1999 Red Izusu Rodeo Suv on 2040-cars

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Junkyard Gem: 2004 Isuzu Axiom

Though the final Isuzu-badged car sold in the United States was the 1993 Isuzu Stylus, Isuzu did very well selling trucks here during the remainder of the 1990s. Things still looked pretty good for Isuzu as the new century dawned, but by then everybody had upped their truck game and many of the competition's offerings made Isuzus seem old-fashioned. Isuzu cooked up a distinctive new body for the Rodeo chassis, arranged to have it built at Subaru's plant in Indiana, and called it the Axiom. You won't see many Axioms today, but I found this last-year-of-production example in an Oklahoma City car graveyard recently. As we all know, the decline and fall of Isuzu in North America accelerated quickly as the 2000s progressed. The VehiCROSS was interesting but just too weird and it got the axe after 2001. The increasingly antiquated Trooper held on through 2002, the Amigo (aka Rodeo Sport) through 2003, and that left just the Axiom and Rodeo to hang on by their fingernails into 2004. By 2005, the only new Isuzu-branded passenger vehicles sold in the United States were two rebadged Chevrolets: the Ascender (Trailblazer) and i-Series pickup (Colorado). In early 2009, Isuzu announced that it would be departing, presumably forever. You can still buy new Isuzu commercial trucks here, of course. The 2004 Axiom had MSRPs starting at $24,849 for the S trim level with rear-wheel-drive and going up to $30,499 for the upscale XS with all-wheel-drive. That's about $40,703 and $49,958 in 2023 dollars. Joe Isuzu was brought back after a decade of retirement to pitch the Axiom. Note that Joe's brag in this commercial is how much cheaper the Axiom was than the Volvo Cross Country. This truck is the cheap Axiom S 4x2, which still seems well-appointed. The 2004 Axiom's 3.5-liter V6 engine made 250 horsepower and 246 pound-feet, up from 230 horsepower and 230 pound-feet in the 2002-2003 Axioms. The power improvements were the result of the switch to gasoline direct injection fuel delivery for the '04 Axiom. Isuzu was so proud of the system that it applied these badges. The only transmission available was a four-speed automatic. The Axiom was introduced to the American public as the SPYMobile in the 2001 film "Spy Kids." The body and interior of this one appear to be nice enough for a 19-year-old vehicle, so we can assume that it showed up in this place as the result of expensive mechanical problems. We'll get to the Joe Isuzu ads in a moment.

Junkyard Gem: 1990 Isuzu Pickup, Zombie Response Edition

Isuzu-built pickups first went on sale in North America for the 1972 model year, but with Chevrolet LUV badges. Elsewhere, they were known as the Isuzu KB or Isuzu Faster, But eventually they got Isuzu badges in America, and were named the Isuzu P'up in the early 1980s. Later, they became simply known as the Isuzu Pickup (following Toyota's lead after the US-market Hilux became just the Toyota Truck) starting when the third-generation Faster debuted for 1988. Here's one of those trucks, found in a Denver self-service boneyard last Halloween. I see a lot of zombie-themed decor on junkyard vehicles, mostly just a single decal here or there (often combined with snowboarding and/or cannabis-themed stickers), but someone went above and beyond in the zombification of this Isuzu. This truck started life with a coat of dark blue paint, but that's just too cheerful when you're out hunting down the undead. Now it has a thick coat of flat black and "Toxic Waste Green" stickers everywhere. It appears that you can buy this sticker set on Amazon for under $30 right now. Remember when you'd see these Metal Mulisha stickers all over? In case you're looking for some Get Up Stand Up Light Roast coffee, Marley Coffee has you covered. Someone should write a doctoral dissertation about the stickers found on vehicles in Denver car graveyards. The engine is the 2.6-liter Isuzu straight-four that went into so many Amigos and Rodeos over the years. You should have four-wheel drive and a manual transmission when pursuing zombies across the wastelands of eastern Colorado, especially in the winter, and this truck has both. There's no telling how many miles were on it at the end, because some junkyard shopper nabbed the instrument cluster. While four-wheel-drive small pickups are useful even at age 32, the rust plus the manual transmission (plus the Zombie Appearance Package) would have made this one a tough sell for its final owner. When you have Isuzus of the late 1980s and early 1990s, you have Joe Isuzu! Did you know Joe Isuzu was a phone phreaker? The Isuzu Pickup was slightly cheaper than the Toyota Truck, if you considered only the stripped-down base versions. The only things scarier than Isuzu trucks are Isuzu trucks on sale!

Junkyard Gem: 1997 Acura SLX

When I'm prowling wrecking yards, I'm always on the lookout for obscure examples of badge engineering, and the weirder they are, the better I like them. While I haven't managed to spot a junked Suzuki Equator yet, I have photographed such rarities as the Saab 9-2x and Isuzu Ascender. A few weeks ago, I encountered one of the real oddities of the Honda-Isuzu dealmaking of the 1990s: a 1997 Acura SLX, a luxed-up Isuzu Trooper that sold very poorly and is now mostly forgotten today. Plenty of Acura SUVs designed and built entirely by Honda roll out of American showrooms today, but the 1990s SUV boom caught Honda by surprise. The first MDX wasn't ready until the 2001 model year, so Honda made a deal to take Isuzu Troopers, apply wood and leather inside and Acura badges outside, and cash in on North Americans' increasing disdain for minivans, sedans, and station wagons. Americans were very familiar with the Trooper, which was sold here from the middle 1980s until the 2002 model year, when the Chevrolet Trailblazer-based Ascender went on sale. The Isuzu name stuck around on these shores until 2008. The SLX was a decent enough truck, but there was no disguising its proletariat Trooper roots from status-conscious SUV shoppers who wanted to look more oligarchic while conquering a half-inch of snow in the mall parking lot. It didn't help that the 1997 Trooper L listed at $27,800 and the SLX Premium cost $38,300 (that's about $44,200 and $60,900 in inflation-adjusted 2018 bucks). SLX sales started off weak and plummeted after that. After 1999, the SLX was done. I spent years trying to find one in California and Colorado wrecking yards, but the few that were sold seemed to be sturdy enough to stay alive for a couple of decades. Finally, this high-mile '97 appeared in a Denver yard. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.