Mitsubishi Colt Galant GTO MII (1971)
Publication: Car Graphic
Format: Road Impressions
Date: January 1971
Author: Shotaro Kobayashi
Road testing the Mitsubishi Galant GTO MII
The Galant GTO series consists of three models: MI, MII, and MR. All three models share the same body, which is cleverly styled like a Ford Mustang shrunk to 1.6-liter size, but each has a different engine. All have a capacity of 1597cc (with a bore increased by 2.4mm over the Galant AI’s 1499cc, but a still-longer stroke at 76.9 x 86mm). However, the MI and MII are SOHC, while the hottest MR has a completely newly designed DOHC head. Output is 100ps/6300rpm for the single-carburetor MI (lower than the Galant AII’s 105ps/6700rpm), 110ps/6700rpm for the twin-SU MII, and 125ps/6800rpm for the DOHC twin-Solex MR. The MI and MII have the same 4-speed gearbox as the AII, but the MR model comes standard with a 5-speed and a torque rod for the rear suspension. Prices are significantly higher than the Galant Hardtop GS, at 786,000, 843,000, and 1,125,000 yen, respectively.
Based on our experience testing the Galant AII GS sedan and Hardtop (see C/G issues 102 and 109), we had high hopes for the MR, which had 20 more ps and a 5-speed gearbox, and made the arrangements to bring it to Yatabe. Unfortunately, the day before the scheduled test date, we received a call from Mitsubishi’s public relations department informing us that the test car had been in an accident, with their apologies. Mr. Togawa from the motorsports section made great efforts on our behalf, but in the end, we were unable to arrange for an MR by the deadline for the new year’s issue, so we had no choice but to run our tests with the 110ps MII this time.
The greatest selling points of the GTO MII, in our view, are its mini-Mustang-like styling and its comprehensive equipment, so these are the aspects that deserve to be covered first. Because it shares the basic floor pan with the existing Galant A-series, the GTO’s wheelbase and tread width are the same as those of the GS sedan and hardtop, but the body is 45mm longer, 10mm wider, and 25mm lower than the hardtop GS. The overall shape is a typical long-nose, short-deck design, with the nose extended by 100mm compared to the hardtop, while the rear end is cut off in a ducktail style. According to the manufacturer, this ducktail works in the same way as a racing car’s air spoiler, reducing air resistance through a streamlining effect while also generating downforce at the rear, improving stability at high speeds.
The GTO attracted an extraordinary amount of attention wherever it went, likely due to its mini-American-car styling and flashy Kenya Orange paint job. The body’s cross section, which uses curved glass with a radius of 50 inches (domestic cars are generally around 100 inches), gives the GTO a powerful “tension” not found in most Japanese cars, and helps make it look larger than it actually is, setting aside for the moment the impact it has on aerodynamics and interior space (which we will discuss later).
The dimensions are essentially the same as the existing hardtop, but the impression from the driver’s seat is entirely different. The driving position is excellent. The high-back seats with integrated headrests are upholstered in fabric only in the areas that come into contact with the body, and their shape, comfort and feel are all commendable. The vinyl leather-wrapped steering wheel offers about 50mm of height adjustment, a Mitsubishi specialty, and its position relative to the gearshift lever and pedals is close to ideal.
The dashboard curves around the driver and is densely packed with gauges, more so than in some high-performance GT cars. Two of the seven gauges are located on the center console: oil pressure and oil temperature. Both feature a clean design with white scales on a black background. However, this alone does not make them easy to read. Even if the average user can recognize the information displayed on these gauges, they are unlikely to understand the significance of the numbers, barring the most technically enthusiastic individuals. To be truly useful, the oil temperature gauge could instead, for example, be color-coded to indicate the optimum temperature range (like a tachometer), or it could even have a separate warning light. This is the fundamental difference between designing for aircraft flown by professionals and cars driven by amateurs. All the gauges have clear plastic lenses, but the fuel and water temperature gauges on our test car were cloudy, making them difficult to read at night.
Safety equipment is also comprehensive. The seat belts are three-point with automatic retractors, and interestingly, there are warning lights for the seat belts and door locks mounted on the headliner behind the rearview mirror. These two red lamps illuminate overhead when you first start the engine and close the doors. They turn off once you lock the doors and fasten your seat belt, but if you forget, they remain lit for 12 to 13 seconds as a warning. If this system succeeds in encouraging the habitual use of seat belts, then it is indeed a worthwhile safety feature. Careful attention has also been paid to ensuring visibility to both the front and rear. The wipers are high-speed types with fins, and the windshield washer is a four-jet system. The rear window is heated, which is no longer unusual, but the GTO’s includes a timer that automatically switches it off after 10 minutes, a thoughtful touch intended to avoid unnecessary battery drain.
That said, rear visibility has been sacrificed considerably for the sake of styling. The high tail, shallow rear window, and high rear quarters create large blind spots, especially when backing up. From the driver’s seat, there are no visual cues to indicate where the tail ends (fortunately, it is much shorter than you might imagine from inside the car).
The rear seat is spacious for a coupe in this class, and the low seating position provides ample headroom. However, for the same reason, occupants are forced to sit cradling their knees, making it unsuitable for long drives. The high front seatbacks severely restrict forward visibility from the rear seats (a common problem in recent cars), and the steeply rising beltline means that side visibility is also quite limited. Those who value privacy would do well to retreat to the GTO’s back seat.
