Here’s another mid-engined car that’s captured my fascination. Yes, it’s Japanese, and yes, it’s relatively modern, and yes, it did with the X1/9 what the Miata did with the Elan, but that makes it no less of a candidate for budget fun on wheels. When I was 19, I had been in my Alfa for 3 years and looked down on most Japanese cars. That is, until I started working part-time as an office assistant for a local tech journalist who had a spare early light-metallic blue AW11 MR2, which I got to use from time to time to run errands for her. And that’s around the time I learned this car, with its Yamaha-designed 4-cylinder 112hp 16v twincam four and fantastic tossability was more than I’d ever expected.
So that brings us to today’s subject, a red 1986 in Lakewood, CA for $2000:
Rusty But Trusty 