This reflected the design trends evident throughout western Europe at the time, but the extent of growth in the footprint of the Ford P7 was matched by few other cars, although a very similar trend had been evident at Dagenham where Ford of Britain's new Zephyr Mk IV model had also excited national press comment because it took up so much more road-space than its predecessor.

The P7 was also longer and wider than the Opel Rekord, which still set the standard for large family cars in Germany; a feeling in the press was expressed that its styling was more Anglo-American than mainstream European.

An otherwise not unsympathetic review in August 1967 described the car as a Volksstrassenkreuzer, and expressed the view that such a "peoples' boulevard cruiser" might be out of tune with the spirit of the marketplace, at least in Europe.

The 26M launched that year shared the body and most of the elements of the 20M, but added to it a long list of luxury touches such as the automatic gear box, power steering, sunroof, twin headlamps, bigger front brakes and tinted windows.

Promotional material made much of the spacious interior and massive boot/trunk space resulting from the car's 1,756 mm (69.1 in) width, and the correspondingly wide track was credited with ensuring good handling and road holding.

Top sellers from the range were the two- and four-door saloons, and the three- and five-door "Turnier" estates were also heavily promoted.

A version of the three-door "Turnier" with the side windows behind the B pillars replaced by steel panels was made available for people whose work and tax status called for a small van, but who nevertheless preferred to drive a car.

The top-of-the-range 26M only came as a four door saloon or two-door coupé, and was distinguished by its black vinyl roof and increased use of chrome and wood décor for its interior embellishments.

However, with the 1967 models, Ford did finally join other automakers at this level of the market in providing a 12-volt electrical system at no extra cost.

Telescopic dampers also improved the suspension of the wheels at the back of the car where the steel beam axle and the semielliptical leaf springs would have been familiar to drivers of earlier Taunus models.

The rear suspension setup was by now seen as rather outclassed in comparison with traditional rivals from Opel, and tended to undermine any aspirations for the 26M version of the relatively lowly 17M/20M to compete in a higher class than the earlier 17M had attempted.

The cheese-grater grill was replaced by a set of thin parallel bars and at the corners the meeting points between the lights and the bumpers were tidied up.

Elsewhere various bumps and creases disappeared from the body work including a kink outlined in the panel below and slightly ahead of the C-pillar, which was one of the decorative features that had been criticised for what was seen as a sign of excessive Anglo-American influence.

The Marketing Department researched their files and retrieved for the Ford P7b a slogan coined for Bahnsen's innovatively styled 1960 Taunus P3, "Linie der Vernunft" which loosely translates as "rational form".

Now, as ten years earlier, the intention was to point up an aesthetic contrast between a newly simplified 17M model and an over-decorated predecessor.

With 155,780 units sold during the ten month life of the P7a, the car was actually being produced at a significantly slower rate than the less ambitiously targeted Taunus P5.

[2] The dominance in the sector enjoyed by the Opel Rekord was not challenged, however, and while neither Ford nor Opel will have been unduly alarmed by Volkswagen's ventures into the production of large family cars with their interesting but commercially unpersuasive 411/412 and K70 models, the arrival in 1968 of the Audi 100 suggested than the market place for large family cars was not about to become any more comfortable for Ford.

Sales of the Ford P7 failed to keep pace with the growth in the German car market, which appears to have contributed to a major rethink.