My father had a Mitsubishi Tredia 4 door saloon in the early 80's, had a weird gearbox for an ordinary road car, manual 4 speed Supershift with hi/low ratio which sort of gave 8 gears. The gearbox packed up after a relatively low mileage and cost him a fortune to get repaired.
richynuts,
Jun 21, 5:47pm
Mitsubishi Celeste
peanuts37,
Jun 21, 5:47pm
Friend of my dad had a new chocolate brown with black vinyl roof 2.5PI. A teacher at school had a 2.5 estate.
jkm,
Jun 21, 5:49pm
yip once had a Marina van, havent seen one in years. must have been a beggar for punishment as we bought a marina XL? model as well with vinyl roof and a ****ed gear box lol.
muzz67,
Jun 21, 6:42pm
Hi/low also worked in reverse, which got some stares when changing gear while going backwards.
bwg11,
Jun 21, 6:49pm
Mate had Turbo Tredia. This was the car which invented turbo lag, but fortunately they didn't have too much grunt when they came on boost.
apollo11,
Jun 21, 7:18pm
Jeez, I knew a bloke who collected marinas, he thought they were the best. He eventually had a warehouse full of them but got behind on the rent and had to cull the herd. I remember going for a drive with him in one of his better ones. As we approached an intersection at no great speed, his seat back suddenly collapsed on him . Luckily he didn't let go of the wheel (and I pissed myself laughing).
meow_mix,
Jun 21, 9:33pm
Mitsi V3000
neldo8,
Jun 22, 10:58am
Vanguard Estate wagons xa Falcon utes
carkitter,
Jun 22, 3:23pm
1982 Toyota Corona Coupe (rwd Celica based) - Rusted away very fast like all 7190-85 Toyotas. Handling and braking was dodgy. Chassis like butter. NZ Toyotas were crud until Chris Amon and Jan Beck got hold of them. 1981 Honda Prelude (early Civic based one) - Major rust problems, engines suffered from condensation issues like the EN Civic and became uneconomic to repair very fast. Made obsolete overnight by the 84YM pop-up headlight Prelude. Holden Camira - COTY in AUS but industrial action in the early 80's meant that on the rare occasions they were actually built, they were very badly built and they never recovered from the poor reputation which later attached itself to every Opel Kadett/Vectra based GM euro product Holden tried to sell. Peugeot 405 Awesome car. Driven to high mileage oblivion by everyones enthusiast uncle/granddad. Alfa 145 You seriously need to ask? 1981 Nissan Leopard JUC with no rust proofing to speak of
kam04,
Jun 22, 3:38pm
Had one and loved it - a Ghia
carkitter,
Jun 22, 3:47pm
Holden Gemini (the FWD one) - Same fate as Camira Mitsi Sigma - Awesome cars, I had a '81 Sigma GLX RWD and a '86 FWD Sigma GSR Turbo in two-tone blue/silver. Driven to high mileage oblivion. Saw a RWD Sigma GLX wagon in Hamilton, march this year. Mitsi Tredia/Cordia - Bodies made from tin foil with engines that would crack cylinder heads and manifolds. Ford Telstar/626 first generation. - Awesome cars. Finally started disappearing in the mid 2000's; still survived by obscure Mazda 626 variants fro the 90's that are mechanically similar. All Ladas (there was a time when they were common) - Rust Subaru Leone - Awesome car. Not as common as you think. Killed by rust. Swift/Barina the early ones. - Major engine problems and extremely high Suzuki parts prices. I tried to rebuild 2 at different times for friends in the mid 90's. Not economic long term. ALL Preludes and the pop up headlight 80's Accords and also Civics of the 80s - Major rust problems. Major engine and transmission problems caused by lack of servicing. The 80's engines were made obsolete instantly by the WORLD CLASS 1990's engines by Honda. Pre VL Commodores are very rare now in road going order. - Rust, crashes, modifying, stolen, Blue Meanie replicas, generally worn out. Ditto XD-XF Falcons - Massively outsold by the Commodore. Too thirsty to run. Rust Nissan Sentra - Driven to high mileage oblivion by students. Nissan Bluebird RWD and Widetrack FWD. - Killed by rust and high-spec Jap-imports. Widetrack Bluebird was simply gorgeous looking, especially as a pillar less hardtop coupe. Ford Sierra wagon -Rust, uneconomic at high mileage, cracked dashboards, Replaced by the Ford Telstar which EVERYONE loved.
venna2,
Jun 22, 3:53pm
Here are a few photos from my father's 1930s album:
Saw one yesterday in Remuera. Awesome Giugiaro styling. Poor handling and unstoppable under emergency braking. WHEELS Magazine in AUS sent it back to Holden for re-evaluation because huge weight transfer and massive axle tramp made the rear wheels leave the ground when braking from 100 km/h. Holden sent it to recent GM acquisition Lotus for suspension changes. Reputation never recovered.
carkitter,
Jun 22, 4:11pm
That was my dream car when I was 10. Someone at my school used to get dropped off in one of those.
azzab54,
Jun 22, 4:30pm
Fiat 130 TC . Chrysler Talbot. Simca 1100. Mitsi Tedia Turbo. Mirage Panther and Turbo. CA Bedford.
carkitter,
Jun 22, 5:49pm
Mitsubishi's heyday, when the roads were literally covered in Mirages, Tredias, Cordias, Sigmas and L200 utes.
bill1451,
Jun 22, 6:37pm
1971, Toyota corona 1700cc, coming back from MtHutt skiing with 3 mates 100mph on the clock. ah good times.
richynuts,
Jun 22, 7:10pm
Diahastsu Max360 and the Honda N360. Work mate had the Diahastsu Max and loved it.
rjgmjs,
Jun 22, 7:57pm
Remember those Austin Tasman and Kimberley's from the early 1970's. Similar body size to the Austin/Morris 1800. but powered by small 6 cylinder engines. They never stayed in production very long. Could have been built for the Aussie car market, i can't remember. They earned a crappy reputation.
franc123,
Jun 22, 8:11pm
Yes they were 1800's that were reworked by BMC Australia in another misguided attempt to take on Holden/Ford/Chrysler. They were spacious and comfortable and handled pretty well but that was the end of the good parts. Engines still too small and of course Wrong Wheel Drive for a big car. Hydrolastic suspension didn't cope well with high ambient temperatures found in Oz and the failure of that vehicle prompted the P76 project which was arguably a better concept for that market but had problems of it's own.
marte,
Jun 22, 11:29pm
Another fitter./ Turner apprentice at polytec in CHCH had one. At the time, whille waiting st a bus stop, i counted 1 in 10 cars being a Cortina.
Another not seen for decades would be a Mazda Cosmo.
Others i have had. Cortina MK4 Vauxhall Vanguard. Alfa romeo 33 very fun to drive, ' point & shoot ' & always squealed a tyre on take off. By design. Honda civic 84 Mazda Capella never got pulled over in this car.
carkitter,
Jun 23, 12:49pm
RUst and car thieves killed these off. There is a plastic trim on the outside of the door with a vent flap inside it designed to stop air pressure build up making the doors hard to close. Thieves would remove the trim, reach inside and move the door lock rods and be inside in seconds.
peanuts37,
Jun 23, 1:00pm
Like early RX7s, unscrew tail light and reach in and release lock.
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