(first posted 7/27/2018) As Chrysler Corporation lurched and stumbled from crisis to crisis through the years, hidden in the mistimed mayhem were a few oddly compelling products. One such car was the Dodge Mirada, a mean-looking Personal Luxury coupe that could even be outfitted as a pseudo muscle car circa 1980. And therein lay the problem: very few people wanted such a machine after the second Oil Embargo of 1979.
Let’s try to be charitable for a minute. Rather than thinking of the 1980 Mirada as launching years too late, perhaps it can be thought of as decades ahead of its time. How so? In the late 1990s, with the arrival of cars like the VW New Beetle and the Chrysler PT Cruiser, new “old-style” cars based on existing underpinnings suddenly came into vogue.
The approach would spread from cutesy retro compacts to big, brawny rear-wheel-drive sedans with “old-school” style like the Chrysler 300 and Dodge Charger in the mid-’00s. Plenty of American swagger for buyers bored with anodyne “international-style” sedans.
And Pony Cars were also reborn in the 2000s with retro skins, creating a new generation of distinctive throwback designs and available high performance in fairly large 2-door bodies. While definitely a niche market, the Chevrolet Camaro, Dodge Challenger and Ford Mustang each represent important halo cars for their makers. All these cars embody a dash of past glories brought somewhat up-to-date.
But big, brashly styled 2-door coupes with thirsty, old-fashioned engines in the late 1970s/early 1980s? Fuggedaboutit! Fuel-price-shocked buyers were flocking to smaller cars, front-wheel-drive was seen as the future, and the “downsized” Detroit cars from the late 1970s started to seem oversized all over again. So the Mirada, already very late to the downsizing party, was a rather unwelcome arrival at the time, despite its handsome lines and full-bore Personal Luxury trappings. Repackaging yesterday’s trends could never really be expected to end well….
Chrysler of course knew that its “new” J-Body Personal Luxury cars were off the mark despite handsome lines that featured more than a hint of the crisp, late-1970s design language of the Lincoln Continental Mark V. Perhaps that prompted the name change from Magnum (which had only been put into use a few years prior) to Mirada (which means “the look” in Spanish). While on the topic of nomenclature that would ultimately change—with references to downsized, front-wheel-drive Aspens and Volarés—it was already clear that Chrysler’s future was K-Car-based, even if the Aries and Reliant names hadn’t yet been released.
Part of the problem was that the “smaller” Dodge Personal Luxury coupe was still pretty big and heavy, and ironically no more fuel efficient than its jumbo predecessor. Plus, despite offering the biggest available engine in its class, it was still no barnstormer thanks to a quixotic-quest for fuel efficiency in the form of a too-high final drive ratio.
Inside, the Mirada was more “mush” than “muscle,” which was fine for run-of-the-mill Personal Luxury duty but hardly appropriate for the “mean-machine” imagery that the Dodge coupe hoped to convey. Even Car and Driver’s counterpoints couldn’t refute the crux of the article: the Mirada was nothing more than a pretty face. Test results bore that out as well—the Mirada could not top traditional rivals like the Pontiac Grand Prix, nor new-fangled competitors like the Datsun 200-SX and Toyota Supra in key areas like acceleration and fuel economy. At $9,791 ($31,712 adjusted), the loaded test Mirada was not inexpensive either, pitting it price-wise against more modern challengers.
So for enthusiast-oriented buyers, the old Aspen/Volaré-based Mirada was a miss, but how about for the benign style-over-substance tastes of the typical American Personal Luxury buyer? Consumer Guide Auto Test ’80 provided some insight into how the typical Mirada would have performed on the undemanding highways and byways of Middle America.
For its role as a stylish cruiser, the car was deemed to be competitive. The same dated chassis set-up that had so irked Car and Driver was seen as “proven” by the pragmatists at Consumer Guide. The “tried-and-true” Slant-6 was also seen as adequate for everyday driving, and not that far off the acceleration performance of the small 318 V8. Gripes centered around ingress/egress and instrument panel layout—the sacrifices dictated by design. Overall, in an age of diminished expectations, the Mirada was seen as being better than the old Magnum it replaced. It was not a chart-topper in any way, but at least Dodge remained in the hunt.
