I’m told there’s some sort of election happening today? Here in America? I think they’re picking a new set of aldermen or a new comptroller or something like that? I’m not really sure, as I don’t think it’s been getting all that much publicity in the media. Now that I think about it, I may have gotten some fundraising emails from the big political parties. I want to say one are the Whigs, and then there’s the Neo-Monaerchists? Is that right? Seems close enough. Anyway, we decided to have our own little election.
What is our election about? It’s about something deeply, richly American, something important and vital, not like whatever trivial showdown is happening tonight. It’s an election about something that matters: what is the best Chrysler K-car variant to, uh, rule America, I guess?
Yes, K-cars! The front-wheel-drive platform that usually came with an anemic 2.2-liter four-banger (there were exceptions with turbos and a Mitsubishi four, for example) and often with all-I-had-handy-was-a-ruler styling. These cars saved Chrysler from disaster and allowed them to pay off their bankruptcy loans early.
There were a lot of cars built on the K platform or modified versions of the platform, but we just picked six of them – in long, involved primaries, of course – and now you get to vote for which K will Rule Them All. Like that ring in those long-ass movies and books about wizards and elves and smurfs and shit.
So, with that, let’s look at our candidates!
The original, basic K-Car! These came in Dodge and Plymouth flavors, in sedans, two-doors, and wagons, but they were all pretty much the same. I have direct experience with these from back in the day, and I can say from experience that these were, charitably, crap.
But, they were inexpensive crap that looked decent and did their jobs, for the most part, and were not terrible on gas mileage, and that went a long way in early 1980s America.
Sure, I once saw my friend close the driver’s door and a four-inch bolt clanged out onto the pavement, but that doesn’t mean these boxy things weren’t, for Chrysler, the right car at the right time. Because they were.
Was an upmarket K-car possible? Hell yeah it was, and the New Yorker proved it! These cars were on the vanguard of digital dashboards and, yes, their Texas Instruments-supplied voice synthesis systems I really do believe made Americans aware of the usage of the word “ajar,” at least in relation to doors.
The interiors were quite plush, and they had that vinyl quarter-roof, which I don’t recommend you look too carefully at, lest you discover that it was made from a half-assed fiberglass cap glued on back there.
The Chrysler minivans of the 1980s were genuine successes, and were pretty fantastic vehicles – perhaps the best of the K-cars, in some ways. Built on modified K-car platforms, these were marvels of packaging efficiency with their transverse FWD layouts that left pretty much everything from the front axle back available for people or stuff.
A real re-birth of the minivan concept, these were the backbone of American familial transport for years and years.
In some ways, this may be the oddest of the K-cars (not counting the not-exactly K-car Maserati TC by Chrysler) with its convertible top and faux wood-paneled sides. It had to be decades since a non-station wagon dared to wear fake wood before the LeBaron brought it back, and that was a bold move.
What else out there has a look and feel like a woody LeBaron droptop? Hardly anything.
I think the Laser, along with its sibling Dodge Daytona, were pretty bold competitors to other sporty/muscle sort of cars available at the time. Unlike the Mustang or even a Toyota Supra, the Laser was a FWD sporty car, and made about 145 horsepower, pretty decent for the time.
These weren’t especially great, but they weren’t bad, either! And that drop-down side window line is pretty fun, right?
These are pretty amazing limos for a number of reasons: it’s a four-cylinder limo, which is already unusual, though the Mitsubishi-sourced engine under that hood does have hemispherical combustion chambers, so it’s a true hemi.
They’re long, but also oddly narrow, and overall while they do have limosinic proportions, they’re not all that big. And the interiors! They’re absolutely velour-slathered! If you love velour, like, really love velour, you can’t get anything better than one of these velour cocoons.
Okay! Those are your candidates! Each offers their own highly specific set of charms and foibles, like all good political candidates, so you need to carefully consider everything and balance all of that information with the needs of yourself, your family, and, yes, the nation.
It’s time to vote! Take your time! Consider carefully, and remember that your vote is private!
