I was fueling my van when this K-car pulled up facing me. It’s actually been a while since I’ve seen one on the streets, so I decided to get out and take a few shots.
It’s a 1985 or later, as it’s had the the facelift that came that year.
Two very disparate vehicles from the same parent, sort of.
And here’s the kicker: as I was pulling into the street, a gen1 Datsun 510 pulled in. No way to get shots of that, sadly.
That was my college car. It was the se 2 door and had the mitsu 2.6. I got 3 reliable years out of it and it was amazing in the snow but all you read about the mitsu 2.6 is true. Its a gas hog (17-21 mpg), the crazy expensive mikuni carb is a black box and is best left alone no matter how rich its running, and the timing chain guides will be the death of it. It had the bucket seats and to this day theyre the most comfortable car seats ive had.
Wasn’t there another facelift at some point that gave these cars flush headlights? (Thought that might help narrow down the year. And did center mount brake lights appear in 85 or 86?)
I came close to buying a Reliant wagon once, but high miles for the year put me off. That, and I told myself if I was going to buy anything it better had a manual transmission.
I guess it has something to do with a slightly different buyer demographic, but it sure seems as though whenever Plymouth and Dodge built nearly identical cars, the Dodge is the one that survives into old age. The only exception I have seen to that rule is the Duster versus the Dart.
No. Single rectangular sealed beams from the ’81 start to the ’89 end. The successor cars (Spirit/Acclaim) had aero composite headlamps, but not the Aries/Reliant.
Paul,
The pictured car is a 1987. I found out the year by running a preliminary Carfax report using the tag number.
For a 33-year-old car it doesn’t look bad.
Had one of these as a company car for a little while in 1987. I was not very impressed. Rough and noisy; the engine would die at stoplights if the A/C was on. Tore the sleeve on at least two dress shirts on the metal window trim of the driver’s door. I viewed it as a sort of FWD Chevette – it beat walking, kinda. Fortunately, I was only using it for occasional local trips. We also had a 1985 Chevy Citation which (while it had its own faults) was much, much nicer to drive and live with.
To be fair though, my personal car at the time was an Acura Integra, so my standards may have been a bit skewed.
Wow, full-on Mopar day at the ARCO what with your van, the Reliant, the RAM and what looks like a mid-2000’s Dodge Caravan…Suddenly, it’s Kansas City!
…….”suddenly it’s Kansas City”…..what am I not getting?
I just picked a random midwest city name due to the fact that the pumps were 100% occupied by domestic name plates. Nothing against KC or any other midwest city, but the ratio of domestics to imports is a lot lower in Eugene than across the midwest.
So Jim, if I observe a gaggle of wet imports and umbrellas…Suddenly is Eugene in November n December?
Nope, those guys wearing orange vests are pump jockeys. Could only be Oregon, or at a stretch New Jersey although that’s a lot less gentle on old cars like the K.
Some cars seem timeless while others were a “you had to be there” kind of thing. The K car is of the second category. It hit the market at the perfect time and did the hard work of making a Chrysler product something considered by “normal people” instead of just by oddballs or old-time repeat buyers.
The K-car did save Chrysler because it was so radically different from the Volare cars. My father had two wagons and I was not impressed. I don’t remember why he traded in the first one one for the second one so quickly. But he traded the second one just as fast and moved on. My stepfather had an Aries coupe and he had transmission problems. I went with him to drop the car off at the transmission shop where the dealer was contracting for repairs. The dealers could not handle the volume. The shop looked like a dealership. I had never seen so many K-cars in one place. After the third unsuccessful repair, he traded the car. It was a huge disappointment.
Interestingly, one of the few remaining K cars in my neighborhood is an ’85 Reliant painted in a similar green. I always assumed that car was repainted, but upon seeing this one, maybe not. Or then again, maybe K car drivers are naturally drawn to painting their cars green after a certain amount of time
I’m glad you stopped to photograph this one — the remaining survivors deserve their chance to be documented for posterity!
That is definitely not a factory colour. It (aided and abetted by the yellow pinstripe and, er, the licence plate) appears to be the present owner’s tribute to the University of Oregon.
My ’85 Reliant was one of the most dependable cars I ever owned. It had the 2.2 L engine up front, front wheel drive, fuel injection, ran winter or summer, snow or rain, 300,000 plus kilometers. Of course I wouldn’t want one now, but in its day it was a good use of funds.
I owned one of these, 2.2/4 with a 5 speed Stick. It was burgundy. I was very happy with it. It went so far on a tank of fuel it must have been the champ, an LE model with the upgrade mags . I was proud to have her, very comfortable inside. One drawback I remember is it was not the easiest to drive in the foothills and it was not a good passer. On flat highway no problem. It met its fate in my heated garage. After just a couple winters of warm and wet. I discovered the underside and rockers we’re rotted. I was so disappointed.
Looks like a fan of the University of Oregon owns or owned this Reliant based on the paint job and license plates. Thanks for these photographs Paul and hopefully they renew their registration soon!
Where was this photo taken at? Does anyone know?