Northern California and Stray Cats Cougar Clubs’ 17th Annual Car Show & Picnic

Posted on August 7, 2012 by Gavin Schlesinger

Northern California & Stray Cats Cougar Clubs 17th Annual Car Show and PicnicIt was a great day to get together, the weather was perfect for bringing the cats out. Several attendees drove for more than an hour to attend. Set up began at 9:30 in the morning as slowly the members found their way to the Sycamore Picnic area. Ernie, as in years past, did an amazing job organizing the event. He was the first to arrive and began unloading his car with the various items he picked up, anticipating the arrival of help to set up the covered picnic area soon. Michael Dugan and Gavin Schlesinger met in San Ramon, California to drive down to Cupertino together.

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G-Force Cougar: The G Car That Could Have Been

Posted on July 30, 2012 by Bill Basore
1217265986_G-Force_Cougar_7529

This gallery contains 21 photos.

What If Team Cougar had won that last race in 1967 and become the Trans Am series Champs? It would have been difficult for Ford to pull the plug on Team Cougar. Perhaps Dan Gurney, Parnelli Jones, and Ed Leslie … Continue reading →

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1968 Mercury Cougar Interior Color Brochure

Posted on April 10, 2011 by Bill Basore
Interior Cover Page

This gallery contains 7 photos.

The Mercury Cougar interior color section of the 1968 Mercury Cougar Dealer Guide. View a page-flip version of the Dealer Guide and download a PDF copy of the Mercury Cougar section of the Dealer Guide here.

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Shelby Letter

Posted on March 30, 2011 by Bill Basore

Today, we bring you a January 3, 1968 letter from the A.O. Smith Corporation to John Kerr of Shelby Automotive, Inc., regarding pricing estimates for modifying the 1968 Mercury Cougar.

Shelby Letter (2 MB)

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J-Code 427 Heads

Posted on March 29, 2011 by Bill Basore

The following document is a PDF containing two blueprints for the 1968 J-Code 427 cylinder heads.

J-Code 427 Heads (3 MB)

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XR7-G Blueprints

Posted on March 29, 2011 by Bill Basore

The way they did things back then…

1968 Cougar XR7-G Blueprints: Cougar Horn Emblem

The original design drawings for the special components that were used to turn a regular Cougar into an XR7-G are now available in the documents section of this site.  The documents are downloadable PDF files and were produced from scans of the original 40-year-old blue prints.

It amazes me that these documents survived for all of these years.  From what I have been able to piece together, this story begins in about 1970.  The engineering group responsible for Shelby Automotive, was being disbanded.  Shelby Mustangs had hit the end of the road, with no new cars being produced after 1969 (the ’70′s were actually left over ’69 models!).  In the process of shutting things down, one of the engineers decided that the trunk of his car was better place to put a box of the XR7-G design drawings, than the dumpster for which they were intended.   This box also included several of the California Special design drawings and even a few others.  The box migrated from his trunk to his basement, and there the papers sat for the next 38 years.  Fast forward to early 2008.  In an effort to clean out the basement, the papers one again saw the light of day, and again bypassed becoming just a little more landfill.  The papers were passed to an eBay merchant, who began listing the drawings in his auctions.

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Unicorn Found: The Cougar That Couldn’t Exist, Does

Posted on January 15, 2011 by Bill Basore

They never installed a 427 in anything but a GT-E in 1968. Except when they did…

Okay, so what if I told you that there was this guy who says there was a ’68 XR7–that’s not a GT-E–built with a factory W-code 427 (impossible), has factory Whisper Aire® Air Conditioning (not available with a 427), painted white (of course, all unicorns are white…), and that it was ordered by a dealer in Texas for a retail customer, built on the assembly line, and it may still be in the hands of the original owner?

Riiiiiiiiiiggggggghhhhhhtttttttttttttt……..

I’ll bet you a beer that I’m not making this up. Make it two beers if you are really confident I am full of horse pucky.

The story begins many years ago. Rumors of a W-code XR7 begin to circulate. Story has it that it is a GT-E that is minus trim. Even the slightest chance of finding another lost GT-E is always worth checking out. It turns out that several guys claim to have seen the car, but no one can pin it down. A trip to where the car is said to be located finds no car, and only the remains of what may have been a house. Over time, the story fades to black, and the forgotten, missing, maybe-a-GT-E, fades from memory.

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What’s New in the Forums?

Posted on January 6, 2011 by Bill Basore

We are using an open source program called phpBB to support the forum. This does lots of great things for us. First of all, open source software can be modified to meet our purposes. We aren’t stuck with the way the developers’ believe things should work. We also benefit from the thousands of other users’ experience and efforts in extending the basic software by developing code that adds features–called “mods” with phpBB–so the Forum does more and we don’t have to spend our hard-earned money paying for it. Since phpBB is also on an open license, we don’t have to pay for the software license, and even more important, all of the constant upgrades and support fees. And here is the real kicker: the most popular paid software is actually based on phpBB! So we get all of the good stuff, and we can put the money into better, faster hosting and things that make a difference for the users.

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New Forums at ClassicCougarCommunity.Com

Posted on January 6, 2011 by Bill Basore

Like to talk Cougars?  Be sure to check out the new forums added to this site.

The forum is run by and for Cougar enthusiasts.  Our main focus is making this the best place for Cougar hobbyists, not advertisers.   You have to be a bit of a web geek to fully understand what this means, but we think everyone will find the results speak for themselves.

Lets take a short tour of the new forums.  Whether you are a forum newby, or a million post master, we think you will find a few things to like.

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MercuryCougar.Net Under New Ownership

Posted on December 24, 2010 by Bill Basore

Here is what we learned today on MecuryCougar.Net:

Hello Mercurycougar.net -

You may have noticed the server downtime yesterday. Today marks the dawn of a new day at Mercurycougar.net. I have, effective today, transferred ownership of Mercurycougar.net to Vertical Scope.

Mercurycougar.net is now part of the automotive family of websites owned by Vertical Scope. This is a great thing for the Mercurycougar.net members. You will soon be introduced to Helena Ciardullo. She will be the new administrator for Mercurycougar.net going forward.

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Cougar on the Prowl