I take great pride in the ability to name just about every car on the road based off a quick glance. This is a skill I’ve possessed since around age 3, and in recent years I’ve even been able to correctly identify the trim level and model year. So, it’s an extremely rare case when I don’t know a car without looking at its badging. But this car was one of those rare, rare cases that left me painfully stumped. I saw this vehicle while out in San Francisco and approaching it’s badgeless front-end, I had no idea. Even as I got up close to it, I hadn’t the slightest impulse of its identity. Whatever it was, this was the first one I’d ever seen. It was driving me crazy. What the hell was this foreign-looking, ’80s sport coupe?
Finally, as I moved to the rear the mystery was solved. An Isuzu Impulse? Never heard of it. At least my nerves were calmed a bit, knowing it wasn’t an elusive Honda or Toyota. Additionally, Isuzu history has never really been something I’ve cared to learn about. Upon research I found that the Isuzu Impulse (or JDM Isuzu Piazza) was a Giugiaro-designed sport-hatchback sold in the U.S. from 1983-1992. Only around 13,000 were imported during that period, making the sight of one 20-30 years later slim, to say the least. The 2nd generation and more familiar 1990-1992 models were also sold as the Geo Storm.
What immediately caught my eye was the “Suspension by Lotus” badge on the rear. And yes, that’s legit. Beginning in 1988, all Impulses came with the upgraded Lotus suspension, previously an optional upgrade. I’m honestly not sure the year of the one I saw, but it’s a 1988 or later because the lack of pop-up headlights.
Needless to say, the amount of Isuzu Impulses left are probably minuscule, explaining why this was the first one I’ve ever seen. If I have one complement for this car, it is that it’s the first car in a long time that’s stumped me. Here’s to that.
never imagined as an Isuzu that the longevity would be good, but a friend in college had an 89 or 90 with the whole lotus tuned suspension and it was an impressively fun driving and handling car. Certainly far superior to the I-Mark.
I must say that this Isuzu is in remarkable shape for being 25 years old. There’s barely any rust from the pictures you show, other than the rock strikes on the hood. The rust beast loved those early Isuzu’s, especially in the areas where rock salt was used on the roads. The interior is especially amazing; nearly factory. Makes me imagine the original owner still drives and loves this car.
I do remember the ‘Suspension by Lotus’ as I totally weighed the decision (at the time, purely hypothetical) of the Impulse vs. the Mitsu Starion and Dodge Shadow ES turbo.
I’m pretty sure that the interior shot is one pulled from the internet, not of the actual car Brendan found. For one thing, it’s parked in a different setting.
You are correct. I try to make it a habit of not breaking into cars to take interior shots haha.
After selling a respectable number of little pick up trucks as Chevrolets, a small car as an Opel Kadet in the States, (the I-mark), and selling trucks under it’s own name, Isuzu was ready for the big time. They went all out with the Impulse. They wanted to move beyond their GM small truck and car supplier image.
It was notable for it’s attractive modern styling and for it’s Lotus suspension.
But it takes more than that to sell a car, and Isuzu wasn’t able to capitalize on the Impulse. The GEO Storm version was rather sad, compared to the first generation.
No one seemed ready for gas prices to fall. For a decade, Washington told us we were running out of gas so auto manufacturers geared up for small cars. Naturally, second-tier players in Japan and newbies in South Korea believed that with the need for small cars in the US, they had an opening to enter the US market.
During this period we see new small car brands unleashed in the States to meet this new demand. Saturn, Mitsubishi, Daewoo, Daihatsu, Suzuki, Kia, Hyundai, Yugo, as well as Isuzu brought over new small cars to sell. By 1984, the Market shifted out of the Malaise period, gas prices dropped and SUVs rose in popularity.
Fortunately for Isuzu, they had the Trooper and the Rodeo. So while Isuzu discovered that their expensive new little Impulse couldn’t find buyers, their trucks could. Isuzu ended up selling many small trucks and SUVs while their Impulses sat on lots.
