1988 Mercury Colony Park - VCR's and Typewriters

If the notion of a luxury station wagon is as foreign to you as watching “over-the-air TV” or listening to the radio, well, kid, you didn't grow up in the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s or 1980s. The 1990s to some extent, too. And please, get off my lawn.

A luxury wagon like this 1988 Mercury Colony Park was what you drove back then if you wanted to swaddle yourself and your family in the lap of luxury while allowing yourself to be as pragmatic as possible.

This one found me on Facebook Marketplace for sale here in the Cleveland, Ohio, area with an asking price of $4,800. The ad lists it as a Mercury Marquis. Technically, that's not quite right: by 1988, the full-size wagon was the Colony Park version of the Grand Marquis. From 1984 onward, the Colony Park was Mercury's sole full-size station wagon, complete with its obligatory simulated wood-grain siding.

With its wood sides—no one ever thought they were real anyway—a Mercury Colony Park was Mercury's top-line full-size station wagon from its introduction in 1957 through 1991. While a fraction of the number of Colony Parks were sold compared with the number of Ford Country Squires, if buyers wanted the equivalent of a station-wagon Lincoln—which Lincoln never built—a Mercury Colony Park was about as close as they were going to get.

A family truckster for the well-heeled that looked as relatively at home at the country club as it did at Home Depot.

I know I'm not the only car guy who's got a thing for station wagons, and the more luxurious and stuffed with doo-daddery, the better.

                          

This one's got it all. Leather-trimmed seats, power windows and locks, air conditioning (I doubt it works), cruise control, tilt wheel and the apple of my 8- to 10-year-old eyes: twin, rear-facing fold-down, jump seats out back. 

Leather seating surfaces were an available option on the 1988 Colony Park rather than standard equipment. They weren't cheap either, figure about $415. The original owner of this "are we there yet" mobile spared no expense.  

By the end of the 1980s, station wagons as we knew them were circling the drain. The growing popularity of the minivan, followed by the rising popularity of SUVs, was eating into the traditional station wagon's territory. Ford's full-size station wagons disappeared after the 1991 model year, although Ford continued selling front-wheel-drive Taurus- and Mercury Sable-based wagons through 1995. GM continued to offer traditional full-size, body-on-frame, rear-wheel-drive wagons through 1996, when the Chevrolet Caprice and Buick Roadmaster wagons went away.

Chrysler got out of the station wagon business wagon after 1988. 

Curiously, Cadillac sold a wagon version of its CTS for the 2010–2014 model years, ostensibly giving luxury buyers an alternative to the German wagons from BMW and Mercedes-Benz that were still being offered at the time. Hey, don't laugh; the CTS wagon was an amazing car but found few buyers. 

Throw in the added surge in popularity of SUVs, and the station wagon, luxury or otherwise, was quickly becoming as irrelevant as VCRs and typewriters.

Our Marketplace gem here appears to have more than her fair share of problems. Rusted quarter panels mean there's probably more where that came from. The leather on the front seats is shot, and the door panels have been torn apart for an aftermarket stereo system, too.

Lastly but not leastly—and sadly—most of her simulated wood sides are faded and worn to the point that they only add to the dreariness of the whole package. Sorry, $4,800 seems like all the money in the world for this old luxury workhorse.

Perhaps it runs fine. Details in the ad, other than it “needs a windshield,” are scant.

It's fun to think about turning this into a sleeper of sorts. What massive junkyard truck engine and transmission could be stuffed into this thing to cost-effectively make it as fun as possible? Not before the interior gets sorted out first, though.

Today's do-everything-well crossovers and SUV's are not unlike our phones, which do most of the tasks we once needed separate appliances for well enough that we don't need those separate gadgets anymore. While some may lament the brand of the crossover or SUV they're driving, few, if any, complain about the vehicle itself per se—above and beyond its reliability or lack thereof.

That wasn't the case when this Colony Park's simulated—don't call it fake—wood siding was shiny and new. Back then, what type of vehicle you drove—sports car, pony car, personal luxury car, four-door sedan—said as much about you, whether you cared or not, as the logo on its hood and sides.