Once you voted, please enjoy this I VOTED sticker you can print out and affix to your clothes with a blot of mustard.
As much as I really appreciate the base K-cars, I have to go with the Caravan/Voyager minivans. They were just the right thing at the right time to define an entire automotive segment. If you weren’t there when the Chrysler minivans debuted, it’s hard to realize how cool they were. Yes, minivans became decidedly uncool over the next decade; but it’s hard to describe how revolutionary they seemed when they first hit the scene.
I’m not sure if they were ever cool, but they were revolutionary in the sense of overall functionality and ease of use for the average consumer and their family’s needs at the time.
The evolutionary bridge between the 70’s full size station wagons and vans, and the 90’s and beyond SUV/CUV eras. Economical to operate, reasonably priced, easy to drive and park, and they could fit the entire family, their stuff, the dog, Grandma, etc. inside.
Although I’ve personally never liked them (I absolutely despised them in my Gen-X angsty teen and young adult years, as they weren’t cool at all to me and represented a contented domestic married Boomer life, complete with all their screaming, puking, pooping babies – at that time in my life – ugh!), but as with so many other things over time and age, I have come to respect and appreciate them for what they were and are. Not for what I wanted or expected them to be, but the role that they served for a huge segment of our population. An appliance, yes, but a very cleverly designed and marketed one, that in retrospect has earned it’s rightful place in automotive history.
The coolness came from the packaging and extensive options list that could make them an excellent travel vehicle in a time when large station wagons were going the way of the dinosaurs. A fully-optioned V6-powered Caravan/Voyager was a great roadtrip vehicle. They were also really the first fully modernized take on a van in over a decade, and they could fit in a garage. The automotive press and buyers were all over them for the first few years until the competition started ramping up alternatives.
For the record, I’ll always vote for an AWD Chevy Astro/GMC Safari compact van as the coolest of small vans.
I hear ya, and if those attributes were things that I appreciated at that time, I would very likely have viewed them the same as you.
They absolutely were a hard break from the heavy, large, gas thirsty family/utility vehicles that came before them!
Reinvention of the minivan? I thought Voyager/Caravan was the INVENTION of the minivan?
This is Torch. You know he’s thinking of the VW Type 2 as the OG minivan.
It is! Or maybe a DKW Schnellaster?
Ah, I should have known!
Oh you know it’s the minivans.
And also, if a Dodge Caravan were running for president, I would absolutely vote for it.
What if it were running against a Plymouth Voyager?
“Not a dime’s worth of difference.”
I’d probably flip a coin? Nah I’d probably go for the Plymouth.
There’s only one vote: Caravan and its many many offspring.
The K-car lineup wasn’t what saved Chrysler, but it did lay the foundation for the lineup that did: the Caravan is why Chrysler spent way more time circling the drain before finally winding up in the P-trap that is Stellantis, after passing through Daimler-Benz’s groping embrace.
I still don’t fully understand what D-B got out of that. There never really was any synergy there.
Daimler got easy money as they bled the resurgent Chrysler Corporation of it’s profit and drained the engineering resources away from Chrysler before dumping them at the beginning of the 2007-2008 Recession
Frankly I don’t think Mercedes Benz bought Chrysler for the engineering department. MB already had better but they were probably thinking dealership network.
Then after buying someone at MB said Jim Smith Mercedes Benz/Chrysler dealership and everyone sobered up.
You didn’t understand what I said, it had nothing to do with wanting to use Chrysler engineering, rather that they took the profits away from Chrysler as well as dictating a reduction in product development for the Chrysler side of the merger that killed any and all engineering prowess that had allowed Chrysler to recover financially and develop new models following the bankruptcy scare in the 1980s.
Daimler saw a profitable competitor that they wanted to extract as much money from and then left them in the trashcan as the money began to dry out due to the looming recession. It wasn’t a merger of equals, it was a pillage and plunder operation.
