99 Conti curiosity question

[Silver Cobra]

When I bought my 98 Conti, I was amazed at how much power and torque it had. That was until I read about the 99 Conti that got a 15hp increase. To me, that's a lot. I'm curious to know what did Ford do to boost it that much. I'm wondering if I can do it to mine? :confused: Anyone know? smile.gif

[Nick]

I would guess its in computer programming because I never found any hardware changes. I thought I read they had detuned it for better gas mileage.

[pro-five-oh]

I think both years had the same HP. It was 250 for the first 1995 model, but I thought 1997-up had 275??? :confused:

[Silver Cobra]

Pro what's the matter? I thought you knew everything? ;) I'm j/k :D . But from 95-98 Contis had 260hp/270lb torque. In 99 hp went up to 275 and torque smidged up to 275 as well.

Nick. Thanks for the quick reply http://www.regalgs.org/forum/smiles/ylsuper.gif . I figured that was it. I knew Ford would do something like that. I heard it was also detuned to protect the tranny from any "real" power output. To me the Conti's chassis is pretty much a stretched Taurus/Sable. Someday though, I'll be seeing low 13's in the 1/4 :D

[ December 11, 2003: Message edited by: Silver Cobra ]

[Nick]

You're not too far from the truth. The Continental was based on the Taurus platform. Any update on the fog lights?

[Silver Cobra]

quote:You're not too far from the truth. The Continental was based on the Taurus platform. Any update on the fog lights?

I've been busy lately working a lot, doing the whole Christmas "routine" and stuff like that. Fog lights won't be coming till spring next year because I'm saving up for school,textooks, equipment costs etc. I have enough saved for tint so I'll do that first in January or so. I went back to looking and here's what I found.

I could easily spend a day or two looking at all the makes and models of fog lights but I'd rather not :rolleyes: . So I found a helpful link. Click me (http://www.itsrealstuff.com/html/hella-fog_clear.html)

I clicked on pretty much all the frames that pertained to fog lights. There's quite a range of styles and prices. What I want is something that will have exactly the same colour and intensity (give or take) as the bright white driving bulbs I'll put on. Blue and any other colour scream rice to me so I'll only take white. I found a perfect picture that cleary identifies what I want. Different car, different lights but same idea. Looky looky :D

http://images.cardomain.com/member_images/12/web/396000-396999/396692_82_full.jpg

I'll try to recess mine the best that I can but It won't be like that. smile.gif

[ December 12, 2003: Message edited by: Silver Cobra ]

[pro-five-oh]

Take it from me, those lights don't do crap on the road. The lights are just too small and ricey (blue, white, yellow, whatever) to cast a decent beam of light on the road to supplement the stock lighting.

That other Conti you showed with the larger driving lights will make a nice difference, they actually seemed to have a decent lens. I have used the small projector (rice) lights like that SHO has, and they are useless. Even with 55w bulbs in them!!! All show, no go.

If you really want to see at night, I think a wiring harness adapter with relays for higher wattage headlights is what you need. I've been meaning to do that, but since I have a spare set of driving lights, I'll just slap them on my Mark instead. smile.gif

[Silver Cobra]

http://images.cardomain.com/member_images/6/web/342000-342999/342691_4_full.jpg

This one? Apparently he has Piaa 100watt driving lights and Piaa 100watt fog lights as well. IIRC, Piaa makes expensive stuff.

I'll be honest here. I didn't want those tiny fog lights. I got really tired of looking :rolleyes: . The style like the ones on the Conti are the ones that top my list. The point of the second Taurus pic was to just give an idea about how I want my car to be presented in the eyes of others smile.gif. Matching colour, intensity etc. Visual candy! :D

[Nick]

Even if you add in brighter bulbs, the beam pattern still sucks, but it should help somewhat. I really want to try a set of Hella FF50 or FF75 lights. They're more expensive than Pilot crap, but they have higher quality and they are still cheaper than PIAA. The overall shape of the lights is ovular so I think it might match the car. What makes mounting so difficult is the rounded bumper. I want to try to mount the lights as far to the sides as possible and cut out that section where the bars are connected. The only other mounting postion I can think of is in the bumper a la Bonneville.

lol Did you notice the SHO owner mounted the right side fog light further back than the left and is consequently lighting up his bumper?

[pro-five-oh]

quote:Originally posted by Nick:
lol Did you notice the SHO owner mounted the right side fog light further back than the left and is consequently lighting up his bumper?

No but I did now! LOL!

[Silver Cobra]

FF50

http://www.puma-access.com/hella/ff/ff50.jpg

FF75

http://www.puma-access.com/hella/ff/ff75.jpg

I like the top one. Looks kinda classy. I like the second one too for it's larger dimensions. I'm perfectly happy with sticking it in the middle of the bumper! Here's a link I found to the lights you mentioned. http://www.puma-access.com/hella/ff/ffsmall.html

[pro-five-oh]

The overall length and design of the Conti's headlights would tell me that the second light you posted would look better installed on the car. Just my $0.02. smile.gif