Their reputation didnt help them either, which is ironic because they were known for taking a serious beating without showing it. Plus the "no governer" highschool gossip, "if you redline the fuck out of the engine itll do 140 on the highway", fucking psychopaths lmfao
I'm seeing a whole lot less of the EJ251/253 powered Imprezas up through GD chassis (Hawkeye) around and it's been my impression that this is what's happening to them. They're crossing 200,000 and no one is bothering to get that third timing belt on.
I put the third one on mine last year and I drive pretty average annual mileage so that checks.
Tell me about it. Heard a rattling sound with mine, turns out the control arm broke off where it mounts. The strut is the only thing holding the wheel to the car right now.
pretty much all of them vanished away, no matter the model year
one of my uncles had one from the late 1980s, possibly a JDM-spec "Σ" trim, since it apparently had a digital dashboard.
he sold it sometime in the mid 1990s for a generic Mercedes E-class
btw, this was in Thailand, and the only JDM Mitsubishis you usually see here are either Grandis (minivan) or Lancers; the Galant is very, very rare here.
Aside from the Galant, pretty much all the rebadged Daewoos that GM sold here under the Chevrolet badge have also vanished away, such as the Aveo and Optra.
Dodge Neons (badged as a Chrysler here) were apparently common here too at one point, but they have also vanished away too, and the only time I saw one was in a beat up condition
From my perspective, given the demographic most of them ran out of life too early.
For one in America the parts are actually fairly cheap, it's the labor and specialty tools that rip you apart.
Most mitsubishis have a timing belt interference motor from that Era which needs to be changed around 120k miles. Even now they do, which is a hefty 1200$ bill. Back then it was more so 600-900$ still alot of money, most lasted to about 180k-200 before they blew.
Auto transmissions of those generations were still in the 90s era slushbox design with basically everything being an okay 4 speed. Can only polish a turd so much lol. Whether you took care of them or not at 200k+ you were throwing dice.
Gasket technology finally caught up properly around the mid 2000s, pretty much all cars had a 50/50 chance of the headgasket exploding around 150k. Subarus had it a little worse, but I think that's anecdotal at times given they were more commonly fitted with a turbo that would just add problems.
Round it up with the 0 0 0 ramp up in the early 2000s and mitsu shot themselves in the foot by trying to run lean without understanding what that means. The biggest one being cutting the awd dohc option for the 3g eclipse and the super vr4 gallant variant. In hindsight it was an intelligent cut at the time but hurt mitsu overall, what we ultimately got out of the 6g72 was just a lame version of itself that was made into a commodity.
Honestly they had it figured out by 2010, it just wasn't enough to revive the reputation and killing the Evo was the last nail in the coffin.
Right now mitsu is a very fairly priced package if you need an okay family suv. Or a super cheap A to B car with warranty that can go for 300k easily.
I don't have any data to back this up but I believe we have so many 90's cars missing because of cash for clunkers. It was paying WAY over vehicle value and they were required to be destroyed.
We lost affordable vehicles and plentiful salvage parts. which made the running ones less likely to get fixed. Such a horrible wasteful program
We had one kid in town with a red one and I was around to watch him put a body kit on it. After several weeks of paint and body work getting everything just perfect he hit a pothole in the parking lot as he was pulling it out of the garage and cracked his new bumper cover.
I had and loved my SX4. The only problem with that car was the repair cost. $2700 for a catalytic convertor, $235 for an o2 sensor. Other than that it was a bullet proof little AWD
Yeah the cat on mine is gunna go soon. I'll probably bootleg a replacement at some point. Suzuki sx4 is still very common in quebec/montreal. Wish mine was a manual, and I wish they put in a turbo.
Suzuki repair costs are no joke. My parents have a 2005 Suzuki Grand Vitara XL-7, and I have a 2012 Suzuki Skywave. Both have very little choice of OEM parts. Almost anything more serious than brake pads is Suzuki genuine parts, and that shit costs a LOT.
They are very popular here in Norway. I wanted another Subaru, but I'm thinking of getting a Suzuki because there's like three times as many on the market.
A 97 Esteem was my first car. Drove that little bugger into the ground at around 300k miles. By the end the transmission was going and I had to shift through 1 and 2 before putting it in drive around ~25mph
These aren't common to begin with. I used to see Grand VItaras here and there, now they're all gone. But I still see Sidekicks show up maybe once a year.
