The seller of today’s Nice Price or No Dice Crossfire will not respond to emails, demanding interested parties text or phone to ask about the car. Let’s decide if the price they’ve set is worth making the call.
In his Saturday Night Live skit, Fernando’s Hideaway, Billy Crystal created a character that espoused that it is “better to look good than to feel good.” Last Friday’s 1977 Lotus Esprit S1 likely felt better than it looked, seeing as, while it had undergone a mechanical refresh not that many years back, its age-worn aesthetics had been left untouched. At a $28,000 asking, the majority of you felt the car needed to encompass a complete body and soul renewal, thus faulting that price tag with a 60 percent No Dice loss.
Lotus is a small car maker that has had numerous owners over the years; various consortiums and companies that have each attempted to make the cottage builder an at least marginally profitable concern. A similar situation affected the Chrysler Corporation over the course of its existence, just on a much grander scale and with a couple of big government loans thrown in for added drama.
When today’s 2004 Chrysler Crossfire Limited rolled off the assembly line, its parent company was owned by Germany’s Daimler-Benz, a relationship that, at the time, was somewhat misleadingly referred to as a merger, with the company branded as DaimlerChrysler. The joke at the time was, “How do you pronounce DaimlerChrysler in German? You pronounce it Daimler, the Chrysler is silent.”
This Crossfire is, in fact, a Mercedes-Benz under its iconic early-aughts period dress, albeit a hand-me-down platform that the German company already felt was out of date. Introduced for the 2004 model year, the Crossfire shares the vast majority of its chassis and running gear with the R170 Mercedes SLK. The thing of it is, at that exact time, Mercedes was on the verge of replacing the R170 with the re-engineered R171 SLK, leaving the Crossfire to soldier on alone with the older platform. Is that necessarily a bad thing now? Oh, hell no. It’s just kind of rude when you think about it. While branded as a Chrysler and carrying Mercedes mechanicals, all Crossfires were built under contract by the German coachbuilder Karmann.
Power for the Crossfire comes from a 3.2-liter Mercedes (of course) M112 V6 offering 215 horsepower and 229 lb-ft of torque. In this car, that’s mated to the standard equipment (and also Mercedes) six-speed manual. The car is rear-wheel drive, utilizing Mercedes’ multi-link rear suspension and a standard un-equal length A-arm front end. Disc brakes are fitted all around.
According to the ad, this Crossfire “RUNS PERFECT AND FAST.” The ad also notes that it comes with a clean title and just 128,000 miles on the clock. Mechanically, the seller says it “NEEDS NOTHING… JUST DRIVE AND GO.”
Aesthetically, the car’s a bit of a mixed bag. The bodywork shows some scratches and scrapes in the also weathered black paint. That black hue has also been invited to the party on the factory wheels, as well as to the formerly silver windshield surround that has some other cosmetic issues going on.
It’s a similar story in the cabin. Everything save for the original Becker stereo seems present and accounted for, but it’s also a little funky in here. The center stack seems misaligned or detached on one side, and the speakers in the doors are completely bare, having lost their grilles to some misfortune. Most oddly, though, is how shiny everything is in here. The leather seating surfaces, dash, and steering wheel all look like a SEMA booth model for ArmorAll. Seriously, it feels like someone with a fixation on piano black has lacquered the entire interior. That’s weird, but probably easily toned down with some interior cleaner and a bit of elbow grease. That just leaves us with the question of the car’s $4,500 price.
What’s your take on this Crossfire and that $4,500 asking, which the seller says is FIRM FOR QUICK SALE? Is that a deal to enter into a merger with this former DaimlerChrysler mashup? Or is that too much, considering the cosmetic issues and the super slick interior?
You decide!
Brooklyn, New York, Craigslist, or go here if the ad disappears.
H/T to EZ for the hookup!
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