Thread: Mitsubishi 380 = P76 ???

Originally Posted by wannalandy

The 380 is an awesome car . Cheaper than a commodore or falcon and go a lot harder than the other 2 . Only thing that lets them down is the front wheel drive and the fact that the magna wrecked the mistu name in the first place . I had one for a few months as a company car and would own one in a heart beat if i hadn't already purchased a calais . If anything they should stop making the Pajero ..... bucket of second hand food

Hey now at least my Pajero is not leaking oil and it can go up a hill without having the ring revved out of it.

The Pajero is a Rolls Royce compared to my Defender!! Long live the Paj

I got the email from MMA advising of this change and the steps they are taking to remain a viable company for the future. I guess the usual spin......

Originally Posted by Pedro_The_Swift

its sadder cause all it does is perpetuate this holden v ford thing,, [ hq racing on a grand scale,,]

must be sad to build something youre proud of only to see the company close you down.

Still got the toyota aurion ..... what a machine .... never seen a shopping trolly look so good

All I can say is dont buy Mitsubishi and send them broke. Not because they are an imported car now, that is fine, but because they screwwed so many people in Australia from their own workers to parts suppliers. They also scooped up millions in benefits and support payments from the taxpayer that they should have to repay in full.
The 380 a great car. Its a POS and why its not selling. Same when the Magna came out, everyone raved about them until they realised they were only average.
I am off to the fire training ground to burn a late model Magna.

The magna was actually a reasonable car for it's price and purpose. The 380 was/is a good car too (let's not discuss turning circle here though!)

The sigma did Mitsubishi no favours

Personally I think there mistake was a) renaming the vehicle, that has always been a bad idea in Australia, never works. And they moved away from the magna concept. A mid range family vehicle that was cheap, comfortable and economical. They started chasing commodore/falcon sales.

As 1 eyed as we might be about 4x4's the Pajero is a very good vehicle. It left the Jackaroo for dead and rightly so, it was/is the better vehicle)

Originally Posted by cookiesa

The sigma did Mitsubishi no favours

Yes, I gave the Magna and its successors too much credit for destroying MMA's reputation. The destruction started with the Sigma, a real pile of puss. Heavy fuel consumption, no headroom for anyone over 5'9" until the later models, heavy oil use, appalling dust entry, shook themselves to bits in country service.

I worked for a company whose wise men in Sydney head office decreed we must have "cheap to run" four cylinder cars and bought Sigmas and Ford Meteors. Big mistake. The Meteors were dangerous on dirt roads, got upside down with ease and the reps. rebelled and refused to drive them.

Sigmas without air conditioning used more fuel than the air conditioned Commodores they replaced. A rep who was 6'3" took out a common law negligence claim against the company for spinal degeneration he claimed caused by driving a Sigma with his neck bent. MMA service rep had log books at the local dealer to record oil usage. We were to take the cars there every week and the dealers staff would dip and top up and record the oil usage. My rep who covered Southwest Qld. asked if he could have log books at Goondiwindi, St. George, and Charleville as when he went to Goondiwindi, he had to put in two litres of oil to continue. Dust entry to the boot was so bad the reps used to wrap their suitcases in a blanket and then into a plastic bag. The dealer did try to fix this with new seals, silastic, packing, etc. to no avail. MMA never at any time admitted to any of these problems.

Hey we missed out the rust.....

sigma was to mitsubishi what the camira was to holden! (or daewoo was/is to holden.... anyone bought a Kalos..oops Barina lately)

Originally Posted by vnx205

On ABC radio this morning, the interviewer accepted comments made by the Mitsubishi rep she was interviewing that the 380 was basically a good car but the Aust public just hadn't taken to it. They also agreed that the car had probably been released when the Aust public were buying either small economical sedans or thirsty SUVs.

It was her next comment that I believe perpetuates one of the great myths of Australian motoring history.
She said, "So the 380 is really a good car, it's not another P76 then?" As if there was something seriously wrong with the P76.

If the opinions of member of this forum are anything to go by, the 380 actually has a lot in common with the P76. In fact the similarities are probably greater than the differences.
Aren't both basically good cars released at the wrong time, handicapped by the loss of reputation caused either by problems with previous models or early teething problems, and killed off by economic decisions made by the parent company?

Seems exactly the same to me.

While the P76 had a good engine (in the case of the V8 option), there were major reliability and quality issues with the rest of it because it was released too quickly to the market. No such issues with the 380. Also, the P76 was and is plain ugly IMHO

Originally Posted by cookiesa

Hey we missed out the rust.....

sigma was to mitsubishi what the camira was to holden! (or daewoo was/is to holden.... anyone bought a Kalos..oops Barina lately)

LOL .... plenty of cars out there have 2 different names ..... Bravo/courier , camry/eclipse and go back a few years ..... mavrick/patrol , 323/lazer , camry/apollo , commodore/lexon and a few others so it's just a normal thing now and everyone knows it but they will still by the badge they like even if they are side by side with the other badge on it .