As C&D writer Rich Ceppos had predicted, the Mirada did top one thing: 1979 Magnum sales. 1980 Mirada sales edged out the ‘79 Magnum by 2,392 units (32,746 vs. 30,354), an 8% year-over-year increase—the only Personal Luxury nameplate to post a gain during the very brutal (for larger domestic cars) 1980 model year. But within the context of the U.S. Personal Luxury market, the Dodge was still the laggard.
| MY80 Sales | Change vs. MY79 | |
| Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme | 273,741 | -40% |
| Buick Regal | 214,735 | -21% |
| Chevrolet Monte Carlo | 187,850 | -41% |
| Ford Thunderbird | 156,803 | -45% |
| Pontiac Grand Prix | 114,714 | -45% |
| Mercury Cougar | 58,028 | -66% |
| Chrysler Cordoba | 53,471 | -39% |
| Cadillac Eldorado | 52,685 | -22% |
| Buick Riviera | 48,821 | -6% |
| Oldsmobile Toronado | 43,440 | -13% |
| Lincoln Mark VI (2- & 4-door) | 38,891 | -49% |
| Dodge Mirada | 32,746 | 8% |
GM continued to dominate with its broad array of successful Personal Luxury coupes (despite suffering dramatic year-over-year sales declines), while FoMoCo floundered with the hideously downsized Ford Thunderbird, Mercury Cougar and Lincoln Continental Mark VI. But the news was also grim for Mopar—the slick new Mid-sized Personal Luxury suits (both the Chrysler Cordoba and Dodge Mirada) failed to catch-on in the marketplace. Possibly it was because the entire market segment was tanking as buyers rushed en-mass to smaller, more logical cars. Perhaps it was fear of a Chrysler bankruptcy that held the J-Body duo back, or maybe it really was because they were still too old-fashioned to be truly competitive despite the trimmer-than-before proportions.
No matter the cause, this was one case where repackaging the “best of yesterday” absolutely did not meet the needs of the current day. But it sure was good looking….
Additional Reading:
Curbside Capsule: Dodge Magnum and Mirada – Last Christmas These Stole My Heart by William Stopford
Now I see where the inspiration for the 1984 Toyota Corona hardtop came from
And the Datsun 200SX arrived a bit earlier then Chrysler J-body Cordorba/Mirada. Note the similarity in the roofline design.
I bet the new for 1980 Datsun 200-SX (by Nissan) outsold the Mirada (and Chrysler Cordoba) as more Americans were turning to Japanese cars that got better fuel economy after the fuel scare. That is especially true in California. Chrysler at that time was in dire straits. And their reliability was hit and miss. And the engine in the 200SX had fuel injection.
Ultimately the inspiration for the roofline on all of them most likely stems from the 77 Thunderbird baskethandle. Now the Mirada may have been a “hardtop” with quarter glass behind the door glass, but the basic silhouette is roughly the same.
Close. I think the inspiration for the 2nd gen Cordoba/Mirada is more akin to the ’77-’79 LTD II/Mercury Cougar.
It’s definitely a mix of them, the “hardtop” execution of the side glass is definitely Cougar, but the thinner rearmost pillar and larger scale of the glass is more like the Tbird.
I believe it’s the combination of all of the cars of the era, starting with the Cadillac Seville that fired the first shot. GM called the tune, everyone else had to dance.
Not that this results in a bad looking set of cars, IMO. I came of age as these cars were starting to ply the roads, they still resonate with me.
Voila: ’84 Corona hardtop. Though Toyota were probably taking inspiration from the 1980 Nissan Leopard, which also had this style of roofline.
The scary thing is I remember the “possum belly soft” quote by Don Sherman. I quite like the looks of these, even to the point of altering a pic of one to give it flush headlights.
Love these cars, (less so the contemporary Cordoba) but suppose they need the 360 with some serious reworking. Hard to conceive the notion of a 318 V8 with 120hp.
Also must roll on Rallye 500s and sport dual exhausts!
