Junkyard Find: 1979 Chrysler LeBaron
By early 1979, Chrysler was really circling the drain. Lee Iacocca was in, the “too big to fail” government bailout loan wasn’t a sure thing, rebadged Simcas and Mitsubishis weren’t luring many subcompact shoppers into showrooms, and the front-wheel-drive K platform was still a couple of years from showrooms. Let’s follow up yesterday’s Chrysler Malaise Era Death Spiral Junkyard Find with the quasi-luxury car Chrysler hoped would help the company stagger, zombie-like, into the 1980s.
Actually, Iacocca’s strategy was successful, so I can’t be too hard on them; the K Cars sold like crazy, the company paid of the government loans on time, and the Diplomat-based LeBaron was forgotten. Hey, is that soft Corinthian Leather? It is!
Did Chrysler offer opera lights on the K-based LeBaron? I might have to go back and get these units for my A100.
I’ve ridden in a few of these, and they really weren’t terrible cars; the 318 was an unkillable, if weak, powerplant, the chassis gave a fairly decent ride, and the goofy crypto-luxurious interior appointments really added something to the ambiance when you were cranking Motörhead with your loadie friends in a $75 LeBaron in 1987. One thing you could say about Chrysler in 1979 that you couldn’t have said about AMC was that the future offered a dim flicker of hope.
Yes, power locks were still a big deal in the late 1970s. Unless the car was German, they didn’t work after a few years, but check out this classy lock knob!
The question to ask yourself now is: would you take a ’79 LeBaron or an ’82 LeBaron on a cross-country road trip? I think I’d be willing to take the 10 MPG fuel-economy hit of the older version.
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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My parents had a '81 lebaron but it was total barebones. It had the same seats and lack of options that a diplomat or gran fury had. Just had the lebaron grill and tail. Didnt see nearly as many as you did from the other 2. My dad had replaced a 72 dart with the lebaron and still talks to this day fondly about how those cars just ran. From what I read they were tanks. the volare/ aspen duo that came between them is to be avoided. I remember a cousin had one of those and we lost touch for years and years but recently i brought up that they had the aspen and they said they still did. Had it professionally restored which to me is kinda crazy. I've looked up cars like these online and from time to time see the latest version of these- the fifth avenue- pop up in awesome shape from time to time and as new as 1989 models with air bags !! I've toyed with the idea of buying one just because even though they are surely big, slow land barges with all kinds of fake luxury touches its so over the top it would be cool to cruise in.
"...and the Diplomat-based LeBaron was forgotten." Well, it got renamed the 5th Ave with more pillowy stuff and sold well in the mid 80's. I think M body profits helped pay off loans early more than the thin K car margins.