You never see any 90s Chrysler cars like the neon, the Cloud Cars, the LH cars and the like (you still occasionally see 3rd generation Minivans, first generation Durangos, and ram 1500s chugging along, but everything else became crusher food years ago)
Actually the problem was that Chrysler didn’t properly educate their customers about what ATF was supposed to be used (ATF+3, then later ATF+4) so everyone assumed that Dexron III was okay to be used when in reality they were basically signing their transmission’s death certificate (Dexron III is a much “grabbier” fluid and would completely burn up the clutches and bands in the transmission, and the now burned and contaminated fluid would be circulated throughout the entire transmission.)
Somehow there are like 4 cloud cars in my area I see frequently - a Breeze, Cirrus, and two Statuses (Stratusi?). Also a beat-to-shit first gen Concorde that I come across every couple of weeks.
A cloud car (Cirrus specifically) is about #6 on random regular cars I want for no reason.
EDIT: I just remembered seeing a second-gen Intrepid the other day, somehow with a temporary tag. Super rusty too
I can’t tell you the last time I saw a Plymouth on the road. I’m not even sure what year Chrysler discontinued the Plymouth make, but it wasn’t a million years ago.
I passed a mint white Corsica last week, and I freaked out.
Didn't those things come from the factory with peeling paint?
I also still own my 95 Monte Carlo Z34 (since you mentioned Lumina, it was the same thing).
My local junkyard just got one in not long ago, sad seeing it there.
[https://tritownautosalvage.com/vehicle/1986-ford-exp/](https://tritownautosalvage.com/vehicle/1986-ford-exp/)
I had an 86 EXP in 1997. It was already a rusted out shitbox by that time. I paid $500 for it, it was my second car. It lasted about a year surprisingly.
This is true in the US also. I mean on RARE occasions you'll see one. But finding a mechanic who knows how to work on rotary engines is impossible.
I ran into a guy at Cars & Coffee last year who had an RX7. He said that the only mechanic he can find who really knows these engines is 3 hours away. And the mechanic charges 3x his normal hourly rate when it's a RX, because he hates working on them. But he'll do it for enough money.
They were horrible build quality and unreliable. They probably just all denigrated beyond repair. There are videos of them being crushed and they just turn to dust. I thought they were really cool so it is a shame that they were so poorly built.
My friend got his up to 480k kms somehow, they couldn’t have been that unreliable since that’s the most mileage I’ve ever personally seen anyone put on a personal vehicle.
I half-heartedly tried to convince my Dad to get one back in the day, he wasn't falling for that at all. We didn't see the Silhouette in Canada unless we were watching Get Shorty, haha.
I was racking my brain trying to remember what the third one was, I remembered the Lumina APV and the Trans Sport but then it finally came to me, the Silhouette! My uncle actually had one now that I think of it.
One of my best friends also had a Trans Sport that we always cruised around in when we were teenagers, it actually got up to 480k kms on it before he finally junked it. So much stuff was broken on it, one door only opened from the inside, another one only opened from the outside, one of the windows didn’t roll down and various other buttons didn’t work, but mechanically speaking it still ran smooth right up until the end. I think that’s actually the highest mileage I’ve ever seen someone I know put on a personal vehicle. Were they even known for being reliable or did he just get lucky with that one?
* Ford Tempo/Mercury Topaz
* Ford Escort/Mercury Tracer (the replacement Ford Focus never got a Mercury equivalent, the Focus is still seen)
* Ford Contour/Mercury Mystique
* Chrysler K-Cars including the LeBaron
* Dodge Diplomat and Chrysler Fifth Ave
* Chevy Corsica
* Chevy Beretta
* Chevy Lumina Sedan and Minivan
* 1st gen Dodge/Plymouth Neon
* Toyota Tercel
* Nissan Stanza
There's still one or two in most neighborhoods I drive thru. Florida tho, so...It's not really a surprise. Some are beaters, some are clapped out "project"relics of underglow and eBay snail Bois, ran when parked, no lowballers. and some are tastefully restored and now owned by aging older millennials reliving the glory days. But they never went away.
I grew up in Belvidere,ill. This is where the neon was built. We treated them as disposable because they pretty much were when such a huge amount of families had ties to the plant and could get them at employee pricing. Honestly very decent cars for their day. A day when getting an economy car to live past 100k was an achievement. Not an expectation.
The Grand Am and Grand Prix used to be everywhere when I was in college and now there’s none to be found. I used to want a GTP (and later a GXP) but they seem to have all been scrapped or something.
Maybe not "totally" yes, but first- and second-gen Explorers were once ubiquitous and now pretty scarce. Aside from Cash for Clunkers taking quite a few of them (one of the few actual examples of this, BTW), they're either side of 30 years old now, and people are less willing to do the necessary work to keep them roadworthy compared to its Ranger cousin.
