i wouldn't consider honda to have the japanese performance benchmark, more like mitsubishi with the lancer evo, and subaru with the sti and they both been making more than 240hp before the srt4 came out.

 

^ Doesn't mitsubishi use crysler motors ? I know when I used to work on the old school eclipse at my cousins shop they had the crysler emblem on the block

 

If you really want to get down to it, way back in 1989 Mitsubishi sold this car called the Eclipse that had a 190hp 2.0, later increased to 210hp in 1995. This was before the Type R, before VTEC, before the Neon. Lets talk bench marks, and then talk about how everyone else caught up.

 

It's true. Those cars were at the top of the 90s 4-cyl import power chart back then.

I know the srt4 has performed well on road courses in pro series, but the dual wishbone hondas are a better handling platform out of the box for amateur/grassroots people.

On the omni, my bad. Figures gm didn't make it. It was called a Dodge, good, small and happened during the 80s.

Anyway, it's not the cars I have an issue with. It's the out of touch business management.

 

Mitsubishi and Chrysler had a partnership from the late 80's to late 90's, and they made a couple of cars together, what we call dsm's and i believed the only engine Mitsubishi used from Chrysler was the 420a
(dodge neon engine) for the gs and rs trims for the 2g eclipse, the 4g63 was used for the turbo versions i believe same 4g63 the evo III used but the 4g63 was produced by Mitsubishi,but i am not 100% sure if this is all correct but it is close.

 

Honda made power with well designed engines not by slapping a turbo on them..And also those cars were hardly affordable for a young person.

 

LOl, some of you guys are really defending the big 3, But if you think that the only reason they are failing is that people " have their heads up their asses" and are not giving them a second chance, i think you might be more be blinded by the support American made ads. most of you have singled out a couple of the big 3's standout's, but lets be honest most of their cars' are crap, they have tried to cut corners to bring down the prices of theirs cars to stay competitive, but they have really burned their consumers. they have given themselves a black eye, they are the only who we can be blamed for Turing people away from them.
I feel sad that our car companies are loosing, it makes me even sadder that a company like Hyundai(sp?) can come from a crappy cheap company, to now with genesis and others cars be a contender, if they can do it why can't we? oh well I'll buy Honda or Nissan until dodge or ford can impress me,
p.s my mom had an astro van, a horrible, horrible, car, we called it the widow maker, could not handle worth a crap, and died on us all the time, my mom sold it bought a volvo, best family car ever

 

Some ? Maybe 1 ?

 

The worst thing about this whole list is the consumers themselves. Even before the Exploder, the consumers wouldn't be caught dead in a lowly wagon unlike the rest of the world. You cannot fault the manufacturers for actually making something that people would buy.

 

^ you lost me