Who the hell wants a Dodge Daytona? It was a question I was forced to ask myself as a 1991 model with an Iacocca inspired trombone red interior passed through the block. The bidding started at $200 and… well… it sold for $200. Then there was the seller fee, the transport cost, a battery, and pretty soon…
We wrote a check to the seller for $16. For reasons that only a cheapskate can fathom I took note of the vehicle before the sale. What if this vehicle had been used for some type of car share program instead? It wasn’t easy on the eyes at all. Thanks to Chrysler’s mandated two coat paint jobs and enough front end bumps to make it the automotive equivalent of Rocky Balboa. It looked like a worn out mop.
But inside everything worked. Really. The interior had nary a crack on it’s dashboard nor any of the excessive wear that comes with using Cracker Jack parts. Seats were in good shape. The engine idled without any hiccups for a half hour, and I later found that the five speed worked perfectly fine. It drove like a bucket of bolts but the price paid easily covered what you would get for it even if it didn’t run at all.
To be blunt, the buyer did his homework. I estimate that with decent maintenance it could very well last another five years. Perhaps it will. Ninety nine times out of a hundred I’m glad to send any cheap sled to a dealer with a cheaper clientele. But as this one left the block I couldn’t help thinking about all the pointless waste this vehicle represented from the very beginning of its life to that very moment. Some models are just crap. Even if you find a good one… and that makes it all the more appealing.
As someone who had a ’93 (and rather enjoyed it) I have to chuckle. Somebody out there got a much better deal than he was expecting.
I bought a used 85 that needed a new head gasket. It was black with black leather seats, AC, Turbo and 5 speed manual. I had the head gasket replaced and engaged in fwd hoonage. It was a fun reliable car after that. The 5 speed was clunky and one time it broke one of the shift cables (they had plastic clips on the end of them) which left me with only 1st, 3rd, and 5th so it was still drivable until I got it fixed. Marriage and family finally interfered and I traded it in for a ’94 minivan.
I just spent a week in El Salvador and rented a 2002 Nissan Frontier that drove like a “bucket of bolts”. Truck had a sticker from a Tennessee dealer on the tailgate. 202k miles. All of the rubber molding around the windshield, roof, roof rack, etc. was replaced with what looked like it was squirted out of a caulk gun and smoothed with a finger. The air bag light, ABS light, and basically every other dashboard light was on. Steering wheel seemed hardly connected to the wheels, brakes screeched and squealed and overheated easily, car ran super hot (you’d burn your hand putting it on the hood after driving awhile) though the temperature gauge was pegged at a normal level, and the suspension was beyond shot to hell. The truck seemed like an absolute death trap, and might have been one for somebody already.
I drew two conclusions from the experience. 1) this must have been a salvaged title truck exported to 3rd world, probably totaled in the US and slapped together cheaply and put back on the road, and 2) despite how awful the condition was in general, it started, and ran every day and got us where we had to go and back. In El Salvador, this was more than a perfectly acceptable car…it was a nice car.
I’d wager that there is plenty of life left in nearly all the vehicles put out to pasture here in the States.
when i said goodbye to my 1st car, a 92 Sable, at the gates of a junkyard in Nowhere IN, i knew she could have easily lasted another couple or maybe more years. but i had a better car then, and didn’t feel like doing all that work to maintain a SABLE. i suspect you’re absolutely right about the condition of most junkyard cars here in the US.
the first car I ever bought new was a 1987 Corolla FX16 and six years and 115K miles later I sold it to a guy who had a dealership in Costa Rica. He broke it down for me: he paid me $2500 for my car, he’d pay $2500 in import duties, $2500 to ship it to Costa Rica, and sell it to a middle class family there for $10,000. The thing that was most attractive to me about the deal was knowing that my car was leaving the country, guaranteeing I would never hear anything about it again if anything went wrong with it.
@xyzzy I know that feeling, a few months after I traded in my clapped out Jetta, I got a letter from a towing company, because nobody had bothered to retitle the car. Fortunately they were cool about it and just took the car.
