Here’s how the Dodge Caliber almost became a rebadged Mitsubishi Lancer

So, what do you think? Don't take this wrong, but it doesn't make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Back in 2006, Dodge collaborated with Mitsubishi, Nissan, Hyundai, and Volkswagen to make a more SUV-like and less cute successor to the compact Neon. Designed during the most turbulent times of the Daimler Chrysler era that ultimately led to Chrysler's bankruptcy, the Caliber had several quirky features for its target young audience. You're my sick puppy. Yet despite initial strong reviews and sales, the Caliber's popularity fell off fast, leading to its cancellation just six years later. But not before we almost got a sedan version based on the Mitsubishi Lancer. This is a story of the Dodge Caliber. This is my old car. Binky, any thoughts? It scares the **** out of me. That's just the reaction we were looking for. The all-new Dodge Caliber. It's anything but cute. For my US-based viewers, if you are looking to sell your old car, or searching for that special old car you once had, check out the My Old Car Exchange. Go to myoldcar.loma.tech and sign up today. I've included this link in the description below. A big thank you to Loma for creating and managing this site. All drive? Nah, we'll switch when we need gas. So I will admit this car is a bit newer than what I usually feature, but as I was looking for a Chrysler model to review, it occurred to me that I haven't seen a Caliber in what seems like forever, despite production ending less than 15 years ago. I'm sure I'll get some comments saying you see them regularly, but I live not that far from the Auburn Hills headquarters, and although I used to see lots of Calibers around here, not so much anymore, it's like they've completely disappeared, despite Dodge having sold over 400,000 of them. Sales numbers that high make it hard to call the Caliber a sales flop. So what led to its early demise? Before the Neon reached the end of its second generation in 2005, at one point it was the most affordable subcompact in the lineup for three brands, Dodge, Plymouth, and Chrysler. Yes, the same model name of Neon was used across all three, although not all in the same market. Upon its launch in 1995, it was sold in the US and Canada as both the Dodge Neon and Plymouth Neon, and sold as the Chrysler Neon in Mexico, Europe, Asia, and Australia. The Neon's small size and blatantly cute features were the core of its advertising early on, so much so that Chrysler's goal for the Neon replacement, the Caliber, was to have more blocky and less rounded styling. But this styling direction was also influenced by the company's plan to have the new model's platform shared with two new Jeep models, the Patriot and Compass, and that ultimately led to the Caliber's hatchback body style. As I noted in this episode's intro, the Caliber wasn't just a Chrysler car, it owes its existence to other automakers as well, with the biggest contributor being Mitsubishi. In fact, the original platform, called the GS, was designed by Mitsubishi for their Lancer model, a key point that could have led to an entirely different Caliber that I will talk about later. Mitsubishi and Chrysler had been long-time partners since the 1970s, and although that partnership stayed on following the Daimler-Chrysler merger, Mitsubishi left the partnership in 2004. However, Daimler-Chrysler didn't lose ownership of Mitsubishi's GS platform, and consequently made several changes to the wheelbase, track, and overall length to create the Caliber, Compass, and Patriot. Since the Caliber took the Neon's place as Dodge's least expensive car, and with the value-oriented Plymouth brand having been gone since 2001, the entry point for the Caliber was at a level of cheap that seemed more at home 20 years earlier than the mid-2000s. The base SE trim did not have air conditioning, power locks, power windows, or power mirrors. It only had steel 15-inch wheels with hubcaps, and only front-wheel drive. It also didn't offer a tachometer, even when it was equipped with a manual transmission. Under the hood, the Caliber's engine and transmission were not Chrysler's traditional offerings. The base 1.8-liter naturally aspirated 4-cylinder was part of an engine series called the World Gasoline Engine, made by Global Engine Alliance, which was a shared development between Chrysler, Mitsubishi, and Hyundai. This 1.8-liter made just 148 horsepower, and came standard mated to a 5-speed manual transmission. However, the SE could be optioned with a 2-liter World engine that made 10 more horses, and mated to a Continuously Variable Transmission, or CVT. This CVT was also a joint venture, made by the Japan Automatic Transmission Company, or JATCO, which was a subsidiary of Nissan. And also adding to the Caliber's mix of foreign parts