A friend’s father bought one new, light metallic blue with navy leather. Beautiful car, I was smitten with it. This man’s wife was still driving a brownish-bronze Plymouth Duster that was pretty basic, so the fact that he sprung for this fancy-schmancy car was amazing to the 10 year olds in the cub scout pack.
I think the Cordoba is prettier, but the lines of these cars are really nice.
I had a hopeless crush on these in the fall of 1979 and was convinced that it would be a winner. How wrong I was.
As beautiful as I saw the outside, I found the inside to be a letdown. I remember sitting in these in showrooms and remember the odd seat ergonomics mentioned in the article. You didn’t sit down into a soft seat but on top of a very firm one. That was not so bad in itself until you noticed how the cushion tilted a bit toward the floor at the front, providing no leg support. The dash that tilted down and away added to the illusion that the car wanted you on the front floor.
I was disappointed when these were killed. With some small tweaks and a better economy these could have found a following.
The seats in the Cordoba/Mirada employed a rather sleazy trick that was revealed in a C&D article on the last RWD Imperial coupe. They pointed out that, in an effort to make it seem like their was more legroom, they shortened up the seat cushions which did away with a good amount of thigh support.
The downsized “GM’s” did too in “78-79”. The “75 Datsun”, my sister’s coworker also suffered from very short cushioned, bucket seats.
For several years, I planned to buy one of these used someday and make a way for the rear windows to roll down, at least as far as they would go.
The Datsun 200SX would have been the better way to go, however. No kitbashing required! Those locked really nice in two-tone blue.
I wasn’t a Chrysler man back in the day but I thought these were gorgeous. Outside, anyway; the interior was period Chrysler and looked like it meant to serve in cars across its line, which is to say it wasn’t designed to be in harmony with the Dodge body.
Does anyone here know if the Mirada dashboard was shared with that of the St. Regis and other R-body full-size cars? They look awfully similar, but the R-bodies are bigger and I’d assume need a wider dash. At very least they seem to have shared many parts.
I remember looking at this once before. They are very similar in shape but have some differences. The picture shows a St. Regis (R body) dash up top and a Mirada dash (J body) below. You can see that the J is narrower. I suspect that there are quite a few shared parts.
Thanks – there are more differences than I realized, but the section on the driver’s side looks nearly identical. I like that air vent curiously poking through the glovebox door on the R body.
The Mirada interior looked so much more modern and up-to-date than the Diplomat/M body interior that outlived it by many years. So too for that matter the exterior; how much would it have cost to also build a 4 door sedan version too (rather than the Imperial perhaps). Instead they were left with the 1976 vintage antique-looking M bodies that had little appeal beyond the fleet market (excepting the Fifth Avenue).
My “uncle” (dad’s business partner) traded a ’77 Delta 88 Royale in on a Cordoba of this generation. White over maroon, maroon padded vinyl top (not the faux-cabriolet one so it “only” ruined the crispness of the lines, not the outward visibility) and maroon velour. I’d forgotten they weren’t functional hardtops even if they were structural ones – understandable in a cheap Duster, inexplicable in a PLC.
I recall this was the case with the ’79-’85 GM E bodies too despite their selling at a much higher price point.
Im curious, those sales figures for the Cutlass and Regal represent the whole lines? sedans, coupe and wagons?
The numbers in the chart are for the Personal Luxury Coupes only, and include the Regal, Regal Sport Coupe and Regal Limited from Buick, along with the Cutlass Supreme, Cutlass Calais and Cutlass Supreme Brougham from Olds.
The new notchback sedans from Buick and Olds did quite well for 1980. Buick sold 129,740 Century and Century Limited sedans (up 557%) while Olds Sold 176,253 Cutlass, Cutlass LS and Cutlass Brougham sedans (up 352%). Rounding out the Century line were 1,074 Aeroback coupes (down 88%) and 17,615 wagons (down 44%). Rounding out the Cutlass line were 4,394 Salon Aeroback coupes (down 63%) and 30,606 wagons (down -43%).
