I bought mine new for 11 grand at the end of the 89 model year. It was the last of a string of pocket rockets I owned back in the day, from an 85 Civic S hatchback, then a 87 Civic Si, then the Mits. I drove it for 10 years, it was the last car I owned that I ever truly loved. The great part was it wasn't really badged much, and pretty much looked like a run of the mill Dodge Colt if you didn't notice the wheels and the spoiler. So you could get into a race off a red light with some of the more well well known small quick cars back then like a VW Scirocco or a Civic Si and simply smoke them, they never saw it coming. Great fun! I still remember driving it home from the dealer, stopping at a toll booth on the way home and thinking it was a good time to see what it could do. When the turbo spooled up the torque came on in a somewhat non-linear manner, and that baby just started to pull to the side like it was on ice. The torque steer was downright frightening. Scared the hell out of me, neither one of the Honda's would do anything like that. The real sport was from about 10 on up, it just kept accelerating like crazy. It would get up to 125 with a quickness, though at that speed it was pretty scary, and felt like it might lift off the ground. If I had known it was gonna be that rare I would have kept it maybe, but lifestyle changes made an Odyssey a better bet in 99 for me. I was really sad to sell it to some friends of a friend who needed some wheels, I don't think they ever appreciated it or took care of it, and I heard it died a couple of years later. They probably coked the turbo, you had to remember to let it cool down or the bearings would fry. As the Trumpster would tweet, so sad... Whenever I see one of these new Mirages I wish they would change the name, it defiles what was one of the great hot hatches of the past.
Thank you for sharing. I really wish I could have lived in this era. I'm 21 and I've never seen any for sale. But I keep my eye out nonetheless. The only time I remember seeing one of these is when I was a kid and some kids parent had one. I did however after 4 years of searching manage to find and buy a 1990 Eclipse GSX which I am happily keeping alive
Good luck finding one. In the ten years I had the car I might have seen 2 more, and I live in Chicago so there is no lack of cars on the road. But what was sort of funny is that a couple of years after I bought the Mits I was driving on the expressway and a red 87 Civic si was in front of me, when I noticed a small sticker on the hatch that I had put on there when I owned the car. It was from a speaker company we had done a factory closing sale for, and they had all these nicely made metal plates that said "Tuned Port". I put one on the si as a joke, but quite a few people asked me what a tuned port Civic si was at the time. As that was the only Tuned Port Civic in existence I knew it was my old car. Made me happy to see it still rolling along...
Randy = If you look at the "Mirage" Mitsubishi puts out now, it is hard to believe it was ever the same car. Mitsubishi literally went backwards in every way with the Mirage. It does not even have all wheel disc brakes, and it now has a non-turbo 3 cylinder POS engine. What happened to Mitsu?
You could drop the Eclipse 2.0 turbo in this car. I did and I was putting 230hp to the wheels. Spinning tires even in 2nd gear. Once you get traction, you could keep up with 5.0 Mustangs back then.
It's faster and bigger than 89 Civic Hatchback SI. It's cheaper and more beautiful than 89 Volkswagen Goft. I think 89 Mirage Turbo is the best choice.
If you look at the "Mirage" Mitsubishi puts out now, it is hard to believe it was ever the same car. Mitsubishi literally went backwards in every way with the Mirage. It does not even have all wheel disc brakes, and it now has a non-turbo 3 cylinder POS engine.
StellarBlue1 Yes, the new mirage is pretty pathetic in terms of performance. A friend in high school had one and it had the 74 hp 3 cylinder. However, it was good on gas and cheap. When the first one was totaled, another replaced it.
I had a black 89 Dodge Colt Gt Turbo that was exactly like this minus the Mitsu logos. Bought it in 1990 used with 10,000 miles on it. Was such a fun car. Thanks for uploading this.
I own a 89 GT that's 4g63t swapped and I just got the car back in January getting the 1g dsm rear end for an AWD swap and roll cage. I can't wait to drive it when it's AWD ❤️
I bought one of these in 1995 with only 49k on it. Great car! It had sat on a VW dealer lot for a while. I picked it up for $5995. Drove a few years until 68k and sold it for $5000. Lots of memories with that car. I met my now wife when I had that car. Lots of good times with a folded rear seat and a secluded area. Anyway I remember it had a prematurely cracked dash that look horrible and a appetite for tires. But still lots of fun. Shoulda kept that rare car. Just did not realize how rare it was
This was back when Mitsubishi was on top of the world. They had just created the Colt Cyborg hot hatch, the Pajero was streaking across the sahara in the Paris-Dakar Rally events, their American division was partnered with Chrysler Corp, and they were developing the Lancer Evolution.And now we're reduced to the Outlander and the godawful Mirage Hatchback, built entirely in Thailand. What the hell happened?
