David S. Wallens
David S. Wallens Editorial Director
10/4/23 8:31 a.m.
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Show us a better car name than the Mitsubishi Legnum: “Sorry, I can’t come in today, I have Legnum.”

But, seriously, we have something cool here with this 1997 Mitsubishi Legnum VR-4 Station Wagon: turbo power, all-wheel drive, wagon bodywork, rally pedigree and that all-import…

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bmw88rider
bmw88rider UberDork
10/4/23 9:21 a.m.

Great Car. I was this close to buying one till I looked at the parts situation. Pretty much nothing is available state side if you need it. The 6A13 was never offered state side and there was never an AWD galant here either. That and there isn't a big community here either. 

It's a great family cruiser overall. About 230ish to the wheels. I think a bit overpriced overall. I would rather have the RVR on their site if looking at AWD haulers. 

camopaint0707
camopaint0707 Reader
10/4/23 9:22 a.m.

Oh that thing is hot

Colin Wood
Colin Wood Associate Editor
10/4/23 9:41 a.m.
bmw88rider said:

Great Car. I was this close to buying one till I looked at the parts situation. Pretty much nothing is available state side if you need it. The 6A13 was never offered state side and there was never an AWD galant here either. That and there isn't a big community here either. 

Parts availability: One of the big reasons holding me back from importing a car from Japan. Need something fixed? You're going to have to wait for the part to get shipped from Japan or some other East Asian country.

Kudos to everyone who puts up with it though.

bmw88rider
bmw88rider UberDork
10/4/23 10:06 a.m.

In reply to Colin Wood :

Yeah Colin. That is the issue with my JDM car for some things. I've made friends with people in Dubai and Japan for that. You also become good at using ASA and other parts lookup tools to find cross references. My car has a lot in common with late model Evos, the USDM mirages, and the first gen S40/V40 that were based off the Mitsubishi Charisma. Really the only thing that is truly unique is the physical motor. That doesn't have much in common. 

It's not unlike any of the rare older cars (mine is one of 1600ish). You can't have one as the sole transportation unless you are in a walkable city. 

RabidBullFrog
RabidBullFrog Reader
10/4/23 3:34 p.m.

Hey I have one like that! Lots of fun. It even filled in for my BNR32 for a track day when it was down for a windshield replacement. I actually have 3 RHD's so if one is down waiting on parts I still have something to drive.

 

AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter)
AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) MegaDork
10/4/23 4:42 p.m.

i sat on the E36 M3ter too long and now my legnum

but seriously folks, that's a crazy rad obscure wagon

Kendall Frederick
Kendall Frederick Reader
10/4/23 5:04 p.m.

I'd much rather have a Stagea, and there are so many RHD Skylines in the country that you can find parts to some extent.  Duncan has a couple of sweet ones:

https://www.duncanimports.com/used/Nissan/1998-Nissan-Stagea-c80d0e830a0e09a84919054ee16c5082.htm

We have a Nissan Pao (bought from Duncan actually) that has almost no parts availability here, but it hasn't been a horrible problem (yet).  It helps that it was a very low mile car and although my wife drives it as her "daily" she works from home and does not drive long distances.  

I just had to disassemble one axle to change a boot; I ordered the boots on Ebay and got them in a couple of weeks.  CV joint itself looked good but I did have to make a snap ring for the inner end of the axle when I broke one during disassembly.  It does have a power steering leak right now and I'm probably going to end up rebuilding the rack for that.  The seals and parts are available, so I'd prefer to do that rather than gambling on a used part shipped from Japan.  Such is JDM life.. LOL.

fanfoy
fanfoy SuperDork
10/5/23 9:28 a.m.

In reply to Kendall Frederick :

At almost 3x the price, that Stagea better be nicer.

I'm obviously an old, out-of-touch man now, but when did JDM cars become this ridiculously expensive? I guess it's the modern equivalent of the Boomers buying muscle cars 20 years ago.

bmw88rider
bmw88rider UberDork
10/5/23 10:10 a.m.

In reply to fanfoy :

When they became legal for US import and rates were next to nothing. The pricing is dropping on a lot of the cars out there. The big 3 are still high but demand has been softening for the more obscure cars.

You can get some really fun things for the 10-15K range. This is a bit more unique because of the stick but you can get a really clean auto version of these for 15-17K landed. There is a really clean 18K miles one that is 18K landed in an auto. 

Kendall Frederick
Kendall Frederick Reader
10/5/23 6:42 p.m.
fanfoy said:

In reply to Kendall Frederick :

At almost 3x the price, that Stagea better be nicer.

I'm obviously an old, out-of-touch man now, but when did JDM cars become this ridiculously expensive? I guess it's the modern equivalent of the Boomers buying muscle cars 20 years ago.

^ what bmw88 rider said.  I have even seen what looks like a decline in the asking prices for R32 GTRs, which is bad because I still look occasionally.  Also Duncan is always on the high range in price.  They bring in some of the nicest, low mile cars though, so they get what they're asking.  

z31maniac
z31maniac MegaDork
10/6/23 10:03 a.m.
bmw88rider said:

Great Car. I was this close to buying one till I looked at the parts situation. Pretty much nothing is available state side if you need it. The 6A13 was never offered state side and there was never an AWD galant here either. That and there isn't a big community here either. 

It's a great family cruiser overall. About 230ish to the wheels. I think a bit overpriced overall. I would rather have the RVR on their site if looking at AWD haulers. 

The 91-92 Galant VR-4s models offered here were 4wd weren't they?

bmw88rider
bmw88rider UberDork
10/6/23 10:17 a.m.

In reply to z31maniac :

They were but it's a completely different system than the 7G Galants. They made 2 more generations of AWD Galants after the VR4 we got stateside. I meant that we never got those. 

6G with the 2.0L 6 Cylinder (6a12)

7G-Same drivetrain as the Legnum

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