Alright, let me tell you about this whole “Ford Montez” thing I got tangled up with the other day. It started pretty simply, really. I was rummaging through some old boxes in the garage, looking for a spare part for my actual Ford, you know, the one sitting in the driveway. Came across this faded label on a dusty component, looked like it said “Ford Montez – Trim Piece”. Never heard of a Montez before.
So, the hunt began. First thing I did was hop on the computer. Typed “Ford Montez” into the search bar. Expected to see pictures, maybe some forum posts, specs, whatever. Got basically nothing. Just a bunch of weird, unrelated stuff. Okay, maybe I misspelled it?
- Tried “Ford Montaz”
- Tried “Ford Montesz”
- Even tried “Ford Monte Carlo” just in case my brain was completely fried, though that’s Chevy, obviously.
Still zip. Nada. It was like the car didn’t exist. Started thinking maybe it was some super rare European model or something? Or maybe a concept car?
Digging Deeper
Next, I went old school. Pulled out some ancient car manuals I inherited from my dad. Spent a good hour flipping through pages, looking at diagrams, part lists for Fords from the 80s and 90s. Nothing mentioned a Montez. Absolutely nothing. It was getting frustrating. Was this some kind of prank label?
Then I remembered my buddy Dave, who’s a walking encyclopedia of car stuff. Gave him a call. “Hey Dave,” I said, “ever heard of a Ford Montez?” Silence on the other end for a bit. Then he just goes, “Nope. You sure you read that right? Sounds made up.” Great. Even Dave didn’t know. At this point, I was convinced I was either going crazy or this label was just plain wrong.
Back to the garage I went. Picked up that dusty part again, wiped it down real good. Looked closer at the label under a brighter light. And wouldn’t you know it? Part of the label was smudged. What I thought was “Montez” was actually… wait for it… “Mondeo ST”. The ‘d’, ‘e’, ‘o’ were faded and the ‘S’ looked like a ‘Z’.
So, yeah. There never was a Ford Montez I was dealing with. It was a trim piece for a Mondeo ST, likely a European version given the part number nearby which I then looked up separately. Felt like a bit of an idiot, honestly, after all that searching.
But hey, the good news? Once I figured out it was for a Mondeo ST, I actually managed to find some info online about fitting similar trim pieces. Although it wasn’t for my specific Ford model, looking at how that Mondeo trim attached gave me an idea for how to fix a loose bit on my own car’s interior panel. Wasn’t the same part, but the way it clipped in was similar. So I grabbed my trim removal tools, popped off my car’s panel carefully, saw a broken clip, and used a bit of strong epoxy and a zip tie on the back to rig up a fix based on the Mondeo part’s design. Put it all back together, and it’s solid now.
So, the whole Ford Montez adventure was a wild goose chase based on a smudge. But, you know, sometimes you go looking for one thing and end up figuring out something else. At least I got that annoying rattle in my door panel fixed. That’s a win, I guess. What a day.