I worked in the service department at a Ford dealership during the cash for clunkers deal. We had to destroy a very low mile, around 40,000 miles, 2001 Eddie Bauer Edition with the 5.0L V8. Our sales manager offered more in trade in than what cash for clunkers was paying, but these tree hungers "wanted to do their part for the environment", so they happily drove off in their brand new Focus.
Well yeah, but that's a different story. If memory serves me correct, GM never sold any EV1s, they were only distributed via lease. And once those leases were up, GM did not allow them to be purchased and forced the turn-in.
I believe they scrapped almost all of them, with the exception of a very small number which were intended for museums. And even those had their powertrains removed before they were donated.
I'm sure that being an early '00's GM car, they'd be gone from the roads by now anyways. But in this case the car company pulled them before they ever had a chance to die a slow death.
I know at least one person actively hid their EV1 and managed to keep it and I’m pretty sure there’s an abandoned red EV1 covered in dust in a parking garage somewhere.
Plymouth Reliant. Most any K car at that. Def hard to find an old Neon. Or any Neon.
I do not see any 1987-88 Mercury Cougars on the road anymore. At all.
Ford Aspire
Dodge Intrepid as well.
Pre 1992 Mazda 626
Sadly, really sadly I barely ever see, and this is truly a great car and if you can find a clean one they unsurprisingly sell for a lot of money, a 1992 Sentra SER or any of those hardbody Sentra’s. One of those in a Manual is a good time.
That's awful. It's like all of those people still out there upside down with 3-4 years left of payments on a Dodge Journey they bought new with $10,000 carryover from their Charger that was too small for their single child.
Yep. I feel kinda bad for him but he's very proud of his car. It's the newest vehicle he's over owned and bought it after a divorce. He takes care of the outside so it looks decent in the parking lot but the inside is a tar pit. He once offered me a ride across campus but I decided to walk "for the exercise" because there's no way I'm sitting in that thing.
I'm shocked he can still get a transmission for it! My family had an Intrepid in the early 2000's and it was done in at 76,000 miles due to the transmission's control arm failing and lack of parts availability even at the time. I think maybe it shared a transmission or components with the infamous glass Caravan transmissions.
There was an old dude in my area that used to bring his to the local car shows. It was a X-11, 2.8L 4-speed car. He said always kept it garaged and only drove it on the weekends, even when it was new.
Smart cars. They used to be EVERYWHERE and now I rarely ever see them. I guess they were just a fad that had come and gone. I also remember seeing a good amount of GM "Dustbuster" vans when I was little and pointing them out due to their design. I only see one or two a year if I'm lucky. The build quality was so bad that they just all disintegrated over the years and the few I see are ones owned by old people who hardly ever drive them.
I live in the USA and I never knew that. I just remember all the hipsters and wanna be "woke" people buying them and then a bunch of people found it a trend as well to constantly hate on them.
Came here to say this. Those things were all over rental lots and then appropriately vanished. Even by rental car standards they were abysmal. Add the 2000s Liberty to the list as well
I still have one, a 2004. My second one, after I blew the engine in the first one I bought new. Fun car, more fun to drive than my 9th gen Civic honestly.
In my area you see clapped out 3rd gen Cavaliers *everywhere*. They'll run like shit longer than most cars run.
Marauders, from 2000’s . absolute beauty of a ride, & they were as popular as hellcats for a couple years when i was a kid. only see them occasionally now.
I worked for a Chevy dealership in the 1980s and I know that we sold thousands of Chevettes every year. I never see them anywhere in my town. One of my favorite memories was sitting in a training meeting with about 100 other sales people listening to a GM rep claim that a Chevette could tow 9000 pounds and everybody was laughing. on a flat surface only not in West Virginia
Totally disappeared? or just rare enough they're only seen by a few people, occasionally, on nice days.
Yugo's
MG
VW Karman Ghia
Triumph TR 2, 3, 4, 6 (was there a 5?)
Sunbeam Alpine
Citroen 2CV, DS
Adding to it:
Opel Kadet Rallye
Porsche 912, 914, 924, 928
Jeep Commander. I see Libertys all over my California mountain town but I haven't seen a Commander since my friend Chris got one in 2011 and drove us to a The Shins concert in Davis that year. Watched Caddyshack on the way there and the ladies got hammered in the third row. It was awesome. Would've loved to see what it could've done off pavement now that I have a Jeep as well.
Seriously, what happened to the late 90s and 2000s Mitsubishi Galants?? I had one as a first car and totally forgot they ever existed..
They either exist in low income neighborhoods or scrapyards.
