2005 Chrysler Sebring Tsi **md Inspected And Loaded** on 2040-cars

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Junkyard Gem: 1978 Plymouth Volare Wagon

When it came time for Chrysler to retire the beloved but antiquated Dart and Valiant in the North American market, the Dodge Aspen and its Plymouth Volare twin were introduced for the 1976 model year. While the Aspen is better remembered today (partly because Aspens were in just about every cop TV show for a good decade and partly because Chrysler revived the Aspen name for a few years in the late 2000s), Plymouth's "small car with the accent on comfort" outsold the Aspen for every one of their five model years of production. Here's one of those Volares, a '78 station wagon with the Custom exterior and Premier interior packages, found in a Denver-area car graveyard recently. I thought this car looked very familiar, and it turns out that it spent many years parked in an alley driveway in my Denver neighborhood, next to a Dodge 600 sedan (which is still on the road; I saw it moving under its own power a few weeks ago). Back in the summer of 2020, I shot this photo for an episode of 24 Hours of Lemons Carspotting. Now I wish I'd talked a local Lemons team into offering a few bucks for this Volare, because it's better to race than to get crushed. Detroit went through an accent phase that started with the Volare and then continued with the Cadillac Allante and Oldsmobile Trofeo. The interior in this car still looks pretty good. This wagon has the exact same interior and exterior colors as the one in the Volare brochure that year. It's nicely equipped, with the optional 318-cubic-inch (5.2-liter) V8 and air conditioning (via the distinctive Chrysler V-twin compressor just in front of the carburetor). The base price on this car was $4,195 (about $19,890 in 2022 dollars), while the 318 cost $129 extra ($610 now). The A/C added $484 more ($2,295 today, and you can see how the price tag got bigger in a hurry with low-priced cars back in the 1970s). Believe it or not, a four-on-the-floor manual transmission was standard equipment in the '78 Volare with 318 engine, but I've never seen one so equipped; this car has the usual three-speed automatic. A cheap wagon like the Volare certainly wasn't going to come with a radio at the base MSRP (though a dealer might throw one in to sweeten the deal). This single-speaker, AM-only radio cost $74 extra ($351 in 2022 dollars).

Dodge Viper saved from crusher by students, but will it last?

The saga of the Washington state community college hoping to keep its allegedly pre-production Dodge Viper out of the maw of the crusher is going strong. Not only does the school still have the car, but there's a chance that the college might even get to keep it.
The whole situation flared up in March when the South Puget Sound Community College in Olympia, WA, received a notice from Chrysler Group that requested that the school's Viper be destroyed. The automaker had loaned the muscle car to it about a decade ago to use for educational purposes in its auto tech classes. With the Dodge growing long in the tooth, "it is unlikely that these vehicles offer any educational value to students," the company said in its press release on the matter.
However, the college balked at destroying its Viper, despite the fact it had signed a contract with Chrysler Group to do so. The school further claimed that its car was incredibly special because it was a pre-production example and just the fourth one made back in 1992. Although, as we pointed out at the time, the photos of the school's vehicle showed a coupe that looked like a newer Viper GTS.

Fiat Chrysler's UAW members ratify new four-year contract

DETROIT — The United Auto Workers union said on Wednesday that rank-and-file members at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV have voted in favor of a new four-year labor contract with the automaker, helping the Italian-American firm avoid a strike as it works to merge with France's Groupe PSA. FCA and PSA, the maker of Peugeot and Citroen, in October announced a planned $50 billion merger to create the world's fourth-largest automaker. FCA's 47,200 rank-and-file UAW members voted 71% in favor of the new contract. The deal follows contracts the UAW already concluded with larger rivals General Motors and Ford. “Every full-time production employee currently at FCA will be at top rate by the end of this four-year agreement,” Cindy Estrada, UAW vice president and director of the union's FCA department, said in a statement. She added that all temporary workers also have a path to full employment. “We are pleased to have reached a new agreement that allows us to continue our record of adding good-paying UAW-represented jobs,” FCA North America Chief Operating Officer Mark Stewart said in a statement. Ratification of the contract had not been viewed as a sure thing, as union members at FCA in 2015 rejected the first version of a contract. In addition, a federal corruption probe related to embezzlement at the union drew attention. The federal corruption probe led GM to file a racketeering lawsuit against FCA, alleging its rival bribed union officials over many years to corrupt the bargaining process and gain advantages, costing GM billions of dollars. FCA has brushed off the lawsuit as groundless. The contract with GM that was ratified by workers in October followed a 40-day strike in the United States that virtually shuttered GM's North American operations and cost the automaker $3 billion. The UAW has said the contract with FCA included a commitment by the automaker to invest $9 billion, creating 7,900 new jobs over the course of the contract. Of the $9 billion, $4.5 billion was announced earlier this year, to be invested in five plants and creating 6,500 jobs. The investments include $2.8 billion at Warren Truck Assembly plant in Michigan to build a new a plug-in hybrid SUV in 2021 and a potential increase of 1,500 jobs.