{"id":41139,"date":"2023-01-25T00:03:46","date_gmt":"2023-01-25T05:03:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=41139"},"modified":"2023-01-25T00:03:46","modified_gmt":"2023-01-25T05:03:46","slug":"junkyard-gem-1988-hyundai-gl-sedan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=41139","title":{"rendered":"Junkyard Gem: 1988 Hyundai Excel GL Sedan"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was going to college in Southern California<\/a> in 1986, driving an affordable Detroit hooptie<\/a> like most of my peers (because only a nobody walked<\/a>), when I noticed a strange thing in the campus parking lots: plenty of brand-new cars!<\/em> More specifically, incredibly affordable brand-new cars from two manufacturers nobody had ever heard of: Yugo and Hyundai<\/a>. As we all know, Malcolm Bricklin’s Yugo GV<\/a> went on to become a big joke<\/a>, the country that produced it disappeared from world maps<\/a>, and its assembly plant was bombed out of existence<\/a> \u2026 but Hyundai became a huge player in the American market. Here’s one of the cars that first made \ud604\ub300\uc790\ub3d9\ucc28\uadf8\ub8f9 a household name here, found in a Denver-area car graveyard recently.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Yugo GV was hilariously cheap, with a price tag of just $4,199 for the base three-door hatchback in 1988 (that’s about $10,805 in 2022 dollars, or nearly three grand less than you’d pay for the cheapest new car in America today<\/a>). But the much bigger and better-equipped 1988 Hyundai Excel started at a mere $5,295 ($13,625 now).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

That was\u00a0unbelievably\u00a0<\/em>cheap for a new car<\/a> that challenged the likes of the $5,495 Chevrolet Sprint<\/a>, $5,999 Mazda 323<\/a>, $5,556 Subaru Justy<\/a>, $5,899 Dodge\/Plymouth Colt<\/a>, $5,995 Dodge Omni<\/a>\/Plymouth Horizon<\/a>, $5,948 Toyota Tercel EZ<\/a>, $5,490 Ford Festiva<\/a> and $5,990 Volkswagen Fox<\/a> for supremacy in the under-$6,000 range (six grand comes to about $15,439 after inflation). The Yugo, Sprint, Justy, and Festiva were itsy-bitsy pretend cars, not suitable for jousting with battered Plymouth Furies<\/a> and Lincoln Mark V<\/a>s on the 405<\/a>, so the Excel looked like by far the best car-per-dollar deal of mid-to-late-1980s America.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

That said, a few decades of hindsight tells us that the early Excel wasn’t screwed together so well. Hyundai build quality has been solid since since at least the middle 1990s<\/a>, but the early Excels tended to fall apart in a hurry. I recall visiting California junkyards in the early 1990s and being startled to find still-shiny Excels with under 30,000 miles on their odometers next to the decayed Super Beetles<\/a> and rage-junked Renault Alliances<\/a>. If I got time-machined back to 1988 under orders to buy a sub-$6k new car<\/a> that had a good shot at lasting at least a quarter-century, I’d get the Tercel EZ or 323<\/a> (and then do all the maintenance on the dot).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

This being an automatic-equipped sedan with the one-notch-above-base GL trim level, its MSRP was well above the $6k threshold: $7,145 ($18,385 in 2022). That’s still\u00a0way<\/em> cheaper than an ’88 Corolla<\/a> or Civic<\/a> sedan with slushbox ($9,358 and $9,655, respectively), and the Excel’s specs looked somewhat similar to those of the Corolla and Civic.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The engine is a Mitsubishi-derived four-cylinder rated at 68 horsepower. Smart Excel owners avoided drag races with anything quicker than Yugos and diesel Volkswagens<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The automatic transmission added a stiff $450 ($1,158 now) to the cost of this car. American drivers loved automatics nearly as much in 1988 as they do now, but two-pedal rigs were costly and Excels were bought on price, so most of them had the base five-speed manual<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Believe it or not, there was a Mitsubishi-badged twin of the Excel sold in the United States: the Precis<\/a>. Starting price was $5,295 for the ’88 Precis<\/a> hatchback, same as the Excel.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Not even 100,000 miles on the clock. Since most Excels died fairly young, they’re difficult to find in the boneyards<\/a> today. I suspect that this one was a just-to-church-on-Sundays car that got regular maintenance from its one owner. Amazingly, I’ve found a junkyard Excel with close to a quarter-million miles showing<\/a>; not quite up there with the 600k-milers<\/a> I find during my junkyard travels<\/a>, but still impressive.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

It’s a bit rusty, though the body filler may have slowed down the leakage into the trunk.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

It will be crushed very close to where it was sold new.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Excel wasn’t a good car, but it was an\u00a0important<\/em> car and thus a big piece of our automotive heritage. That’s what makes this one a gem<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n

Buy two for the cost of an average car! A new Chevy Celebrity<\/a> cost about the same as a pair of Excel 5-speed hatches in 1988, so this commercial isn’t wrong.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was going to college in Southern California in 1986, driving an affordable Detroit hooptie like most of my peers (because only a nobody walked), when I noticed a strange thing in the campus parking lots: plenty of brand-new cars! More specifically, incredibly affordable brand-new cars from two manufacturers nobody had ever heard of: Yugo […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41140,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-industry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/41140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}