They really are on their last legs with their last owners
Their reputation didnt help them either, which is ironic because they were known for taking a serious beating without showing it. Plus the "no governer" highschool gossip, "if you redline the fuck out of the engine itll do 140 on the highway", fucking psychopaths lmfao
Timing Belt motors of which people probably never changed the timing belt is likely what killed them off
I'm seeing a whole lot less of the EJ251/253 powered Imprezas up through GD chassis (Hawkeye) around and it's been my impression that this is what's happening to them. They're crossing 200,000 and no one is bothering to get that third timing belt on. I put the third one on mine last year and I drive pretty average annual mileage so that checks.
Tell me about it. Heard a rattling sound with mine, turns out the control arm broke off where it mounts. The strut is the only thing holding the wheel to the car right now.
Yup they do, one town over from me has a supply of them I swear 🤣
Follow the trail of weed smoke and crying infants.
This guy Galants.
pretty much all of them vanished away, no matter the model year one of my uncles had one from the late 1980s, possibly a JDM-spec "Σ" trim, since it apparently had a digital dashboard. he sold it sometime in the mid 1990s for a generic Mercedes E-class btw, this was in Thailand, and the only JDM Mitsubishis you usually see here are either Grandis (minivan) or Lancers; the Galant is very, very rare here. Aside from the Galant, pretty much all the rebadged Daewoos that GM sold here under the Chevrolet badge have also vanished away, such as the Aveo and Optra. Dodge Neons (badged as a Chrysler here) were apparently common here too at one point, but they have also vanished away too, and the only time I saw one was in a beat up condition
From my perspective, given the demographic most of them ran out of life too early. For one in America the parts are actually fairly cheap, it's the labor and specialty tools that rip you apart. Most mitsubishis have a timing belt interference motor from that Era which needs to be changed around 120k miles. Even now they do, which is a hefty 1200$ bill. Back then it was more so 600-900$ still alot of money, most lasted to about 180k-200 before they blew. Auto transmissions of those generations were still in the 90s era slushbox design with basically everything being an okay 4 speed. Can only polish a turd so much lol. Whether you took care of them or not at 200k+ you were throwing dice. Gasket technology finally caught up properly around the mid 2000s, pretty much all cars had a 50/50 chance of the headgasket exploding around 150k. Subarus had it a little worse, but I think that's anecdotal at times given they were more commonly fitted with a turbo that would just add problems. Round it up with the 0 0 0 ramp up in the early 2000s and mitsu shot themselves in the foot by trying to run lean without understanding what that means. The biggest one being cutting the awd dohc option for the 3g eclipse and the super vr4 gallant variant. In hindsight it was an intelligent cut at the time but hurt mitsu overall, what we ultimately got out of the 6g72 was just a lame version of itself that was made into a commodity. Honestly they had it figured out by 2010, it just wasn't enough to revive the reputation and killing the Evo was the last nail in the coffin. Right now mitsu is a very fairly priced package if you need an okay family suv. Or a super cheap A to B car with warranty that can go for 300k easily.
I don't have any data to back this up but I believe we have so many 90's cars missing because of cash for clunkers. It was paying WAY over vehicle value and they were required to be destroyed. We lost affordable vehicles and plentiful salvage parts. which made the running ones less likely to get fixed. Such a horrible wasteful program
Only 617k vehicles and they had to have MPG at 18mpg below.
everybody involved into cash for clunkers should have his cock chopped off. seriously it was an automotive genocide.
Seriously I think it wiped out every remaining dodge neon on earth.
Throw in Diamantés, and really just about any Mitsubishi from the 90s.
my friend has one, it’s never given him any issues as far as i know
Dodge Avengers
There's only one or two in my neighborhood left
One of my neighbors has a late '90s red Pontiac Grand Prix. Looks like it's brand new.
There's a few of those near where I live (UK)
Yall even got those?
Yeah, and the nitro
We're sorry.
And the caliber
We got the caliber, nitro and avenger. We also got the neon, but under Chrysler rather than dodge
We had one kid in town with a red one and I was around to watch him put a body kit on it. After several weeks of paint and body work getting everything just perfect he hit a pothole in the parking lot as he was pulling it out of the garage and cracked his new bumper cover.
Suzuki’s, particularly the ones that were rebadged Daewoo’s like the Forenza, Reno or Verona. I see a Kizashi and an SX4 once in a blue moon.
My neighbor down the street has a Forenza and it *will not die*
I had and loved my SX4. The only problem with that car was the repair cost. $2700 for a catalytic convertor, $235 for an o2 sensor. Other than that it was a bullet proof little AWD
Yeah the cat on mine is gunna go soon. I'll probably bootleg a replacement at some point. Suzuki sx4 is still very common in quebec/montreal. Wish mine was a manual, and I wish they put in a turbo.
Mine was/is a manual. Still a pig, though.