I've owned one. Modded with a 2.0L swap, but it was a blast to drive. Never ending smiles and more than enough to surprise other drivers with acceleration and handling.
@@jimmbobb both the galant vr4 and the eclipse gsx used the same 6 bolt 4g63t 2.0 engine, but the mirage turbos used similar wiring to the 1990 turbo eclipse talon laser triplets, I've built one myself out of a non turbo mirage made for a nice sleeper and still got good mpg too.
After the death of the Evo not sure what the hell Mitsu was thinking. I had a 98 Eclipse GSX which was a ton of fun and looked great. Too bad it's all gone.
My very first car identical to this sold in Canada as the Dodge Colt 200GT, but with a 12v 1.5 with a meager 82hp, I always dreamt of making my car into the rare colt\mirage turbo, I don't think I'd ever seen one in person, thanks for posting! brought back memories!
4 sure. JDM mirages of the 90s with the MIVEC 4G92 1.6 has 175hp (keep up with Honda's B16A!) are even better than the sissy current mirages have (dusted.)
I test drove one my senior year in high school 1989. This was the hot hatchback! Considerably quicker than the Si and GTI. It truly sucks Mitsubishi and Dodge only made these for one year!!!!
I remember reading about this car back in the day and always told my friends this car was a contender but they never wanted to believe me that it was better than and cheaper than an Si Civic or VW GTI. Then again you never really saw them too much just the regular models.
My first car out of college was an '89 Eagle Summit ES-- a rebadged Mirage Sedan with the normally aspirated 1.6L 16V (same as this, but without the turbo). I've had a string of European cars ever since, but that little Mitsu was still the most fun to drive. Still miss it.
In Australia this was know as a Lancer. It followed the Lancer family. It was in sedan, wagon, 5 door lift back and this hatch. It also did not have the silly levers you had with the steering wheel. Better dials and the seatbelt was fixed the the side pillar.
My sister had one exactly like the car in the video. It drove really well. I loved the big gauges. The only problem she had was cv boots failed at about 70k miles.
I didn't realize that Mitsubishi put the 4G63T in the Mirage/Colt stock....Thought it was just Eclipse/Talon, Galant and Evo's that got the 4G63T. Very interesting.... Most colts come with the SOHC 4g37 or the later..
Mitsubishi cars came with a lot of the same engines the 2000 Mitsubishi Eclipse had the same engine as the 2000 Mitsubishi Galant Gtz they did it to save money.
it's basically the 1.6 version of the 4g63T, the colts from "89-"92 in the USA used the SOHC 4G15 as the base motor the 4g37 was the 1.8 base motor used in the 1st gen dsms.
I drove one of these for my whole senior year in HS. It was awesome but I had no idea what a piece of history it was. A couple of years later I got a similar experience in a Mitsubishi Space Wagon (which was awesome too.)
If you just watch the person fiddle with the inside of the car with the audio off, it looks like he is on speed and cannot stay still and gotta touch everything.
That is one unique hot hatch! I love it. I see there is a video of the 99 Civic Si on RU-vid, but it is of low quality. Do you guys mind if you could put the test footage of that certain car on here some day? That would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Ronald de Rooij If Mitsubishi doesn't bring any fun into their lineup, they're fucked because almost every other brand has some sort of fun in their lineup. And if Mitsubishi is not going to bring any sort of sportiness, then they're as good as dead.
I will keep my 16 valve VW GTI 2 liter. I remember reading about these cars and liked them well enough. I owned a Sprint Turbo, that was a fun car and very reliable. But nothing beats the GTI for over all feel, handling, and style. They are Timeless.
For all the haters of the new Mirage. There is a reason why sales will not drop off, even after 7 years of production. Not even in Europe, whilst it was made for third world countries (or "upcoming markets as they say in automobile language). Mine, still zero defects after 60.000 miles. Not even a light bulb broke, and still 50 mpg.
