A pretty Ford Probe, as seen in Beijing in 2012. It was painted in a fiery shade of red with darkened windows and white alloy wheels. The black license plates are from Tianjin Municipality.
The good Ford was in mostly sad shape. It seemed abandoned. The paint was still okay, but both mirrors were loose, the wheel hubs were missing, and it was covered by a thick layer of dust.
The first generation Ford Probe was made from 1988 to 1992. It was a sporty 3-door liftback based on the FWD Mazda GD platform. At the time, Ford and Mazda were very close. They developed various platforms together and there was a lot of rebadging going on.
The Ford Probe was a pretty car with a sharp design. Almost space-ship for the period. Cool details include the pop-up headlights, the black b- and c pillars, the hidden door handles, the rear spoiler, and the rear light bar.
The Probe was never officially imported into China, so it is very rare here. The LX model was powered by a 3.0-liter ‘Vulcan’ V6 gasoline engine with an output of 140 hp and 217 Nm. The gearbox was a five-speed manual. The top speed was 210 km/h and 0-100 was done in 8.4 seconds. Proper speed for the period!
The famous black license plates were issued to foreign-owned companies from the 1980s to the mid-00s. These companies could buy a car locally or import one. There were no limits on the number of cars or price or engine type. The numbering started at A·00001 and then up.
So the lower the number the older the car. Each province and municipality had its own black-license plate program. This Ford has 津A·06323, so it is an early Tianjin black license plate car. The character 津 refers to Tianjin (天津). The license plate area is too narrow for a Chinese plate, a clear sign of a direct US import.
A sticker showing a stylized layout of the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal, Canada, with some specs and facts on the right. This kind of track-stickers was very popular in the 2000s, you could get them at any car parts market. The kaisite.com website is no longer active but the domain name is for sale.
My bicycle is in the background on the right, parked next to a FAW-VW Audi A4. In 2012, a bicycle was still the best way to get around town spotting cars. Later, when Beijing kept growing, I changed to an electric scooter.
The red Ford Probe is probably long gone by now unless it was picked up by a fanatic Ford collector. But the Probe was relatively unknown in China even in period, let alone in 2012, let alone today.