Eagle automobile
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Eagle was a short-lived division of Chrysler, formed after Chrysler's 1987 purchase of American Motors (AMC). The name was taken from the AMC Eagle, the last of AMC's domestically designed vehicles. The vehicles were marketed primarily by AMC dealers along with Jeep products.
Two of Eagle's products, the Eagle Premier and Eagle Medallion, were four-door sedans designed by AMC's former corporate partner, Renault. The remainder of the brand's cars were simply badge-engineered versions of cars sold by Dodge and Plymouth, as well as some captive imports produced by Mitsubishi.
Throughout its short history, the Eagle brand suffered from a lack of product recognition, because all its cars were also marketed by Chrysler (and sometimes by Mitsubishi) under one of its other brands, much like Plymouth more recently. Thus:
- The Eagle Premier (also badged Renault Premier or AMC Premier in 1988), designed by AMC, was essentially identical to the Renault 25 and the Dodge Monaco spin-off from 1990-92, and was built from 1988 to 1992.
- The Eagle Medallion (also badged Renault Medallion for much of 1988) was essentially identical to the Renault 21, and was built in 1988-89.
- The Eagle Summit was essentially identical to the Dodge Colt and the Mitsubishi Mirage.
- The Eagle Talon was essentially identical to the Plymouth Laser and the Mitsubishi Eclipse. (Also see Diamond Star Motors)
- The Eagle Vision was essentially identical to the Chrysler Concorde and the Dodge Intrepid from 1993-98.
Of these, the Eagle Talon was the only one that ever outsold its competing clones in any market. The Eagle Vision was the brand's only pure Chrysler design--all others were either AMC or Mitsubishi designs.
After a decade of slow sales, Chrysler discontinued the Eagle brand in 1998. The 1998-2004 Chrysler 300M was originally intended to be part of the Eagle Vision line.
The name Eagle was also used by Dan Gurney for his racing cars. Among them the most noticeable is probably the 1967 Eagle-Weslake Formula One, considered by many as one of most beautiful F1 cars ever built.