During this time we see a whole lot of cool small cars from many manufacturers. We see a mini V6 coming out of Mazda, EXPs/LN7s our of Ford, teaming up of Toyota and GM at NUMMI, teaming up of Kia, Mazda and Ford at Flat Rock, $3 billion spent on Saturn and a slew of US wanna-be’s from all over the world.
Had Washington and the Environmentalist been right, these expensive excursions and investments into small cars for the US Market would have been good gambles. However, as we have repeatedly seen, Washington’s faux science claims are more politically based than are reality based.
The Impulse got good reviews, but was not considered a good value. Isuzu, while a respectable truck company, ended up more like International Harvester, than another Nissan.
I seem to remember the I-Mark being offered as a diesel as well as gas?
This is true; I remember it being touted as the most fuel-efficient, and probably slowest, car in the US market.
No diesel Impulses, not even in Europe. At least from the factory; maybe someone swapped one in.
I just realized you said “I-Mark” not “Impulse”; my bad.
Right. The I-Mark had a diesel option making it cheaper than the diesel competition. Isuzu had a good run of diesels in their trucks and used the I-Mark as well to sell that engine.
Diesels had a pretty good run back then based on fuel mileage possibilities.
Isuzu used the Impulse as a market-builder differing from their trucks and I-Mark, their Chevy P’up and Opel Kadett, sold by Buick, replacing the Opels sold by Buick and made by – uh, Opel.
GM kept pimping out Opel and ended up with those gad-nasty Daewoo Opels. GM pretty much fired Daewoo after that catastrophe. Remember the Daewoo Pontiac LeMans? Well, it was sold as an Opel – and as a Daewoo as well. Woo! What a POS that was!
The Impulse didn’t have a diesel, but it did have a turbo option around 1987-1988, most people don’t remember that the 1st gen Impulse was a RWD T-car (Chevette!) based car, it was very good looking, but it had a fairly mundane powertrain.
I remember attending a relatives wedding in the 80’s where the bride a groom got a pair or gold and black Impulses as a wedding gift from the brides parents.
I had the privilege to briefly own a diesel I-Mark (bought it cheap and soon found out why), all I can say about the diesel I-Mark was that Isuzu found a way to make an already uninspiring car (gas I-Mark) even worse. The seats weren’t bad as I recall but other wise… sometimes great MPG just isn’t worth it.
Isuzu I-mark Diesel- It was definitely slooooowwwww. I drove a friend’s I-Mark Diesel Automatic (yes. automatic.) through the mountains of PA. Nearly got us flattened by trucks out-hillclimbing us in the right lane. Driving on the shoulder was the next step.
PS. I know slow. ’67 VW Kombi, ’68 VW panel van fully loaded, 504 Diesel wagon well beyond rated payload – and a buddy’s 2CV! Literally, a 602cc 2CV held the grades better than that I-Mark Diesel auto.
@VD “But it takes more than that to sell a car, and Isuzu wasn’t able to capitalize on the Impulse. The GEO Storm version was rather sad, compared to the first generation.”
Do you have any clue what you are ranting about?! The Geo Storm Impulse was available in turbo/intercooled AWD form where as the Storm GSI was not. The first gen Impulse was just a glorified RWD Chevette by comparison.
There is another Lotus connection that most don’t remember. The turbo 4XE1 Isuzu motor was used in the 1990 vintage Lotus Elan. Many consider this Lotus to be the best handling car ever built. IDK. I’ve seen them in action on the track and like I’ve always said. “It’s the driver and not the car!”
BTW I’m surprised that the author would admit to being a car geek but yet had never ever seen an Impulse in the flesh until now. These were all over the place in my neck of the woods back when they were fairly new. I guess success was measured by how big the dealer that piggy backed Isuzu on their Big 3 franchise was back than.
BTW I’m surprised that the author would admit to being a car geek but yet had never ever seen an Impulse in the flesh until now. These were all over the place in my neck of the woods back when they were fairly new.
The author wasn’t even born until some years after the Impulse went out of production. Does that help explain it?