As for south of the border, years ago a rental company I was working for sold off their collection of old air compressors to buy shiny new ones and we were told they were going to Mexico,but they still had the decals with our address and phone number so for a while I would check the street out front in the morning in case we saw one hitched to a beater truck with Mexican plates and some guy in a straw hat knocking at the door saying “You fix?”
That’s the funniest thing I’ve read all day! Thank you.
I have always had a special place in my heart for the losers. My 1967 Delta 88 sedan (nicknamed the Delco Demon), 1977 Volare (the Bog’are) and 1979 Cordoba (Dr. Love’s travelling love machine). None of these cars could go a week without changing a part or a carb adjustment but they were loved nonetheless.
“it’s” is not a possessive pronoun for “it.” Looks like it could be. But no.
“it’s” is a contraction of “it is.”
Just sayin’.
PS: I’m assuming the red interior was not the color of the trombone, but of said instrument’s felt-lined case.
I’d hit it, with turbo III or II engine please.
As long as grammar school is in:
“It looked like a wore out mop.”
Should have benn “worn out mop”
And “benn” should have been “been.”
Ah, the vile smell of self ownage!
“self-ownage”
;)
Should be “self-pwnage”.
Kind of reminds me of the Toyota Hamster bought on his trek across South America in Season 14…some vehicles just refuse to die. As for the Daytona…I owned a cousin, a 1986 Dodge Lancer ES. At the time, I thought that was the absolute coolest car in the world. 5 speed manual, real bucket seats, gun metal blue/gray, hood louver…I put a set of after market wheels and rims on it (and $2000 worth of stereo upgrades…ahhh, to be young and irresponsible again!) and thought I owned the hottest sports sedan out there. Never mind that the turbo lag required you to thoughtfully plan any passing manuevers, or that the tranny more closely resembled a tractor’s (check that…I’ve driven plenty of John Deere tractors, and they’ve ALL shifted better than my Lancer did). Still, I sold it years after I bought it, pushing 180k on it and (after placing a new clutch into it), the only non-functioning option was the A/C.
I guess being around when those cars were common having been in my fair share of K-Cars I can’t quite write em off as junk.
Even without resorting to the “Turbo Card” a K-car with a base 2.2 was a reasonable alternative to what else was out there. Lebarons were the convertible to have, Caravans had awesome utitlity, Daytonas talked to you and told you your door was open and looked cool. Grab yorself a little Dodge Shadow or Plymouth Duster, get anything from a turbo to the Mitsu 3.0 and have pretty quick car.
There were better cars on the market but that doesn’t mean that K-Cars were crap.
As for the Daytona, from what I recall they got the job done. When it first came out the Daytone was hot car. The base model had a pathetic engine but the car got out of its own way and it kept up with the rest of the underpowered crap the manufacturers were pushing out in the 80’s. The Turbo models were pretty hot items and the 3.0 V6 models were what you found in the showroom.
Would I want one now? No, but in the 80’s and early 90’s I would gladly take one if someone gave it to me.
Agreed. Second generation K cars were way underrated. Yeah the interior fitments were cheap and assembly fair at best, but they would run forever and the 3 speed auto was a legend in reliability…kind of like a 727 for front wheel drive cars. I put over a quarter million miles on mine before the head needed a new gasket.
I owned an 88 Daytona; bought new. Yes, $16 is about right.
$16 is $14 too much. Had an 85 Turbo I, inherited from my wife when it would stop running occasionally (hall effect pickup in the distributor). Four head gaskets later at 123,000 miles, I brought the title down to breakfast one morning and asked her to sign it. I said I wasn’t coming home with the car that night. She signed it and I called her two hours later to pick me up. Sold it for $1200 to a used car lot on the area’s “used car miracle mile.”
Never have looked back.
You just can’t beat the $200 beater (or banger as I used to call them in the UK). For many years they were all I drove. If you consider the tiny purchase cost and the fact that they just aren’t worth repairing – even if one only lasts you 6 months then it’s paid for itself.
My ‘beater’ of choice back in the UK? Ford Sierra. Bombproof and cheap as chips. Nobody wanted them and they were a hoot to drive.
“But as this one left the block I couldn’t help thinking about all the pointless waste this vehicle represented from the very beginning of its life to that very moment. Some models are just crap.”
