A Fistful of Yen was a subplot in the epic 1977 John Landis (Animal House, Blues Brothers, Coming To America, Spies Like Us, Three Amigos!) directed Kentucky Fried Movie. For some reason I can't even look at a Daihatsu Charade without thinking of the classic line from Loo (who is a Bruce Lee look-alike with an Elmer Fudd speech style) "What was that? Dis is not a chawade, we need total concentwation!" See this 1987 Daihatsu Charade with 40k miles on the odometer offered for $1200 in Redwood City, CA. Tip from Kaibeezy.
It takes a whole lot of imagination to picture this car as anything but automotive purgatory, but how many other 40k mile economy cars from 1987 can you find for sale? The Japanese built 1.0 liter inline-3 good for 53 horsepower should be good for a few hundred thousand more miles and the 5-speed manual gearbox should return good fuel economy. Really, how bad could it be?
See another cheap econobox for less? tips@dailyturismo.com
"Take him to Detroit."
ReplyDeleteTwy again, with feewing!
ReplyDeleteActually did a road trip in a new one of these back in 1988 (long story), LA to Palm Springs and back, and it was a pleasant surprise. Sure, it was a 52 hp, 3-cyl, slightly-bigger-than-kei-car-sized box on wheels, but it was far from a tin can--it was surprisingly solid, well-built and Interstate 10 worthy. Slow of course, but did manage to keep up with 1988 traffic with little difficulty. Ignoring the parking-by-Helen-Keller dents and dings, for a few hundred bucks someone will get a pretty solid 1980s econo-orphan.
ReplyDeleteLA to Palm Springs?
DeleteIf you mean Louisiana to Palm Springs, that's a road trip.
If you mean the City of (heh heh) Angels, then my wife drives that far to go shopping.