MALIBU 12000 '81 Malibus for sale!
- Thread starter Ribbedroof
- Start date
I propose a new category, 'Legend Lore'. This link needs to be in there, as well as one for the 'Black Air' film.
A solid body on frame RWD platform. Am guessing the "Iraqis" didn't know how to service or repair them. Far better than the later FWD stuff that replaced them, in terms of durability.
As stated in the video, GM built approximately 25,000 of these cars at the Oshawa Ontario plant in 1981. Also as stated, there were issues with the cars that were shipped to Iraq. As for why the deal fell apart, there seems to be 2 schools of thought. Number 1 is that because of the issues with the cars, Iraq refused the final shipment(s). Number 2 is that Iraq couldn't afford to pay for the rest of the cars. By now, the reason or reasons why those 12,500 cars ended up here really don't matter. Supposedly, those cars were sent down the Oshawa assembly line for a second time, to have federal emission controls retrofitted to them, so they could be sold here in Canada, and were sold off here at a discounted price. If memory serves, the selling price on them was around $6,500.00 new. They were a pretty basic car, but they had a heavy duty A/C system on them. I've owned 3 of them over the years, and I can tell you that when the A/C system was working properly, and using the R12 refrigerant, you could hang meat in those cars.
If I had to find an upside in this story, I'd say that it made for quite a few manual transmission conversion parts to be available as the cars got to the end of their life cycles.
If I had to find an upside in this story, I'd say that it made for quite a few manual transmission conversion parts to be available as the cars got to the end of their life cycles.
What were the "issues"? Those were solid cars. Maybe the "deal" wasn't so solid as Oshawa/GM thought it was.
There was the IRAN / IRAQ war going on as well, at that time, that may have had a lot to do with the deal going south.
Remember the news reports of it, from that time. The war soon turned into a stalemate, and lasted eight years.
There was the IRAN / IRAQ war going on as well, at that time, that may have had a lot to do with the deal going south.
Remember the news reports of it, from that time. The war soon turned into a stalemate, and lasted eight years.
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More than a million dead in that proxy war. All the big powers got behind Saddam, sent weapons, because the powers (USA, France, etc.) wanted regime change (again) in Iran. Somehow, the big thinkers rationalize megadeaths as necessary each decade with each new proxy war. Satan is always busy.
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