This 1980s Ford Escort shows what a leap forward for cars this decade was
While supercars dazzled, normal cars made huge strides in the ’80s, and none illustrates this better than the first front-drive Escort
The ’80s gave us incremental steps forward in the ease of use and performance of the supercar, but normal cars took an arguably bigger leap. For every decade in our Eras series we’re bringing along one of the period’s best-selling cars to contrast against the exotics. For the 1970s it was a Mk3 Ford Cortina; now for the 1980s we have the sales smash hit Mk3 Escort. And boy is there a chasm between them. To look at and drive, you’d swear they were at least 20 years apart.
The Mk3 Escort marked a major shift from the Mk2. Gone was the saloon body, and the rear-drive layout, Ford opting instead to follow trends of the time – set by the original Volkswagen Golf and Vauxhall Astra – by going front-wheel drive. Better for packaging and practicality, it became the default format for small family cars in Europe, and continued through every generation of Escort and Focus that followed.
Design-wise, flat surfaces and boxier shapes were the order of the day in the ’80s – as evidenced by the supercars – so the subtle curves of the Cortina and early Escorts went out in favour of neater, sharper lines. Time has been kinder to those older shapes, I’d argue, but the Mk3 Escort marked a new direction for Ford and the design reflected that. It enjoyed extremely strong sales from the word go: from its reveal in 1980 through to 1985, Ford shifted around 800,000 units in the UK, regularly topping the annual sales charts.
A wide variety of versions, from three- and five-door hatches to an estate and cabriolet, plus a range of trim levels, supported that success. There was a Mk3 Escort for pretty much anyone, including those wanting something a little spicy. Hot hatches really started coming on stream in the ’80s and the Escort XR3 was Ford’s answer to the Golf GTI. With cloverleaf alloys, tweaked bumpers and a rear spoiler, it looked the part, and boasted 96bhp from a 1.6-litre CVH engine. Peppy for the time, but still easily less than half the power of the Esprit, the least potent supercar in our test.
This Mk3 1.3 L has been kindly lent to us by the Great British Car Journey museum, founded by Richard Usher. ‘I think you’ll get on a bit better with this,’ he tells me, reminding me of how much patience and planning it took to guide the likeable but gutless Mk3 Cortina along on the previous test. Certainly, jumping from the Countach or Testarossa into this is bizarrely quite freeing. This was a period when performance levels were proportional to the effort demanded from the driver, so where the supercars require a firm hand and some muscle to get moving, the little Escort zips away with an easy lightness.
The CVH engine was new at the time and boasted improved efficiency over Ford’s previous Kent motors, and the little 69bhp unit makes the Escort feel a lot more willing than the Cortina. It still needs working hard on undulating sections of road, but it’s just about peppy enough to not get in the way of modern traffic, and the four-speed ’box, with its spindly lever sprouting from the floor, is light and easy. It sounds a bit harsh at higher revs, but with no rev counter on the dash it’s best to shift early anyway, to be on the safe side.
Don’t be fooled, L doesn’t mean luxury – it’s only one up from the base Popular spec and the cabin is still sparse. Among the included kit is a three-speed fan, Pasha cloth seats (if it was good enough for Porsche…) and a single door mirror, on the driver’s side. Richard has added his own kit, including a Welsh road map and a tea flask apparently offered by the dealer at the time. No Apple CarPlay here, or even a radio.
It certainly feels built down to a price, but Ford didn't cut corners with the Mk3’s suspension, fitting it with an independent rear end rather than the torsion beam found on most rivals. You wouldn’t call it sophisticated but there is some fun to be had in punting the Escort along a road, partly because it feels so compact, but also because your inputs have such an obvious effect on how it gets through a corner. It’s not very precise so you need to be deliberate, but feeling it lean, the thin-rimmed wheel talking back to you as you load it up, is a bit of a giggle.
It’s a stark difference in character from the ’70s Cortina, which felt entirely geared towards loping comfort rather than handling. By contrast the Escort is busier and less graceful but far more capable and easy to drive. There’s more joy in it than its humdrum looks would suggest, certainly, and it shows that while the supercar made significant evolutionary steps in the ’80s, the general public was also enjoying major strides of development in their everyday family cars.
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