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Lincoln Blackwood

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After an overwhelmingly positive reception at auto shows in Los Angeles and Detroit in December and January, Lincoln will put the Blackwood luxury sport utility concept vehicle into production.
'Blackwood takes Lincoln and our sport utility lineup a significant step forward,' said Jac Nasser, Ford Motor Company president and chief executive officer.

Details of the production vehicle and manufacturing plans will be announced later.

The Lincoln Blackwood concept vehicle is the ultimate utility vehicle, with all the comfort of a luxury sedan and the convenience and versatility of a sport utility vehicle. The four-door, four-passenger luxury utility is an extension of the extremely successful Lincoln Navigator, with one important difference: an enclosed 4-foot, 8-inch box that serves as a trunk.

The concept Lincoln Blackwood has a covered exterior trunk area. The trunk sides are finished in 20 square feet of Wenge wood – a dark, dense, striated wood from central Africa – with a brushed aluminum strip defining each band of wood. It's a modern twist on the 'woody,' which traditionally used different-colored wood strips between large wood bands.

The hard top of the closed box in the rear, which is operated by a key fob, opens hydraulically to a 45-degree angle to reveal an aluminum finished trunk interior.

The interior of the Blackwood concept vehicle is based on the Lincoln Navigator's, with the addition of a global positioning system integrated into the floor-mounted center console and four bucket seats trimmed in black Connolly leather.

Blackwood is built on a 4x2 chassis that's lowered 3 inches to give the utility vehicle a more stately stance. It's powered by a 5.4-liter DOHC V-8 and fits into the Class III trailer tow group – allowing enough towing capacity for a boat or horse trailer.

The four-door configuration of the passenger area coupled with the extended trunk area give the Lincoln Blackwood concept vehicle the look and feel of a touring coach from the 1930s with a distinctly modern flair.

Source - Ford

The public was given their first glimpse of the Lincoln Blackwood Concept at the 1999 North American International Auto Show. The production version would take a few years longer, arriving in 2002. It was available in only one color - black. The allure of this vehicle was that it was a truck, but the bed of the truck was more of a trunk than it was a truck-bed. The bed featured aluminum pinstripes over artificial burled black wood. The cargo box of the truck was produced by Magna Steyr. Delivery of the truck arrived late in October of 2001 as there were problems with the cargo box. The contract with Magna International was frozen in late 2001 due to the issue.

The truck was only available in rear-wheel drive configuration. It was a luxury vehicle powered by a 5.4-liter V8 that produced 300 horsepower. It had a 138.5 inch wheelbase and a four-speed automatic gearbox with overdrive.

In total, there were only 3356 examples of the Blackwood produced. Production ceased in December of 2002 for the $52,500 luxury truck. A special run of only 50 examples were created for the Neiman Marcus spring catalog. These versions were dubbed, the Neiman Marcus Edition. They featured the company logo stitched into the headrests. There was a 7-inch Panasonic wide screen LCD DVD/Video-CD and CD player with wireless headphones. The rear console lid was wrapped in leather. The price tag for this ultra exclusive, ultra-luxury vehicle was a bank-breaking $58,800. Though, with the limited number of vehicles produced, it is believed that the value of these vehicles will be retained.


By Daniel Vaughan | Jan 2007