Complaints of no oil pressure gauge? Most cars today don't have one and some even get rid of the temp gauge. Although like MW I do like having extra gauges to see what's going on, but most people don't care.
Ronald de Rooij So what? They are going to not bring any sportiness back to their brand? Unbelievable. They are the only brand in the US I know that doesnt have any sort sportiness to them! And that's actually bad. That's really bad that they dont anything sporty to offer. Combine that with the fact they dont even make quality cars, they're done. If Mitsubishi doesn't step up their game and bring quality AND sportiness to their brand, they'll be no more.
There's a lot of us who love the irrelevant Mitsubishi. Doesn't everything have to be sporty.Theres sports cars out there.Why bother ripping on Mitsubishi?
The wheels and upholstery were actually kind of nice for the time. This Was 1989 after all. 14" wheels on a compact car was a Very Big Deal...and a Serious Upgrade!!!!😎😎
@@landonbenford8369 Yeah I made that comment 7yrs ago, but I completely agree with you now. I miss the days of loud upholstery and smaller aero wheels on fatter tires.
I got one of these when I was 20. It was AWESOME! Fast as hell and sporty for its time. I loved it. That is until it shredded 2 timing belts and destroyed the engine twice. Mitsubishi, after the second timing belt, issued a "customer service campaign" to deal with the issue. I contacted them and they paid for the second belt / engine and then reimbursed me for the thousands I spent when it happened the first time. After I got it back from the second timing belt debacle, the transmission fell apart and that was that. All of this happened within 4 years.
Loyalmoonie Barely. They cant even compete in their segments anymore. I mean, they have potential as this car proves but their just choosing to make lackluster low rent cars that are very uncompetitive.
MetalAndMotorsGuy506 blame it on the Japanese corporate decisions. Even though I understand/now realize that the stigma of 1990s Mitsubishi's reliability issues were overblown, however, it was enough to kill the sales into discontinuation. Japanese companies have strong pride in their products. If their products don't sell, they won't make it anymore. That being said, however, Mitsubishi has stated recently that a new mid-size sedan (either a Galant or Diamante) is being considered for the American marketplace, but not anytime within the next few years.
Actually, the Mirage is selling quite well and the car is quite profitable. Nothing wrong with the low rent market if you know how to build them cheaply enough.
I had one of those and it was so much fun and so easy to make it go faster.I got a inter-cooler off of a 1988 Volvo turbo wagon.I had the turbo upgraded it was larger almost to big , cause the boost was like a light switch no boost then BOOM .I had mine at 210 Horsepower could have gone more but that was plenty for such a small car.
I bought the Dodge Colt version of the GT. Same car, different badges. The dealership kept lowering the price by 100 dollars a week until somebody bought it. I had fun embarrassing owners of many so-called "sports cars" of that time.
This was the greatest Mirage in the world, next to the Cyborg and the Ralliart International Cup Cars. Now, the current Mirage has a CVT, and a 3-cylinder engine. (And, it’s not even motorcycle-based! It could’ve been assembled by Triumph, the British motorcycle makers, who love 3-cylinder engines.)
Aaaahh Back when Mitsubishi was actually competitive and made interesting cars. Nowadays, they're just making low rent lackluster uncompetitive cars. At that point, we can only hope Mitsubishi comes along, redesigns their entire lineup and makes it class-competitive and brings back their high-performance cars and off road vehicles, such as the Evo, Eclipse(Not the crossover that rides on a similar chassis as the C***sler S****g(Just guess what car), the AWD Turbo sports compact coupe), 3000GT, Montero, etc. Once their lineup gets class competitive, they should make a high performance line of those cars. Also, if there are any off road vehicles or high performance cars I forgot, tell me now.
Rumored that we only ever got 1,500 of them imported...likely half of them went to the crushers. You'd be hard pressed to find one completely unmodified, too. I've owned two personally...it was fantastic!
@@Nobluffbuff I JUST found one in Colorado... bought it with about 77000 miles on it... some paint, new front struts, and apparently it should be good to go. Bday present for my mom. :)
@@splatbubble Very cool! I'm happy for you there. We never could figure out how Colorado ended up with so many of these cars. That's where I found my last one..lol
