Junkyard Find: 1983 Dodge Rampage Prospector

Murilee Martin
by Murilee Martin

Even as the K-cars became a huge success, Chrysler didn’t give up on the Simca-derived Omnirizon platform. In fact, the 2.2/2.5 engine helped extend the Omnirizon’s life until the 1990s. We’ve seen a fair number of Omnirizon-based Junkyard Finds, including this ’78 Horizon, this ’84 Turismo, this ’85 Shelby Charger, this ’86 Omni, and this this Shelby-ized ’86 Omni GLH, and now I’ve managed to find one of the rarest of all: the pickup-truck Omnirizon!

This truck came fully loaded with options, including cruise control, air conditioning, clock, and Prospector emblems.

Sporty red-striped bucket seats!

Chrysler was very proud of their all-Detroit 2.2 engine (no Mitsubishi, Hillman, or Simca genes in the 2.2), and this truck is covered with 2.2 emblems.

The chunky DODGE emblem on the tailgate would make more sense on a 3/4-ton pickup, but it still works here. Remember, 1983 was the last year of the Malaise Era, with a new optimism appearing in Detroit vehicles.

The Rampage couldn’t haul much of a load— you don’t want to shift too much weight to the rear on a front-wheel-drive vehicle, anyway— but it was quite useful for hauling of lightweight items.

I’ll need to let the members of the Haulin’ Ass Plymouth Scamp 24 Hours of LeMons team know about this truck, since I’m sure they always need parts.


America’s first sports pickup!







Murilee Martin
Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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  • MRF 95 T-Bird MRF 95 T-Bird on May 25, 2013

    I never know these came in a Prospector edition. Over the years I have seen the Prospector edition of the pick-ups, van and of course the Ram Charger.

  • Prancingmoose Prancingmoose on May 28, 2013

    Haha I JUST saw one of these coming home from school today. Same color, same seats, same awful decals.. Except in mint condition. Does it have the 2.2 liter? I wasn't sure..

  • CanadaCraig You can just imagine how quickly the tires are going to wear out on a 5,800 lbs AWD 2024 Dodge Charger.
  • Luke42 I tried FSD for a month in December 2022 on my Model Y and wasn’t impressed.The building-blocks were amazing but sum of the all of those amazing parts was about as useful as Honda Sensing in terms of reducing the driver’s workload.I have a list of fixes I need to see in Autopilot before I blow another $200 renting FSD. But I will try it for free for a month.I would love it if FSD v12 lived up to the hype and my mind were changed. But I have no reason to believe I might be wrong at this point, based on the reviews I’ve read so far. [shrug]. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it once I get to test it.
  • FormerFF We bought three new and one used car last year, so we won't be visiting any showrooms this year unless a meteor hits one of them. Sorry to hear that Mini has terminated the manual transmission, a Mini could be a fun car to drive with a stick.It appears that 2025 is going to see a significant decrease in the number of models that can be had with a stick. The used car we bought is a Mk 7 GTI with a six speed manual, and my younger daughter and I are enjoying it quite a lot. We'll be hanging on to it for many years.
  • Oberkanone Where is the value here? Magna is assembling the vehicles. The IP is not novel. Just buy the IP at bankruptcy stage for next to nothing.
  • Jalop1991 what, no Turbo trim?
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