially the 3rd generation ford probe. Apparantley the sales didnt go good enough for ford to put a ford badge on it and try to sell it again.

As for perfomance mods i would just throw a exhaust system on it , and cold air intake and call it good for the time being until you do some more research on the engine and what other people have done and been succesfull. (im sure there is forum for this car or even a car with the same motor) svt contour???

 

I don't know if I would call it a 3rd gen probe, but I see your point. If was more of a way to keep the cougar name than anything else. Ford never cared about probe sales, ever since the original probe was supposed to replace the mustang for 1987 and it got rightfully shuffled to a whole separate car while the mustang remained rwd.

I posted a link or 2 (like 10 pages ago LOL) about mods to a FWD cougar, or the contour. The cougar is a shortened contour chassis, so those most of those mods will work. The SVT contour did have a duratec 2.5l v6, essentially like the cougar, but the SVT had enough upgrades to give it around 30hp more than the 170 hp cougar. You could easily bolt ona set of SVT contour heads and cams which I am certain are different than the ones on your cougar. Or, do the old 3.0 duratec V6 swap that many contour guys do. At most there might be a minor hood modification to the cougar, but adding a .5 liter bigger motor and its more hp and tq would be a simple swap for cheap.