Topic: Final Drive: 1986 Hyundai Pony

[Autos_Editor]

My little Pony.

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[tpl]

A friend of mine had one in 1989.   The roof went rusty.  Possibly caused by a splatter of birdsh!t that was never cleaned off, who knows.

[mixmanmash]

I too had a friend who bought one used.  He drove it from Vancouver to Thunder Bay several times.  Just couldn't kill the car.  Racked up a fair bit of miles on it.  The car's end was when someone turned left in front of him.

[Guy]

My brother in law had one in the days. He got good service out of it. Put a ton of miles on it. Then corrosion took over and the thing fell to pieces.

[tazcubed]

The only one who this is a classic car for is the scrap metal dealer - and even he's trying to find the metal between the bondo. A friend of mine owned one new and he spent more money on repairs than it would have cost to have bought something else that actually had some build quality. He abandoned it after the engine blew at the end of the first year. I'm surprised that Hyundai actually survived in the North American market after this thing - it's a piece of junk that makes a Lada look like quality.

[Fobroader]

Great article, very entertaining, "If im not back in an hour, avenge my death!! Ok hon, get some milk!!"  As for the car, my father in law had one and my wife distinctly remembers the bloody thing on fire on their driveway, so yeah, not exactly a great car.

[quadzilla]

I use to drive for Mother's Pizza when I went to school (yes I'm that old) and they had one of these for their cars. We would fight for this over the Mustang (4 cyl, auto tranny locked in drive) as you could shift the gears and it was also RWD. Add some water to the roads, onde up to speed you can have a lot of fun drifting around corners. Now you know why all your toppings were on one side of the pizza. 

Considering the abuse we put that car through it never broke once.

[Oldsguy]

These initially sold like gangbusters when they were first introduced because of, as the author says, the low, low price, which Canadians are always suckers for. I remember talking to a guy who worked for the local Hyundai dealer at a party in the mid-80s who was telling stories about how they were selling them right off the transporter as soon as they were delivered. Then after a year or two the issues with the build quality became known and the bloom started coming off the rose. Hyundai followed this up with duds like the Stellar and the first-gen Excel which didn't help much.

Last year I saw one of these being driven here on the east coast and it looked *perfect*. Obviously nobody would/could restore one of these things so it must have been kept locked away in a heated garage for the last 25 years. Amazing.

[dkaz]

More proof that Vancouver's the place to live if you're a lover of old cars. Even cars that wouldn't normally register with enthusiasts.

I wish I knew these cars were RWD. I might've had a second look at them when I was car buying back in grade 12.

[Blueprint]

Author's next mission: find a stellar Stellar. Never saw one with properly working rear lights - they must have had quite an interesting wiring harness.

I drove a new Pony that was in the city's fleet during a summer job (my regular fleet ride, a retired Malibu cop car, was not available). Even though I was used to a manual choke on my parents' '81 Civic, the Pony took a while to start on rainy days. It felt...agricultural. They did look like improved Chevettes at the time, and sold by the ton. They even had a tacky black and gold "special edition", whose proud owners often graced with chrome lip / chrome gold center mags from Crappy Tire. Ahhh, the '80s...

[Thinking Out Loud]

I recall this article as a kid (scroll down to the 'Canadian Caper').

http://skodacanada.ca/SkodaReviewsAndPress.html

I was more fond of the Skoda back in the day myself, but being a Canadian teen, there was lots of choice in cheap metal....

[Brendan McAleer]

Dan Proudfoot is a national treasure. And I am currently in the hunt for a Lada.

[Patrick_D1]

The thought of those cars careening around Mosport makes me shiver with glee. I second Brendan's comment re: Dan Proudfoot.

[Arthur Dent]

I've casually looked for a Pony for years. None ever come up for sale. Those that are left are used up by their owners then junked.

The Pony seemed to come in two flavours - completely horrible, junked after a few years or dead reliable.

I did own a '86 Stellar for a while. And the rear lights worked. It had 1.6L version of the article's 1.4L motor. It was slow but not that bad (says the guy who owned a 220D  ).

I'd love a Skoda one today - they are very rare however.

Interestingly I got offered almost free Lada Niva today. I'm not sure if I can take it however as it is up by Edmonton. 

Anyone want to crowd source a Lada? If I get it going I'll attempt a cross country trip! 

[Silverbird]

Great Dash gauges:

Speedo to 180
No tach
A big clock so you can tell how late you'll arrive

[Guy]

Great Dash gauges:

Speedo to 180
No tach
A big clock so you can tell how late you'll arrive

  

[Northernridge]

The Pony. My former brother in law bought one shortly after they were released here, he kept telling me that Hyundai was going to be the new BMW. He ended up hating the car because of reliability issues. Best story though was that he took up pipe smoking about the same time. One nice summer day he was driving around with the windows down the embers from the pipe blew all over the back seat and melted a series of holes across the seat back.

Reminds me, his other vehicle was a white Mazda B2000 pickup. One day he repainted the mirrors (...may have only been a driver's side one actually) black and drove off before the paint was dry. Of course the black paint ended up splattered across the door which my sister noticed long after it had dried.

[phazotron]

Great Dash gauges:

Speedo to 180
No tach
A big clock so you can tell how late you'll arrive

The only way a stock Pony would hit 180 would be after it drives or falls off the ramp of a C-130 Hercules doing one of those  low altitude just-off-the-ground-cargo-drops. 



Skoda, Lada, Dacia, Chevettes, Omni, Pony, Yugo...the '80's    

[PJ]

Great Dash gauges:

Speedo to 180
No tach
A big clock so you can tell how late you'll arrive

The only way a stock Pony would hit 180 would be after it drives or falls off the ramp of a C-130 Hercules doing one of those  low altitude just-off-the-ground-cargo-drops. 



Skoda, Lada, Dacia, Chevettes, Omni, Pony, Yugo...the '80's   

That's pretty accurate list of the cars my friends and I drove in college.  Even when they were only a few years old they were dirt cheap. 

[Fobroader]

Great Dash gauges:

Speedo to 180
No tach
A big clock so you can tell how late you'll arrive

The only way a stock Pony would hit 180 would be after it drives or falls off the ramp of a C-130 Hercules doing one of those  low altitude just-off-the-ground-cargo-drops. 



Skoda, Lada, Dacia, Chevettes, Omni, Pony, Yugo...the '80's   

Wait...wait....wait....there were Dacias officially imported into Canada??