{"id":48215,"date":"2023-04-26T00:03:16","date_gmt":"2023-04-26T04:03:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=48215"},"modified":"2023-04-26T00:03:16","modified_gmt":"2023-04-26T04:03:16","slug":"junkyard-gem-1992-mitsubishi-expo-lrv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=48215","title":{"rendered":"Junkyard Gem: 1992 Mitsubishi Expo LRV"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chrysler<\/a> did reasonably well selling first-generation Mitsubishi Chariots<\/a> in North America with Dodge\/Plymouth Colt Vista badging<\/a> during the 1980s, and so Mitsubishi<\/a> Motors decided to take a shot at selling the second-generation Chariots with its own company’s badges when those vehicles went into production in 1991. Those vehicles were known as Mitsubishi Expos here<\/a>, with sales beginning in the 1992 model year and continuing through 1995. Here’s one of those ultra-rare first-year Expos, found in a Colorado self-service car graveyard recently.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Chariot line had split into two in its home market by that time, with the regular four-door wagons still called Chariots and a shortened three-door version given the RVR name, which stood for R<\/strong>ecreational V<\/strong>ehicle R<\/strong>unner (actually \u042fVR, with the Cyrillic first character). In the United States, the Chariot was sold as the Expo Wagon while the \u042fVR was dubbed the Expo LRV.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The LRV’s door setup is a bit odd. On the driver’s side, there’s just one door.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

On the passenger side, there’s a sliding rear door (with interlock to prevent it from tearing off the fuel-filler door if it’s open). In right-hand-drive markets, Mitsubishi put the slider on the left side<\/a> while keeping the fuel filler on the right.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Chrysler sold its own versions of the \u042fVR, of course. The Eagle version was known as the Summit Wagon<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

Dodge<\/a> and Plymouth dealers<\/a> sold the \u042fVR as the Colt Vista.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Since this is the base-model Expo LRV for 1992, it has the 1.8-liter SOHC 4G93 engine<\/a>, sending 113 horsepower and 116 pound-feet in the general<\/a> direction of the front wheels. The all-wheel-drive and Sport versions got a 2.4-liter 4G64<\/a> rated at 136 horsepower and 145 pound-feet.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The emissions<\/a> sticker tells us that this car<\/a> was sold new in California. It was built in Aichi Prefecture, Japan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

This one has the optional four-speed automatic, which cost $670 extra (about $1,460 in 2023 dollars).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Not even 100,000 miles passed beneath this Expo’s wheels during its 31-year career. Why is it in this place, then?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Here’s the reason: a crash that mangled the left front suspension.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The ignition key dangles from the kind of lanyard used by car auctions<\/a>, so we can assume this car got totaled instantly by the insurance<\/a> company and had no chance of being sold to any customer other than a junkyard.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The MSRP for this car was $11,537, or about $25,132 today. The Eagle Summit Wagon and Colt Vista were priced similarly.<\/p>\n\n

In its homeland, this car got ads featuring Bugs Bunny and a crypto-reggae soundtrack.<\/p>\n\n

In the United States, Mitsubishi pitched the Expo and Expo LRV as “sport wagons,” and included some of the worst rapping in human history.<\/p>\n\n

Yes, this commercial came out at about the same time as Cypress Hill’s first album hitting the airwaves<\/a>. That’s\u2026 a contrast in rapping styles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chrysler did reasonably well selling first-generation Mitsubishi Chariots in North America with Dodge\/Plymouth Colt Vista badging during the 1980s, and so Mitsubishi Motors decided to take a shot at selling the second-generation Chariots with its own company’s badges when those vehicles went into production in 1991. Those vehicles were known as Mitsubishi Expos here, with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48216,"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-48215","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\/48215","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=48215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48215\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/48216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}