Before Daimler, Chrysler Corporation had been recovering and making somewhat desirable and profitable products like the minivan. At the end of their partnership they were left with technologically backwards home grown vehicles with 4 speed automatic transmissions like the Journey and the CVT equipped Dodge Caliber, Jeep Patriot and Compass, and old Mercedes based platforms such as the LX, and the Grand Cherokee etc, all with trashcan plastic interiors etc.
Cerberus Capital Management didn’t do Chrysler any favors, either. We’re lucky that the company isn’t long dead and buried by now.
Look for the rebound. Somehow it always rebounds.
Cerberus was paid to take Chrysler off Daimler’s hands.
What sent Chrysler down the drain wasn’t the minivan, it was the electronic 4 speeds and grey suits who listened to Daimler.
I’m not saying the Caravan is why Chrysler was circling the drain. I’m saying the Caravan is why Chrysler circled as long as it did. If it hadn’t been for the Caravan, Chrysler might well have gone straight down the pipe.
“I still don’t fully understand what D-B got out of that”
$13Bn –
Wired from the Chrysler accounts to Deutsche Bank the day after the “merger”.
When I bought a 93 Grand Caravan, I asked how the automatic transmission reliability was, as the earlier ones had problems. They told me problem was fixed years ago. I donated it at 115K miles needing its fourth automatic transmission. I vote the Caravan top K car. Everybody in America with a kid or more had a Caravan/Grand Caravan. Didn’t look up sales, bet minivans were more than these other candidates put together.
When I was sixteen my dad was trying to decide between a banana yellow Lincoln Continental coupe and an 84 Plymouth Caravel. When Dad went in the house for a second on the k car test drive, the sales guy leaned forward from the back seat and whispered (because I was clearly and vocally on team banana boat) “hey kid…this baby’s got turbo.”
That said, for me, forever and always, it will be the white Chrysler LeBaron. So I can tour facilities and pick up slack.
I voted for the base because my uncle drove a Reliant. Unremarkable story until you learn he never drove it faster than 35mph, because that’s where he got the best gas mileage. He told me this on a visit to Missouri…he’s from Wisconsin.
Driving School I went to had a fleet of Brown K cars. They all had a piece of rebar that went from the brake pedal across the transmission hump and into the passenger foot well, where the “instructor” could apply the brakes. Every one of the cars in that fleet reeked of cigarette smoke. Thankfully that was my only K car experience.
Was this in Waukesha? You gave me flashbacks
Actually it was in Ohio, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a common thing.
The previous Premier of the Yukon has an old beat up LeBaron convertible he use to drive around every where, including the Christmas Parade.
Sounds like he should be on Mountain Men.
I’ve been to Yukon in the fall.
It must have been a very short parade.
normal length for a small town. Yukon Kids are built different. The premier would have his top down for the parade.
Laser. It was the only one that didn’t make me gag.
They all make me gag, but at least in the convertible there’s an easy way to throw up!
But the minivan has the ability to hold volumes of regurgitant. The ultimate upchuck bucket.
I can’t think of a more appropriate metaphor for an election than a bunch of choices between the same disappointment in a bunch of different outfits. Except here we actually get to choose between more than two. My brain says vote for the Aries/Reliant. It’s honest. It’s not trying to be something it isn’t.
My heart wants the Laser/Daytona. It looks great. Is it great? No. But it looks great. And I’ll have to look at it for four years, so cool.
My limbs say the minivan. It’s the most practical of the group. It’s won’t demand too much from me. It will put up with my kids and all of their shit. It deserves a chance.
My liver says the limo. It’s pickled in alcohol and there should be plenty more for me in the back seat. It’s bribing it’s way to victory at the expense of my life.
My ears say the Lebaron. Certainly because my eyes are the ones making that call. And there’s a certain satisfaction to hearing the jeers to people around you.
So many rationales. So many solid arguments.
But in the end, I’m writing in DeSoto Firesweep.
Do you have a “sixth sense” where you “see dead people” and they’re screaming “RUN AWAY FROM THE K-CARS!”?
