@keithrsquires: These looked great when they came out. An ambulance chaser I knew in college bought one of the first STSs, which of course meant that it had a pushrod engine known for being terrible rather than the Northstar it needed to approach the Lexus LS400. People were impressed when I opened the trunk with the…

I see these things abandoned on the side of the road with flat tires all the time. I'm guessing the owners run off before the cops come rather than find out if the spare works.

@cgarison: I'm pretty sure that they flew the floorpans from Michigan to Italy to have the bodies built before flying the bodies back for final assembly. For the final year of production, Allante finally got an engine that made it comparable in performance to other cars selling for over $35K and even an independent…

Just as with the Fiero, Cadillac finally addressed all the drivetrain shortfalls as production ended, having squandored all the initial public attention with a car that had glaring inferiorities when released. The last Allantes had world class Northstar V8s and perhaps even tops that worked, but nobody cared anymore.…

@duurtlang: This thing really does look just like a Toyota Avalon. They could share body stampings.

@Rupunzell: Wasn't the R5 line actually replaced by the Clio?

@duurtlang: FIAT is still around because a dirty dealing european court played pinata with GM and stole US money to keep FIAT in business. GM paid up rather than allowing their own dire financial situation to become public. Basically, when FIAT was dying, GM invested heavily in FIAT in exchange for a 25% equity…

@duurtlang: Pre-EU, many European countries engaged in protectionism to preserve their domestic auto industries. While that has kept the French and Italians in the auto business, it also gave them no need to actually compete in a large open market like the US.

@ranwhenparked: The problem was the availability of Japanese cars in the US. They were better in every way and happily suffered any abuse. That is what did in the French and the Italians in the US market.

1988-1991 Honda CR-X Si

That's the nicest Le Car I've seen in well over 20 years. $800? How much is 1,500 lbs of scrap going for these days?

@brisbrd: It was the best gas mileage of any compact car. Most of its competitors had a bit less interior volume and were classified as subcompacts. There were also minicompacts as an official class. Many subcompacts and minicompacts would have had higher EPA mpg numbers. Something else that comes through from the ad…

@vavon205: The model numbers reflecting relative position in the model line theory doesn't seem to work for the 124, which was a larger, bigger displacement, more expensive car than the 126, 127 and 128.

I think the last time I saw one of these in the US may have been when I worked for a car dealer...in 1989. I never understood the tail light design. It always looked to me like they didn't have any that fit, so they filled the extra space with plastic.

Who says you just can't find good help?

@Pessimippopotamus: Technically speaking, it was the Golf that VW marketed at homosexual men with their 'antiquing' commercials. They were so successful that they had to change the name back to Rabbit in an effort to get someone straight to buy one. It didn't work, so they went back to the gay nameplate.

Looks just like a Toyota Avalon. At least until it gets dark and only some of the lights come on.

I wondered what sort of people bought cars from GM.

@rb1971 - E39M5 + E9 CSi: I think the TC has a higher survival rate than the Biturbo, but probably just because only the 500 manual transmission TCs actually had Maserati built engines. The other 6,800 cars had Chrysler or Mitsubishi assembled engines. All of the cars were built in Milan, with a body that only failed…

@rb1971 - E39M5 + E9 CSi: They also put the trident on the Biturdo. And they put a Maserati engine in a Shitroen. This was no greater indignity.