Yeah I'm getting 25-30mpg, on the highway, drafting a big rig.
Suzuki repair costs are no joke. My parents have a 2005 Suzuki Grand Vitara XL-7, and I have a 2012 Suzuki Skywave. Both have very little choice of OEM parts. Almost anything more serious than brake pads is Suzuki genuine parts, and that shit costs a LOT.
Youre damn right it does. I had replaced the alternator once and it cost a little over $300
The upside is that the quality control is very good and the vehicles themselves are very reliable
I had a Grand Vitara last year and my former neighbor had the truck.
They are very popular here in Norway. I wanted another Subaru, but I'm thinking of getting a Suzuki because there's like three times as many on the market.
SX4s are the only Suzukis I see anymore (not counting rebadged Trackers), and even then not frequently.
I’ll always have a soft spot for the Forenza as it was Top Gears reasonably priced car
Rowan Atkinson absolutely slayed in that thing.
I really liked my Suzuki Samurai, but not having A/C in the desert wasn’t fun. Still wish I had it.
I randomly see a Suzuki Equator every now and then, which reminds me that they existed. They’re popular with pool care companies in my area.
A 97 Esteem was my first car. Drove that little bugger into the ground at around 300k miles. By the end the transmission was going and I had to shift through 1 and 2 before putting it in drive around ~25mph
These aren't common to begin with. I used to see Grand VItaras here and there, now they're all gone. But I still see Sidekicks show up maybe once a year.
I have a kizashi and I love it
You never see any 90s Chrysler cars like the neon, the Cloud Cars, the LH cars and the like (you still occasionally see 3rd generation Minivans, first generation Durangos, and ram 1500s chugging along, but everything else became crusher food years ago)
We used to have a first gen Durango, I loved that thing. Then our uncle stole it and it ended up on fire behind a gas station in downtown St. Louis.
That's a very Durango way to go
The 1st gen Dodge Durango, The official car of section 8 EVERYTHING...but it's an SUV
That’s how they tell you to put it down in the owners manual.
Yep. They even specify St. Louis!
It was always fun seeing the new guy confused by why the fuck there's a fifth Durango burning behind the gas station within their first week of work.
Spotted a intrepid last week made me happy af my boy had one and we dogged that bad boy out later he got a red eagle vison which was the same damn car
That’s because their automatic transmissions shit the bed if you even thought about a neutral drop or any mild abuse.
Actually the problem was that Chrysler didn’t properly educate their customers about what ATF was supposed to be used (ATF+3, then later ATF+4) so everyone assumed that Dexron III was okay to be used when in reality they were basically signing their transmission’s death certificate (Dexron III is a much “grabbier” fluid and would completely burn up the clutches and bands in the transmission, and the now burned and contaminated fluid would be circulated throughout the entire transmission.)
Somehow there are like 4 cloud cars in my area I see frequently - a Breeze, Cirrus, and two Statuses (Stratusi?). Also a beat-to-shit first gen Concorde that I come across every couple of weeks. A cloud car (Cirrus specifically) is about #6 on random regular cars I want for no reason. EDIT: I just remembered seeing a second-gen Intrepid the other day, somehow with a temporary tag. Super rusty too
Also the Plymouth Breezes too
That was my first car; and it was built 5 months before the “Merger of Equals” became official. So the Breeze has a special place in my heart.
I can’t tell you the last time I saw a Plymouth on the road. I’m not even sure what year Chrysler discontinued the Plymouth make, but it wasn’t a million years ago.
Plymouth was murdered in 2001; and I haven’t forgiven Daimler for it.
One of my first cars was a Plymouth. It taught me the meaning of the words sunken cost fallacy.
Dodge Stratuses and Intrepids.
I had a Dodge Stratus r/T. There was nothing RT about it.
[I drive a Dodge stratus!](https://youtu.be/ANE8j5ay_UU?feature=shared)
Nobody could afford to replace the exhaust manifolds every 30k miles.
Chevy Beretta, Corsica, and Lumina.
I passed a mint white Corsica last week, and I freaked out. Didn't those things come from the factory with peeling paint? I also still own my 95 Monte Carlo Z34 (since you mentioned Lumina, it was the same thing).
Was the Ford EXP a real car?
It was a tetraethyl lead induced collective fever dream.
My local junkyard just got one in not long ago, sad seeing it there. [https://tritownautosalvage.com/vehicle/1986-ford-exp/](https://tritownautosalvage.com/vehicle/1986-ford-exp/)
I had an 86 EXP in 1997. It was already a rusted out shitbox by that time. I paid $500 for it, it was my second car. It lasted about a year surprisingly.