was a 2-liter turbo 4-cylinder diesel, made by Volkswagen, for Calibers sold in Europe or Australia. Although this car was designed before we had smartphones, the Caliber had an interior feature that could make some think it was designed to work with a smartphone. The center armrest had a hidden compartment which could flip up to allow what looks like space for a smartphone, but it was intended for an iPod, or some other form of MP3 player. The design of this iPod holder was such that its screen and controls were visible and accessible by the driver. That's a design feature you likely wouldn't find today, considering it encourages distracted driving. Yes, I know, the big screens we have in our cars today are just as distracting, but this may be one of the earliest examples of integrating handheld devices into our cars, something that we take for granted in modern cars today. Above the SE trim was the SXT, which although had the same engine options, you also got air conditioning and all the power features that were missing on the SE, optional aluminum wheels, and a tachometer. But the SXT also offered other features you weren't likely to find in any other car. Inside the glovebox was a built-in beverage cooler, essentially just an AC router in. In the cargo area was a removable and rechargeable flashlight, and in the back were optional speakers that could fold down from the open tailgate. But although these features were intended to attract younger buyers, it was the next two trim levels that clearly had younger buyers in mind, even though their higher price point probably excluded many of them. The first of the two highest trims was the RT, which still had one of the world family of engines, this one being a 2.4 liter that made 172 horsepower. Considering that relatively low horsepower rating, you may think it was still offered a manual transmission to offset it, but it didn't. Instead, the RT could only be had with the CVT, but with a very odd addition. Chrysler had offered its Autostick clutchless manual transmission in several of its cars since the late 1990s, but they were always added to transmissions that had a set number of gears, usually four. This was the first time the Autostick was offered on a CVT, which by its very nature makes zero sense. How can you manually shift a continuously variable transmission? Well, you can't. Instead, this Autostick offered six simulated fixed gear ratios. I suspect Dodge tried to tout this as an advantage, saying that there was some improvement in fuel economy with the Autostick. But the RT did have one redeeming factor, you could get it with all-wheel drive, which considering its styling that was intended to make the Caliber look more rugged and off-road worthy, this was one feature that should have been available for all the Caliber trims. Finally, the top-end trim was the SRT4, the closest replacement to the discontinued Neon SRT4, but it wasn't available until 2007 for the 2008 model year, about a year after the other Caliber trims first went on sale. Although it still had the 2.4-liter world engine, it added additional valves for a total of 16, and a turbocharger to bring horsepower up to 285. It also was only offered with a Gatrog six-speed manual transmission, and four-wheel disc brakes, unlike the rear drum brakes in the other trims. In fact, the Caliber's SRT4's front brakes were the same as those on the Dodge Charger's police package. Added to that were 19-inch wheels and functional hood scoops. This high-performance engine routed all of its power to the front wheels, which in older, more powerful performance cars, like the Omni GLH, meant ridiculous torque steer. The Caliber had less torque steer, but it was still there, so anyone truly serious about performance probably chose the then-new, rear-wheel drive Dodge Charger. As this was the mid-2000s, the SUV craze hadn't yet grown to what it is today, so smaller cars still had a fighting chance to sell. The Caliber should have had an advantage, since although it was a small car, its taller profile and being a hatchback meant it overlapped in the SUV and crossover market. Considering the Neon didn't have that advantage, Chrysler predicted the Caliber would be a sure bet to outsell the Neon. Although the Neon sales peaked at over 240,000 in 1996, they dropped to 128,000 by its last year of 2005. The Caliber's best year was 2007, when it reached sales of 136,000. At the time, I remember seeing a lot of them around, but with sales numbers not coming close to what the Neon had in its early days, clearly not every Neon buyer switched to a Caliber. By 2009, sales had dropped to only around 59,000, but this was also after the housing market crash which started the Great Recession. It also was a rough period for Chrysler, considering that Daimler had since exited, and Cerberus Capital Management