My wife had an 88 Sprint when we got married. It was very hard to merge onto highway traffic with that thing. That said, it was reliable and fuel efficient. On the downside, by the time it hit 100K miles, the 3 cylinder was pretty much worn out. With today's synthetic oils, a car like this may last a bit longer.
Both of these cars were also sold in Australia under GM's now defunct Australian GM brand, Holden. The Chevrolet Spint was sold as the Holden Barina and Suzuki Swift in Australia, while the Chevrolet Spectrum was sold as the Holden Gemini, but only as a sedan, the 3dr hatch wasn't offered. The Holden Gemini was also built in Australia, while the Holden Barina was imported.
To round things out, the Corolla-based Nova was offered only in the Midwest in MY1985 (despite being built in CA). National distribution of all three lines, plus 5-door hatchbacks of the Nova and Sprint (the latter on a stretched wheelbase) came for '86.
I had a 1985 Spectrum just like the one they featured here. Same colors, too. I brought it slightly used from a neighbor when it was 2 years old. I loved the car for commuting. It had a nice ride and pretty good power. It was also very comfortable. The folding rear seat back made it very practical, too. Nice thing was my wife didn't know how to drive a stick so she kept her hands off it LOL. The only problem I had was the timing chain broke while I was driving the car. So the repair was very expensive. Probably my fault for not changing it when the owner's manual said to . I had the car fixed and ended up selling the car when it reached 200,000 miles.
My cousin had a Spectrum when they first came out, a 4-door. Very nice looking, quiet and comfortable. It was so long ago, but I remember being impressed by it.
My favorite car. My 87 Sprint Turbo. Fast. Efficient. Easy to Park. Reliable. Don’t crash. It was reasonably comfortable in back. Parts were getting scarce so I sold it in 2012 with over 190k.
The Sprint became the Geo Metro in 89 it was a far more drivable vehicle but still pretty slow and squirrelly. Luckily we also got the Suzuki Swift GTi (slightly decontented from the JDM version) that year which drove far better. Shame they've all rusted away :(
My sister dated a guy in high school whose family had nothing but horrible cars, and an ancient Spectrum sedan was one of them. I rode in it once and was mildly terrified. Again, it was ancient and dubiously maintained, but that was my Spectrum s’perience.
Chevrolet might have called this car the Sprint, but they should have called it the Marathon, since that is what it was like getting a car with a 48-horsepower 1.0-liter 3-cylinder engine up to speed!!!!!!
It's hilarious looking back at how embarrassingly terrible GM was mismanaged around this time since that they could have swallowed up Toyota if the big wigs and bean counters had any foresight.
Why would Americans reduce themselves to driving this when they had the cheapest fuel in the world and a sea of local made lounge rooms on wheels made for their roads.
