[mmarshall]

Money is not really the issue at Chrysler. You could give them the entire U.S. Treasury and it still would not solve their #1 problem.....poor-quality materials in the design/construction of their cars. Overall, outside of the 1984 Pontiac Fiero and 1987 Hyundai Excel, they rank as some of the lowest-quality vehicles I've looked at and reviewed.

This is nothing new with me personally either....I owned several new FWD Chrysler products in the 70's and early 80's. Most were in the shop for warranty work more than they were out, backed by zone reps that had no idea of what they were dealing with. One was so bad (a 1983 K-car-based Lebaron) that I didn't even keep it a year, and finally switched to Japanese cars, with a new 1984 Mazda.

Chrysler had some great engines and automatic transmissions in the 60s that were bulletproof, but let things go way downhill after that with the quality-cheapening in the 1970's and the switch to lightweight, FWD designs. They were junk from the beginning of that era, and, to an extent, still are today. The RWD models today, like the Charger, 300, and Challenger, have a reasonably good chassis/drivetrain (some of it Mercedes-based) but the hardware/interior materials are still junk.