Every summer at the Mitsubishi Motors North America’s headquarters in Cypress, California there’a massive gathering of the triple diamond clan. The company might be in dire financial straits, but they’re still the only Japanese automaker to invite all their fans over for a house party. This is the west coast Mitsubishi Owners Day.
Not only does Mitsubishi put on this shindig for its left coast fans, there’s also an MOD at the Normal, Illinois factory where Outlander Sport is built coming up September 20 and another one on the east coast in Camden, New Jersey (see this schedule for details).
Unlike last year, there weren’t any Dodge-era Colts to be found among an ocean of Evos. But, there was a 50 percent increase in Starions, which brought the field total to a whopping seven or eight.
Of course, not all of them were Starions per se; several were in fact “Imported for Chrysler” Conquests TSi rebadgers.
It was a rare opportunity to see the Starion alongside its successor, the 3000GT, buried under an avalanche of 80,000 Evos. There was also a minty fresh first-gen Montero but it escaped before we could snap a photo of it, no doubt to run the Dakar Rally without breaking a sweat or something.
Come on, other automakers. If Mitsubishi can do something nice like this for their fans, so can you.
No Pajeros?
Just one nice first-gen but he left before we could grab a shot.
Brian from gearboxmagazine.com had his first gen there, in his coverage I think I saw an old Mitsu van as well.
Pretty sure I had the only Pajero at MOD this year. At least, parked on MMC property. Took some social engineering to get past the gatekeepers to my shady spot under the tree out back.
Rocinante is a 6-footer, easily, but I appreciate seeing the kind words while looking for good pictures from MOD for a friend in the UK this morning.
Cheers.
well they did have a cool sign. lol
Typical no love for the old 4x4s….
The welcome mat was out. It’s not their fault if the owners don’t come.
To be fair, the event officially starts at something like 9AM, but there are usually about 300 Evos blocking traffic into the facility from every direction before dawn. Wish they would have at least held the sectioned parking until official starting time. I would have been there.
That champagne Starion with the B.B.S. style wheels is absolutely gorgeous. The prettiest one they snapped a shot of.
It was stunning. And I don’t even like champagne.
C’mon now, was there really 80,000 evos there?
We may have miscounted. Maybe 79,998 or so. There were a LOT.
Well, there you have it; the real reason Toyota is bugging out. They didn’t want to sponsor two TOD’s.
Sad that more old Mitsu’s showed up to the JCCS I flew out for a few years back then go to a brand specific show hosted by the manufacturer. So much goodness out in Cali that would be awesome to see on display at one place.
I make the homage to Camden each year to help fly the Vintage Mitsubishi flag here on the east coast.
Expect at least one Colt out there at East Coast MOD and if I can find a driver maybe the Sapporo as well.
lot of us would never bring oldschool mitsus to a mostly evo event. got a lot to do with mitsu not existing as a 70’s brand in the usa
historically mitsu dropped the ball imo
Well, maybe not so much under the Mitsu name, but under the Dodge and Plymouth brands, you’d think there would be a good number out there.
nope. there’s not even a good number @ jccs
Did they just not survive?
How cool would it be to have a Plymouth Arrow pickup, even just to confuse the neighbors? Espescially if you can find a Plymouth Arrow car to park next to it!
I admit I wasn’t crazy about the concept of the Galant(?)-based Challenger, but thinking about it, it kinda did fit with the idea of a smaller, sporty car. Maybe if they hadn’t called it “Challenger…”
So many Starions! So ’80s! I think they’re very pretty cars, glad to see so many of them in beautiful condition. The 8th-gen Galant is actually a great design as well, so too bad we never got the VR4 version along w/ the Legnum wagon. Were there any pre-Evo VIII Evos? I feel there has to be some grey market import Evos in SoCal. Lack of Expos and Space Wagons I understand, but the lack of interest/appreciation for the Pajero/Montero is just too sad. It’s a rally legend!
So cool to see my car on the JNC front page! There were actually 16 starquests there that day, not all got to park in the main lot, which is huge compared to the 6-7 cars we saw at last years mod.
James, your car is beautiful.
Agree with Ben – there are only a few I’ve ever seen in real life, and never in THAT color.