History 1963 Cougar... II

The '38 Mercury post got me searching around the internet for Mercury prototypes, and I remembered a model car my dad had of the 63 Mercury Cougar II... So I went online and found some pics and websites...

http://www.carstyling.ru/en/cars.1963_Ford_Cougar II.html
http://www.conceptcars.it/usa/ford/cougar2.htm
http://www.thelynxproject.org/

I always thought it was a beautiful car, at least as pretty as the '63 Corvette if not more, and apparently, designed before it... It would have given the 'Vette some sales competition...

These sites all say that the Peterson Museum has one of the two built... Does anybody have any pics of it from the Petersen Museum?

 

I remember seeing the car in person. I think it was at the World's Fair in NYC in the 60's.
There was a plastic model of the car, which I built and still have somewhere.
Some of the features I remember: transverse leaf spring for the front suspension and a panel between the tail lights that opened at speed to evacuate interior air pressure.
It was a really nice car and looked like it was complete enough to be easily put into production.

 

I have the model sitting on my shelf.

 

It may have been on a Cobra chassis

 

It was. The early SB Ford Cobra version. One of my favorite cars.
The IMC model was cool too. On the original issue the body was molded in red with metal flake in the plastic.

 

Mustang I 1961
Always liked this car too. Way ahead of it's time. Mid engined V-4.

 

That's the one my dad had... I remember it had some nice wheels and tires.... and that it burned really well when I put a firecracker in it.... I'm lucky to be alive.

 

Dang bratty kids!!

 

perhaps the ultimate cougar . . .

 

I wish some ambitious kit car company would re-pop the Cougar II body and glass....and design it to fit on one of the better Cobra kit chassis (Factory 5 perhaps?) ...that would be sweet.

Oh yeah... I still have the IMC model kit unbuilt....someday I'll build it.

 

IIRC, there was a Cougar II in the Detroit Auto History museum in '84-85.

 

Interesting how many people had this obscure model kit...I built it as a kid and still have it around here somewhere. Beautiful car.

 

its stiil at the det. hist. museum. they just had thier first open house there last week. it was quite a secret event. you had to call and get an invite, and it was only one day, never to happen again according to the news cast i saw.

 

I've always loved Cougars but have never seen that prototype. Thanks for posting it, that's bad.