(I voted Laser since it looks great)
The Caravan/Voyager feel like the easy winner here, as they were genuinely good and were extremely popular for a long time.
A more interesting choice would have been to vote for best non-minivan.
This was actually difficult even though they’re K-cars
I voted Laser since it looks the best and is sporty and fun
My list:
1)Chrysler Laser
2)Dodge Carvan/Plymouth Voyager
3)Chrysler Executive Limo
4)Chrysler New Yorker
5)Chrysler Le Baron T&C Convertible
(JON VOIGHT!)
6)Base K-Car (Aries, Reliant)
(These were TRASH)
I drove a New Yorker in high school. Needless to say I voted for anything else. What a gutless and unreliable piece of garbage
Gotta be the Plymouth Voyager! I’ve said it before, but my first car was an 86 with a manual transmission, a great vehicle for me at the time, not too fast, could haul a lot of friends and stuff.
Well, Tim drives an Aries.
Around here, quality is spelled with a K! Kwality!
So Kwik Kwality Kars?
Mini Van! True story time. We had a Caravan as our driver’s ed car. I had already been driving for about a year when I took driver’s ed. We had a set course that we went to that should have taken most of the class period. I set off on the course with the teacher in the passenger seat and two other students in the back. About 1/2 way into the round trip, the teacher fell asleep. My 17-year-old brain said I would be a school legend if I could get a speeding ticket in the van (my 50-year-old brain is less convinced that would have been true). So, I sped up and drove the van down the two-lane highway we took back to the school as fast as I dared, but alas, there were no cops to pull me over. The teacher woke up when we returned to school, and we were extremely early. He could not admit that he had fallen asleep but had no idea why we were back early and seemed very confused. The other students did not rat me out (that I know of), so I wonder if he ever figured it out?
There was a turn at the far end of our parking lot course the instructor could not see from his tower. We practiced neutral-drops down there in the former Forest Service AMCs we had. The guy driving after me went just a bit too hard and broke the transmission hard enough that it showered fluid on the pavement.
our road instructor used the students to run errands: I got to know his dry cleaners, pharmacy, and bank pretty well
I used to do neutral drops in the old man’s 74 LTD Country Squire with the 460 when I was (rightly so) pissed at his dumb ass.
After about the 50th time it blew out the rear end…in the driveway.
Covered under warranty. Good times.
To me this is like asking a parent to choose which of their children is their favorite.
My turbo minivan is my favorite. However I voted for the executive limo because I need the motivation to get that one running, and maybe if it wins I might dig it out of the barn.
Do it!
—even better if you have children you can embarrass with it.
Parents do that. If you don’t realize that sorry I guess it’s one of your siblings who is….
OK all you damn fools voting for the minivan, watch this epic 80’s TV detective/cop show car chase and tell me the Laser/Daytona doesn’t deserve to win!!!
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cc-tv/cc-tv-car-chases-daytona-versus-firenza-in-hunter/
(Also, LeCar sighting @ 0:42 or so.)
You should have also added Black Moon Rising’s Daytona:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIjPrfyKX6A
Shooting the tire to make it go flat resulted in a spinout… and a tire that was not flat at all. TV shows were so low-budget…
Also I would just like to note for the record that it’s not ME making you all vote for K-cars this time.
The base model Aries K is the only car I’ve never had any trouble fixing. It needed repair constantly but kept chuffing along until the floorboard rotted out from under it.
I voted Minivan because Aries K Wagon wasn’t a candidate here.
If you’re driving a car this shitty, you’re clearly driving it for the utility and nothing else.
My friend had a lot of sex in the back of a New Yorker back in high school. So, I’m guessing he is one of the 5 that voted for it.
The Caravan/Voyager might be the most influential K-Car, but the Daytona/Laser was the light at the end of the performance car tunnel, so it gets my vote.
I kind of liked those VW clones, especially the GLHS versions, simply because they were insanely oversteered Turtles that could actually move until they broke down of course.
I do too, but by not being K-Car based, they are ineligible for this election.
I know minivan wins, but I voted Laser because “sportscar”.