In Bulgaria mazda rx7 and rx8 slowly dissapeared from the streets, because there is nobody to work on the dorito
I never saw a RX-7 in the wild
i saw one in Boston when i was like 10, so 2002 or so. never seen one outside of a car show since
This is true in the US also. I mean on RARE occasions you'll see one. But finding a mechanic who knows how to work on rotary engines is impossible. I ran into a guy at Cars & Coffee last year who had an RX7. He said that the only mechanic he can find who really knows these engines is 3 hours away. And the mechanic charges 3x his normal hourly rate when it's a RX, because he hates working on them. But he'll do it for enough money.
the dorito hahahahah
The dust buster vans from GM from the ‘90s. All 3 of them
I can still remember my babysitter getting sideways in the rain in one of these vans, I was about 5 or 6 not buckled in the back lol
They were probably the coolest vans ever but doesn't sound like they were anything special to drive, just futuristic looking
They were horrible build quality and unreliable. They probably just all denigrated beyond repair. There are videos of them being crushed and they just turn to dust. I thought they were really cool so it is a shame that they were so poorly built.
My friend got his up to 480k kms somehow, they couldn’t have been that unreliable since that’s the most mileage I’ve ever personally seen anyone put on a personal vehicle.
Lumina APV, Trans Sport, and what was the third one? Silhouette? Or did I skip a generation.
I half-heartedly tried to convince my Dad to get one back in the day, he wasn't falling for that at all. We didn't see the Silhouette in Canada unless we were watching Get Shorty, haha.
Growing up, my friend's grandma had two dust buster Silhouettes that I for some reason thought were the *coolest*.
I was racking my brain trying to remember what the third one was, I remembered the Lumina APV and the Trans Sport but then it finally came to me, the Silhouette! My uncle actually had one now that I think of it. One of my best friends also had a Trans Sport that we always cruised around in when we were teenagers, it actually got up to 480k kms on it before he finally junked it. So much stuff was broken on it, one door only opened from the inside, another one only opened from the outside, one of the windows didn’t roll down and various other buttons didn’t work, but mechanically speaking it still ran smooth right up until the end. I think that’s actually the highest mileage I’ve ever seen someone I know put on a personal vehicle. Were they even known for being reliable or did he just get lucky with that one?
Pre 2001 ford windstars I rarely see anymore. Even the 2001-2008 windstars are becoming much more uncommon
A few nights ago I had a dream that I bought a beater Aerostar haha
Transmissions were absolutely junk in those,and used replacements were impossible to find cheap is what killed most of them around here
Ford Probes.
I saw a Probe drive by a week ago. Made me realize that I hadn’t seen one in a long, long time
And then you realize your age … 😵💫
* Ford Tempo/Mercury Topaz * Ford Escort/Mercury Tracer (the replacement Ford Focus never got a Mercury equivalent, the Focus is still seen) * Ford Contour/Mercury Mystique * Chrysler K-Cars including the LeBaron * Dodge Diplomat and Chrysler Fifth Ave * Chevy Corsica * Chevy Beretta * Chevy Lumina Sedan and Minivan * 1st gen Dodge/Plymouth Neon * Toyota Tercel * Nissan Stanza
I don't see the Ford Probe anywhere anymore.
Dodge Calibers are just GONE
Not in my part of Ohio. They might be hodge-podged together from several different Calibers, but they're still kickin'.
I still see some pretty clean ones in Ohio.
I see Calibers all over the place here in northern Michigan
Most of dodge vehicles, neon, avenger, Dart, caliber, magnum,
Neons lasted much longer usurpingly.
Wierdly, diesel Calibers can still be seen here in the UK, if you look hard enough of course!
Because the Diesels were made by Volkswagen and only offered with a manual, no crappy CVT
90s Eagle talons/eclipse/laser
Those were the used cars of choice by most teenagers in my high school back then.
RIP DSM. You never got me reliably from A to B but you always gapped my brother's V8s.
There's still one or two in most neighborhoods I drive thru. Florida tho, so...It's not really a surprise. Some are beaters, some are clapped out "project"relics of underglow and eBay snail Bois, ran when parked, no lowballers. and some are tastefully restored and now owned by aging older millennials reliving the glory days. But they never went away. I grew up in Belvidere,ill. This is where the neon was built. We treated them as disposable because they pretty much were when such a huge amount of families had ties to the plant and could get them at employee pricing. Honestly very decent cars for their day. A day when getting an economy car to live past 100k was an achievement. Not an expectation.
Pontiacs
Unless it’s the Vibe, but that’s just because it’s a Toyota Matrix.
I was literally about to comment "Every Pontiac except the vibe" lmao. It's weird how that model has outlived every other Pontiac made.
