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Chrysler 200 officially dies Friday


fuzzymoomoo

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Makes you wonder what a 2003 one would've looked like (the 2003 Navigator has always been my favorite).

Yeah I liked the 03 Navi. It's a shame quality just wasn't there. Most everything about 03 I liked. I liked the dohc engine. I liked the interior. Just every time one can in with 30k+ miles, it had a grocery list of concerns for warranty repairs. The air suspension is range Rover expensive to fix and it can be a multitude of problems not just one.

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I think the Lincoln Blackwood is widely considered the biggest flop in US automotive history since it lasted less than a year.

 

Not even close to the magnitude of the Edsel division. I can't think of one instance of a car company spending so much money on another division only to have it shut its doors in 4 years! Even Scion lasted around fifteen years.

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Not even close to the magnitude of the Edsel division. I can't think of one instance of a car company spending so much money on another division only to have it shut its doors in 4 years! Even Scion lasted around fifteen years.

Saturn comes to mind of a flop. The idea was there. But the product was not. By the time they turned into something it was time to pull the plug. Those where some pretty terrible cars. My sister had a couple. Sounded like a weed eater at highway speed and the steering wheel vibrated like a push mower at idle.

 

I thought the old escort and zx2 shook like a crack addict. Then I got in her sc2.

Edited by fordtech1
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Saturn comes to mind of a flop. The idea was there. But the product was not.

 

The problem with Saturn is it took FOREVER for GM to get an actual product out for the division. They started talking about it in 1982 or so and didn't have an actual product till 1989/90!

 

It also didn't help that it came out of GM and ran into a whole host of problems because of that...I just saw that 41% of Saturn owners where coming from other GM divisions...yet another reason not to have multiple car lineups.

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I'd say that Saturn was the biggest flop. It was only profitable for one year, if I recall correctly, and siphoned off resources that were desperately needed to keep Chevrolet competitive.

 

The first Saturn was a mediocre car that was barely competitive with the contemporary Ford Escort, let alone the Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla. Meanwhile, the Cavalier was rotting on the vine.

 

Good dealer service and some clever PR helped mask the car's basic mediocrity. In the long term, however, product is what mattered, and the Saturn was simply another GM small car that was barely competitive when introduced and quickly left in the dust by the competition.

 

The Lincoln Blackwood was small beans compared to the Saturn fiasco.

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Saturn didn't make any money until they started selling badge jobs, and by then it was "who cares?". Though there were still tears when they folded, as some car trivia buffs do whenever a brand ends. They act as if their "youth is destroyed". Some still pine for Edsel, Nash, Hudson, De Soto and Studebaker.

 

Anyway, one other hilarious 'fix' for FCA posted by the Mopar fan men, is to "bring back the Neon and PT Cruiser!" As if the tooling was carefully packed away in an attic. And the old designs will pass modern crash tests. To some, they were the 'best cars ever made'!

Edited by 630land
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Maybe FCA can reintroduce the 1957 Mopar line. This time, however, it sell the propensity to rust as a bonus for the environment:

 

"With our new InstaRust technology, there is no worry about your new car someday cluttering up a junkyard or someone's yard. In four years, it will be gone, and you can buy a brand-new one, which will also ensure more jobs for American workers."

Edited by grbeck
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Chrysler's roller coaster history really started with the 57 lineup. The 1960 Dodge Dart is my favorite of that generation. The 62 Dodge and Plymouths were disasters, but I really like the Custom 880's of 62 through 64.

 

The 1991 Saturn should have been the 1991 Cavalier, and GM shouldn't have wasted all those billions. The only good GM small cars of that era were made by Toyota.

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