Welcome back to Guilty Pleasures, the weekly homage to vehicles that we shouldn't want, yet can't resist. Last week, we admired an 80s Chrysler product that was, really, a holdover from earlier decades; today we're going to mainline some pure, un-stepped-on 1980s with a Chrysler product that had one foot in Europe and the other in the Motor City: the 1985 Plymoutyh Turismo Duster.
Based on the Simca/Chrysler of Europe Omni/Horizon platform (check out Allpar's excellent history for the whole story), the '85 Turismo could be purchased with the base 1.6 liter Peugeot engine for $6,584 (about $13,650 in 2011 bucks). But that wasn't quite Eighties enough, which is why the $96 Duster option package was the way to roll. Chrysler has slapped the "Duster" label on several unrelated Plymouths, before and since the '85, but it was the infamous "Cocaine Factory" Duster ad, broadcast during the 1984 MTV Music Awards, that made the '85 the pinnacle. The tape-stripe graphics, super-plastic spoilers and trim, and Simca-grade indifference to panel gaps that made this one the most of-its-time vehicles ever created. You want to feel like you're driving in true 1965 fashion? Get an Alfa Romeo Giulia SS. You want to do 1985 proper-like? Plymouth Turismo Duster!
Image source: Old Car Brochures
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