I was thinking that this could make a great CC question: what was a car, made before you were born, that completely stumped you the first time you saw it? In Brendan’s case, it was this Isuzu. For me, it was a Ford Anglia. I remember thinking, what the Hell is this small, strange car? A Ford?!?!?! That little wonder was quite a sight in America during the age of the Torino!
For me, any European model that had its moment in the sun in the U.S. during the 1958-60 import boom, then receded. I was born in 1970 and have lived my entire life in Massachusetts. By the time I was old enough to pay much attention to cars (mid ’70s), the non-VW imports from that era had long since either been discarded in favor of something larger/more mainstream, or had simply rusted away.
A while back, IIRC, someone posted here that Renault had sold 100K Dauphines in the U.S. in 1959, eleven years before I was born. I can’t say I have any memory of ever having seen a Dauphine on the road.
For domestic cars, I’m pretty good back through the ’50s, a bit shakier on the ’40s, and start to get lost once you get more than a few years back into the ’30s.
For me, it was a Crosley, driven by a high schooler around 1973 or 74. I would’ve been 12 or so. It made my dad’s VW look like a Lincoln!
Having been born into a family that owned Checkers, an Ami 6, a SAAB 93 wagon, among others, you’d be hard-pressed to find anything built in the years before I was born that I couldn’t identify…
(Born 1991)
A 1987 Subaru “coupe” – no, not the XT, but the Loyale/Leone-based 3-door hatchback. What really stumped me is that it was one of the lower-trim “DL” FWD versions with quad sealed-beam headlights instead of composite headlights – if you do a Google image search for Subaru coupes of this era, every one will either be an XT or be a composite-headlight version (turbo, AWD, RX, etc.).
I had never seen one before, and I might never see one again, since this one was not in very good condition. It doesn’t help that I live in New England, where most Subarus of this era outside of car shows rusted away long ago.
I also had a college friend with an Impulse, and would echo the sentiment.
I really liked these when they first came out. At the time, the Giugiaro design looked super smooth and sleek.
A beautiful car unfortunately with mundane mechanicals and a minor-brand maker with a thin dealer network. Imagine how it would have sold if Honda used this design for the Integra.
In Australia it was launched as the Holden Piazza (inevitably nicknamed the “Holden Pizza”) with a wildly-optimistic $35k pricetag. They sold so few that Holden dropped the price $5k and even sent $5k checks to the original buyers, but the damage was done.
The ‘handling by Lotus’ was because the early ones were a pig to drive- I remember Wheels magazine giving them a real caning over the price and handling. It was a real pity because they were a great looking car!
I remember reading an article (probably in Road & Track) about the first-generation Piazza/Impulse and thinking it was a cool-looking car. The pop-up headlights weren’t so much pop-up as partially hidden by little “eyebrows” that raised to clear them when the lights were switched on.
A co-worker of mine when I was right out of college (early ’90s) thought these were cool, and went to a lot of trouble to track down a good used one. This was in Wisconsin; no idea how long it lasted in the snow and road salt up there.
I’ve always appreciated the Piazza / Impulse for the fact that it was essentially unchanged from Giugiaro’s ultra-modern for the time Asso Di Fiori concept of 1979.
I remember seeing many of these at the time as well as the I-Marks, it’s all about “location, location, location”. As a Automotive Service Professional (yeah i had to go there) I saw many of these come into the shop usually with terminal engine failure. I would have thought more of these were sold as many came into the shop and as far as I remember only one or two were ever released back into the wild, most went on to their final resting place(s). The running Impulses I .drove handled quite well and were somewhat fun to drive but the lack of build quality was hard to overlook.
I used to see one of these now and then back in the day, but never talked to anyone who owned one. But I can offer one observation on the successor Geo Storm – at a time when I was looking for a good Civic for the daughter it was hard to find one, but every car lot had one or two Geo Storms.
Friend of mine had one. It handled very nicely. You could induce a bit of oversteer if you let up on the throttle. It was plenty of fun to drive. The Lotus tag definitely fit the bill. The engine on the other had was ka-ka. It was a turbo that had a ton of lag and was very thrashy. It had to be spooled and to move, which wasn’t bad if you were having a nice ride but painful day to day. The engine seized around 65k miles.
