Friday, 9 October 2015

1337.2

Continuing on from my previous post here - more Magna Elite love. These cars deserve it. All the love? Any love. ANY.
Still discarded like garbage...

1985-1991, TM, TN, TP, Mitsubishi Magna Elite. Top-of-the-line for the Australian-made first generation Magna's.

As I had written in the previous post; these are an absolute wreckers-favourite for me. Its sad when a car gets that title.. but could just be because I truly see more of these at the wreckers then I do on the streets. Maybe they sneak them there under the cover of darkness.. or when I turn my back... I don't know..
But strolling through the wreckers a couple weeks back? Elite. Complete. Well lets face it.. no one even takes stuff of these. Urgh...

Its the interior that gets me.

Wait - wheres the single-spoke multifunction wheel? Too early a build?
Whatever; we're still already winning with that ruthless burgundy-on-burgundy-velour, and the Elite-specific extras just keep on giving...

Indicator stalk? Pah - we've got a paddle here! Reaching out towards the back of the wheel, with an up-down for left-right operation, tangential to the wheel...

Light switch? A knurled twist knob with operation marking window.. as if on some vintage exercise equipment. Flat home-audio style buttons for demister, hazards, success. 

Don't even think about removing your hand from the wheel to adjust the HVAC settings. Long enough fingers? Here you go.
A left to right rotating switch for wiper speed.
Main wiper controls mirroring their headlight equivalents beautifully.

A full digital dash, lighting up with large orange numbers, and horizontal building tacho.
Likely laggy, and 6000rpm may cast a shadow of your head onto the roof; but god are 80's digi-dashes rad.

The final dash detail; an AWA cassette deck with separate equaliser..

..and I'm spent.


A 2.6litre four driving the front wheels through a four-speed auto, may not be the most inspiring combination... but these are well built, look great, and have some fun detailing.
Other than some slow-motion-demo-derby style incidents at the front and rear, this 25year old Mitsubishi has been way too well cared for to end up here.
A polish, nice set of wheels, and a few coils removed; this could've been great.

Damn shame.





2 comments:

  1. I have such one in my garage )

    ReplyDelete
  2. The article has been very helpful and very informative. I will keep posted about these wrecking cars.

    ReplyDelete