26th Aug 2010, 12:18
I owned a 77 Cordoba. I paid $850 for it at a dealer in Lincoln NE. It had 177,000 miles on it, and had been the owner's personal car.
I rebuilt the carb, eliminated the lean burn with a points distributor, rodded out the radiator. I drove that car from 1989 to 1995, putting another 130,000 miles on it.
I did have to replace the alternator twice and the water pump once.
I finally junked the body due to rust everywhere.
The steering gear was also badly worn by then.
Never had it aligned the whole time I had it, and it didn't eat tires.
This car got 18 mpg highway regularly on regular unleaded gas. Rode and handled beautifully (until steering gear bearings wore out).
Overall, it was the best cheapest car to own I have ever had.
I put the engine/trans into a 77 LeBaron, and drove it another year before selling that car.
I liked it so much I recently bough a 76 Cordoba fixer upper, claimed to be at 87,000 original miles... things people say to sell a car...
27th Aug 2010, 12:40
Alas the days of these wonderful old cheap and durable cars from the 70s and early 80s is over.
28th Aug 2010, 06:12
Now we have bulletproof Camaros, and the new Corvettes are incredible. I have had no issues and what a blast to drive. However my 69 SS has been my favorite Camaro. My least favorite was my wife's Berlinetta.
28th Aug 2010, 19:14
I had a 1981 Plymouth Horizon with a 2.2 liter engine. Other than doors and windows "junk", I had no problems until it hit 350,000 miles, then a wheel bearing went, so I sold it for $50. Wish I still had that car. The darn thing did 65 m.p.h. in 1/2 block in second gear; you should of seen the look on that Camaro driver's face when he got smoked by a econo-box car.
Chrysler should redo this car, as it was awesome and got 40 m.p.g.
29th Aug 2010, 12:54
I totally agree. I owned a 2.2 Dodge Omni that would hit 90 in third gear and bark the tires shifting to 4th. I once had a friend follow me to see how fast it would go (the speedometer only went to 100). We got on a deserted stretch of rural interstate and really wound it up. I saw him backing off and when I asked why later he said "I got scared when we hit 130".
The car was sold still running perfectly at 240,000 miles. Not even the A/C had required servicing. It still used not a drop of oil and had nothing beyond routine servicing. It also got 40mpg on the highway. It was quite a contrast to our Honda Civic, which used a quart of oil every 3 weeks after 50,000 miles and totally fell apart before 100,000 miles.
22nd Sep 2013, 00:15
I own a 1980 Cordoba Crown coupe with blue leather interior, white with blue leather quarter roof. It still has the original factory aluminum sport rims, an AM/FM/CD/Cassette radio, fully loaded.
The car has 123,500 miles, and as you said, I cannot hear it run! I classify the car as showroom clean; on a scale of 1-10, I give it a high score of 9.
I am about to drop a new 318 into it this week, only because I was gifted another 318 with 22,000 miles. The one I am taking out runs great, but I do not want to have it sitting around.
A GREAT CLASSIC!!
31st Oct 2006, 07:04
Well, I have a 82 Cordoba bought it for only $300 dollars with 78,000 miles. Since then, no big problems. Basic thing do go wrong. Drove it to Oklahoma from Florida 3 times. No, overheating problems. So now, I have 105,000 miles on it and carburetor was going bad. Rebuilt it and now I just can't tune it right. I've been reading on the internet about cordoba and I noticed everybody complains about the carburetor and the choke. I got tired every morning putting gas in my carburetor to get it started, so I rebuilt it and now I'm stuck on tuning it. Maybe I should of left it alone.