Junkyard Find: 2001 Chevrolet Tracker ZR-2
The second-gen Chevrolet Tracker, a badge-engineered version of the Suzuki Vitara and the descendent of the Geo Tracker Suzuki Sidekick sibling, was sold all over the world with many nameplates. It was never much of a big seller in the United States, so this ZR-2 is an unusual Junkyard Find.
It will tow a semi! It’s like a (Suzuki) rock!
Remember when the Culture Wars were all about flag-burning? Here’s an early-to-mid-2000s artifact of those days for you.
The ZR-2 option package was all about off-roady stuff. I wonder if any base-model Tracker owner will grab all the skid plates and stuff off this one.
The engine is gone.
There’s probably not so much demand for worn-out Florida State tire covers.
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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Regarding the history & marketing of the Tracker/Sidekick by GM in Canada, directly from the ever reliable Wikipedia. "The Sidekick was sold in various badges such as the Geo Tracker (Chevrolet Tracker after 1998) in the United States, and as the GMC Tracker, Chevrolet Tracker, Asüna Sunrunner and Pontiac Sunrunner in Canada. It was also sold as the Santana 300 and 350 in Spain. In the Japanese home market, it was variously sold also with Mazda badge." Our corporate fleet mechanic drives one. Despite the fact that rust is starting to take hold, he has a great deal of affection for its reliability and capability both off road and in very poor winter driving conditions.
I've heard about people making lightweight rock crawler buggies with 1.6 Tracker engines before, so perhaps someone pulled the motor from this thing for a similar purpose.