So when you total it all together, both Buick and Olds fared decently well between the PLCs and the rest of their mid-sized lines. Buick sold 363,164 Century/Regal models (up 9%) while Olds sold 484,944 Cutlass Supreme and Cutlass models (down 14%).
Chevy and Pontiac mid-sizers were hit harder. Malibu coupes, sedans and wagons sold 278,350 (down 32%). Combined with Monte Carlo, total Chevy mid-sized sales were 466,200 (down 36%). Pontiac did even worse: LeMans/Luxury LeMans/Grand Am sales were 84,024 for 1980, down 39%. Combined with Grand Prix, total Pontiac mid-sized sales were 198,738 for 1980, down 43%.
With downsizing, things got a little messy in the early eighties, but for the 1980 model year I believe the following applies:
Olds used “Cutlass Supreme” to refer to the coupes, while sedans and wagons were just “Cutlass.”
Buick called their coupes “Regal,” while the sedans and wagons were “Century.”
So the Cutlass and Regal coupes basically outsold the Monte Carlo by that much???? Never would have guessed it, the Malibu alone was all over the place. But numbers don’t lie…………i guess.
Thanks GN great article. thanks Dave!!
I really enjoyed this – thanks for posting. Back in ’82 my dad was considering a Mirada – he wanted a black Mirada with the CMX package (padded full cabriolet roof) but wound up with a New Yorker Fifth Avenue instead.
They had nice proportions and the design aged nicely – I always thought they should have kept the Magnum name, especially given that the Mirada retained some of the front-end design of the Magnum. Too bad the details like powertrain, suspension and interior details were so mediocre – I guess this really was the last gasp of old Chrysler.
The sales figures here dispel the widespread notion that poor sales of the downsized 1980 Thunderbird and Cordoba were the result of their smaller size and boxy styling being unpopular. Yes their sales tumbled dramatically, but sales of GM’s personal-luxury stalwarts Cutlass Supreme, Monte Carlo, and Grand Prix fell just as much despite carryover styling that was popular in ’78 and ’79. So the Ford and Chrysler entries were done in by the end of the PLC’s heyday, not a backlash to their downsizing.
The new shape nonetheless somehow worked much better on the Mirada than the Cordoba despite having very few differences between them. The antiquated platform may have hurt sales, but the fear of Chrysler becoming orphaned likely hurt more as did the reduced marketing budget forced by the financial conditions. As with the big R-body sedans, I think Chrysler should have stuck it out with these longer than they did, as sales of rear-drive midsize coupes (and big sedans) recovered by mid-decade. Both the Monte Carlo and Thunderbird veered off in a sportier NASCAR-inspired direction later in the ’80s, a direction the Mirada was primed for from the start. A revamped suspension, engine tweaks, and reliable fuel injection would have made the Mirada competitive.
The 1983 Thunderbird would have made the Cordoba/Mirada look rather outdated from that point forward. However there were still quite a few people who did not like the modern direction Ford styling was headed and these could have provided a good alternative.
1984-85 was when the economy picked up and fuel prices started to settle down. I think that with 20-20 hindsight Iacocca might have kept these around longer than he did. But at the time decisions were being made he explicitly stated that Chrysler did not have the luxury of competing in every market segment and he had to pick and choose where the company had the best chance for significant share in a segment. Unfortunately, these had proved that they were not going to be breakout successes and were clearly going to come in a weak 3rd in a 3 company race. I think a combination of the J and R cars would have been a better competitive plan than the M that Chrysler eventually stuck with. But then they were able to keep costs under control producing just one car instead of two.
Ah, good old Chrysler before Iacocca, the Maxwell Smart of the Big 3.
And so it was with the 2G Cordoba/Mirada. If only they had been released a couple of years sooner. Like others here, I liked them, particularly the Cord-inspired front end of the Mirada. I was less fond of the Mirada’s roofline and rear-end/taillights. In fact, I much preferred the roof of the standard Cordoba, sans vinyl covering. If they had put the simpler (and better looking) Cordoba steel roof on the Mirada, and smoothed up the sawed-off rear-end, they’d have really had a great-looking car. Then, with the styling fixed, as others have mentioned, stuck the 360-4v in the engine bay, they’d have had a real PLC winner, which would have easily cleaned-up in the PLC class, what with the downsized GM offerings and the truly awful Fox-chassis Thunderbird.
