Loser cars: All awesomely lame, but which is king?

[Tom Geiger]

I loved our Aries. A lot of people make fun of K-cars. Without K-cars, there would probably be no Chrysler right now and all the neat stuff they're making.

Absolutely true. Under Lee Iococa, Chrysler was in the process of digging itself out. The Horizon/Omni pair, based on the VW Rabbit were selling well and the K-cars were designed but hadn't gone into production yet. In the hearings as to IF the government should bail out Chrysler, the company showed the plans for the K-cars. Note that many Chrysler vehicles of the next decade were built on that platform including the original mini vans, which changed the entire auto market in America! And Chrysler made good on the government loans, paying them, with interest, ahead of schedule.

Edited May 9, 2014 by Tom Geiger

[lordairgtar]

car was a hand me down, uncle blew the 6 & swapped in the 2 liter 4 (the vw 4) out of a '77 gremlin. totally gutless engine, prime candidate for best boat anchor

I see. That engine was slow. If it would have been let out with it's original intake design and Bosch fuel injection, it would have had some oomph. That engine did well in the 924.

[lordairgtar]

what has that HHR got to recommend it really? throwback looks? cause I know those things pretty nearly cannot get out of their own way and I am pretty sure the fuel mileage doesn't compensate for the lack of pep. And it sure doesn't have rearward visibility on its side. I do kinda like the looks but if that's all its got...loser.

jb

Actually it has plenty of go. As far as visibility is concerned, I never had trouble seeing out the back with the side mirrors it has. The panel weighs considerably less than the windowed version by virtue of no rear seats and side windows. Plus it handles quite well too. I'm thinking of buying an SS version. look at what one did at Nurburgring. They could have updated the grille design to better reflect Chevy corporate looks and kept on selling it.

[lordairgtar]

Absolutely true. Under Lee Iococa, Chrysler was in the process of digging itself out. The Horizon/Omni pair, based on the VW Rabbit were selling well and the K-cars were designed but hadn't gone into production yet. In the hearings as to IF the government should bail out Chrysler, the company showed the plans for the K-cars. Note that many Chrysler vehicles of the next decade were built on that platform including the original mini vans, which changed the entire auto market in America! And Chrysler made good on the government loans, paying them, with interest, ahead of schedule.

The cars, although they resembled the VW Golf/Rabbit were actually based on the Simca, a company Chrysler owned before selling it to Peugeot, where it was called a Talbot. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talbot_Horizon The car did use a 1.7L engine from VW in some of it's cars, the more common K engine displacing at 2.2 L was usually in the car. I had the 1984 Charger variant with the 2.2. Pretty quick car and handled well.

Edited May 9, 2014 by lordairgtar

[charlie8575]

The cars, although they resembled the VW Golf/Rabbit were actually based on the Simca, a company Chrysler owned before selling it to Peugeot, where it was called a Talbot. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talbot_Horizon The car did use a 1.7L engine from VW in some of it's cars, the more common K engine displacing at 2.2 L was usually in the car. I had the 1984 Charger variant with the 2.2. Pretty quick car and handled well.

When the free Celebrity we were given died of a combination of rust and a spun bearing, my dad took a Trans4/5-speed Omni out for a test drive. It was a very quick little car. I wouldn't reject an Omni at all if I found a nice one. As I remember, they were pretty roomy inside and I do remember Chrysler's small-FWD car bucket seats being quite comfortable.

Our Aries went over 200k until my dad and I were hit by an inattentive driver coming out of a driveway around the corner from the house.

Charlie Larkin

[unclescott58]

Pete's Aries story reminds me of the '81 Aries I once own. Not a bad car. But, not a great one either. Every time it rained is when I ran across problems. Mine had the 2.6 Hemi. Rather than the base 2.2. The 2.6 was a Mitsubishi engine designed originally to go in their rear wheel drive cars. In the front wheel drive Aries, it was mounted transversely. Putting the distributor high on the front and driver's side of engine compartment were rain water could get at it from under the edge of the hood. I tried everything to keep water away from and off of this distributor. Nothing worked. I finally just drove around with a can of spray dry in the car. Stopping every few miles, and sprayed the distributor on rainy days. Minnesota winters finely destroyed the car. One very cold day, a trim piece on the forward edge the landau vinyl roof got so brittle it just fell off! Later, rust finally made the floors feel spongy. That's when I got rid of the car.

I have a buddy who bought an Omni GLH brand new. I was very impressed with that car. It was fast. Handled well. And was largely ignored by the cops. Shortly after he bought it, we decided to go to Dyersville, Iowa, to tour Ertl's facilities and buy kits at their outlet store. I drove it about half of the trip with my foot into it as much as possible. Had a blast! And we still got better than 30 mpg! I've got nothing bad to say about Dodge Omnis or the 2.2 turbo engine. (Though I've heard that if you didn't keep things clean around the turbo, fires were known to happen!)

And as I've mentioned before, I knew several people who own Chevettes. No diesels in the bunch. So they were all very reliable, boring little appliances. Note I say appliances, not cars. These were like toasters. They did their job, but did not exicited you. Kind of like the early Ford Falcons. Corvairs were more interesting cars. But, Falcon were better appliances. And sold better for that reason.

My first new car was a '77 Plymouth Volare. I can tell you all sorts of horror stories about that car. Cool looking car. But, nothing but trouble. But, that's for another time.

Scott Aho