The great thing about doing this job is that it’s something I was doing anyway, looking at classified ads for crappy old cars and annoying people (usually my wife) by babbling about them. Now I just get to annoy a lot more people. The terrible thing about this job is finding a whole bunch of cars I wish I could buy, like the two I’m about to show you. One is on the wrong side of the country, and the other is nearby, but twice the price and broken.
Yesterday we looked at a couple of Ford’s stranger post-malaise efforts: a diesel Escort and a 4WD Tempo. I was surprised by the results; I didn’t expect that many of you to cotton to the idea of a $4,000 Ford Escort. Oh, it still lost, but only by about two to one. I thought it would be a lot worse.
I’m with you. If the prices were the same, and both lower, I could maybe be talked into the Escort just for the manual transmission. But as it stands, I think the Tempo would make a perfect winter car, or better yet, rallycross hero. (You show up in earnest with a beige Ford Tempo to any motorsports event, and you’ve already won, before a single lap is run.) I’d want to talk them down some, though. But at a dealership like that, I bet if you waved two grand cash at them, they’d take it.
It won’t happen for a while yet, probably another year at least, but eventually, I would like to get another “fun” car to replace the hole in my fleet left by the MG. The trouble is that I have no idea what I want, or even what definition of “fun” I want to go by. All I know is that I’d prefer a manual transmission, and it has to fit in the available space in my garage. Apart from that, anything goes. Little Japanese sports coupe with T-tops? Sure, why not? Overblown K-car in a vaguely cheesy Italian suit? That’d work too. But which one would you prefer? That’s the question.
1989 Chrysler TC by Maserati – $2,500
Engine/drivetrain: Turbocharged 2.2-liter DOHC inline-4, five-speed manual, FWD
Location: Highland, MI
Odometer reading: 39,000 miles
Operational status: Hasn’t run in 6 years, bad fuel pump
You all know this car, right? Lee Iacocca and his buddy Alejandro de Tomaso joined forces to create a personal luxury car, and ended up creating the nicest possible Chrysler LeBaron. A little over seven thousand of these things were sold, and nearly all of them had an automatic transmission, along with fairly standard Chrysler engines. But 500 of them had something a little bit special: a twin-cam engine that was part Chrysler and part Maserati, coupled to a five-speed manual transmission. This is one of those 500 cars.
The list of suppliers for this special engine reads like a who’s who of go-fast parts: Cosworth, Mahle, Crane, IHI, and more. The result is 200 horsepower, double the standard K-car engine at the time. It would probably be a pretty fun car to drive – if it ran. It has been sitting since 2020 with a suspected failed fuel pump. If that’s really all it is, SWG and I could have it back running in a weekend, I bet. (And that would be a really fun weekend, honestly.) A car that has sat that long is going to need some other things, of course, but for this price, it feels like a worthy project to me.
The best part of the TC is the interior: squishy leather seats, wood trim, power everything, and both a soft and a hard top. This one looks like it’s in really good shape, except for the rearview mirror. And it seems like once those damn things come unglued, they keep coming unglued. What happened to just attaching the mirror to the ceiling on a little stalk? Ah well, if that’s the worst of it, for a car this age and price, that’s pretty good.
It looks like it might have a ding or two, but otherwise, it’s in great shape outside. Both tops are included, and the soft top seems to be in good shape. It looks like it hasn’t been put up in a while, though; it’s all wrinkled from hiding under the hard top for so long. Yes, I see the crooked panel gaps too. It’s all part of the handmade charm.
1992 Nissan NX 1600 – $1,250
Engine/drivetrain: 1.6-liter DOHC inline-4, five-speed manual, FWD
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Odometer reading: 171,000 miles
Operational status: Runs and drives well
If there’s one category of cars I really miss these days, though, it’s sporty coupes based on economy car platforms. They’re not as practical as the cars they’re based on, and they’re not necessarily any better performing either, but they feel faster, and cooler. This Nissan NX is really just a Sentra underneath, like the Pulsar before it, but add a sporty body and some T-tops, and it becomes something special.