But, no. Just like Agent 86, they “missed it by that much”, once, again.
To my eyes, the Mirada is more like Agent 99. Just gorgeous!
In 1980 my Dad bought a new Dodge Omni 024 2 door (the “swoopy” coupe)…it was probably his “mid-life crisis” car, as it was out of character from the cars he owned before and after. A year later, I kind of followed suit and bought a used 1978 VW Scirocco (which I think was the sporty equivalent of the Omni sold by VW…haven’t owned a non-VW in the 37 years since.
The funny thing, back in 1980, I don’t think I looked twice at the Mirada, though working at Hertz as a transporter I did drive the predecessor 1978 Dodge Magnum and liked it a lot….I think part of it had to do with the times back then (and where my mind was)…the 2nd gas crisis was only a year before this, and like many others I was looking for economy almost above all else…My Mother worked for a local Dodge Dealership, and I think even on new cars, the interest rates were something like 16%…so going for a car like the Mirada was kind of a dream…I had started my first professional job after leaving undergraduate studies, and it was kind of “nose to the grindstone” time thinking back on it. I actually got a really good deal financing my 1978 Scirocco, my Manager was the president of the local credit union (great coincidence for me, thousands of people worked at the same plant I was employed at and where the credit union was housed at the time)…and that was 16%…one of my buddies had a 21% used car loan shortly after I got mine.
What does that have to do with the Mirada? Might not seem like much, but though in retrospect I like them very much, I didn’t give them a second thought in 1980…maybe others like me, the timing wasn’t really good for non-economy cars, and I’m sure these were no fun with a slant 6….the funny thing was that 5 short years later these probably would have sold pretty well, with gas in plentiful supply and the economy roaring, too bad these didn’t last but 3 years…bad timing for Chrysler, unfortunately.
A guy I used to work with I met later had one of these….he was a big Mopar fan, he had a ’64 Polara in his garage….he gave me a ride to lunch one day in it…but this WAS in 1985, after the Mirada had been taken off the market…wonder if he still has his?
Dad kept the Omni only 4 years…the big problem was he ordered it without air conditioning, and he had moved from the North east to central Texas…I followed him down the next year and have lived here since then…so he ended up trading it in on a Dodge 600 as I recall….with air conditioning….no more 2 door coupes for him, the 600 was a 4 door sedan.
Replying to my own posting I notice I forgot to add a point, that is these immediately followed the prior generation (though the name was changed in the case of the Dodge) whereas the other “retro” examples you mention weren’t, many years separated them from the model (or “type” of car in the case of the PT Cruiser, which I guess was actually never offered originally but was a takeoff on the 30’s styling). Doesn’t there have to be a “decent interval” before you can declare a design as retro, between the original model that you are “copying” and the later one?
I saw these more of a downsizing of an immediately proceeding model, rather than retro (though I guess “retro” can be interpreted in different ways). Yes, today’s Dodge Challenger is a retro version of the 1970’s model as the Camero is of the 60’s one, but don’t think the Mirada was trying to be anything different than a smaller followup to the Magnum (whoops, the 1970’s Magnum, need to be precise because they reused the name). And the Imperial version…don’t think it was retro to any previous Imperial (other than having 2 doors), it didn’t resemble any previous Imperial to my mind (so what part would be considered Retro?)
Wonder if anybody at Mitsubishi might consider doing a retro version of the 1980’s Dodge Challenger? Guess they weren’t nearly as popular; another co-worker owned both an ’83 Challenger and a ’78 Sapporo (same model sold by different divisions). Well, probably not…Mitsubishi probably isn’t looking to cover niche markets with the problems it seems to be having now.
