Monday, April 19, 2010

Nostalgic Subcompact: 1989 Shelby CSX—A rare turbocharged Dodge

1989 Shelby CSX turbo Dodge Shadow Subcompact CultureThis, my friends, is a Shelby CSX. Made from 1987-1989, and based off of the Dodge Shadow, the Shelby CSX came with the famous Dodge 2.2-liter turbocharged/intercooled four cylinder. CSXs also had handling goodies, aero bits, optional Recaro seats, and upgraded interiors, further differentiating them from the Shadow.

The '89 model, such as the car pictured above, was rated at 175 horsepower and 205 ft./lbs. of torque (@15 lbs. of boost), and power was run to the front wheels via a five-speed Getrag transmission. Zero to 60 times were in around 6.8 seconds, and the quarter mile was in the low 15s.

The '89 models also got lightweight gold "Fiberide" wheels made of fiberglass-reinforced plastic—something you don't see very often. (I believe this was the only Fiberide wheel application.) Also, the ground effects were made by Kaminari, a staple of the body kit industry to this day. If you were going to purchase an '89 CSX, you'd better have liked red—it was the only color available.

These are rare vehicles; only 498 of them were offered to the public in '89. The '89s were also the only year for the Fiberide wheels, the upgraded Turbo II engine (previous models made 175 ft./lbs. of torque), and the Kaminari body kit.

The CSX shown here belongs to my friend Jim Redden. Jim writes for the Portland Tribune and is a fellow member of the Northwest Automotive Press Association.

1989 Shelby CSX turbo Dodge Shadow Subcompact CultureLINKS
The Shelby CSX on AllPar.com
ShelbyCSX.com
Shelby CSX on Wikipedia

4 comments:

Unknown said...

sweet. before i could drive i had a serious fascination with all the mopar turbo cars of this era.

Your friends appears to not have the original front bumper cover....the original had no foglight cutouts and a more aggressive lip. I imagine a replacement is completely impossible to find.

http://www.shelbycsx.com/gallery/89csx222.jpg

Jim Redden said...

Not impossible to find but expensive and impractical. The original air dam is much lower and easy to hit on curbs. The one on the car was badly damaged when I bought it from the original owner. I decided to go with a smaller after-market one that I bought from another CSX owner who wrecked the back of his car. Other than that, the car is 100 percent stock. Jim

Billy said...

Very nice! I'm a fellow CSX owner as well. What # is your vehicle, and have you registered it with www.shelbyregistry.com ?

Small Adventures said...

I had several turbo powered K-cars back in the day (mid 80's to mid 90's),mostly Daytona's (there was an '87 Shelby Charger and '85 GLH too,those were fun when modded a bit). Love seeing this post!