Junkyard Gem: 1979 Toyota Corona Station Wagon

Junkyard Gem: 1979 Toyota Corona Station Wagon

Thanks to a certain unwelcome virus, the Toyota Corona's image has taken a bit of a beating over the past year or so. My very first car was a 1969 Corona sedan that cost 50 bucks, and I now own a chopped, customized 1969 Corona coupe that Boyd Coddington proclaimed as the "Coolest Car in L.A." a quarter-century back. For these reasons, I document every single Corona I find in car graveyards, and here's the latest: a well-worn 1979 Corona station wagon in a Denver-area yard.

Junkyard Gem: 1992 Toyota Previa All-trac With 5-speed Manual Transmission

Junkyard Gem: 1992 Toyota Previa All-Trac with 5-Speed Manual Transmission

Between the boxy Toyota Van of the middle 1980s and the competent-but-unexciting Sienna of our current century, Toyota spent much of the 1990s trying to sell Americans the oddball Previa minivan. A masterpiece of engineering wrapped in a goofy-yet-futuristic-looking egg-shaped body, the Previa boasted a mid-mounted engine flipped on its side and located beneath the front seats. Later versions had an intercooled supercharger, and Previa shoppers wishing for better grip in mud and snow could get Toyota's innovative All-Trac all-wheel-drive system. All-Trac Previas are slightly easier to find in Colorado junkyards than their Camry brethren — yes, there was a Camry All-Trac in the late 1980s and early 1990s — but a Previa with All-Trac and a manual transmission? That super-rare combination is exactly what we've got for today's Junkyard Gem!

Junkyard Gem: 2004 Mitsubishi Lancer Ralliart

Junkyard Gem: 2004 Mitsubishi Lancer Ralliart

I do manage to find the occasional discarded Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution during my Denver-area junkyard explorations, but such cars— like their Subaru WRX rivals— are always far too crashed and/or stripped to be worth documenting for this series. When it comes to the Mitsubishi Lancer O-Z Rally Edition, though, I get the impression that just about every Lancer sold here during the first part of the 2000s had that all-show-and-no-go package; after shooting several examples, I no longer pay attention to the O-Z Rally. The Ralliart Lancer, on the other hand, was a genuine factory hot-rod, with much more power and a stiffer suspension than the ordinary Lancer. We saw a used-up bright yellow '05 Ralliart last year, and now here's a black '04 in a different Denver yard.

Junkyard Gem: 1985 Mazda 626 Sedan

Junkyard Gem: 1985 Mazda 626 Sedan

Mazda began selling cars in the United States all the way back in the late 1960s, with the Cosmo Sport 110S, and many interesting(ly strange) Wankel-powered machines followed, but they eventually gave way to much more conventional piston-powered cars such as the the original 626 that the ex-cork-making company from Hiroshima offered here starting in 1979. That car didn't sell so well, though it looked good and boasted build quality as good as the better-known Japanese brands. Starting with the 1983 model year, a new 626 with front-wheel-drive appeared here, with production continuing through 1987. That car did a better job at luring buyers away from Nissan and Toyota showrooms, but examples are nearly nonexistent today. Here's one of those cars, found in a Colorado yard overseen by Pikes Peak.

Junkyard Gem: 2001 Subaru Legacy Outback Wagon, Duct Tape Interior Edition

Junkyard Gem: 2001 Subaru Legacy Outback Wagon, Duct Tape Interior Edition

Living in Denver, I have the opportunity to view just about every model of Subaru sold since the late 1970s in my local car boneyards, from the "Making Love In a Subaru" era of super-cheap tiny cars all the way through to the odd-looking B9 Tribecas. Since the third-generation Outback wagons are now at least 16 years old, they've begun showing up in vast quantities here (which works well for me, since I'd like to upgrade my '04 Outback with options it didn't have when new). Most of these cars aren't sufficiently interesting to achieve Junkyard Gem status, though I have documented a McIntosh-audio-equipped Outback VDC and a fully-loaded Outback H6 in recent years, but today's car had such a dramatic — if horribly impractical — interior that I felt compelled to photograph it.

Junkyard Gem: 1987 Toyota Van, Rat Patrol Edition

Junkyard Gem: 1987 Toyota Van, Rat Patrol Edition

Chrysler scored a massive sales hit with its original K-platform-derived minivans of the middle 1980s, and the Japanese automakers decided to jump into the North American small-van game with their popular-in-the-home-market rear-wheel-drive vans. Mitsubishi had the Delica (called the Mitsubishi Van here), Nissan had the Vanette (called the Nissan Van here), and Toyota had the LiteAce/TownAce/MasterAce (known as the Toyota Van here). Clearly, the Japanese companies' marketing departments weren't particularly creative when it came to names. Toyota's Van was by far the best-selling of the three in the American market, and it proved to be a reliable machine. Here's a Colorado Toyota Van with a quarter-million miles on the clock and a lot of exciting stories to tell.

Junkyard Gem: 1996 Acura 3.5 Rl

Junkyard Gem: 1996 Acura 3.5 RL

Honda had a good sales run with the Acura Legend, the first of the luxury-marque spinoffs from well-known Japanese carmakers to appear on our shores, but times change and the RL replaced the Legend as Acura's flagship starting in the 1996 model year. Here's one of those first-year RLs, found in a Denver boneyard covered in decorations from the Rocky Mountain Rambler 500 road rally.

