The 1970s were certainly not a time of automotive greatness from the Big 3. Reeling from the oil crisis, cash-strapped car companies were focused on fuel economy and very basic features. This resulted in many quite awful cars, very few of which have been saved today, but making the ones that have survived, extremely rare and worthy of a second look. This nicely brings us to today’s find – the 1980 Plymouth Horizon TC3 available in Manasquan, New Jersey here on eBay with a current bid of just $5000.
The Horizon was based on a Euro-spec chassis from Chrysler Europe and the Rootes Group on the catchily named ‘Omnirizon’ platform. The big selling point of this car was its efficiency, getting a claimed 40mpg in the automatic version, and up to 54mpg in the manual version. That’s where the good news ends because the other features of the car were exceptionally underwhelming. Its sales brochure boasted about the ‘radial tires’, the ‘dent-resistant front, and rear bumpers’, and a ‘fold-down rear seat’. Yet, which car would get the most attention at your local Car and Coffee event against a sea of Mustangs and Camaros – this is likely a good contender!
Luckily this rare care only has 25,000 miles on the clock and the body and interior are in reasonable condition considering their age. There are some rust marks on the body at the bottom of the door and the top of the fender, but if treated soon enough they should be remedied before having to find any replacement panels. And given how rare this car is, I don’t imagine that those will be easy enough to find. If we look under the hood of the car, it really doesn’t improve – although the engine is in good condition and runs and drives fine, the engine is a tiny 1.7l VW unit with just 70hp, giving it a 0-60 of 16 seconds.
The interior is in better condition with the red carpets and leather not suffering any sun damage or noticeable rips or tears. However the car does need a new headliner, so you will need to get this custom-made from your local shop. The only issues are the air conditioning which doesn’t work but probably just needs a regas, and the rear hatch does not open. If you are a fan of oddball cars or rare cars from this era then this really could be the car for you – so would you want to be seen driving around in one of these?
Cool little cars. Definitely rare at this point. Questionable reliability (I had experience with one early on). Poor performance (factually), especially with the auto. But hey, in this day and age, I’d buy something like this just to make people go 🤔 at Saturday cruise ins/cars and coffee. I’m past the age of abusing cars, so it wouldn’t be pushed. Knowing these things, you’d have to baby it.
I still don’t get sellers who don’t try to figure out stuff like the AC and hatch issues. They would definitely be items I’d tackle right off the bat. But, hey, some people just don’t care and only want the little bit of coin from the flip. Hopefully, someone buys it, repairs it right by taking care of the AC, hatch and little bit of rust that’s there. Would love to see the underside.
All in all, I wouldn’t go over $5k on it, but that’s just me. It could be a maintenance headache and some parts are just plain obsolete. Cool oddity, worth a look if you like hard to find vehicles that aren’t worth a ton.
This POS was no good when it was new. Think it used a VW wabbitt mill. First one I worked on litterally had the carb fall off of it. Then every accessory bracket broke. 10 50 said it – Poor performance and reliablilty, whats left but rust and 40 years. Had trouble getting parts when they were popular. Put it out of its misery.
Cheers
GPC
Hmm, I usually expect a more positive response from you. But you seem to have the qualifications to make that statement, again, just your view on a limited number of cars. They sold over 3 MILLION units, and that, my friend, is impressive. I read, the VW motor was just a “short block”, upped to 1.7 from 1.5, used all add on stuff, like manifolds, so your carb gripe lies with the American schmoe that assembled it. The accolades of these cars is too long to list, but I liked every “K” vehicle I had, and in a small way, helped Chrysler stay afloat during those crazy times. Why, I’m not sure. To create 900 hp Challengers and RAM pickups, but that’s the way the cookie crumbled. You like that crap? Thank the lowly Horizon it’s even there at all,,
I usually don’t correct other people spelling because I’m not a language teacher but ,gaspump it’s spelled RABBIT.
wabbit season.
Duck Season
It may come to, or already has, some folks may never know who Elmer Fudd was. Looney Tunes was the funniest, it’s amazing we can think at all watching those cartoons. Some today feel LooneyTunes has racist overtones,,,
Howard, did you know in the newest cartoons they took away Elmer Fudd’s gun? He has to use something else to go after the wabbit.
Ahhh RW go back to Looney toons 101. Wascally Wabbit. The Inimitable mr, Fudd.
