I was the king of Ponys and probably owned more of them than some small cities. I'd love to have another one but not at that price 
I was the king of Ponys and probably owned more of them than some small cities. I'd love to have another one but not at that price
In reply to Suprf1y :
That’s at least one extra zero on the price.
I started my apprenticeship at a Hyundai dealership way back in the day. Worked on quite a few Ponys, Stellars, and Excels. Awful cars.
Wouldn't you rather have a Colt?
In reply to SkinnyG :
What was so awful about them? I thought they were a decent car for the price
I'd love a Pony as well but say at 10% of that asking price as a max.
I thought they were a perfectly nice crappy car. $15k is all the money in the world for one of those, but its probably very close to the last running example in the country.
I knew a woman who bought one new, and within two years it was blowing blue and was rust perforated in several places. The ultimate disposable commodity.
In reply to Suprf1y :
It could just be that at the time, I was a big Toyota fan, and these did not match that level of fit and finish. They just seemed really really cheap. Which, I guess they were. So that would make them fine..... I guess. I was not enamoured.
The Sonata seemed to get it together a bit better, but by then I had moved on.
One of those mid-80s Hyundais is a great Locost donor. Has the “correct” spindles as seen in the book and everything. Might have been the Sonata.
The Hyundai Stellar is the one with the Cortina spindles. They are much less common than the Pony.
Turboeric said:I knew a woman who bought one new, and within two years it was blowing blue and was rust perforated in several places. The ultimate disposable commodity.
Well, they were Mitsubishi hardware.
(Not really a dig. Mitsubishi in the 80s/90s was BAD for heaving oil past the valve guides.)
I thought they were only good for donating their carb to use on Samurais.
Knurled. said:Turboeric said:I knew a woman who bought one new, and within two years it was blowing blue and was rust perforated in several places. The ultimate disposable commodity.
Well, they were Mitsubishi hardware.
(Not really a dig. Mitsubishi in the 80s/90s was BAD for heaving oil past the valve guides.)
That is very unusual and they were 70's Mitsu, but made in Korea.
Those motors were VERY stout. I built a race car from a 150k used Pony and raced it very hard for at least 4 years on one motor. The only one we ever blew up was a very high compression, high RPM screamer I built for my dad and I suspect he ran too much timing and not enough octane.
In reply to SkinnyG :
A new Toyota at the time ws at least 50% more. Was it 50% better? Maybe, but if you didn't have that kind of money, it didn't really matter. They were not great cars but they were cheap, good enough and rugged as hell.
They were never sold in the US, were they?
No they weren't, but they were the #1 import in Canada while they were sold here.
Like every other cheap car, the owners generally got cheap maintenance as well. If people were willing to spend the dough, they were fine.
Also, they could be compared to a Honda 600 or a Toyopet. First car in the market, next car was better. The ones following them are pretty good cars. The new ones can be cross shopped with anything.
In reply to Dave :
Darn there was a Stellar sitting in my parents back yard for many years and I just picked up the Champion book recently. Keiths book is on one of my Amazon lists. Off to see the Wizard aka Bezos aka Amazon. 
I think it's still kinda pricey tho'.
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