1972 Citroën SM - Nothing Says, "France" Quite Like An Old Citroën

How do you pronounce Citroën? See-troe-on? Sih-tron? Cee-trin? Best I can tell, since it seems no two people pronounce it the same way, Citroën is pronounced something like, see-tro-en—and this 1972 see-tro-en SM is up for sale on Facebook Marketplace less than an hour south of the Triple Wide, just west of Cleveland, Ohio. If you're interested, bring a trailer with a powerful winch.

While today’s Citroën's are generally less eccentric than their predecessors, they're part of the monolithic Stellantis Auto Group now, there was a time—particularly from the years just prior to World War II through the 1970s—when Citroën marched to the beat of its own cylinders.

I thought they were just plain weird and, without question, they were. For the most part, though, they were weird in the most wonderful ways.

Citroën was founded by André-Gustave Citroën in 1919 and quickly established a reputation for doing things differently.

The 1934 Traction Avant was a watershed. Its name literally means “front-wheel drive,” and the car combined front-wheel drive, a unitary/monocoque body structure, four-wheel independent suspension and hydraulic brakes at a time when many competitors were still building cars around separate frames and rear-wheel-drive layouts.

Then came the 2CV in 1948, a remarkably simple and inexpensive car designed to provide basic transportation to rural France. Nothing says “France” quite like an old Citroën, in particular a 2CV.

And then, in 1955, Citroën dropped the technological equivalent of a flying saucer on the Paris Motor Show floor. The DS.

The DS introduced Citroën’s famous hydro-pneumatic suspension, which used hydraulic pressure and gas-filled spheres to provide an extraordinarily smooth ride while automatically maintaining ride height. Hydraulic pressure was also used for other systems, including the brakes and steering.

Citroën began developing what eventually became the SM in the 1960s as a high-performance derivative of the DS. As the project evolved, however, Citroën decided it needed a more powerful engine for it than anything it had available.

Rather than go through the expense of developing its own engine, Citroën acquired Maserati in 1968 and used the Italian company’s expertise to develop the 2.7-liter, 90-degree, quad-cam V-6 that powered the SM. The engine produced about 170 horsepower with its original triple-carburetor setup; in 1972, Bosch D-Jetronic electronic fuel injection was introduced, increasing output to approximately 176 horsepower. 

Up front, European-market SMs have six headlights tucked behind a broad transparent cover. The inner pair swivel with the steering, allowing the lights to illuminate the road around corners. The car’s hydropneumatic suspension also automatically maintained ride height, and the headlights were hydraulically self-leveling so their aim remained consistent as the car’s load changed.

The SM’s love-it or what-the-hell-is-that styling, designed under Citroën stylist Robert Opron, is what makes it really stand out. Despite the deterioration visible on our Marketplace gem here, the basic shape still looks reasonably contemporary more than half a century later.

The list goes on and on with unique, different and debatably overly complicated, “Rube Goldberg-esque” engineering that makes it terrifying to think how much money one would have to spend to get this particular car roadworthy. Not to mention the interior and exterior work that needs to be done.

The poster of the ad is asking $2,500, but they're adamant they “need it gone,” so they're open to offers.  It might be hard to believe, but it's not running, although it was apparently running when parked in this field. Not surprisingly, in addition to all the other issues this car has, the floor pans are rotted out.

I’d love to know why anyone would buy this and go through the labor and expense of even getting it roadworthy. Especially since, unlike back in the 1970s, importing a 1972 SM from Europe today doesn't involve federalizing it to meet current U.S. safety standards. Doing that wouldn't be cheap, but it would probably be a lot less than fixing this thing up—and less of a headache, too.

Poster of the ad claims if you know what this car is, you know how valuable it is. Well, can't blame them for saying that, problem is, what something is really worth is only as much as someone is willing to pay for it. 

The SM was withdrawn from the American market after 1973 because Citroën could no longer get an exemption from evolving U.S. safety requirements, particularly the five-mile-per-hour safety-bumper mandates. Citroën pulled out of the U.S. market after 1974. 