Still wish I’d gone for one back then…I suspected these would be the end of an era back when I drove the ’77 Magnum working as transporter at Hertz, but as you say you’d be bucking trends doing so in 1980…these weren’t cheap, interest rates were almost usury (24 percent even on new cars) and gas availability was uncertain (even if you had the means to pay for one, you still had to worry about where to get fuel, maybe unless you got it with the slant 6). I’ll admit that though I still had my ’78 Scirocco when my co-worker owned the Mirada, I was a bit jealous (though in my eyes the Scirocco was also a knockout of a car).
These were beautifu except for the plain and boring back. Should have made it more mark vi like. Especially good looking with the convertible looking top. The mechanicals were dependable all. Interior was a little cheap looking and the fenerbextensions were Cadillac quality. They disintegrated like a Cadillac. Still would take one over a fox t birdor gm of the same years.
My FIL had one of these, a 81 or 82, I don’t recall which. The company he worked for was a Chrysler supplier, all of their company cars were Chryslers of some stripe. He had a disastrous St Regis before the Mirada. The Mirada failed to make a good impression on him; his was a slant six powered slug that he thoroughly disliked. I only got this information second hand from him; we lived halfway across the country from each other at that time.
In the mid 1990’s, I ran across a 1980(?) Mirada with the 360 and all of the toys, including T-tops. It was a lipstick red with a white interior and quarter vinyl roof due to the T-tops. It was a decent looker, even though it was at one of those little “iron” car lots, which usually had cars that were on their way to the junkyard. This was their last stop before emptying your wallet and forcing you to ride the bus to work. Even if it drove out OK, I was always suspicious of T-tops in the South. In semi-arid Atlanta, weatherstripping and body gaskets dried very fast. I could see a lot of wet seats and general misery had I spent the $$’s for that car. I still wonder about it, though. It’s an outlier in my MM garage, but if the right one showed up…
You had to be there at the time, but after the 79 Fuel Crisis, the prevailing winds were indicating that FWD was the wave of the future. EVERYONE had to have at least one FWD car somewhere in the lineup, VW and Honda were the darlings of this late decade gas crisis and folks decided this was the way forward.
Chrysler had a lot to overcome with the bankruptcy followed by the gas crisis; love him or hate him Lido bet the farm on the FWD L & K cars, it was the right decision. No one imagined (in 1979) that gas prices would be lower in 1985. And that they would continue on a historical downward spiral until the New Millenium.
Chrysler had a huge image issue to overcome and cars like this frankly were old school. Old school wasn’t cool then, it was more like the stench of death. We can look back on these cars now and wistfully bemoan their passing, but the sales figures bear out their inappropriateness for the times.
I really liked the styling of these, and thought they were much better than their overweight and oversized predecessors. Angular styling and crisp clean lines always get me.
I think a combination of factors doomed these.
They may not have been as comfortable inside as their GM competitors; the review is so heavily biased against the thing that it had no chance. The car magazines at this time were heavily pushing the idea that by 1984, we’d all be driving sub-Chevette sized fwd super econocars and two seater commuters like the Fiero and Opel Corsa. Anything that contradicted that idea was viewed as a ridiculous foolish anachronism. Everyone KNEW that the future was in smaller and smaller fwd cars! It would be like reviewing something like an Aston Martin Cygnet today.
0-60 in 16 seconds! Wow, that’s slow, even by the characteristics of the time. I’m looking at a review of an 80 Cutlass Brougham with the 260/4.3 v8 and it managed the same speed.
The economy was on pretty wobbly footing through most of the 70s and the late Carter recession + the gas crisis meant people weren’t buying personal luxury cars, and if they were buying cars, they were buying weeny gas sipping four cylinder fwd cars. The late Carter recession almost killed Ford as well as Chrysler.
Chrysler’s quality reputation also really killed these cars. People were willing to buy Dodge Omni/Plymouth Horizon L cars because if people bought anything in those years, they bought ANYTHING in that size and price range after the ’79 gas crisis, even Renaults and Fiat Stradas. GM and Ford didn’t offer anything in 79 like the L Body. The Fiesta was too small, the X was pricier than the L body. The Rabbit was more expensive, a little smaller, and VW quality wasn’t any worse than Chrysler, and you didn’t have to wait for a boat from Der Vaterland to bring you parts. But people who had a bad Aspen/Volare were not taking another chance on an even more expensive car.
