zzdcar
Home
/
Reviews
/
Buying
/
Why Buy This 33k-Mile Porsche 911 for Over $165,000 When You Can Get a 254k-Mile Turbo Plymouth Voyager for $3,500?
Why Buy This 33k-Mile Porsche 911 for Over $165,000 When You Can Get a 254k-Mile Turbo Plymouth Voyager for $3,500?-May 2024
2024-02-19 EST 22:09:47

I just don’t get it. Somehow we live in a world where non car-enthusiasts keep buying, and car enthusiasts keep spending ridiculous sums on . All this when really, they should all be buying for much, much less. What am I not getting here?

was this past weekend, and the attendance was definitive proof that ’80s and ’90s cars are “in.” That’s great news for the seller of this for auction on Bring a Trailer. Bidding climbed all the way to $165,000 before ending with the reserve not having been met.

The car is red. Its air-cooled engine is in the back. It’s got a manual transmission. No doubt, it’s a ton a fun to drive. But it’s not going to be the hero of Radwood—no, no. Not if this thing is also in attendance:

I couldn’t help but spot this 1990 Plymouth Voyager Turbo with a five-speed manual transmission, and it’s for a measly $3,500. That’s $161,500 less than the Porsche’s final bid, which—as you may recall from a few paragraphs before—wasn’t even enough to buy the car. Put another way, you can buy over 47 of these Plymouth Voyagers for the not-quite-enough $165,000 bid for that 993 Porsche 911.

But you don’t have to buy 47 Plymouth Voyager Turbos (you may not even be able to find 47 of them), because even a single one is just as cool—if not cooler—than that Porsche. Want proof? Look no further than the interior. Check out this amazing expanse of cheap plastics and over-stuffed cloth seats:

Compare all of that red goodness to this boring black leather interior whose only hint of soul is the red instrument cluster and the spare “Turbo” written on the sill guard:

As for exterior aesthetics, the 993 is just gorgeous, especially with that bright red paint:

But come on, which car speaks to more American hearts than the very first mass-produced American minivan? This boxy profile is just classic, and—to the deeply ill among us—kind of sexy:

Under the hood, there’s a 150 horsepower turbocharged 2.5-liter four-cylinder mated to a five-speed manual. That made this minivan hot stuff back in the day.

Sure, the Porsche makes 400 horsepower, and it sends those ponies to the correct set of wheels, but what use is all that power when you can only transport two humans? The Voyager will move eight while smoking those front tires (on a wet day), plus, its imperfect paint will make it much more useable than the Porsche.

Seriously, do you want to be this guy checking paint thickness?

Or do you want to be wringing out the turbo four-banger in a high mileage, rough-around-the-edges, boxy K-car-derived minivan without a care in the world?

The answer is, : Buy the damn minivan.

Comments
Welcome to zzdcar comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
Buying
Buy This Volvo V70 For $20 Million, Get A Free License Plate (Updated)
Buy This Volvo V70 For $20 Million, Get A Free License Plate (Updated)
Spending a cool $20 million can get you a lot of things. You could buy multiple and a place to store them. Or, you can buy this old Volvo V70 in New York and get a distinctive set of vanity New York license plates that say New York on...
May 12, 2025
What's The Best Way To Get Top Dollar For An Affordable Enthusiast Car?
What's The Best Way To Get Top Dollar For An Affordable Enthusiast Car?
As Jalopnik’s resident car-buying expert and a professional car shopper, I get emails. Lots of emails. I’ve picked a few of your questions and will try to help out. This week we are talking about selling “affordable” enthusiast cars and the best-used choice for a young professional. I bought...
May 12, 2025
Witnessing The Birth Of The 2021 Ariel Atom 4 And Driving The Mad Thing
Witnessing The Birth Of The 2021 Ariel Atom 4 And Driving The Mad Thing
The Ariel Atom is a prosthetic. It’s something you strap onto your body that takes your physical motions and multiplies them, dramatically. All cars are like this, but the bigger and more complex they get, the less they feel like connected body augmentations. The is still fundamentally four wheels and...
May 12, 2025
We Drove The 2022 Golf R On Ice And It’s Probably Going To Be The Best New Hot Hatch You Can Buy
We Drove The 2022 Golf R On Ice And It’s Probably Going To Be The Best New Hot Hatch You Can Buy
At the end of last week, I hitched up the family GTI and pointed it north toward the Smithers Winter Driving near Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. The Mackinac Bridge was partially closed due to high winds, so I got to do a bridge crossing under partial closure, which may...
May 12, 2025
A Bunch Of Sweet Movie Cars From Films Like Fast Five And Ford v Ferrari Are Going Up For Sale
A Bunch Of Sweet Movie Cars From Films Like Fast Five And Ford v Ferrari Are Going Up For Sale
give gearheads a chance to see many of their favorite cars all in one place. One awesome museum near Chicago with a collection of movie cars is about to auction off some of its holdings to make room for new exhibits. You can even score a car from Ford...
May 12, 2025
At $13,500, Could This 2013 Dodge Caravan Camper Unleash Your Inner Nomad?
At $13,500, Could This 2013 Dodge Caravan Camper Unleash Your Inner Nomad?
Wanderlust may not be a clinically defined ailment, but if it were, today’s Dodge minivan might just prove an effective therapeutic. That is, of course, only if its price makes it an affordable prescription. Based on the comments for last Friday’s , the ugly specter of Porsche’s infamous intermediate...
May 12, 2025
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.zzdcar.com All Rights Reserved