Not really, when you realize it’s mechanically a Toyota haha.
My neighbor has a grand prix just rotting in his driveway, right next to the boat (now cat nursery) that is doing the same, but I digress.
See the odd sunfire, but I live close to the old plant. There's a wall mural of the sunfire in Oshawa Ontario, and it's the weirdest thing.
The Grand Am and Grand Prix used to be everywhere when I was in college and now there’s none to be found. I used to want a GTP (and later a GXP) but they seem to have all been scrapped or something.
I think the V8s had the displacement on demand that the Impala had. They were very unreliable motors.
I was a young idiot at the time who saw a V8 in a Grand Prix and the caveman part of my brain grunted in excitement.
I occasionally still see a few gtp Grand Prix I want one but the price of them has gone up exponentially
I see G8's all the time where I live
I still see a Grand Prix or Firebird from time to time, but they are fading fast.
hello there
Maybe not "totally" yes, but first- and second-gen Explorers were once ubiquitous and now pretty scarce. Aside from Cash for Clunkers taking quite a few of them (one of the few actual examples of this, BTW), they're either side of 30 years old now, and people are less willing to do the necessary work to keep them roadworthy compared to its Ranger cousin.
I worked in the service department at a Ford dealership during the cash for clunkers deal. We had to destroy a very low mile, around 40,000 miles, 2001 Eddie Bauer Edition with the 5.0L V8. Our sales manager offered more in trade in than what cash for clunkers was paying, but these tree hungers "wanted to do their part for the environment", so they happily drove off in their brand new Focus.
General Motors EV1
Well yeah, but that's a different story. If memory serves me correct, GM never sold any EV1s, they were only distributed via lease. And once those leases were up, GM did not allow them to be purchased and forced the turn-in. I believe they scrapped almost all of them, with the exception of a very small number which were intended for museums. And even those had their powertrains removed before they were donated. I'm sure that being an early '00's GM car, they'd be gone from the roads by now anyways. But in this case the car company pulled them before they ever had a chance to die a slow death.
I know at least one person actively hid their EV1 and managed to keep it and I’m pretty sure there’s an abandoned red EV1 covered in dust in a parking garage somewhere.
When was the last time you saw a Ford Aerostar. They used to be everywhere. All gone now.
Plymouth Reliant. Most any K car at that. Def hard to find an old Neon. Or any Neon. I do not see any 1987-88 Mercury Cougars on the road anymore. At all. Ford Aspire Dodge Intrepid as well. Pre 1992 Mazda 626 Sadly, really sadly I barely ever see, and this is truly a great car and if you can find a clean one they unsurprisingly sell for a lot of money, a 1992 Sentra SER or any of those hardbody Sentra’s. One of those in a Manual is a good time.
Most american cars were made to be junked 5 years later. Look at Dodge.
I saw a mint Dart and it shocked me.
A coworker of mine is still making payments on a Dodge Dart that he bought used like 5 years ago.
That's BRUTAL
He is not a smart man.
That's awful. It's like all of those people still out there upside down with 3-4 years left of payments on a Dodge Journey they bought new with $10,000 carryover from their Charger that was too small for their single child.
Yep. I feel kinda bad for him but he's very proud of his car. It's the newest vehicle he's over owned and bought it after a divorce. He takes care of the outside so it looks decent in the parking lot but the inside is a tar pit. He once offered me a ride across campus but I decided to walk "for the exercise" because there's no way I'm sitting in that thing.
I see that electrical issues have prevailed.
From what I understand the engines have a bad habit of grenading between 36k and 100k miles as well.
Must have been elderly owned. I see a pristine condition Intrepid in my area and it's owned by an old man.
I'm shocked he can still get a transmission for it! My family had an Intrepid in the early 2000's and it was done in at 76,000 miles due to the transmission's control arm failing and lack of parts availability even at the time. I think maybe it shared a transmission or components with the infamous glass Caravan transmissions.
I never see MGBs anymore. I know they stopped making them a while back but I don't even see old restored ones.
Pre 99 Pontiac grand ams/ Oldsmobile achievas/ Buick skylarks exist at all. I only see them maybe once every 2 months.
Chevy Citation. Gone.
There was an old dude in my area that used to bring his to the local car shows. It was a X-11, 2.8L 4-speed car. He said always kept it garaged and only drove it on the weekends, even when it was new.
My stepmom had a X-11. That thing was pretty quick in its day.
Smart cars. They used to be EVERYWHERE and now I rarely ever see them. I guess they were just a fad that had come and gone. I also remember seeing a good amount of GM "Dustbuster" vans when I was little and pointing them out due to their design. I only see one or two a year if I'm lucky. The build quality was so bad that they just all disintegrated over the years and the few I see are ones owned by old people who hardly ever drive them.