1987 Porsche 944S - Reifen Kicking

I haven't seen a Porsche 944 in years. I mean, years. This 1987 popped up on my Marketplace feed this morning for sale out in Willoughby, Ohio, just east of Cleveland. Asking price is $2,900. What could a prospective buyer be getting themselves into? Let's virtually kick a reifen or two—reifen is German for tire—and see.

First, some backstory on what the 944 was.

The Porsche 944 was a front-engine, rear-wheel-drive 2+2 sports car built by Porsche from 1982 through 1991. It was based on the 924's platform but received extensive mechanical and styling changes, including a Porsche-developed 2.5-liter four-cylinder engine and the wide-body styling that made the 944 distinctly different from its predecessor.

The idea was to offer a relatively accessible Porsche sports car that was less expensive and less exotic than the company's flagship 911 and 928 while still delivering legitimate sports-car performance.

Like the 924, the 944 was powered by a four-cylinder engine.

Just like some Honda Civic or Chevrolet Celebrity.

Ha. Right. We're talking Porsche here, people.

The original 944, introduced for 1982, used a 2.5-liter overhead-cam inline-four developed by Porsche. In its original form, it produced about 160 horsepower. It was hardly your garden-variety economy-car four-banger.

And here's the really interesting part: the engine was essentially half of Porsche's 4.5-liter V8 used in the 928. In other words, Porsche didn't simply grab some ordinary four-cylinder off the shelf and slap it into a sports car. The 944's engine shared its basic architecture with one of Porsche's most sophisticated engines of the era.

This was heady stuff back in the day, kids.

In 1985, Porsche introduced the 944 Turbo, which turbocharged the 2.5-liter four-cylinder and bumped output about 217 horsepower. In 1988, Porsche introduced the limited-production 944 Turbo S with about 247 horsepower. For 1989, that 247-horse engine became standard in the regular 944 Turbo.

That kind of power from just 2.5 liters today isn't impressive; 40-years-ago, it was the stuff dreams. 

The 944 S arrived for the 1987 model year with a high-compression, naturally aspirated, 16-valve version of the 2.5-liter engine. Porsche rated it at about 187 horsepower. It sat neatly between the standard 944 and the Turbo in both performance and price.

And this is where the 944 gets particularly interesting. It wasn't just a Porsche with a four-cylinder engine. With its front-mounted engine and rear-mounted transaxle, the 944 had nearly ideal weight distribution, which helped give it the balanced handling for which these cars became known.

This car, though.

Hoo-boy.

The big-little engine isn't running; there are issues with the body seemingly all over; and the interior is a train wreck. In fairness, it may just need a deep cleaning, although this looks nasty.

Someone swapping out the Blaupunkt radio it was born with, got lost in the wiring maze and give up? 

The poster of the ad claims this car is a perfect project for that "special Porsche enthusiast" and, at this price, won't last long.

I beg to differ. To me this is a parts car. 

But what do I know?

Frankly, if you have to have a Porsche 944, while you'll spend upwards of four times more for one that's not this side of a roller like this one is, I think that money would be better spent. A running, reasonably sorted 944 S is a whole different proposition from a $2,900 non-running project with questionable cosmetics and an interior that looks like the German army in the days, weeks and months after D-Day. 

2005 PT Cruiser Turbo GT Convertible - Your Secrets Are Safe with Me

 

Whether you like or dislike a vehicle's styling, it doesn't matter what its design inspiration is. Case in point: with its outboard, suitcase-like fenders, Chrysler's PT Cruiser was intended as a throwback to cars of the 1930s; few cared, they liked it enough to buy it, were ambivalent towards it or had varying degrees of disdain for it dismissing it, at best, as another prime example of answering a question nobody asked. This one is a 2005 Turbo GT convertible I found for sale on Facebook Marketplace in North Royalton, Ohio, with an asking price of $4,200.

Introduced for the 2001 model year, the PT Cruiser was a sensation at first before it became, as is often the case, the punchline to a joke. It was a fashion-conscious vehicle of the moment that transcended its inspiration much in the same way Chevrolet's 1973–1977 Monte Carlo did. You tell someone their vehicle was throwback-inspired and they couldn't care less; they just liked it. Again, or not. 

