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Ford recalling 370,000 Crown Vic, Grand Marquis and Town Car models

The Detroit News is reporting that Ford will recall some 370,000 Crown Victoria (pictured), Mercury Grand Marquis and Lincoln Town Car vehicles from model years 2005 through 2011, for an issue regarding the lower intermediate steering shaft. 355,000 of the vehicles in question were sold in the US, with the other 15,000 sold in Canada.
The report indicates that corrosion of the lower intermediate steering shaft could cause a "loss of steering," presumably because of a partial or complete failure of the part. The report points out the dealers will inspect and replace the offending steering component for recalled cars, and may also secure a lower steering column bearing and replace the upper intermediate steering shaft as needed. The company is unaware of any reports of the faulty part causing any accidents or injuries.
Ford helpfully lists states in which corrosion is more likely to have taken place, mostly in the Snow Belt, as you might guess. Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Wisconsin, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia are listed.

2019 Lincoln Navigator gets slight price hikes, crosses six-figure mark

As of the end of June this year, all-new Lincoln Navigator sales are up by triple digits over last year. No wonder, as Lincoln's flagship has impressed us on both our initial drive and again recently on a 900-mile road trip. Even if numbers slump some between now and the end of the year, the full-sized luxury SUV should achieve sales not seen since 2007, when it sold 24,050 units. That would help explain why the Navigator's already had one price increase this year, in June, when MSRPs across the range went up $500 and the destination charge rose another $100. According to order guides, prices for the 2019 model year will go up even more. The entry-level Premiere trim gets bumped by another $650, while the Reserve trim climbs by $3,500. After the $1,295 destination fee, the 2019 Navigator Premiere starts $74,500, and the Select trim rises by $1,000 to $78,850. Neither of those trims add additional equipment to offset the additional cost. The Reserve price hike to $86,500 does capture the cost of the Technology Package, which will come standard. On the 2018 Navigator, that package, which bundles aids like adaptive cruise control and autonomous emergency braking, is a $2,640 option, so the net price jump for the trim is $860. The Black Label price drifts upward by $2,190 to $97,690, but the 2019 models will throw in 30-way power seats as standard. Those thrones being a $1,250 option on 2018 models, the net increase is then $940. The long-wheelbase L models will all go up by the same amount as their non-L counterparts, which puts the Navigator over the $100K mark for the first time; the 2019 Black Label L will need $100,890 to put in a suitable driveway. That's just $700 less than the list price of the 2019 Cadillac Escalade ESV Premium, but Cadillac incentives mean the Lincoln would actually cost thousands more. Lease prices have gone skyward, too. Cars Direct found that in the middle of this year, the average monthly cost for a 36-month lease in California was $1,023, a $131 increase compared to lease prices in February. Two months later, the average monthly cost in California has gone up another eight dollars, to $1,031. That's only $14 less per month than the lease for an Escalade Luxury, even though the Cadillac has a list price $9,500 higher. Related Video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

A car writer's year in new vehicles [w/video]

Christmas is only a week away. The New Year is just around the corner. As 2014 draws to a close, I'm not the only one taking stock of the year that's we're almost shut of. Depending on who you are or what you do, the end of the year can bring to mind tax bills, school semesters or scheduling dental appointments. For me, for the last eight or nine years, at least a small part of this transitory time is occupied with recalling the cars I've driven over the preceding 12 months. Since I started writing about and reviewing cars in 2006, I've done an uneven job of tracking every vehicle I've been in, each year. Last year I made a resolution to be better about it, and the result is a spreadsheet with model names, dates, notes and some basic facts and figures. Armed with this basic data and a yen for year-end stories, I figured it would be interesting to parse the figures and quantify my year in cars in a way I'd never done before. The results are, well, they're a little bizarre, honestly. And I think they'll affect how I approach this gig in 2015. {C} My tally for the year is 68 cars, as of this writing. Before the calendar flips to 2015 it'll be as high as 73. Let me give you a tiny bit of background about how automotive journalists typically get cars to test. There are basically two pools of vehicles I drive on a regular basis: media fleet vehicles and those available on "first drive" programs. The latter group is pretty self-explanatory. Journalists are gathered in one location (sometimes local, sometimes far-flung) with a new model(s), there's usually a day of driving, then we report back to you with our impressions. Media fleet vehicles are different. These are distributed to publications and individual journalists far and wide, and the test period goes from a few days to a week or more. Whereas first drives almost always result in a piece of review content, fleet loans only sometimes do. Other times they serve to give context about brands, segments, technology and the like, to editors and writers. So, adding up the loans I've had out of the press fleet and things I've driven at events, my tally for the year is 68 cars, as of this writing. Before the calendar flips to 2015, it'll be as high as 73. At one of the buff books like Car and Driver or Motor Trend, reviewers might rotate through five cars a week, or more. I know that number sounds high, but as best I can tell, it's pretty average for the full-time professionals in this business.