Well, its time for my girlfriend to look at getting a new (used) car. She loves the Cougar V6 (manual, of course) but I know it shares alot with the Contour. Needless to say, I'm a little worried seeing as how I had two 2.5 Duratec engines from my SVT die on me. Are the problems mostly only for SVTs or all Duratecs? Also, were any of the *other* problems fixed for '01+?
Also, if anyone else has any good suggestions for a low (<50k) mileage used car in the 8-12k range? Must be manual, must not be japanese or korean, must be decently reliable. She doesn't drive the hell out of her cars or even drive "sporty" like I do, but she does like pretty cars. Other cars we've considered were the Saturn SL2 and the Ford ZX2.
