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2019 Lincoln Continental will cost as much as $5,000 more

Rumors have been swirling for months about the fate of the slow-selling Lincoln Continental amid Ford's larger plans to pare cars from its lineup in favor of trucks and SUVs. But now comes word of official order guides that show the 2019 Continental priced as much as $4,925 more than the previous year's model. That price bump brings more perks for buyers, however. According to CarsDirect, all models will get adaptive cruise control and the Lincoln Co-Pilot360 suite of safety technology, which includes automatic emergency braking, blind-spot information system and rearview camera. The base level Continental Premiere will start at $47,140, including destination fee, which is $985 more than the 2018 model. The Reserve model is where the starting price jumps $4,925 to $60,705. It adds technology like a 360-degree camera, heads-up display and park assist, plus heated rear seats and steering wheel and windshield wiper de-icer. The top-of-the-line Black Label edition starts at $71,040, an increase of $4,630, and adds 30-way adjustable seats. Those prices are considerably cheaper than comparably equipped competitors like the Audi A8 or BMW 7 Series, of course, but that value proposition hasn't so far managed to help the sedan's fortunes. Lincoln sold 12,012 models of the Continental in 2017, according to CarSalesBase.com. Sales through August were 5,677, which is more than 29 percent off the pace at this same point last year. Lincoln revived the storied Continental nameplate back in 2015 to much fanfare, but its market release in 2016 was a victim of bad timing, coming amid a rising tide of crossovers. Earlier this year Lincoln reportedly showed dealers photos of a Continental with rear-hinged suicide doors that it said it planned to manufacture, which may be an attempt to drum up interest. Jalopnik, citing unnamed sources familiar with Ford's product plans, says the Continental is likely to be killed off at the end of the run of the current model in 2020. That aligns with what a user on the Blue Oval Forums is saying, that shift changes at the Flat Rock Assembly plant near Detroit are coming and that workers have been told the Continental can be phased out of production by next summer. One supposed possibility is Ford moving production to China, though any plans to import sedans to the U.S. from there would seemingly be negated by the same Trump administration tariffs that killed plans to import the Ford Focus Active. Related Video:

Lincoln teases a new Continental with suicide doors

Lincoln posted a photograph of its Continental from the 1960s on its social media channels today with a cryptic message to go along with it. Here's the post below: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. The last line, "#TBT ... or is it?" sounds like Ford's luxury arm is trying to tell us something about what's to come for its current Continental. If we use Lincoln's post as an opportunity to speculate, one might presume that a Continental with suicide doors is coming our way soon. Beyond planting the idea in our heads, Lincoln doesn't appear to have anything else to say for the time being. Right now, the only car you can buy with suicide doors is a Rolls-Royce, most recently in Wraith form. If Lincoln decides to offer suicide doors again, you can bet the car is going to get some attention. The question would be if a special car like this could draw any of that attention away from Lincoln's SUVs such as the Navigator and new Aviator. We've seen reports that the Continental would not be moving on past this generation, so maybe Lincoln is trying to get as much play out of this car as possible. A more recent report calls it dead after the 2020 model year, meaning that if we do see a suicide-door Continental, it wouldn't be in this world for very long. Lincoln says to "stay tuned" at the end of its post caption, so watch out for Continental news dropping in the near future. We can all hope it's going to be good news ... View 20 Photos Related video:

Preposed class-action lawsuit targets 'defective' MyFord Touch

A national law firm, Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP, has filed a proposed class action lawsuit whose presupposition is that MyFord Touch is defective. Specifically, the complaint states that the system - as well as the MyLincoln Touch and MyMercury Touch clones - often freeze, fail to respond to voice or touch commands and have issues connecting to mobile phones.
According to Hagens Berman managing partner Steve Berman, MyFord Touch is a theoretically "brilliant idea" that falls short in actual execution. Said Berman in a press release, "In reality, the system is fundamentally flawed, failing to reliably provide functionality, amounting to an inconvenience at best, and a serious safety issue at worst."
Other MFT issues enumerated within the 41-page filing include problems controlling the window defroster, rear-view camera and navigation system. The suit maintains that Ford is aware of the problem but has yet to submit a workable and acceptable solution to MFT customers. Scroll down if you'd like to read the full press release.