The Daihatsu Charade that was in showrooms from 1987 to 1994 was quite a memorable car. Enthusiasts will of course remember the GTti. However, there was also a diesel, a turbo diesel and above all a sedan.
Well, ‘above all’. Most of the bystanders will find the car very ugly in these photos. It is often said that compact sedans look like the butt was glued on later and this car is the textbook example of that.
Up to and including the rear doors, the car is identical to the five-door version, which is quite rare in the Netherlands, but behind it follows an almost vertical rear window and a proudly protruding rear with a striking, continuous reflector bar between the rear lights. The ‘Gandini mudguard’ (sorry, enthusiasts) does the rest: here is a strikingly designed automobile.
1.3 with 90 hp
There is 288 liters of luggage space behind the lid. Not a lot, but much more than the 152 liters that you could stow in the hatchback version of this model. What also speaks for the sedan is that it always has a 1.3 four-cylinder injection engine (model code G102), while the three and five-door versions were also available with a one-liter three-cylinder with carburettor and 52 hp (model code G100).
That 1.3 is quite remarkable, because it provided the Charade with no less than 90 hp from 1991. That is an exceptional amount for a 1.3 from that time and, moreover, a value that was at the most achieved by a hot hatch in this segment at the time.
A manual Charade should be able to go from 0 to 100 in a second or ten, but unfortunately this white sedan got a little smooth three-speed automatic transmission. That takes the energy out: the factory promises about 14 seconds for the standard sprint.
SG
The nameplate is also worth a comment. The letter combination on the valve did not indicate a trim level for this model, but an engine version. The ‘SG’ was always a sedan (and therefore always a 1.3). The three-door was available as TS (1.0 / diesel) and TX (1.3), the five-door as CS (1.0 / diesel) and CX (1.3). In the case of the three-door, there was also a TXF, which added four-wheel drive to the package.
The sedan lasted the longest of all these body styles and was not replaced until 1994, one year after the hatchbacks. By the way, the successor was called ‘Valéra’ in the Netherlands, but elsewhere was still simply known as Charade. In China, the third generation of the Charade survived for years, albeit under the name Tianjin Xiali.
The white Charade of the photos looks good except for the inevitable dirt, although the rear fenders seem to show some traces of previously repaired rust. Anyone who still thinks they see a Charade in the photos should be disappointed: the Yaris to the right of the Daihatsu is really a Yaris.