Junkyard Gem: 2010 Nissan Cube With 6-speed Manual Transmission

Junkyard Gem: 2010 Nissan Cube with 6-Speed Manual Transmission

The Nissan Cube sold very well in its Japanese homeland, but struggled to find many North American buyers during its 2009-2014 sales run over here. As was the case with its boxy Scion xB competitor, the target demographic of youthful Americans looking for a "mobile hub" (Nissan's term) seemed unimpressed with the Cube, and plenty of Cube haters saw its asymmetrical design as the visual equivalent of fingernails-on-the-chalkboard. Here's a 2010 Cube in a Denver self-service yard with the exceedingly rare six-speed manual transmission.

Junkyard Gem: 1983 Toyota Camry Sedan

Junkyard Gem: 1983 Toyota Camry Sedan

In recent years, I've put a lot of work into finding junkyard examples of vehicles from final model years (either for the model or the manufacturer itself). We just saw one of the very last Pontiacs ever sold, for example, and I managed to locate one of the Final 500 Oldsmobiles as well. The first year of a car that went on to great fame and fortune seems like a happier story in these unhappy times, though, and so here's one of the first examples of the Toyota Camry ever sold on this side of the Pacific.

Junkyard Gem: 1984 Nissan Maxima Wagon

Junkyard Gem: 1984 Nissan Maxima Wagon

Before there was the front-wheel-drive Nissan Maxima we all know today, there was the rear-wheel-drive Datsun 810, which was pretty close to a sedan version of the famous Z-Car. The 810 begat the Datsun 810 Maxima, which begat the Datsun Maxima, which begat the Datsun Maxima By Nissan, which begat the final rear-wheel-drive Maxima of 1984. After that, the Maxima got a 300ZX V6 engine, but became front-wheel-drive. Today's Junkyard Gem is one of those incredibly rare straight-six/rear-wheel-drive Maximas of the early "The Name Is Nissan" era, found in a Denver-area self-service yard earlier this month.

Junkyard Gem: 1988 Subaru Gl 4wd Sedan

Junkyard Gem: 1988 Subaru GL 4WD Sedan

While Subaru kept the hatchback version of the second-generation Leone available in North America all the way through the late 1980s, the third-generation sedans and wagons went on sale here in 1985. Today's Junkyard Gem is a loaded '88 4WD sedan, found in thoroughly worn-out condition in a junkyard next to Pikes Peak in Colorado.

Junkyard Gem: 1994 Subaru Svx

Junkyard Gem: 1994 Subaru SVX

Before Subaru became best-known in North America for outdoorsy all-wheel-drive machinery (but after it was best-known for extreme cheapness), we got some wild-looking Subarus with strong overtones of science fiction over here. First, the wedge-shaped XT, XT Turbo, and XT6 arrived during the mid-1980s through early 1990s, with their video-game-style digital instrument panels and fighter-jet-joystick gearshifts. Starting in the 1992 model year, we saw the XT's replacement: the joyously weird SVX. The SVX cost plenty, especially when viewed against the backdrop of the super-cheap Subarus of the past, and not many were sold. Still, Coloradans love old Subarus, and I manage to find discarded SVXs here every now and then. Here's a screaming red '96, found in a self-service yard about 50 miles from Cheyenne.

Junkyard Gem: 1978 Toyota Hilux

Junkyard Gem: 1978 Toyota Hilux

Toyota sold plenty of small pickups prior to the Hilux's introduction in 1968, including the old-timey Stout and cartrucks based on the Crown and the Corona. The Hilux ended up being one of Toyota's all-time most legendary vehicles in company history, if not the most legendary, in large part due to its reputation for durability in low-intensity conflicts around the globe. You can still buy a brand-new Hilux, though not in North America; the commute-friendlier Tacoma replaced the commercial-grade Hilux starting with the 1995 model year here. While the first-generation Hiluxes could be purchased on our shores (and some were), the 1973-1978 second-gen trucks were the ones that really established Toyota as a major truck player in the American market. Here's one of those trucks, a very worn-out '78 in a Denver-area car graveyard.

Junkyard Gem: 1991 Toyota Mr2

Junkyard Gem: 1991 Toyota MR2

During the middle to late 1980s, American car shoppers looking for an economical-yet-sporty two-seater for non-oligarch money had plenty of interesting choices. From Detroit, they could choose a Ford EXP/Mercury LN7 or a Pontiac Fiero. From Europe, Malcolm Bricklin made the Pininfarina-badged Fiat 124 Sport Spider and Bertone-badged Fiat X-1/9 available over here (the Alfa Romeo Spider sold for Corvette money, so we're not including it here), while ships crossed the Pacific carrying Honda CRXs and Toyota MR2s. The latter car, with its light weight and mid-engined design, developed a cult following during its first generation (1985 through 1990 model years in North America) but didn't seem to make as vivid an impression after the second generation debuted for 1991. I've documented first- and third-generation MR2s for this series, and now I've found a good second-gen example in Denver.