CLUNKBUCKET

Everything but the same old cars

Mark of Excellence

By

lincoln_markiii

From the we’re not fooling department comes this 1971 Lincoln Continental Mark III. This embodiment of American luxury and style was purchased at a Goodguys car corral for the princely sum of 500 dollars by one Brad Walker. “For 500 bucks, it’s got some good bones”, said a smiling Brad out on the lawn. While the sled came stock with a 460 cubic inch V-8, Brad just happens to already have a 429 Ford Cobra jet engine out in his garage that might soon have a new home. 1971 was the last year for the big Mark III, which sent 365 horsepower through the three-speed automatic trans. We also solved a mystery for which fellow FoMoCo driver Steve McGarrett already knew the answer to. The War of the Worlds looking sensor located to port of the mighty Continental bridge is the AutoLamp, which senses oncoming headlamps, and automatically adjusts the Lincoln’s lamps accordingly. We were hoping that the Lincoln automatically charged and fired its laser if the other driver didn’t drop their high beams, but this would have likely been too expensive an option for 1971.

auto_lamp

Comments

  3. jeremy! says

    Wait, it flashes your lights at people running with their high beams on or turns off yours if it senses oncoming cars? [As far as we know – automatically switches to low beams when it senses oncoming lights. The lasers function may have been reserved for the military versions – Ed]

  4. casadelshawn says

    My old boss has one of these with ~8k miles. No foolin’, he bought it new. It gets driven around the neighborhood once a month, then wiped down with a diaper. Kind of a shame, IMHO. ‘Course, he does have a few other nice cars, like this one

  6. USA#1 says

    Those cars are freakin sweet! So is the 72 Mark 4 .
    Great buy for 5 hun! Lincoln should still
    build them like this today! The 72 Eldorado
    also had the highbeam sensor.

  8. Mark B. Morrow says

    Steve McGarrett drove a Mercury, not a Lincoln. [Mea Culpa! A major short-circuit on my part. The entire first season of Hawaii-Five-O on DVD is in the Clunkbucket collection. – ed]

  9. Myron Vernis says

    @USA#1: The Mark III design is classically elegant while the Mark IV looked best in Bugazzi get-up by Barris.