What was that all about? This started out as a normal article about the vagaries of the auction scene, and then this.
Personally, I had a cousin to this car a Dodge Lancer Turbo ES, similar to the one another poster commented on earlier. I would agree that the turbo did have lag, but when it came on, you were going for a ride. The trans wasn’t the greatest, but in my case it was no worse than anything else out there in the ’80’s. I drove that car for 11 years and 165,000+ miles. Had some of the regular K-car maladies with head gaskets and transmissions, but once those were taken care of the worst was the idle motor thing that I changed every other year. Kind of like doing a brake job, but a lot cleaner. I would have kept the car longer (and really should have) but I thought I needed a truck. I was wrong.
Regardless, if I could find a condition 2 or 3 (according to your description) for $18, I would be very happy. I’m assuming bucket of bolts means that the car has rattles, but I could live with that. I’m nearly deaf in one ear and can’t hear out the other!
What was the deal with AIC motors? Reading your post, I remembered I did have to swap one of these. Oddly, the one I pulled out was dented inward, but I couldn’t see anything that could have done that to the motor!
@Aqua: I was told two stories about those by dealer’s (service departments). One was that we should never “top-off” the fuel tank, as fuel fumes could reach the circuit board controlling the AIC and cause it to malfunction. Another one was that the pintle would get “carboned-up” and malfunction. Apparently there was no R&R procedure for this condition. It was strictly replacement only. I believe the second story more than the first, but either way, it was a PITA to have to change the part out. And, IIRC the part was about $100, so it was no bargain, either.
My $160 Chrysler LeBaron with the 2.2L engine gave me six months of reliable service before being traded off for something else so I do have some respect for the 2.2L engine.
The 2.2 started out as carbureted 93 hp motor and ended up with port fuel injection, counter rotating balance shafts, turbo, intercooler, and 16v head with 224 hp. Not bad for the “son of the slant 6”.
@windswords: +1.
Underrated greatly, as much as the Ecotec is now.
I remember when these got the POS Mitsubishi V6. You always knew when one of these engines was on the road from the massive cloud of oil smoke(built in bug fumigation perhaps)!
I had 1990 with Mitsu V6 that did the same thing. Actually the motor smoked at idle, not under load. The problem was in the top of the engine, not the bottom. The fix was to replace the valve seats with a harder alloy. The factory got the updated parts in the early 90’s and the motor from then on till it’s last use in the early 2000’s was fine in that regard.
I agree. I had a Chrysler mechanic tell me to stay away from a 1992 Daytona ES that I was looking at that had the 3.0 V-6 and 4 sp automatic. He mentioned I would have double trouble with the car (from the engine and transmission). Being from a strong Chrysler family at the time, we really wanted to stick with the Chrysler-engineered equipment anyway, so I passed on the deal. It really doesn’t matter as I came across a nice 1989 Shelby later on.
My mother had a loaded ’90 LeBaron convertible with the Mitsu V6/4-spd auto…it ocassionally made some cold-start ticking noise, which stopped as it warmed up, but the engine/trans were pretty bulletproof for the 145K miles she put on the car over 5 years.
I remember the V6 having decent grunt for the day, and a nice burble out of the exhaust. Of course, by 145K, the LeBaron had the structural rigidity of overcooked pasta…but at trade-in the engine and trans were still going strong.
My first new car was a bright red 1988 Dodge Shadow – 2.2 Turbo/5 speed. It was a quick, tight little ride that would stick with almost anything on the road – OK, that Grand National Buick I tried to race one night dusted me off, but not much else could.
If I was looking for a fun little project car, a Turbo Shadow or an Omni Charger would be high on my list.
@tmkreutzer: Yes, the Turbo Shadow is a highly underrated car! I had a a friend with a Turbo Shadow back in the day who thought it was hotter than my warmed over 5.0L Fox body Mercury Capri. She was right! That little beast freakin’ flew past me as I was trying to hook. Once I hooked and got up on the cam, I would catch it and pass it, but we were in triple digits at that point.
Another acquaintance had a Turbo Saab they thought was stout, when it ran against the Shadow, it was no competition. It slayed it right from the start and never looked back. I think the only FWD Mopar that was faster was yet another acquaintance’s Shelby GLHS.
