Junkyard Find: 2004 Dodge Stratus R/T Coupe
The Dodge Stratus Coupe was another one of those badge-engineering/branding oddities that will be driving parts-counter employees crazy for many years to come; it had very little in common with the Stratus sedan and in fact was a close relative of the Mitsubishi Eclipse. I see never-ending lines of Stratus sedans at wrecking yards these days (only the near-valueless Sebring outnumbers the Cloud Cars in the Chrysler sections of U-Wrench-It today), but R/T Coupes are fairly uncommon. Here’s a clean one I spotted in a Denver yard last week.
The versatile Mitsubishi 6G72 had a very long production run, starting in 1986, and its 6G75 cousins are still made today. The one in the Stratus R/T Coupe made a pretty decent 200 horsepower. Perhaps The Worst Car In History would stop killing 6G72s if it got one of the 21st-century examples.
The R/T tachometer was mean-looking.
“You know you need a player in there to help with them 200 horses!” Chrysler did many very embarrassing ads during the 2000s.
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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I leased a red 2001 version of one of these. Nice car with some caveats. In fact, it's the only car I ever bought at the end of the lease so I guess I liked it! Mine was a 5-Speed,consequently the dealer couldn't unload it and I got a good price. Strong points were decent acceleration from the 3 liter Mitsu V6 and great handling, especially after I put 17's on it with wider rubber. Nice creature comforts and I couldn't make that car get under 22 mpg. It would top out on the highway at about 29. I got lots of compliments on its looks. Weak spots (like with the Eclipse) were the clutch and the transmission synchronizers. Fortunately, I got both replaced before the warranty was up. Another was the front brake rotors. One spirited drive down a mountain and you needed a set of rotors. After replacing several, I installed the drilled/slotted variety and the problem was gone. I traded it in on a new '09 Challenger R/T at about 110,000 miles. I really didn't want to replace the timing belt so it seemed like a good time to trade. Plus, I REALLY wanted a Challenger, which I still own. Incidentally, this car has nothing in common with its 4-door relative. I found out the hard way that not even the lug nuts interchange (after buying a set of locking ones to find they didn't fit). This car is a re-bodied Eclipse.
In December of 2016, i bougth a 2003 coupe 2.4l, 4 cilynders, 16 valves, and im impressed knowing that has a mitsubihi engine, after 2 years of driving it, i found a very reliable car, comfortable,