12 DISCONTINUED FORD CARS FROM THE 90S, RANKED WORST TO BEST

5.Ford Probe (1989-1998)

The Contour SVT might have been like a Mustang for families, but it was missing one crucial ingredient—a rear-wheel-drive setup. Back in the ’80s, Ford didn’t see this as a problem at all. In fact, they even planned to replace the Mustang with the front-wheel-drive Probe. Spoiler alert: that didn’t go as planned. That’s not to say the Probe was unattractive. On the outside, it looked far more modern and sleek compared to the boxy fox-body Mustang. It was a sharper, more dynamic design and packed more advanced tech too—like an adjustable suspension instead of the Mustang’s old-school live rear axle. Ford did such a solid job that the Probe actually won better reviews than its mechanical cousin, the Mazda MX-6. Early on, buyers seemed to like it as well.

However, the Probe never offered a V8 under the hood. The first-generation came with a turbocharged 2.2-liter inline-four pushing 145 horsepower—good enough for a 0-60 time of 6.7 seconds. The sleeker second-gen model upgraded to a 2.5-liter V6 with 164 hp, which could do 0-60 in about 7 seconds. While both generations had their differences, neither could quite capture the Mustang’s magic. The economic slump of the early ’80s, which Ford thought might kill the Mustang, was long forgotten by the ’90s. So instead of pouring more effort into the Probe, Ford shifted gears back to what buyers really wanted—a new Mustang. The front-wheel-drive platform lived on for a while in the Mercury Cougar, but even that model was discontinued by 2002.