For a bone stock car, it was quick little bugger. I’d love to find one.
@geozinger – SAAB turbos never had a chance against my Shadow.
5.0 Mustangs? Well, I had to pick my battles – from a standing start there’s no way I could take one stoplight to stoplight, but on the highway with a rolling start I could get up and get away from them before they knew what hit them.
100mph is kind of a magic barrier. Since most pick-up races on the highway end there, the guy who gets there first generally wins. I surprised a lot of guys with that little sub $10K economy car – got my share of tickets too…
I was never crazy about the Daytona/Lancer. When it first came out, it was cool, but by the late 80’s it was long in the tooth. My buddy had a Shelby Turbo for 6 mos. The engine blew. Story over.
However, there was an honesty about the K-cars, the derivatives, and the Omni/Horizon that a lot of others of that time didn’t have. I don’t know exactly what it was, maybe the promises they didn’t make, but I liked them.
One of my favorite cars EVER, was the 88 Dodge Omni I inherited from my parents. When they brought the sky blue box home from the dealer, I made fun of it. I even hated it. 98K miles later, when I took the Omni to my new home, away from Mom and Dad, and began using it for work, to pay my own rent, and try to make my own way…I loved the sky blue Omni.
Suddenly, I saw the beauty in its simplicity, the fuel economy, the ergonomics, the utility, and the way it delivered me to work every night, and safely home every morning. Had Chrysler only blessed the cars with decent metal that wouldn’t succomb to rust at the slightest hint of moisture…who knows, I might still have that car.
Owned a ’84 Laser XE Turbo till 2003 (from 1991!). Loved that car, was finally killed by a ice storm (I think it was ’03 anyway), when the ice storm put a pine tree on the roof of it.
Even in 1998, it would burn the front tires 1st through 3rd if you kept the boost up (not brake torquing here). I never had a serious 2.2L problem. The big failure point for me was the shift cables (and subsequently clutches, for driving it to a dealer to get the cables replaced with only 4th gear available — thank goodness for the turbo :)). I was able to replace the cables myself (I did one set myself, actually), but I was in the middle of graduating from college, so I roasted a clutch nursing it 15 miles in the city to the dealer.
Right now, I own a LS1 V8 powered Chevy coupe from 2002, but sometimes I have that desire to feel the “step function” of the boost coming online. I also miss the gadgetry and the computer telling me that my “door was ajar”. The thing even had brake pad monitors and oil level monitoring :)
The picture for this story sure brings back memories. If I recall correctly, that is a photo of a 1990 Shelby from the 1990 Daytona brochure. I remember when the Shelby went from the two-tone look of the ’89 model to the mono-tone of the ’90 model. It made the car look a bit more upscale and performance-oriented. However, I still love my ’89 Shelby.
Growing up in the 80s, the Daytona was the first car that really caught my attention and brought me into the automotive world. Before that, I knew of some cars, but none that resonated with me like the Daytona. I’ll never forget the black Pacifica we had in the showroom back in 1987. I loved that car back then. However, the Shelby Z model blew me away. It was my dream to own one. I never did have a Shelby Z of my own, but my brother does and it is an absolute blast to drive.
No, I have an ’89 Shelby that I use as my daily driver. It is getting up in years and miles, but I still love driving it. It is such a great feeling cruising down the Interstate with the t-tops off. There is not a car in the current Dodge line-up (except for the Viper) that I would want as a replacement. I hope to one day restore the Daytona to like-new condition, so I plan on holding on to it for a very long time.
The Daytonas had their share of faults, but they are pretty neat cars to drive (especially the turbo models). They can’t quite compare to today’s cars, but I am still glad I was able to pick up a used Shelby when I had the chance. I don’t regret it one bit.
I seem to recall various family friends also getting great mileage out the K car with the 2.6 Mitsu engine.
Anyway, the 2.2 Turbo could be tuned to produce some pretty respectable numbers. Oddly enough a Daytona in that state of trim was for sale recently around these parts for less than the cost of the parts and labour it would take to build the engine up, probably because it was just a Daytona.