People knew what a Cutlass or Regal was much more than they knew what a Mirada was. The Cutlass and Regal were the Lexus ES of their day, a predictable, upscale, reliable, solid choice. There was brand equity, a solid reputation for reliability and resale value, and image to go with the Cutlass and Regal. What’s a Mirada? Will Chrysler even exist in a few years?
Chrysler REALLY looked like it was going to go bankrupt until the K car debuted in 1981 and the X car blew up. Even then, it took a few years for consumers to regain their confidence in Chrysler. People were more willing to take a chance on an Omnirizon than a car which cost twice as much, and there were better choices across the way at Olds or Buick.
Lee had to promise to kill the gas guzzlers to get the loan guarantees. This was a casualty of Chrysler surviving. They might have limped along with the Lebaron and Diplomat and Gran Fury, but Lee could make a business case to Congress for that body style cos Cops bought them. Lee had to kill these cars early to get the loan guarantees. They could have been surprise mid 80s hits like the New Yorker, but didn’t live through the recession.
I still do have a soft spot for these cars (Mirada-Cordoba-Imperial). They had many shortcomings, but I do admire their styling and proportions. Unlike so many personal luxury coupes of the era, the Mirada and Cordoba at least come across as leaner and athletic, at least in appearance.
I’m late to this party, but GN, great writing and well-shared articles, as per your normal. I’ll echo what many others have said about the styling of the Mirada – absolutely gorgeous, except for that boring tail panel. Ugh – how could the stylists have gotten every other styling detail so near-perfect and then just phoned it in when it came to that unimaginitively chopped butt and those blocky taillamps?
I’m distressed to read about this car’s actual, dynamic shortcomings. Up until now, it had never really set in that these had actual, serious flaws – like the sloppy, unresponsive steering and those seats. I had imagined that these never got a fair shake simply because of the state of Chrysler Corporation in those days. I’m disappointed to read otherwise.
Still, if I had come across an example such as Geozinger had described above, I might have been tempted.
I guess I am an outlier on this one, but I never found these cars particularly attractive. Although I will say the test car in this C/D article is probably one of the nicer ones I have seen. While these cars were a product of there times, compared to the 1978 GM A-bodies these were nothing to write home about. They were also quite large for the times, at 209″ overall length, it’s pretty near the same length as a 1980 LTD and as the article states not far off a Caprice. These cars were dead in the water out of the gate IMO, too old fashion, too thirsty and too large for the times. In 1980, people were moving away from big cars in droves. Sure Dodge saw a small increase production numbers but they were so low in 1979, it’s not really something to brag about.
The performance of the 318-2bbl isn’t surprising. I had a lot of seat time in a friend’s Chrysler 5th avenue with a 318-2bbl (which had custom true dual exhaust). It could “barely” beat my 307 Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser off the line. While the 2.47:1 final drive isn’t doing this Mirada any favours, that was the norm of the time. GM and Ford cars had equally as steep rear gears, in some cases even worse (Olds had a 2:14 rear axle).
What is somewhat surprising is how poorly the 360 car ran with a very robust (for the times) 185 hp. It had a 2.94:1 rear, which was basically a “performance” rear end in those times, and it still only ran mid 17 sec quarter miles times. Heck, that’s petty much what a 305 Monte Carlo would have run.
I will give credit to Chrysler credit for making a valiant effort at a car it knew was going to be a stop gap. Compared to our recently discussed Ford LTD II, Chrysler made a much more concretive effort using all parts for the parts bin compared to Ford.
Thanks for a great read and for sharing the articles GN.
I always like the way these cars looked. And that ends anything positive I have to say about them.
Back in the summer of ’80, my newly minted bride and I were starting to look at something to replace her ’76 Vega hatchback (and it’s wasn’t going to be a Chevy given I was driving the worst POS of my life, my ’79 Monza Kammback), so we hit the local Dodge dealer. Who was an old friend of the family (the dealer himself had been dad’s used car manager during the Chevy days, and his two sons were among the better friends I had in town). Which meant straightforward dealing and no bullshit.
