There are untold legions of cars and trucks sold overseas that we never received here in the states. Fortunately, it’s gotten far easier to import these so-called “forbidden fruit” vehicles, and there’s so many more out there that fall well outside the normal channels of JDM tuner cars and Rest of the World (ROW) spec Porsches and BMWs. There’s also cars like this, a 1985 Ford Escort XR3i convertible listed here on Facebook Marketplace for $6,200. This wouldn’t be my first choice if you told me I could import anything, but it is an interesting vehicle that doesn’t have many competitors here or abroad.
For a short time a few years ago, I was considering importing a Peugeot 205 GTI convertible. I am not a convertible fan by any means, but my wife likes them and I felt like I needed one vehicle that she would enjoy. Needless to say, when she got wind of my plans, she told me under no uncertain terms that she, and we, did not need to import a weird convertible from overseas, and to just focus on what I liked. But it dawned on me through my research that there were very few vehicles in the four-seater convertible segment with a manual transmission and sporty chassis dynamics – except for perhaps the Escort XR3i.
The Ford Escort in Europe had a much different vibe than the one we had in the states. For one, the European-market Escort has a fairly enthusiastic following, especially for the hotter spec models like the RS, RS1600, RS2000, and the XR3. The XR3 was a shot across the bow to compete with Volkswagen’s GTI that was dominating the hot hatch class both overseas and here in the states, and thus an entire community of high-performance Ford enthusiasts was born around a compact car with flared fenders and big spoilers, marking perhaps one of the biggest differences between Ford enthusiasts in the U.S. and in Europe.
This, however, is not one of those models, which makes it a curious choice for importation. The convertible version of anything is going to suffer from scuttle shake and generally weaker driving dynamics, especially in what amounts to a 1980s econobox. The car shown here is powered by a CVH-series 4-cylinder engine, and the “I” designation on the badge indicates it is fuel injected. The seller notes it does not run particularly well, as it runs but will “…stall after some driving,” which doesn’t tell us much other than you’re buying a car with limited local parts and service support so be prepared to begin troubleshooting immediately. If you want to march to the beat of a different drummer, this Escort XR3i is a good place to start. Thanks to Barn Finds reader Sam61 for the find.
Are those Cigarettes on the floor 🚬 lol
Drove one of these with a 1.1 liter engine in the 80s. Even with a manual, an hourglass was more appropriate than a stopwatch to measure 0 to 60. However, having owned a US Ford Escort of the 80s, the XR3i options were much more enticing than anything we got here.
My Mother had a new 1.1E 1982 Escort, Caribbean blue ,slowest car I drove! Really high gearing, basically a 3 speed gearbox with a stupidity high economy gear (E on the gear stick), it had economy lights on the speedo too, it was geared so high it couldn’t pull that E gear! Eventually got wrecked by a head on collision with a van, the guy in the van had pulled out to overtake, hit my Mums car head on, my mother actually survived too.