You know you’re getting old when you read a post about one of the most significant cars design-wise of the modern era and the author has never heard of it 🙂
As cjiguy pointed out a couple of comments earlier, the Piazza/Impulse was that very rare car that went from concept to production with only the smallest of changes made to it. Both the Assa di Fiori and the Impulse/Piazza were absolutely stunningly beautiful in their day, and quite the contrast to what was being peddled at the time.
I’ve shot an Impusle, and have long meant to do a proper CC on it. I just hadn’t had the impulse, but one of these days….
Please be sure to mention that the Lotus suspension helped the driver to exercise Impulse control. 🙂
Aha! A lawyer that needs pun-ishing!
I think I now may have an idea for my next CC (or whatever it would be called) — I may have mentioned this in comments on other posts before, but I came across an extremely low mileage Impulse a few years ago, along with its extremely low mileage garage mate that I bought, which was nothing like it. Oh, how I wish I’d bought that Impulse.
I was also mildly amused by the fact that Brendan had never seen an Impulse before, but I guess it makes sense. They weren’t exactly thick on the ground when new, and well, that WAS a quarter century ago! I used to think of myself as a “younger” classic car fan. Um, no more. I was driving when these things were new!
I was a teenager in the ’80s, so I was aware of the Impulse’s existence. I’m not sure if I would have recognized one from the front with no visible badging, though. I came across an Impulse here in Massachusetts several months ago, but probably hadn’t seen one before that in years.
The sight (or even thought) of any Isuzu passenger car from this era always makes me think of Joe Isuzu.
The garage mate was the green Monte Carlo?
No, but you’re actually not too far off — I will make it a goal to share this as an article for this site.
I’m not nearly the car geek that most people here are. But even I knew that the Geo Storm was built by Isuzu, and that it was a rebadged version of the Impluse. How I knew this, I have no idea. Maybe because my dad worked at a Chevy dealer right around the time that Geo became big.
It features that great, unmistakable Giugiaro design, though the Storm sadly lost that styling.
Well, the first gen and second get Impulse are 2 totally different cars, the first gen has Giguiaro styling, there was NO Chevrolet/Geo equivalent, but Isuzu was sort of part of GM, so its kind of a GM car, its is based on an improved GM T-car platform that was shared with Isuzu.
The 2nd gen car is all Isuzu, and the baby-Camaro Geo Storm is an offshoot of that, those are FWD though.
The “Handling by Lotus” is another part of the smorgasbord, since GM also had bought Group Lotus at the time.
We all agree that the Joe Isuzu ads made up one of the greatest advertising campaigns ever, right? 🙂
No. They cheapened the brand. Our humor is good, but not our cars. I’m not surprised Isuzu is gone from the US market. Same with Suzuki. To play this game, they needed to catch up with Toyota/Honda/Nissan/Mazda. It didn’t happen.
The Lotus-tuned suspension was a horrible marketing concept. A tug-of-war of desperation. Isuzu needed the presitige and Lotus needed the cash. Embarrassing for both.
Sorry, but I LOVED the Joe Isuzu ads. One of the best series of ’80s car commercials
“He’s Lying”
These looked great new and still do today.
A dealership in my town has run through a number of makes – starting with Pontiac, then Isuzu and now Kia.
I test drove an Impulse back in 86 from this dealer – and honestly can’t remember much about the brief test drive other than it was a 5-speed.
I eventually went with a Nissan 200SX because my dad knew the salesman.
I do remember these, and the Guigiaro show car on which it was based. Very striking design and extremely futuristic–in a good way–for the time. Got a fair amount of buff book coverage back in the day. I also remember that it used a lot of the GM T-car underpinnings, and that fact (“Chevette suspension pieces”) muted some of the enthusiasm in the press for the car. As did the price, which seemed really high for an Isuz-who? And there was no real dealer body network to fall back on either. A kid at my high school had one of these, and I was in it exactly once. It was very nice looking inside and out, but the brand did it no favors, and my buddies and I kinda grouped it with “oddballs” like the Renault Fuego. I think the market agreed.
