The origins of the 1966 - 1967 Mercury Comet are a tarradiddle of sticking to it : Having tried once and fail to join the rank and file of the important new intermediate stratum sweep the American automobile market in the early Sixties , Mercury made a second attempt a few age later on with a larger , burly Comet .
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1966 Mercury Comet Lineup
From the outset , the 1966 Mercury Comet card strove to secern the car from the Falcon via a longer wheelbase for coupes and sedan chair and more " authoritative " styling that included quadruplet headlamp . After Mercury ’s first stab at a true medium – the 1962 - 1963 Meteor – quickly faded , Comets that were farseeing , wider , and spacious than before assay to fill the role in 1964 - 1965.They were still very much " senior covenant , " however . That ’s not true of the 1966 Mercury Comet lineup . Finally , in 1966 , the Comet stopped being a compact and farm up into a genuine average .
1966 Mercury Comet Powertrains
The 1966 Mercury Comet powertrains useable during this time change widely . All Mercury Comets through this era ( including place wagons ) came with a choice of two basis locomotive engine . The more stinting alternative was the 200 - three-dimensional - in , inline , pushrod six rated at 120 horsepower . The more powerful alternative was a 289 V-8 rated at 200 HP . Beyond them in the catalogue of 1966 Mercury Comet powertrains was a choice of optional 390 - cubic - in V-8s with two - barrel carburetors , one rated at 265 horsepower for use with manual transmission and the other at 275 horsepower for reflexive - transmission car .
Mercury Comet Headlights
Why were there stacked headlights on the 1965 Ford and Mercury Comet , but not on the 1965 large Mercury or the Ford Fairlane?Motor Trendlooked into the question at the time . The most pictorial account given to the magazine derive from Bill Shenk , a clothes designer who worked in the Comet styling studio back in the Sixties . In 1997 , Bill created a little pamphlet explain that the stacked - headlight root word had initiate in 1962 - 1963 in the Mercury studio apartment . Ford Motor Company president Lee Iacocca and corporal sale handler Don Petersen had make out into the studio apartment one mean solar day , fell in sexual love with the stacked smell , and ask Gene Bordinat , the company ’s design vice United States President , to put them on the 1965 Ford . Before that , Ford had been working on adapting European - style rectangular headlamps to the 1965 Ford , but the company was get trouble get them legalized .
After Iacocca mandated that the Ford switch to stacked headlights , continued Shenk , the challenge became to make the 1965 Ford and Mercury look different . Bordinat insisted that Mercury employ side - by - side quad headlamps with a formal wicket . The 1965 Comet front pilot , though , had already been joyride for stacked headlight , so it went through that way . A. B. ( Buzz ) Grisinger , who ’d been Lincoln - Mercury ’s conception director during the tenner , validated the floor . Grisinger , still incisive in his 90s , substantiate that Mercury had indeed been working on a 1965 poser with stack headlight . But he tally that everyone – not just in Dearborn , but throughout the industry – was doing conception subject field with vertical headlights at that time . He remember that one day Bordinat came over and asked for an alternative musical theme so that the 1965 Mercury would n’t look like the 1965 Ford . The Ford Division side came from Joe Oros , who ’d been Ford ’s styling conductor in those day . Oros ’s story differed from Shenk ’s . He said that the 1965 Ford ’s stacked headlamp originated in a Ford studio apartment – not at Mercury – and concord to preeminence he ’d relieve from that era , work started on the 1965 Ford ’s stack headlamp in January 1962 . The date answered another question : Were Ford ’s vertical headlight inspired by the 1963 Pontiac Grand Prix ? patently not , unless Ford designers had somehow get a sneak peep at a preproduction Pontiac . Former Ford figure managing director Gale Halderman corroborated the story . Mr. Halderman , too , felt that the stacked headlights had originated at Ford rather than in a Mercury studio . He echo that the 1965 plan had so many thing croak simultaneously – among them the Mustang and the Galaxie – that tooling cost were critical . Bordinat , Halderman explicate , was a wizardry at keep tooling price down , and the creased , squarish 1965 Ford front wing was designed specifically to derogate tooling disbursal . Ford used a shallow stamping die and then stoop each buffer along its horizontal creese , so there was an economic reasonableness to put stacked headlight on the 1965 Ford , that being the volume line . Halderman recall that the 1965 big Ford programme was not a Benjamin Rush job , and he had no recollection of Iacocca or Petersen insisting that Ford use a theme developed by Mercury . It ’s most likely , he said , that Ford and Mercury were pursuing the same theme at the same time and , confirm Grisinger ’s financial statement , Mercury ’s translation was discourage by Bordinat in edict to keep Ford and Mercury visually different . Vertical headlights became something of a Sixties furor . Once constitute on the 1965 Comet , they stuck around for the next two model years . Ford ’s related intermediate Fairlane also adopted them in 1966 - 1967 , and aside from the aforementioned Pontiac and full - size Ford , various Cadillac , Buick , Plymouth , and AMC models also rollick stacked twinkle prior to 1969 .
On the next page , learn about the Mercury Comet ’s public presentation .
1966 Mercury Comet Performance
Car Lifemagazine tested a 1966 Mercury Cyclone GT ’s execution but did n’t think much of it . Car Lifepointed out not only the car ’s 56.4/43.6 system of weights distribution , but also its scarce decent Goodyear Power Cushion tires ; marginal drum brake ; and slow , overboosted steerage as knocks against the 1966 Mercury Comet performance . The powder store pronounced the GT ’s handling mediocre . Nor wasCar Lifeimpressed with the 390 - three-dimensional - column inch engine , saying , " … the 390/4 - gun barrel has never been much of a top - closing performer . It develops plenitude of usable torque in the lower stretch , and it pumps up more than enough horsepower for its nominative role . But , as a performer , it just does n’t deliver . "
need for Comets in fashion model - twelvemonth 1966 come to a goodly 170,000 , but that fell to 81,000 in 1967 . Labor problems took a cost on all auto maker that yr , but the instauration of the Cougar also took sales off from the Comet . Mercury made almost 151,000 Cougars in 1967 ; the new mutant coupe led the way to a record sales yr , but there ’s little question that it tempt some customers aside from upmarket Comets . On the next Sir Frederick Handley Page , find out more about the 1966 Mercury Comet ’s successor in 1967 .
1967 Mercury Comet
For the 1967 Mercury Comet , L - M management decided to abandon " strength " as a selling theme and began call it " The Man ’s gondola . " A bargainer brochure that yr proclaimed , " The homo who get it on the upheaval of high performance will just of course take to the Cyclone two - door hardtop or exchangeable . Man - power with the Cyclone 289 V-8 … this is the Man ’s Car with a heritage of performance . Mercury Cyclone – for Man who like their action big . " And so it choke .
1966-1967 Mercury Comet Models, Prices, Production
The Mercury Comet hit its stride in 1966 - 1967 , taking a whole tone up in sizing and performance . Here are 1966 - 1967 Mercury Comet specifications , covering the model ’s efflorescence :
1967 Mercury Comet Capri Models , Leontyne Price , yield
