1989 Chrysler TC by Maserati

Available now is the 1989 Chrysler TC by Maserati. This car is an excellent well-kept example of the blunder of the Chrysler / Maserati collaboration. While not a wild success at the time of its release, these are becoming more and more collectible as time goes on. This example is dressed in a muted yellow with a black convertible top covering a tan leather interior. Full power everything in side and the Chrysler is powered by the turbo-charged 4-cylinder engine mated to an automatic transmission. Runs and drives well, but the front shocks will need to be serviced before being completely road worthy. From the Motor Trend Article on the Chrysler TC: An Italian-American LeBaron for nearly three times the price-what could go wrong? Chrysler head honcho Lee Iacocca in the 1980s teamed up with Maseratis Alejandro de Tomaso to produce sporty coupes that combined the so-called best of both brands. The result: the Chrysler TC by Maserati. (TC is short for Turbo Convertible. ) It made its debut at the 1986 Los Angeles auto show and rolled on the Q-platform, a shortened and otherwise modified version of the K-platform from the LeBaron and Dodge Daytona. Heres a quick rundown of what you need to know and never cared enough to ask of your college-professor neighbor who drove his to and from work every day during a simpler automotive time. The turbo-charged, convertible version of the Chrysler TC by Maserati was available in Arctic White, Exotic Red, Jet Black, Light Yellow, Royal Cabernet Pearl, and Smoke Quartz Pearl. Inside, the interior trim colors were Black, Bordeaux, and Ginger. It also came with a removable hardtop with opera windows, plus an electric rear window defroster. Classy. Standard goodies included A/C, a 10-speaker sound system with CD player, six-way power-adjustable Italian leather bucket seats, leather-covered instrument- and door-trim panels, and more. The puffy leather interior looked like a giant catchers mitt from above-appropriate since the Chrysler TC by Maserati was nothing but a giant automotive swing and miss. The Chrysler TC by Maserati was powered by the Daytonas 160-horsepower, 2.2-liter turbocharged inline-four that was mated to a three-speed automatic transmission. According to our experts at Automobile, an optional 200-hp, 16-valve Maserati engineered inline-four was available with a five-speed Getrag manual gearbox. There was also a Mitsubishi-built 3.0-liter V-6 option available as well. The two-seat drop-top was built in Milan, Italy, from 1989 to 1991, and it wore a Chrysler Pentastar badge with a Maserati trident inside it. A base TC started at around $33,000 in 1989 (nearly $69,000 in todays dollars), and a similar-looking fully-loaded LeBaron cost about $14,000 less. In our June 1988 issue of Automobile magazine, we made what was perhaps the understatement of the decade when we proclaimed that TC stood for Too Costly, which at this point is an even more accurate judgment than it was at the time. Thanks to its hefty price tag, Chrysler sold just more than 7,000 TCs during its brief three-year run.