"Good question about the engine wiring harness. It's starting to get really bad. I've been spending a fair amount of tme under the hood trying to sort out a driveability issue. Every time a touch the harness another bit of insulation breaks off. Bare wire ends everywhere. That'll probably be my next little project."
Oh my friend, you have got a major problem..... There was a TSB on the wiring issue and the dealers replaced them for free under it. The problem is it was good on 95-97 cars for 10 years or 100k miles. Your 95 if you didn't have it done is on your nickel now and for a V6 it is not cheap. Please read the service bulletin on it, do a search on this site for wiring harness. It will tell you specific to you car and options what you need. Then contact Team Ford Parts for a price. I'd bet the cost for you Tour will be around $3k installed, but highly dependent upon options.
"Now that the Taurus cup-holder has been in for a while, and since you have one of each, which would you recommend (assuming all else equal), the factory '99 console version or the Taurus insert?"
Ok so I like them both for different reasons. The stock replacement one is sturdy and it holds a larger cup / bottle fairly reasonably sometimes. EXCEPT it tips on the passenger seat cushion and causes what ever it is holding to fall out. The Taurus ones do about what the stock ones did in holding smaller cups, only stronger. If the bottom part breaks, as they do, they still work, and you get the coin holder too :laugh:
If I were to just do one or the other I think I'd do the stock replacement, but I had that and got tired of that one not holding what I wanted right, so I did the other one...... You see what a circle this created
I will say that my 99 isn't perfect either, so what is one to do. I haven't found a way to add in the ones like in my 02 Ram they work great...
Bottom line is nothing is going to be perfect all the time regarding Tour cup holders. It's a crap shoot out there :crazy:
I happen to like the mod it makes a usless hole useful, no matter what else it does, and the coin holder is flawless LOL