Dodge Colt
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The Dodge Colt and the similar Plymouth Champ and Plymouth Colt, were compact cars sold by Dodge and Plymouth from 1970 to 1994. They were captive imports from Mitsubishi Motors and, initially, were twins of the Mitsubishi Galant, before shifting to the Mitsubishi Mirage in 1979.
The Plymouth Cricket nameplate was used on Galants from 1974 in Canada, after Chrysler pulled the plug on the unhappy Hillman Avenger-based model sourced from the UK.
The Plymouth Arrow was offered from 1976 to 1980 as a badge-engineered version of the Mitsubishi Lancer Celeste.
From 1979, the Dodge Colt and Plymouth Champ nameplates applied to the front-wheel-drive Mitsubishi Mirage imports into North America.
In the 1989, the Eagle Summit joined the array of nameplates describing a Mitsubishi Mirage, as did the Vista designation for tall wagon versions based on the Mitsubishi RVR or Space Runner in 1985.
The last Colt Turbo was on Car and Driver magazine's Ten Best list for 1989.
Not unlike the related Mirage, the Colt and other similar vehicles were well utilized in rallying, both in the United States and abroad. The Colt was the most widely utilized of these variants, appearing in events through the 1970s and 1980s. A Colt was run to a third-place finish in the first ever Sno*Drift rally in 1973, and repeated the feat the following year, as well as a third time in 1982. A Plymouth Arrow was driven to third place in Group 5 of Sno*Drift in 1999.
External links
- Colt/Champ/Cricket infos on Allpar (http://www.allpar.com/model/champ.html)