1992 Isuzu Rodeo Stick Shift 2 Wheel Drive 4 Cylinder Great Gas Milage on 2040-cars

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Junkyard Gem: 1994 Isuzu Rodeo 4WD

After a decade in which Isuzu-built Chevrolet LUV pickups, Isuzu-engined Chevrolet Chevettes and Isuzu Geminis with confusing "Opel by Isuzu" or "Buick/Opel Isuzu" badges, Isuzu finally began selling Americans its vehicles with Isuzu badging in the early 1980s. There were Isuzu cars, sure, but the P'up pickup and (starting in 1984) the Trooper SUV showed that Isuzu was likely to rake in the most yen by selling trucks on this side of the Pacific. The three-door convertible Amigo appeared here in 1989, but it was a little too small and silly to sell much among the suburban-commuter set. For the 1991 model year, a five-door Amigo sibling showed up: the Rodeo. The early Rodeo is getting quite rare today, but I was able to find this fairly clean '94 in a Denver-area self-service yard a few months back. These trucks, which were based on the same chassis as the P'up (known as the Isuzu Pickup after 1987) sold well in Colorado. You could get the first-generation Rodeo with rear-wheel-drive, but the four-wheel-drive version made more sense if you wanted to slog through snow and mud in the Rockies (or just feel safe when crossing a parking lot dusted with the white stuff). This truck has true four-wheel-drive, not what eventually became known as all-wheel-drive, but at least the higher trim levels had automatic locking hubs instead of the manual sort that forced you to stop and kneel in the mud to switch. Americans loved automatic transmissions nearly as much in 1994 as we do today, but they cost a lot more relative to manuals back then. This truck has a five-speed manual. The MSRP on this truck was $19,249, or about $39,075 in 2022 dollars. If you wanted it with an automatic transmission, the price went up to $20,349 ($41,310 today). The air conditioning in this one cost an additional 850 bucks (1,725 bucks now). The engine is an Isuzu 3.2-liter V6, rated at 175 horsepower. This truck was built at Subaru-Isuzu Automotive in Indiana; Subaru eventually bought out Isuzu's share of the joint venture and now only Subaru models are built there. Just to add another manufacturer to the mix, Honda sold rebadged Rodeos with Passport badges (and rebadged Troopers as Acura SLXs). This one was well-cared-for, looking clean for a machine with close to 200,000 miles on the clock. We can assume that some costly mechanical ailment finally sent it to this, its final parking place.

Junkyard Gem: 1996 Isuzu Trooper

Though Americans had been buying the Isuzu-built Chevrolet LUV pickup since the 1972 model year (plus plenty of Isuzu-derived Chevettes and Chevette components later on), the first widely available Isuzu-badged vehicle available here was the LUV-sibling P'Up. That was the 1981 model year, and the I-Mark (Gemini) and Impulse (Piazza) soon followed. Later in the 1980s, GM (which owned a hefty chunk of Isuzu by that time) began selling Isuzu-built Spectrums and Storms with Chevrolet and/or Geo badges… but Isuzu started its United States business by selling trucks, and that's the only type of Isuzu you could buy new here when the company departed our shores in 2009. The Trooper SUV first went on sale here for the 1984 model year, and eventually the Trooper became the biggest-selling Isuzu in North America. Here's an example from the sales heyday of the middle 1990s, found in a Colorado self-service yard. In its homeland, this truck was known as the Bighorn. Elsewhere around the globe, however, it went by far too many names to list here (though Trooper was the most common). Highlights include the Holden Jackaroo and Caribe 442. Honda's desperation to cash in on the 1990s North American SUV craze led to the creation of an Acura-badged Trooper, known as the SLX and sold here from the 1996 through 1999 model years. As part of this arrangement between Isuzu, GM, and Honda, the Isuzu Rodeo became the Honda Passport here (confusing every North American who had ever bought a Passport-badged Honda Super Cub, which got that name so as not to run afoul of the builders of the Piper Super Cub aircraft) and Isuzu dealers sold Honda Odysseys with Oasis badges. Once we'd gotten a few years into our current century, the only Isuzu-badged vehicles you could buy new here (not counting commercial trucks) weren't even built by Isuzu at that point. One was the Ascender (a badge-engineered Chevy Trailblazer) and the other was the i-Series pickup (a badge-engineered Chevy Colorado). Oh, sure, a handful of Axioms and Rodeos slunk out of American Isuzu showrooms in the early years of the 2000s, but the clock really started ticking for Isuzu USA when the final Troopers showed up for 2002. When this truck was built, Isuzu was engaged in an eye-gouging, kidney-spearing price- and financing-deal war with Mitsubishi Motors and its Montero.

Junkyard Gem: 1992 Isuzu Amigo

After some success providing General Motors with small Faster pickups badged as Chevrolet LUVs in North America (plus some Chevette-related Geminis labeled "Buick/Opel by Isuzu," which confused everybody), Isuzu began selling vehicles under its own name here in the early 1980s. At first, we just got I-Mark subcompacts and P'up pickups. Then the Trooper SUV appeared in 1984, and Isuzu joined the suburban-commuter truck game in a big way. For the 1989 model year, the little Amigo three-door convertible SUV landed on our shores. Here's one of those early trucks, found in still-rad condition in a San Francisco Bay Area self-service yard recently. Once Isuzu made a version with five doors and a solid roof, giving it Rodeo badges in the process, the Amigo became more of an afterthought in the North American Isuzu world. Amigo sales halted here after 1995, then resumed for 1998-2000 (after which the three-door became the Rodeo Sport before disappearing in 2003). Starting in 1996, Isuzu replaced its Amigo-platform-related pickup with a rebadged Chevy S-10 known as the Hombre. That meant that Spanish-speaking Isuzu shoppers could be disturbed by the prospect of buying a friend or a man. The Isuzu company itself was named after a river in Mie Prefecture. The Suzuki Samurai kicked off the "cute-ute" craze for the 1986 model year, with the Suzuki Sidekick/Geo Tracker appearing in 1989. Around the same time, irritating pastel colors and squiggly graphics became trendy. This — and other unfortunate 1980s fashions — continued well into the 1990s (One man's "irritating" and "unfortunate" is another's "delightful" - Ed). This odometer can't be right! I suspect a broken speedometer cable. The engine is a 2.6-liter inline-four rated at 119 horsepower.  Unlike Honda's VTEC, the variable-cam-timing system that made its debut in the 1989 Honda Integra, Isuzu's I-TEC name just stood for an electronic fuel injection system.  The only transmission in the Amigo for the first couple of years was a five-speed manual, which is in this truck. That three-pedal setup kept the Amigo's appeal limited to the small group of American drivers willing to work a clutch. The optional automatic became available for 1992. You could get the Amigo with four-wheel drive, but this one is the cheaper rear-wheel-drive version. This interior looks so nice that perhaps this Amigo really did get junked with 57,000+ on the odometer.