Junkyard Find: 1988 Dodge Aries LE Station Wagon

Murilee Martin — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 13:00:54 +0000

Given that just about everything Chrysler built for much of the 1980s and 1990s had some connection to the original K Platform, I don’t pay much attention to Ks when I see them in the junkyard. In fact, this ’83 Aries was the last “pure” K Car we’ve seen in this series. When I see an Aries K wagon with perfect Whorehouse Red interior, however, that’s when I reach for my ~~revolver~~ camera.
The interior of this car looks showroom-spotless, right down to the I Can’t Believe It’s Not Velour™ upholstery and You’d Have To Suspend The Crap Out Of Your Disbelief To Think This Is Real Wood™ interior trim.
The Chrysler 2.2 engine had an overhead cam and electronic fuel injection by 1988, which made it comparable to the powerplant of an intergalactic starship when placed side-by-side with the Stone Age GM Iron Duke engine.
You’d hope that this space-saver spare was just used to get the car onto the flatbed for its final ride to the junkyard, but I’m betting that the last owner of this car put 5,000 high-speed highway miles on it. It’s a K-Car tradition.
Chrysler figured that reminding customers about front-wheel-drive would somehow sell more cars, because… the Accord had front-wheel-drive?

We really can’t talk about the K-Cars without discussing the United States government’s bailout of Chrysler in 1979. Oh, sure, the Chrysler Jihad will tell you that it wasn’t a real bailout, because loan guarantees aren’t the same as cash handouts… but what would have happened to those loans if Chrysler had gone under? Pay up, Uncle Sam! Anyway, happy ending, because the K bought Chrysler another quarter-century of life.

Junkyard Find: 1983 Dodge Aries

Murilee Martin — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:00:15 +0000

So, after Chrysler got those government-backed loans that saved the company in 1979— take note, members of the Iacocca Jihad, that I am not calling those loans a bailout (even though Uncle Sam would have been forced to cover them if Chrysler had failed), and thus you may rest easy that this writer is not lumping your favorite Italian-owned corporation in with the People’s Democratic Cadres’ Bailed-Out Motors Corporation— everything hinged on the K-platform cars being a success. And they were!
The really impressive thing about the Aries (and its Plymouth Reliant sibling) was that Chrysler managed to make a reasonably modern, fuel-efficient front-wheel-drive sedan that still felt like a real American car inside. Bench seats! Lots of room! Comfy ride! Look at this interior— except for the flat floor, you could be looking at the inside of a ’73 Satellite.
It even has hood springs instead of the usual small-car prop rod.
The Chrysler 2.2 engine was still carbureted in 1983, but it had an “Electronic Control System” (which I’m assuming was a primitive mixture-adjusting feedback carburetor setup).
These weren’t great cars by modern standards, but keep in mind that you could still buy the staggeringly obsolete and fuel-swilling Cordoba in 1983. The Aries got the job done, it was cheap, and it felt like a proper Detroit car. GM fell flat on its face trying to accomplish the same feat with the Citation and related X-bodies, and the company never really recovered from that debacle.
Many of us don’t take the early Ks very seriously these days, since Chrysler stuck with the platform and its seemingly hundreds of derivatives about five years too long, plus we’ve spent the last 20 years looking at completely hooptied-out beater Ks limping along on space-saver spares in a trail of oil smoke. However, this was a very important car, and it’s sad that the last survivors are straggling into the jaws of the Crusher.

The Truth About Cars » Dodge Aries

Junkyard Find: 1988 Dodge Aries LE Station Wagon

Junkyard Find: 1983 Dodge Aries