“You know you’re getting old when you read a post about one of the most significant cars design-wise of the modern era and the author has never heard of it.”
+1, Paul. I know less about cars than just about everyone here, so I was surprised I easily recognized a car a contributor did not. These were stunning cars, IMO, especially in white with white wheels, which seemed to be the majority of them back in the day. They caught my eye like nothing else in the 80s. Concerns over their reliability made me afraid to seriously entertain buying one. It’s hard to believe how homely and forgettable the second gen was by comparison.
BTW, is the feature car white, or off-white? I don’t remember seeing any in the latter.
It was off-white. I shot the pictures at night, and lightened them a little.
A beige Impulse: what a great oxymoron!
Holden pedalled a line of these for a while but the never gained any popularity, Isuzu copies of Opels are usually very underdone in the handling department so getting Lotus to improve it was a good idea. Havent seen one in ages though the CC effect will no doubt kick in I saw an Austin 1800 yesterday not running mind after the Maxi post
The instrument panel on these was pretty cool, from what I recall the whole instrument cluster was adjustable, like a 928 AND you could slide the pods on each side in and out, it didn’t have a conventional turn signal lever, it had a tab on the side pods, pretty futuristic in a 80’s sort of way.
I looked closely at one of these in 85. As a Lotusphile I was attracted by the tuning. I cross shopped it with a GTI (VW salesman was a total jerk) and an Accord hatch (dealer markup was too much). I didn’t buy anything as I suddenly got a temporary assignment in California that supplied me with a free rental car for over a year. By 87 the novelty had worn off and I decided to go American and got a 4 cylinder 87 Mustang. Oh well…
The Isuzu Impulse, faster than a speeding, well. You know. 😛
And dang! it still has the original UGLY original California plates issued in 1988 that started with 2(ABC123)
I loved watching those commercials with Joe Isuzu, as a kid. That bastard liar! (David Leisure) I got his John Hancock at the 1989 or 90 LA Auto Show on a glossy 8X10 B/W photo. Sadly, It’s gone already. 😐
Tow Away? What’s that”?
I am in the same camp as Paul and the others, I guess our age is showing. I instantly knew this car, back in the day I loved them. There is one near me that I see driven daily, it appears to be in basically showroom condition, simply perfect. An earlier model one too with the semi-popup headlights and those funky cube-design wheels, which are one of the best features. The interior was out of this world for the time too.
Another important detail that I didn’t see mentioned: The first-generation was RWD. That alone makes it a pretty desirable old hatch, especially if you can find one in good shape.
Part of the reason this car looks so modern is its early use of flush-mounted, gutter-less side-windows. The ’82 Audi 5000 is commonly credited with this innovation, but I believe it was this Isuzu that was first in production.
This one go 950 mph? 😀
http://youtu.be/Ic0UejzZDZ8
What happened to the other windshield wiper on that Impulse? Aren’t those supposed to have the industry-standard two wipers, or did they come with just one from the factory?
The one-blade wiper is correct. At the time, it was a very novel feature that survived from the original concept.
From what I recall, the Impulse was on the cutting edge of the “monowiper” trend that was just starting to catch on in the 80’s.
Give me an Impulse, a Subaru XT, and a Mitsubishi Cordia and I’d be a happy driver!
So in other words you impulsively ran over to take a picture of that impulse. Thereby giving into your hidden impulses to get a nice pic of a CC 😉
All jokes aside, I am not surprised you did not know what kind of car that was at first look. There are a lot of folks that don’t realize that Isuzu had a car line up in the USA for years before they totally left the USA market except for the commercial side of the business. I remember working at Win Kelly dealership in Clarksville MD in 2001-2003 when they had a Isuzu and Kia franchise(it was located in a smaller building on the property which is now Antwerpen Hyundai Clarksville) this was at the height of the SUV craze and Winkelly could not keep any suburbans, Blazers, Tahoes, any Chevy extended cab trucks, Trackers or Kia Sportages on the lot and yet not one Trooper or Rodeo sold. Nobody wanted what Isuzu was making.