The NX came in two flavors: 1600 and 2000. The difference between them was more than engine displacement; the 2000 added bigger tires, stiffer suspension, and some other goodies to go with its extra horsepower. But even this 1600 is a pretty fun little car to drive. The seller doesn’t give us much to go on besides “reliable” and “runs great,” but it’s a $1,250 car. You want to know more, go test-drive it.
The interior doesn’t look bad at all for a car this cheap. That warm California sun has been hard at work on the dashboard and some other plastic bits, but the upholstery is intact and not gross, and nothing looks like it has been abused. My big worry is that you’d take this car to some other climate where it actually rains, and discover that the T-top seals don’t actually seal anymore.
The outside is a bit of a mess: there’s a big crease in the left rear quarter panel, and some uncharacteristic rust on the rear hatch, which makes me wonder how close to the beach this car lives. Again, for the price, it’s not bad at all. I also appreciate that the seller hasn’t tried to jazz it up with crappy Wal-Mart wheel covers. I’d rather just see plain, honest black steelies like this, if the original wheel covers are gone.
Neither one of these is going to be “the car” for me, but they give me some interesting ideas. I could find something cool and non-running like the TC and host a wrench-a-thon to have a couple people help me get it back on the road. Or I could find something out west that’s just an old car there, but would be special and interesting here, and fly out and drive it back. For now, I’m just starting to save up money. But if it were down to these two, which way would you go?
Look, if these two are my options, I’m looking for a good time, not a long time.
Maybe the TC DOES just need a fuel pump, but the good times start as soon as the $$$ and title change hands on the Nissan.
T-tops forever!!!
I guess I could stomach the Chrysler if I removed the badges and anything else that try to make it seem like a Maserati. But then there are the issues with it being a non-running non-Maserati and finding parts for that very interesting engine and I am only slightly reluctantly having to go with the beat-up Pulsar.
I would not NOT buy a non running K car that has been sitting for 6 years! Even if it was the fuel pump 6 years ago a bunch of stuff is now bad. I will take a running manual t-top beater everyday over that.
The best part about the TC is it can engulf it self in flame through solar power and not just shoddy wiring.
I learned this through a Torch article from 2021.
It feels good to be seen.
As for today, I went with the Chrysleratti. That NX is hiding something, I don’t know what; and I don’t want to find out.
Speaking of SWG, it sure would be great to be his mechanic buddy. I’m still staring at the slowly failing clutch in my 03 Civic, and hemming and hawing over DIYing it VS spending three times as much money to have a shop sort it for me. Would be a lot more exuberant to do it if I had a friendly co-wrencher. Sadly all my mechanically inclined friends have offered a resounding hell no when I mentioned it.
My first car was a Plymouth Sundance Duster that I swapped a fully-built 2.2 8V Turbo into.
I’ll take the tC by Maserati, if only for the tuning potential of the 16V DOHC head on that thing that was designed by Cosworth.
It also has a manual, which was rather rare if memory serves.
Would the NX2000 effectively be the B13 Sentra SE-R underneath?
Oh man, a stick shift turbo convertible?
I’d low ball them cause it’s not running, then haul it home.
The Nissan is half the price, but is beaten to shit.
Look, the NX is kinda my jam…kinda. It’s that small, Japanese, coupe type thing I usually like. But it’s in rough shape. And I’ve owned a 200SX coupe (the Sentra-based one), which is similar enough that I feel I don’t need it, even with its “Toyota SERA from Temu” looks.
And it’s up against a clean, preservation-grade TC by Maserati. One of those cult classic cars derided even today that we all kind of love deep down. And a manual, at that! Yup. K-Car day today.
You know how bad the TC is? I buy wholesale cars in the Southeast. I bought one of these for an insanely low amount of money. We have a wholesale lot where we market running and driving units. We offered it for sale. AC worked, reasonably OK interior. It was puke yellow. After 3 months of trying we crushed it.
Cheaper, manual, t-tops, needs nothing fixed (supposedly). My new winter beater/rallycross car is a Nissan.
That NX1600 has the optional digital dash and it is one of the coolest ones ever put in a production car. Also buying a non-running Mopar is a special kind of masochism.
The Nissan has been beat to hell and shouldn’t be the vote but T-tops! So I voted that haha