1986 Chrysler Laser XT - Cotton Knew a Good Thing When He Saw One

I've always found Chrysler's Laser and near identical Dodge Daytona handsome in that oddly Eighties kind of way I also find Camaros and Firebirds of the vintage attractive. I used to chuckle, however, at their K-Car bones and gimmicky turbo engines. Pony or sports cars had to be rear-wheel-drive and have big V-8 engines. Naively, I thought any derivative of a Chrysler K-Car couldn't be any good or worth my time. Didn't stop me from begging a friend at St. John's University for a test drive as I wrapped my senior year there in the spring of 1986. Flattered by the request, he obliged. 

I was wrong about these cars. Very wrong. They're so fun to drive. The handling is darty and responsive, as if the car was on rails. And the little turbo motor was ferocious although it sounded like a seasick sewing machine. All that and my friend who owned it claimed it got over twenty-five miles-per-gallon. 

So, when this 1986 Chrysler Laser XT continually popped up during my cheap car searches the last several weeks, I felt obliged to blog on it and not snarkishly scoff at it like many car bloggers and vloggers do. Although, with an asking price of $14,500, someone's got some explaining to do. Only 19,000 miles on its thirty-six-year-old ticker and it appears to be in really good shape but fourteen-five? NADA high retail pegs this at $2,050. Quite the spread. 

Perhaps the consignment shop outside Detroit that's selling this feel there's a premium to be charged since this was allegedly the last car owned by NASCAR Hall of Famer, Cotton Owens. Listing doesn't mention if this homemade tribute to the late stock car racing pioneer comes along with it or not. Something tells me it does. 

Compared to the oafish 1975 Chrysler Cordoba I was driving at the time; the little Laser might as well have been a Porsche. Of course, I either didn't see it that way or want to believe it was as good as my backside was telling me it was. My GM and Ford myopia most certainly got the best of me. 

All I could see was that it was a god forsaken K-Car. Which, of course, it was. Although one that was factory modified to be the best it could be. Lee Iacocca and company called the chassis these ran on the "G-body". 

Fox-body Mustangs, Camaros and Firebirds of the same vintage could only dream of handling as well as that Laser did or be half as accommodating. I mean, look at how deeply bolstered these buckets are. Mustangs, Camaros et al, especially in retrospect, always left me wondering, save for their ability to accelerate, what anyone would see in them and not see in a Chrysler Laser. Or Dodge Daytona for that matter. 

Honestly, back then on the heels of college graduation, given the choice, I'd have opted for a Camaro or Mustang even though I knew the better car was a front-wheel-drive Chrysler Laser. Or Dodge Daytona. Not that I had that choice; are you kidding me? But I couldn't be seen in some K-car. Sorry. Couldn't do it.  

I guess Cotton Owens knew a good thing when he saw one. And could have cared less what anyone thought.