Back when the lacquer topcoat on this little thing wasn't peeling, cars like the Mazda Miata, Volkswagen New Beetle, Chevrolet HHR (and SSR, to some extent), Ford Mustang and the PT were all the rage and had enough mainstream appeal that it didn't matter what their design inspiration was.

The problem with retro is, where do you go with it after the initial fervor dies down? Chrysler's answer was—and almost inexplicably so—to make a convertible version.

New for 2005, top up or down, this car does have a butch-ness the wagons didn't have; there never was a fixed-roof version of the two-door PT. I have to wonder if Chrysler had come out with these cars first, would I feel differently about them? As it is, and still to this day, all I see is a cutesy, manipulative design attempting to cash in on the hot retro-trend of the day. Nothing wrong with that, just don't ask me to join the party. 

Soon as the fervor cooled for them, they were disposable. A 1964½ Ford Mustang they were not, although in a 2000 article, the Los Angeles Times called the PT one of the most refreshing new car designs since the original Mustang. That may have been so but initial success is not indicative of future appreciation. 

Contemporary road-test reviews were generally benign, if somewhat inert. Above and beyond its styling, the PT Cruiser distinguished itself by being non-distinguishable. With a suspension tuned for as broad a market as possible, it wasn't particularly interested in doing anything better than expected. Based on Chrysler's taller derivative of the Neon architecture, if the PT Cruiser had anything going for it tangibly, it's that, for its size, it was remarkably practical.

Chrysler bragged that, on the wagons, its seats could be configured in 26 different ways. With the rear seats removed, the PT had an impressive amount of cargo space for its size. The rear seats could fold, tumble and be removed, while the front passenger seat could also fold flat. 

On the convertibles, depending on how honest the reviewer was, there was considerable shudder to the body despite efforts to reinforce of the structure. That big basket-handle-looking thing behind the front seats is what Chrysler called the sport bar. It was designed to add structural rigidity and provide rollover protection; it also helped deflect wind over the rear-seat occupants. So, technically, it's more than just a giant basket hoop. And if anything, it looks better than the hoop on the 1993–1996 Oldsmobile Cutlass Convertible.

They were also, at first, fairly underpowered. The original PT's best offering was Chrysler's 150-horsepower, 2.4-liter four-cylinder. Chrysler soon upped the ante, introducing a 215-horsepower turbocharged version for the 2003 model year. The high-output version eventually produced 220 horsepower, and the GT Convertible got that 220-hp engine paired with a Getrag five-speed manual.

Above picture is from e a 2008 PT, poster of the ad didn't provide pictures of the engine. 

And that's the power train our Facebook Marketplace gem here has. Excuse me as I avoid eye-contact with anyone and cover my face as I take this thing for a drive. 

For "just" $4,200, the prospective buyer gets a recent female college graduate's former car, which she used through high school and college. It has 120,000 miles on its 21-year-old ticker, along with lots of parts already replaced, including new motor mounts, newer shocks and front-end parts, new plugs, wires and headlights.

So, essentially, a perfect first car for a high-schooler or college-age student who needs cheap transportation—a beater with a heater, so to speak—that might, thanks to its 220 turbocharged horses, be something you can somewhat secretly have fun driving.

Your secrets are safe with me.

There's conflicting information about what the "PT" in PT Cruiser stands for. Chrysler used PT as the vehicle's platform designation, with the Neon associated with Chrysler's PL, or "Platform Low," architecture and the taller PT architecture becoming known as "Platform Tall." Chrysler also marketed the initials as standing for "Personal Transportation." Looks like some word jockey at Chrysler letter-smithed PT into a marketing-friendly phrase. 

Chrysler discontinued the PT Cruiser after the 2010 model year. Production ended in July 2010, after roughly 1.35 million had been built worldwide.

1962 Chrysler 300 Sport - Those Crazy (Good) old Chryslers!

With arguably the exception of the 1960 and 1961 “toilet seat” [Plymouth] Valiant and Dodge Lancer—and I'll throw the 1969–1973 full-size “fuselage” models into the mix as well—Chrysler had some crazy good designs from 1955 through 1973. None more fantastical, sorry, my blog, my opinion, than its 300 series of cars, which first debuted in 1955. Our well-worn Facebook Marketplace gem here is a 1962 Chrysler 300 Sport.

