It’s a beautiful day outside, and after spending some time playing with the puppy and thinking of things gone by, I got to thinking about the car I miss most. There have been a few cars that I loved over the years. Some I kept well beyond 100,000 miles long before that was considered normal or acceptable. One car which I really miss is my 1990 Eagle Premier Ltd. Since most of you probably don’t even remember that car, let me provide you a few links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagle_Premier
http://www.allpar.com/model/premier.html
It was the end of AMC and the beginning of the Iococca golden years at Cryco. It also happened to be when I finally had 120,000+ miles on my AMC Concord station wagon and had to look around for a new ride. (I actually didn’t trade the Concord, but sold it later, with > 130,000 miles on it, to some high school aged brothers who put a transmission in it and handed it down betwixt the three of them.) It wasn’t just the first time I had a job paying enough to let me buy a brand new car either, although many will try to that.
The Premier had lines like nothing else on the road at the time. It was one of the first production cars in an “ average joe” price range to feature interior climate control. Some of you might not remember that phrase, but, when set on automatic, you chose a temperature and it chose everything else. For its day, the V6 had balls to spare. While there are faster 4 door sedans on the road now, the Premier held its own matching wheels against BMW and Mercedes models it/I encountered…of course…that was back when radar detectors actually worked and the patrol officers had a little more leeway in judgement…<sigh>
Probably the coolest thing, which I haven’t seen duplicated on any car ever again, was the “wings” on the steering column putting the most used controls within reach of your fingertips so your hands never had to leave the wheel. It lead to a beautiful and clean looking dash. I remember the bizarre turn signal which was a paddle that didn’t stick. You moved it like a regular turn signal, but it followed your finger back. The turn signal stayed on and used the same “chime” as the rest of the car’s features, so it was a bit difficult for the untrained owner to tell if the turn signal was on or someone hand managed to open a door without making any noise.
As I recall, even with the way I drove it, that car averaged in the low 20’s MPG wise. Pretty much about the same as my current Buick Rendezvous. Funny, but we have had 20 years of “ improvements” from Detroit and a V6 with a 4 speed automatic still gets about 24 MPG on the highway in real life and 17-19 around town.
I have to admit. If I was shopping for a car and Cryco announced they were re-introducing the Eagle Premier Ltd. I would order one before production even got started. Of all the cars I’ve owned, it’s the one I miss the most.