This was originally designed to be the 2nd generation Scirocco….After all Giugiaro penned the MK1 Scirocco and Rabbit…..VW decided to go with an in-house design…VW’s loss, Isuzu’s gain.
That is very plausible. After owning both a ’77 (Gen 1) and 83 (Gen 2) Scirocco, I definitely see the resemblance to the latter. Of the two, I would love to have the first one back in new condition. It wasn’t the most reliable of my rides but it was the most tossable, especially after a Bilstein re-shock job. The performance was very good for the time.
Where this incorrect information originates, I have no clue. Giugiaro’s relationship with Isuzu is documented thoroughly in Italdesign’s Catalog Raisonne. There is no correlation whatsoever to Guigiaro’s second generation Scirocco proposal and the Fiori concept. For clarity, this is what Giugiaro thought the second Scirocco should evolve into (The obvious inspiration to the Audi Coupe / Quattro series) :
You beat me to it. The Fiori concept was clearly on a RWD chassis, and would not have worked on a FWD chassis.
That concept sure reminds me of the Lancia Gamma coupe …
I had the second gen of these. Great cars, never missed a beat.
I’d love to have one of these or the second gen; they are my dream cars…but its like finding a needle in a haystack. Ive only ever seen one black first gen in my area (Obviously the owner loved it considering it was almost new looking) and one second gen (…and it was obvious from this one the owner had nothing else to drive :-(… )
I remember seeing one in gold, full Lotus style when I was younger and I was hooked instantly
I had one of these, an 87 Impulse Turbo RS. pre-lotus suspension, the pop-up eyelids over the headlights, real seatbelts. my first new car. a real gas to drive. easily the worlds best chevette (the chassis was shared with the lowly chevy, but with a real 5-link real suspension, and much upgrades everywhere). mine had rust issues at 7 years, and we needed back seat access and better winter capability, so off it went. sometimes I wish I had it back.
CC Effect (sort of)! I saw a 1985-1990 I-Mark in Warwick, RI today.
Now we have to see if you can spot an Isuzu Stylus in the wild…
I have a 88 Isuzu Impulse for sale. This was my first car and I still have it. Time to part with it though. Has about 121,000 miles and in great condition. Any takers???? pls email me at leigh@bulloch.net
Ah, memories of my college days! One year I drove a baby-blue Renault R-15. Besides being a relatively rare car, it only had the Renault ‘diamond’ logo badges and R15 badges on it. A week wouldn’t go by without my being asked at least 2-3 times what kind of car it was… ^_^
NOTE: Pic is not my car, just snagged random R15 pic off internet to illustrate the lack of badging…
I had an 88 Impulse Turbo… Red like the Ad. The model you spotted was non Turbo, missing the huge wail tail spoiler.
I had a love/hate relationship with the car. Purchased new, it was plagued with electrical problems. When working, though a little under powered, the car did not seem to have a top end that I could find. At 125 it keeps climbing! Although I was easily out powered on the straight-aways by any mustang, I could out run a vette on a twisty road coarse, and I never had to slow down on wet roads (it hated snow though). My (now ex) wife forced me to trade it for a Lumina upon the birth of my son.
I miss the car.
I owned a 1987 Impulse Turbo. It has the white wheels and all the body trim. Great looking car. I loved the interior of that car. It was really modern for the time with the control pods at your finger tips. Single wiper blade on the front windshield. Suspension was excellent. The engine was just OK even with the intercooled turbo. No electrical issues with mine but I had rear axle seal problems every year it seemed. There were two different rear ends for it. The performance rear end was notorious for the axle seals failing. Eventually swapped out to the non performance rear end and that fixed the issue. It eventually got traded in after thieves broke two windows and ripped out the center console to steal the CD player. It was a very fun car to own in Florida as a 21 year old.