The Chrysler 300 began life in 1955 as an exclusive, high-performance two-door based on the New Yorker. More precisely, the C-300 used the New Yorker's two-door hardtop body, with some Windsor and Imperial design elements thrown into the mix. The original C-300 was followed by the 300B in 1956, the 300C in 1957 and so on through the 300L in 1965. There was no 300 “I” because Chrysler skipped the letter “I” to avoid having it confused with the number “1.”

There actually were plans for a 300M for 1966. An early proposal called for a 426-cubic-inch V-8, while a later version was to get the new 425-horsepower 426 Hemi. But Chrysler executives decided the letter cars had lost their exclusivity and canceled the project. From 1966 through 1969, there was still a Chrysler 300, but it was no longer part of the traditional letter series.

Then, in 1970, Chrysler resurrected the 300 name for the limited-production 300 Hurst. Despite the “H” in its name, this wasn't another letter car, nor did the H stand for “Hurst Shifter.” Hurst Performance helped turn the regular Chrysler 300 into a rather outrageous special edition, complete with a 440-cubic-inch V-8, distinctive white-and-gold paint scheme and other Hurst-specific goodies. Only about 500 were built.

The original C-300 was called the 300 because its 331-cubic-inch Hemi V-8 was rated at 300 horsepower, making it the most powerful American production car of its day. It was also very much a performance car, with Chrysler building it specifically with racing in mind. The C-300 went on to make quite a name for itself in NASCAR and other competition.

Chrysler hadn't necessarily planned on creating an ongoing “letter series” from the start, which probably helps explain some of the awkwardness of the naming scheme. The letters simply evolved into the way Chrysler identified each year's 300 as the series continued.

In an attempt to broaden the 300's appeal, Chrysler introduced a less expensive, non-letter 300 Sport like this for 1962. It was offered as a two-door hardtop, convertible and, for the first time in the 300 line, a four-door hardtop. The Windsor name was dropped from Chrysler's U.S. lineup for 1962, with the new 300 Sport taking its place while the Newport became the entry-level Chrysler.

While buyers could order the 300 Sport with some serious hardware—including a 413-cubic-inch V-8—the standard engine was the 305-horsepower, 383-cubic-inch V-8, which this car has. The optional 413 came in a 340-horsepower four-barrel version, while the 380-horsepower dual-four-barrel version from the 300H could also be ordered in the 300 Sport.

By 1962, the styling excesses of the late '50s had grown long in the tooth. These cars have sometimes been referred to as “plucked chickens,” a description supposedly used by outgoing Chrysler design chief Virgil Exner to describe the finless 1962 Chryslers. The big fins of the 1957 cars were gone, leaving what looked like a somewhat awkward transition between the wild Exner era and the more restrained designs that followed.

The famous Chrysler push-button automatic transmission controls, to the behind the steering wheel to the left, were still around in 1962, but Chrysler abandoned them for the 1965 model year in favor of more conventional column- or console-mounted shifters.

For sale out in bucolic Painesville, Ohio, a good thirty minutes east of Cleveland, the asking price is $5,500. Supposedly 120,000 miles on her 64-year-old ticker, it was parked back in 1992 and apparently hasn't moved since. The engine allegedly turns over, but to what degree it actually runs isn't disclosed.

Bet you a Kennedy half-dollar it does not run.

It doesn't look too bad, but not too good either, frankly. Still, it looks like it hasn't spent the last 34 years sitting in a grass field, either. There's rust, but nothing too immediately disconcerting. I mean, I wouldn't touch this thing with a pole of any length, but that's just me.

Despite the homely rims, this is a super-cool mid-century car. I'd rat-rod it, keeping the body as is.

Somewhat amazingly, given the price point and its apparent condition, the sale is pending.

From 1999 to 2004, Chrysler resurrected the 300-nameplate affixing it to an LH-series based sedan they called the 300M; picking up where the letter cars left off in 1965. From 2005 to 2023, a Chrysler 300 was a large sedan available in rear-wheel- and all-wheel-drive.