#wagon
Junkyard Find: 1987 Subaru GL-10 Turbo 4WD Wagon
By the second half of the 1980s, Subaru had moved beyond being known only for tiny, hilarious econoboxes. While American Subaru shoppers could still get front-wheel-drive cheapmobiles at that time, the same showrooms also offered futuristic-looking s ports cars and four-wheel-drive family wagons loaded with luxury features. Today’s Junkyard Find is the swankiest Subaru wagon money could buy in 1987 North America: a GL-10 4WD Turbo, found in a Denver car graveyard last summer.
QOTD: Should North America Have the Genesis G70 Shooting Brake?
Genesis teased the rather handsome G70 Shooting Brake (wagon) this morning, highlighting the brand’s ability to design sophisticated automobiles that don’t need to compete directly with the cost of your home. Unfortunately, just about every automaker on the planet has decided that wagons have no business in America. This includes Genesis. The manufacturer made it clear that the liftback G70 was designed specifically for Europeans.
While the body style used to be the king of the road, it was supplanted by the minivan in the late 1980s. By 1996, the last American full-size wagons (Buick Roadmaster and Chevrolet Caprice Classic) were discontinued. The region had lost its taste for them and the industry has been operating under the assumption that the feeling has gone unchanged for thirty years. Aren’t we due for a resurgence?
2022 Hyundai Staria People Mover Unveiled
Inching closer to its mid-year debut, the 2022 Hyundai Staria multi-purpose vehicle (MPV) was revealed yesterday, with the premise of next-level mobility.
Minivan though it may be, at no point did Hyundai use this often-maligned vehicle classification. In the world of auto sales, it is the people mover that a family of four or more can hardly live without and that many parents dread for the stigma associated with them.
Junkyard Find: 1986 Nissan Maxima Wagon
Even as Toyota kept the Cressida a rear-wheel-drive first cousin to the sporty Supra (sales of that car continued here well into the 1990s), Nissan moved the formerly-Z-based Maxima to a front-wheel-drive platform for the 1985 model year. The new, roomier Maxima continued to be loaded with futuristic electronic gadgetry and a Z-Car engine, and sales of the wagon version continued all the way through the 1988 model year. Here’s a well-traveled ’86 Maxima wagon in a Denver-area car graveyard.
Junkyard Find: 1996 Saturn SW1 Wagon With Manual Transmission
We’ve had back-to-back oddball three-pedal cars in this series ( a Suzuki Forenza and non-SHO Taurus), so let’s make it three weeks in a row with today’s Junkyard Find! Saturn S Series cars were always cheaper with manual transmissions, but nearly every Saturn wagon shopper insisted on an automatic. I knew I’d find a manual Saturn SW if I kept searching junkyards, though, and here it is: a low-end ’96 with single-cam engine, Ignore Me Silver paint, and a 5-on-the-floor manual.
Junkyard Find: 1988 Dodge Colt DL 4WD Wagon
Junkyard Find: 2001 Subaru Legacy Outback VDC Wagon
Junkyard Find: 1995 Volvo 850 Turbo Wagon
When I’m strolling through my favorite junkyards and looking for significant bits of discarded automotive history, I’m always on the lookout for interesting Volvos. Thing is, my definition of interesting has long spanned the PV544/Amazon Era through the Late Rear-Wheel-Drive Brick Era, meaning that the universe of front- and all-wheel-drive Volvos beginning with the 1993 850 has been neglected in this series.
Lately, I’ve been making an effort to fill in some of those blank spots in the junkyard record, and so I went out and found a ’97 850R sedan and today’s find: this 1995 850 Turbo Wagon.
Junkyard Find: 1990 Volvo 740 Turbo With Nearly 500,000 Miles
One of the frustrating things about my job looking for interesting discarded vehicles is the fact that most cars and light trucks didn’t start getting six-digit odometers until the 1980s or even the 1990s. I find vehicles that I know must have racked up incredible total mileage figures, but their odometers all turned over (once? ten times?) when they got past 99,999 miles.
Fortunately, Volvo felt sufficiently optimistic to adopt the six-digit odometer way back in the 1960s, so I was able to read a very impressive figure on the one in this 740 wagon: 493,549 miles.
Junkyard Find: 1981 Mercedes-Benz 300TD Wagon
The oldest Mercedes-Benz W123 diesels are getting pretty close to 45 years of age, which means that— finally— they’re wearing out and becoming easy to find in the big self-service car graveyards that I frequent. Most of these proto-E-Classes sold in North America were sedans, but the wagons developed something of a cult following and I keep my eyes open for discarded examples.
Here’s an ’81 300TD turbodiesel that seems to have been going strong when it got crashed.
Junkyard Find: 1974 Toyota Corona Station Wagon
Junkyard Find: 1990 Volvo 240 DL Wagon With 393,888 Miles
Because Volvo made the 200 Series cars well into the 1990s, they were pretty reliable, and 240 owners tend to stick with their cars for decades. I still see plenty of Swedish bricks in the self-service car graveyards I frequent.
In fact, I walk by a dozen or two discarded 240s for each one I shoot, but I appreciate good manual-transmission wagons and high-mile veteran vehicles and this ’90 checks both boxes.
Junkyard Find: 1960 Chevrolet Brookwood Two-door Wagon
Junkyard Find: 1988 Toyota Tercel 4WD Wagon With 413,344 Miles
2019 Volvo V90 Cross Country T6 AWD Review - Plush Wagon, Plus a Little Extra
Ever since Volvo showed the V90 wagon in Detroit in 2017 – in journo-bait brown, no less! – I’ve been keeping an eye out for this stunningly styled family hauler. I never see them, especially not in that lovely Maple Brown hue. Are wagons dead?
I rather hope not.
So, while the V90 is still nominally available, the very similar Volvo V90 Cross Country is a more frequent sight on our roads. With a few tweaks to appeal to those who want to cosplay as an uncouth mountain dweller, the low-slung wagon is transformed into something resembling a crossover.
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