bought Chrysler for $7.4 billion in 2007, far less than the $36 billion Daimler had paid to merge with Chrysler in 1998. Then there was Chrysler's bankruptcy in 2009, followed by Fiat buying a 20% share. Oddly enough, the drop in sales to 59,000 occurred in the same year as President Obama's cash for clunkers, despite the Caliber being one of the highest volume new car participants of that program. You would think with all that going on, Chrysler wouldn't have had the time or money for changes to the Caliber, but for 2010, new partner Fiat allotted an extra $500 towards each car, so several improvements were made to the interior to decrease the immense expanse of gray plastic on the dash. The smaller 1.8-liter engine was dropped, as was the SRT4 model. The latter's drop in the lineup wasn't a surprise, as it failed to impress most former neon SRT4 fans. The Caliber's high center of gravity meant more body roll, and no significant improvements were made to mitigate that. But the weirdest change for 2010 was the renaming of the trims. Instead of SE, SXT, and RT, the new names were Main Street, Heat, and Rush. They also added a new luxury-themed trim, called Uptown, and a new stripped-down base model, called Express. I suppose Dodge thought these new names would inject more interest in the car among its younger demographic. However, as MotorTrend pointed out in a 2010 article, the model that used to be called RT, or Road and Track, didn't fit this new name of Rush very well, considering the car's so-so performance. This was quite the reversal in opinion compared to the same magazine's review of the Caliber back in 2006. This was also a transitional period for Dodge, as the Ram trucks began their move to their own brand. Dodge had been using the Ram's head logo on its pickups in the 70s and 80s, and by the mid-90s, we started seeing the Ram's head on other Dodge vehicles. But once the decision was made to split off the Ram trucks to be their own brand, that meant the Ram's head logo on Dodge cars just added to the confusion with the names. In 2011, the Caliber, along with the Jeep Liberty clone Dodge Nitro, they were the last Dodge models to still have that Ram logo on the front grille. No plans were made to update the logo on either car, as both were slated to end production that year. However, you may recall that in my intro to this episode, I mentioned that there could have been a sedan version of the Caliber. This picture posted on thedrive.com shows what looks like a small Dodge sedan with Caliber badging, and when you look at it closely, it looks a lot like a Mitsubishi Lancer. Well, that's because it is a Lancer, just with a Dodge-specific grille and Caliber badging. Although these photos were taken in 2010, the date that this one-off model was built is unknown. I'll post a link to this article in the description if you want to read more about it. Although the last Caliber was built on November 23, 2011, they still had a 2012 model year. These 2012 models abandoned the silly trim names introduced in 2010, so now they just had SE, SXT, and SXT+, the latter replacing the RT. Despite SUVs and crossovers continuing to grow in popularity, Chrysler's new association with Fiat had the Caliber's replacement based on an existing platform from Alfa Romeo, the Giulietta, which became the Dodge Dart. Considering that the Caliber didn't really fit into either the traditional compact or crossover segments, which was a factor in its poor sales, I can see why they decided not to repeat that. The Dart's four-door sedan body was smaller than the Caliber it replaced, and despite having an Alfa Romeo platform, the inside was economy car quality. The compact sedan market had shrunk so much by this point that the Dart was a money-loser for Fiat Chrysler, and was gone by 2016. Although Dodge had considered it an SRT4 version, it never made it past the concept stage, as sales for the Dart overall didn't justify it. Dodge never offered a compact sedan replacement. Instead, their closest alternative is the Dodge Hornet crossover, which may not be around for much longer either. So, although I said at the beginning of this episode that I couldn't recall when I last saw a Caliber, I saw one today as I was writing this. If you follow me on Instagram, you may have already seen this photo. For some reason, it seems smaller than when I last saw it, but that may be because everything else on the road today is bigger. Speaking of big, I think we can all be happy that big headlamps like these are no longer in style. Thanks for watching. If you liked this video, click the like button and subscribe to my channel. If you once owned a car from the 70s to mid-2000s that you rarely see today and would like it featured in a future episode, leave a reply in the comments, or contact me at the email shown here. See you next time.