Low mileage because it spent most of its days sitting in the dealership service lot.
bidding at $5,000 for a $1,200 at best dollar car hit that sold button take the money and run before the border sobers up and backs out
Oops ,Auto correct ,^ bidder this site doesn’t allow for editing after posting
I drove a new one (maybe a 79, can’t remember) with that rubbery four speed. Despite the lousy shifter, I really liked it. It was the first front wheel drive car I had ever driven and I thought it was pretty cool. My Mother drove a four door 79 Omni with the 1.7 4 sp for years without any problems, though the door handles broke in the cold a lot. Her biggest problem was rust, they may have even been worse then the early Japanese cars, though looking back, I think all cars rusted, even the big ol’ American iron. The difference was that those cars had more steel so the rust wasn’t so noticeable. Rust prevention has come along ways, be it galvanizing lower panels, or plastic in vulnerable areas, and under coating. Despite that, I still see some rust on modern cars, and for some reason, esp modern crazily priced pick up trucks. Guys, how hard is it to hand wax your cars twice a year, wash them once in a while in the winter salt months, and garage them? I swear many of those trucks will rust away before they are even paid for. I like this car a lot. I wish it was a 4 speed, the 3 speed autos just don’t cut it will a low power engine, though the ad is pretty vague about it, I assume it is an auto. BTW, the 54 MPG with a manual was not for this car, it was a later model several years newer than this. The “Mizer” version. It came with crazy economy rear end to achieve that. Not sure that would be much fun to drive. On base in England, we had a bunch of cars in the fleet that were Horizons with 2.2 5 sps. I really liked those. I felt really safe in those. Some of the staff sergeants once mocked me about saying how much I enjoyed a low powered car. I reminded them that I got my kicks at Mach II, so on the ground I felt no need to show off in some over powered car.
Creepie little car, but at least it has a VW engine. Thats kind of a Porsche, the greatest car ever.
That old comment again ?
Don’t knock ’em til you’ve tried ’em!!
Had many L Bodies….’83 Turismo with the 1.7 litre engine, an ’85 GLH-T, and ’89 Horizon and I bought a ’90 Omni for my height-challenged Mum. The Omni was the only car that she could get in and out of the garage, but to be fair, I put her ’78 Cordoba and its rusty frame out of its misery and put the Omni in its place.
Yes, the Turismo was slow…..you times zero to sixty with a sundial, not a stopwatch. But it and the Horizon would run on anything that came out of a pump labeled “gasoline” and they were dirt simple to work on. That came in handy, as I got used to the Turismo eating oxygen sensors, and became very adept and swapping them at the side of the road. Usually in a driving rain or snowstorm.
I was a broke college student while I had most of my Omnirizons, and they put up with a lot of abuse and kept humming along, until the tinworm took them under. I actually traded my Horizon for my first Saab, and while I still have the Saab, I wish I still had the Horizon.
OK I will knock them because I did try them. They were common used cars when I was buying and selling and if you could get into the car, broken outside door handles, they had all kinds of mechanical problems.
They weren’t good cars in any way.
My father bought one of these brand new in 1979 and we put well over 170,000kms on it. It had a propensity for chewing up distributor shafts (3 over the life of the car), but other than that it only req’d routine maintenance. A friend’s mom had one and it was a POS, they got rid of it after 4 years with less than 50,000kms. Monday versus Wednesday build perhaps? Ours was a pretty good driver and got great mileage, and with the manual 4-spd was a relatively mid pack performer compared to other cars of the time. BTW, MSRP in 1979: $4,864.00
My Turismo had a four speed and would regularly get 38-43 MPG…..of course, I could have run uphill with the car on my back and been faster. The Horizon used to hit the mid 30’s on average and had a 5 speed, but I really kept my foot in the 2.2 litre under the hood. Had I taken it easy, 38-40 would have been possible.
All of my L-Bodies got me where I needed to go without any drama. They may not have been flashy, but then, they weren’t as expensive as a Cadillac of the day and didn’t have the thirst for gas that a Caddy would have had.
As Howard A so aptly put it, the modern Chrysler Corporation (or whatever they call themselves these days) owe their existence to the humble L-Body.
My best buds family had one of these. I may have told the story here before but… We put a crappy “one day hotel parking lot sale” car stereo with equalizer and Tancredi speakers in it. Given that it was the newest car they had, his father was furious when my best friend’s brother flipped the thing with five of us inside of it, two of us in the hatch, when driving down the hill in the snow after a bottle rocket war. The idiot twisted the steering wheel trying to get it to fishtail. Oh it fishtailed, then did a 360 and a 180 before going off the edge of the road and down the hill sideways. Thankfully the tree was there to catch us before rolling more than halfway over. Also thankfully the car was totaled before his dad could paint it IBM mainframe blue with a brush as he did most of the rest of their cars 🤣
Cars like this were the cars of many of our youths. They’ll never be collectible but there’s always going to be some love for them.
Wasn’t this same car listed here just a few months back??