We didn’t get to the Le Baron during Chrysler week, and the Acura Legend awaits its CC day too, so let’s consider this a preview of coming attractions. We could preview our sentiments too!
CC Outtake: The New Coupes Of 1987
– Posted on April 12, 2011
Is it wrong that I’ve always wanted some version of a K-car to own as a daily driver?
Parts for them are practically free, the cars themselves are too, and if you buy the right version they get decent fuel economy and are something resembling reliable.
In a very cheap guy kind of sense, a K would be a very reasonable purchase.
I just put my father’s ’90 LeBaron sedan up on the Cohort. It’s a remarkably nice car, and has been very reasonable for 20 years.
Maybe as long as you get one of the basic models. My BIL parked his ’87 LeBaron 4-door after the digital instrument panel failed, and there it stayed for about 10 years. Now that his kids are old enough to drive he decided to fix it up for them to use, but he has not been able to keep the thing on the road as something is always breaking, and after all this time a working replacement instrument panel is now 24-karat unobtainium.
I actually did run a $160 LeBaron as a daily driver for 7 or 8 months. Cost me also nothing. Kept it as a strictly in city car. Worked out just fine – you just have to daily drive a k-car is all.
Man…………I miss the wide selection of 2-3 door cars that were on the market as little as 15 years ago. For instance, in 1994, Ford offered up five coupes/hatchbacks: Escort, Probe, Tempo, Mustang, and Thunderbird (and four of these had performance versions!). In 2012, Ford will only offer one coupe — the Mustang. How sad.
I’m sure the other mainstream manufacturers followed this trend to some extent.
Long doors + shrinking parking spaces + plus-sized Americans who can’t climb into the back seat of a coupe = insufficient sales to keep building them.
That may have been part of the reason, but the main reason coupes died off was demographics — the baby boomers were having kids, and turned to minivans ( and then later SUV’s ). Up until the mid 80’s, car seats/booster seats for the young-uns weren’t mandatory, and getting a car seat into the back of a coupe was no easy chore.
I remember many a family vacation trip in the 70’s where I would be sitting between my parents in the front seat while my two brothers would be in the back seat ( with the cooler between them ) of whatever 2-door Ford product my dad was driving at the time. No seat belts either, of course………..
That Legend Coupe is so sweet-What happened to Acura? I remember in the fall of ’87 my dad and I tried to buy one of these but they wouldn’t take his 5 year old Audi 5000 in trade.
Bought an 88 Accord instead, which is still in the family and still trucking along.
Well, I guess you know what I’m going to say here – This car, I believe, was/is the last coupe where the rear windows rolled down! ‘Nuff said!
Doesn’t matter that they didn’t roll down all the way – but they rolled down!
The Subaru SVX (in production ’til ’97) also had roll-down rear windows.But the LeBaron and Legend both had convertible variants (the Legend ‘vert was coachbuilt but sold new through Acura dealers).
And to think that year you could have also purchased one of the last (I know 1988 was the official last year) Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme Brougham coupes with the 307V8 and a 4brl E-Quadrajet! Comparing that to the Acura and the LeBaron would be quite the study in contrasts.
All I know is I want that Legend.
I was going to say something snarky like “from the sublime to the ridiculous”, but at different times I was interested in both of these cars.
In ’89, I was working at a Chrysler dealership when the ’90 models started arriving. The interior had been upgraded with a new ergonomic dashboard, and overall the car was like a 7/8-scale T-Bird (Car and Driver’s phrase). However, at the time I was driving a 1:1 scale ’86 T-Bird, so I was fine staying pat. Also, the never-ending line of Chryslers coming in for warranty work every Monday morning was somewhat discouraging.
About 6-7 years (and two cars) later a lady in my neighborhood had a beautiful red ’89 Legend coupe for sale with about 95K on the odo, for $5500. I was VERY tempted, but it would only have been a second car and I couldn’t justify it.
1987. Just learning to drive. Available cars — a Ford LTD wagon, a Subaru wagon, and a Jetta diesel from 1984.
I remember going to see both the Acura and the Sterling. Suddenly, it is 1990. Leather?.
My second cousin had one — or rather her new husband did — and after driving across the country is a Mercury Sable it seemed pretty new and stylish. Then my uncle got an Acura Legend — and got more: a TL and a TSX after that.
I went European — Audi, then SAAB, but that Acura is just a blinking light after all those year, making me remember what 1990 could have felt like.
I amazed how the combination of color and lighting completly hides the fairly pronounced square fender flares on the Acura. I had to do a triple take to convince myself it wasn’t a contemporary Accord coupe.