Faults:

Gearbox, gear stick broke 3x.

Power steering rack replaced.

Head gasket blew at 165K.

Rust in rear hatch.

Radiator.

Non-fixable oil leak at 210K.

Several clutch replacements.

Roof-rack whistled at speed on motorway.

General Comments:

Officially my third car, initially to replace my aging Lancer. Used this car for delivery of KFC. And for camping out in during my holidays.

In 2000 bought a second Chariot for $500 simply for the parts and the power steering rack.

Car came with standard Cheviot Mag wheels, often the standard mag for Mitsubishi's at least here down-under.

Although I broke a lot on the car it was an excellent run about town. It had a snappy performance and often got pulled over for speeding.

I changed jobs in 2001 and would've still had this wonderful 7-seater if they weren't so fussy at work about the non-fixable oil leak.

Replaced it with a younger version, a 1991 Chariot GLX. Slightly different setup with gearbox, instead of rods it used cables, therefore less possibility of me breaking the stick like with the '86.

Faults:

The head gasket blew twice just after 130000 ks.

Getting the car into 1 st gear was very tricky.

General Comments:

This car drove very well - it was a shame that it cost so much in repairs just prior to us selling it.

This car was very hot on a sunny NZ day - big windows with no air conditioning was not a good move.

Faults:

The head gasket blew at approx 80,000 k's. There had been no warning. The temperature gauge never showed it was running hot. The oil light never came on. It suddenly just blew.

We took it to the Mitsubishi dealer for repairs. That was a big mistake. It cost us nearly $3,000 in repairs, including a planed head, all new cooling pipes, and a new radiator. They told us they replaced the cam belt at the same time.

The engine leaked oil ever since that repair. We took it back to the dealer several times, but they said they couldn't find the leak.

Last year at about 95,000kms the head gasket blew again. This time we took it to an independent mechanic who showed us that the dealer had used a sub standard genuine Mitsubishi head gasket. They said the cause of the oil leak was obvious - the head gasket was faulty. They said the cam belt didn't look as if it had been replaced, so they put in a new cam belt and replaced the head gasket, did a general service and told us to sell it.

General Comments:

We'd be extremely reluctant to buy another Mitsubishi after this experience. We've learned not to use a dealer for after warranty servicing. It's just too expensive, and their mechanics are sub standard (at least locally)... as are their parts!