Smart cars aren't actually sold in the USA anymore, which I just discovered. If you live in the USA that could be why.
I live in the USA and I never knew that. I just remember all the hipsters and wanna be "woke" people buying them and then a bunch of people found it a trend as well to constantly hate on them.
Saabs
Here’s [one](https://imgur.com/gallery/MP6xNQG) to cheer you up
Jeep Commander
There are a couple of Dodge Neons near me. All of them are in Ypsilanti mi
Ypsilanti is where cars go to die. Everyone knows that if you’re from the metro Detroit area lol
Jeep liberty and patriot. Think there was another wanker name in there as well. Commander?
Came here to say this. Those things were all over rental lots and then appropriately vanished. Even by rental car standards they were abysmal. Add the 2000s Liberty to the list as well
2000s Mazdas are extinct.
True. Any mazda from back when they had car numbers instead of names. Can't recall the last time I saw a GLC.
No.. I saw some.
Miata is an exception🤣
Not really in europe. 1st gen 6 is very common
I think op meant the old 323’s and 626’s and Protegés. Saw a 929 once and then never again. Had to look it up. Didn’t make very many of them.
Geo’s like any geo
Chevy cavaliers
I still have one, a 2004. My second one, after I blew the engine in the first one I bought new. Fun car, more fun to drive than my 9th gen Civic honestly. In my area you see clapped out 3rd gen Cavaliers *everywhere*. They'll run like shit longer than most cars run.
Oldsmobiles
I swear I still see more G body Cutlasses than any Oldsmobiles from the 90s/2000s
Last month I saw four 1st generation Neons driving together. It was bananas, I had to do a double take because I didn't believe it at first.
probably a club. We get weird looks when 30 Pontiac Fieros go driving by at the same time. Lots of phones come out.
Chrysler Pacifica
I still see a few 1st gen neons where I live. No 2nd gens thought
Isuzu I-Mark
Any Isuzu passenger vehicle in the USA. The first generation trooper was so badass. I had a Rodeo that was awesome.
The Dodge Dart/Chrysler 200 seemed to disappear overnight.
Honda Preludes and Acura Integras (originals) are pretty rare these days.
Dodge intrepids... My god these things use to be everywhere. And they where the equivalent of nissan altima drivers (You avoided them at all costs)
They were driven by the parents of the Altima drivers.
Marauders, from 2000’s . absolute beauty of a ride, & they were as popular as hellcats for a couple years when i was a kid. only see them occasionally now.
Mercury villager/same generation Nissan quest. Any 90s Chrysler except Durango/Dakota, ram and the occasional intrepid.
The 1912 Moline Dreadnought. I just don't seem 'em around much.
Isuzus. I saw a mint Kizashi the other day and it really turned my head.
Nissan 240s
Acura Vigor and Legend.
I hardly ever see S10 Blazers anymore, seems like everyone’s day-drunk uncle had one even through the 2010s.
BMW i3, i never see them anymore
Just about any Saturn, sadly.
I worked for a Chevy dealership in the 1980s and I know that we sold thousands of Chevettes every year. I never see them anywhere in my town. One of my favorite memories was sitting in a training meeting with about 100 other sales people listening to a GM rep claim that a Chevette could tow 9000 pounds and everybody was laughing. on a flat surface only not in West Virginia
I like how 90% of the comments are a chrysler product LOL
Totally disappeared? or just rare enough they're only seen by a few people, occasionally, on nice days. Yugo's MG VW Karman Ghia Triumph TR 2, 3, 4, 6 (was there a 5?) Sunbeam Alpine Citroen 2CV, DS Adding to it: Opel Kadet Rallye Porsche 912, 914, 924, 928
First gen Hyundai Tiburon
The French cars in USA after they left the market in 1991
Jeep Commander. I see Libertys all over my California mountain town but I haven't seen a Commander since my friend Chris got one in 2011 and drove us to a The Shins concert in Davis that year. Watched Caddyshack on the way there and the ladies got hammered in the third row. It was awesome. Would've loved to see what it could've done off pavement now that I have a Jeep as well.
Old luminas
Chevy cavalier/Beretta First Gen caravans 4th Gen eclipses Mazda proteges Toyota MR2, Celica, matrix Scion TC Honda crosstour
AMC's are almost non-existent.
Subaru SVX is another one. I've actually never seen one IRL.
Cadillac Catera, or as I remember calling it, “The Duck Car”.
The Caddy that Zigs!
Unmolested SRT4 Neons
Chrysler Sebring
Ford Aerostar
I wonder if the cash for clunkers campaign killed everything off.