Obviously, we were looking for an Omni. Which they had none on the lot, because every Omni they got in was sold immediately, and to get one Omni they had to take something like 5 or 6 Aspens, 1 or 2 Miradas, and probably a like number of Diplomats – none of which the buying public had any kind of interest in. After talking over the non-availability of what we wanted, Roger (the younger son) actually tried to talk us into looking at a Mirada.
My wife looked at him like he was totally mad. Of course, he’s trying to appeal to me (Sally, my first wife, was a complete car hater considering the necessity of driving as something you tolerate like that one certain time of the month). And I sure didn’t want something that big.
We finally did get our Omni. Bought from Roger. In 1982. Still have fond memories of that car, the beginning of two decades of Dodge ownership.
I’ve always loved the looks of the Mirada. One of the best-looking personal luxury coupes ever made, which is remarkable considering the year it was released and its contemporaries.
Agree with Matt above. The Mirada/Cordoba appeared most influenced by the ’77 T-Bird. The clean, modern styling, is what appealed to so many.
From what you say, this seems a classic example of the rest of the car not living up to its looks.
I remember reading the C’n’D article and thinking Mopar really seemed back on top of design. Of course it was hamstrung by so many carryover components, but at least it looked modern, branching out beyond the boxy (I didn’t say poxy) Brougham look of the seventies, reaching toward a possible next look. The straight lines and flat panels are certainlt looking to the future rather then the past, though it really needed (still illegal) flush lights. The look isn’t retro, though the concept of a sports coupe this size may have been.
Here’s a 1980 Nissan Leopard: similar roof style.
The Car and Driver article really reads as a hatchet job. Saying that the 1976 Volare platform was antiquated for the 1980 model year and that Chrysler was almost done with it is at odds with the fact that they were still pumping out Fifth Avenues and Furys on the platform almost a decade later. They also tested the engine that provided the fuel consumption of the 4-barrel 360 and the performance of the slant-six. The efficiency issues would have been just as bad for the bigger V8, but at least the car would have been quicker than a Turbo Trans Am. I guess they were fully in the tank for GM in December of 1979, a time when they were still failing to report on the obvious flaws of the X-car.
Ah, Chrysler Corporation, the Maxwell Smart of the Big 3 in that they were perennially ‘missing it by just that much’, and the Mirada is yet another example. The downsized PLCs from both Ford and GM were radically different from their predecessors, and with good reason. Gas prices were at an all-time high in the early eighties so everything was geared toward fuel mileage. The Fox-chassis based Thunderbird/Cougar were particularly noteworthy in how miserable they were in virtually all aspects, mainly due to the short-lived 255 V8. The 1980-82 Fox T-bird and Cougar are universally derided as the worst cars of the model series.
Poor Chrysler, as usual, had terrible timing with the nicely styled, but old-school-sized 1980 Cordoba/Mirada. Considering the competition at the time, they should have been successes. The irony is, as stated, when the very limited, one-year-only 360-4v was specified (CMX trim), performance of the Mirada was actually quite decent, not far removed from the Corvette of the time (at least in a straight line).
But even with Iacocca now at the helm, anyone buying a Chrysler product was taking a big chance on getting an orphan car, and sales suffered until the 1981 K-car appeared and Chrysler’s survival was on much firmer ground.
A real pity, because the final Cordoba/Mirada coulda been a contender.
On the top left of page 137 of the feature review, issues are mentioned of the feel of Dodge’s “high effort” steering system.
By the way they are describing it, Dodge’s name for it is a misnomer. Yes, the power steering system itself is exerting all the “effort”, and all the driver has to do is drape one pinky over the steering ring, or for that matter, just blow on the wheel to turn it.
If I drive any vehicle advertised as having “High-Effort” steering, that kreldan steering wheel better have some weight to it when I perform a turn at anything above parking lot speeds! And it had better center expeditiously from that turn as well.
Because the way I interpret “high-effort” steering, it means that I will have to exert some actual muscle while steering the thing.
120 hp to motivate a 3720 Lb curb weight auto, no thanks!