The first thing we noticed when we got the MII out on the road was that, contrary to expectations, the SOHC engine was rather noisy. When we picked up the car, we were warned that because it had not yet been fully run in, it might not give representative performance (its odometer showed a mileage of just under 2,000km), and unfortunately, this proved to be true. The idle speed wandered between 600 and 800rpm, and while the engine revved easily up to its 6800rpm redline, an unpleasant mechanical noise appeared abruptly from around 3000rpm. The exhaust system also produced a large resonance peak around 4800rpm. In short, at least judging from the test car, the GTO MII’s engine is noisier than that of the AII GS, and falls below average in general smoothness. Even at low speeds in the city, the noise level in first, second, and third gear made us eager to shift into top. We’ve praised the AII GS in previous C/G tests, both the sedan and hardtop, for being exceptionally smooth and quiet, to the point of inviting comparison to a six-cylinder engine. By contrast, the engine in the GTO was a significant disappointment.
Setting aside its noise and general roughness, the GTO’s power performance is at the level one expects from a 1.6-liter sports coupe. Since we didn’t conduct instrumented testing this time, we can’t directly compare it to the AII GS sedan we previously tested at Yatabe, but intuitively at least, the GTO has the advantage. Output is up by 5ps (4.8%), while torque is up by 6%. At the same time, the weight of the car has increased by 50kg, so the power-to-weight ratio has slightly worsened (from 8.14kg/ps to 8.45kg/ps), but the air resistance has been significantly reduced. The gearbox and final drive are the same as that of the AII GS, but the 155SR-13 radial tires have a slightly smaller effective radius than the GS’s 6.15-13 bias-plies. As a result, the overall gearing is slightly lower, which should favor acceleration.
This last point was confirmed when checking the speedometer error. Previous tests of the AI and AII have shown that the Galant’s speedometer is slightly pessimistic, unusually so among Japanese cars, which are generally quite optimistic. In the case of the AII GS, an indicated 100km/h corresponded to a true 104km/h, and an indicated 160km/h to 167km/h. In the case of the GTO, an indicated 100km/h corresponded to an actual 101km/h, with the improved accuracy likely due to the effective diameter of the tire being slightly smaller. The odometer, however, remained slow and read 2.8% below the actual distance traveled.
According to the nearly accurate speedometer, running the engine to the 6800rpm redline in the lower gears results in speeds of 54, 87, and 132km/h. If one is prepared to ignore the aforementioned noise, the engine will rev easily beyond 7000rpm, and the valve gear tracking remains perfect at these speeds. The 4-speed gearbox shifts smoothly and precisely (though the synchronization isn’t especially powerful), but there is a fairly large gap between third and fourth gears. In top gear, 100km/h corresponds to about 3600rpm, but downshifting to third for quick acceleration raises the engine speed to 5200rpm, which increases the noise level disproportionately, making passing maneuvers seem unduly dramatic.
The 185km/h top speed listed in the catalog is almost certainly achievable, as the speedometer once reached 182km/h on the test course (at about 6500rpm). The AII GS sedan previously tested at Yatabe (with a catalog top speed of 175km/h) recorded 173.1km/h at about 6200rpm. On the same day, the C/G 1300cc AI sedan surprised us by reaching 147.0km/h, exceeding its 145km/h catalog figure. From this, it is entirely reasonable to expect that the more powerful GTO, with its superior aerodynamics, could reach a top speed approaching 185km/h. However, a car that can reliably achieve 185km/h with a 1.6-liter SOHC engine would be a first among domestic models, and even abroad, only a few cars, such as the BMW 2002ti, are capable of doing so. On the other hand, this engine is also tenacious at low speeds, making it very easy to use in the city. It will maintain 30km/h in top gear without difficulty, and by gradually applying the throttle, it is even possible to accelerate smoothly from that speed.
The GTO is unusual in having an oil temperature gauge, so we made a point of observing it during the test. In town it read 80°C, slightly below the middle of the range; after about ten minutes of hard running on the Tomei Expressway it rose to 90°C; and only when we made full use of the low gears attempting hill climbs at Fuji and Hakone did it reach 100°C momentarily.
The Galant series has a well-established reputation for good fuel economy, and this test of the GTO was no exception. On the day of the test, we drove at our usual fairly brisk pace along the Tomei, Hakone, Fuji and Chuo Expressways along with another test car, the Skyline 2000GT-R, achieving an average of 8.35km/l over the 324km measured section (the GT-R returned 6.5km/l). Our CO test was not strictly accurate as the engine’s idle fluctuated between 600 and 800rpm, but the readings from the test equipment fluttered around 4%, which would place it just within the acceptable limit.
The MII’s suspension is basically the same as the AII GS’s, but one leaf has been added to the rear springs, bringing the total to three per side, and the settings are generally stiffer. In the case of our test car, the 155SR-13 radial tires fitted as standard were Yokohama GT Special Hi-Blocks. When we drove on the Tomei Expressway, the wind was so strong that windsocks were being blown fully sideways, so it was the perfect opportunity to evaluate behavior in crosswinds. In short, the GTO is not as strong against crosswinds as the manufacturer claims; rather, it gave the impression of being average or even below average. Up to 100km/h stability was passable, but at 120km/h it was necessary to make constant small steering corrections to maintain a straight course, and above that the steering needed real concentration. Observing other cars, most were indeed being blown around quite a bit, but the accompanying Skyline 2000GT-R had excellent straight-line stability, as one would expect, and was hardly affected by the crosswind at all.
The MII’s handling is by no means poor, but it cannot be said to be particularly outstanding. Its principal virtue is its steering response, which is exceptionally good by domestic standards. Except at parking speeds, the steering is very light and quite precise. At normal speeds, understeer remains within a reasonable range, there is little roll, and the car follows steering inputs faithfully. At the limit, however, cornering is greatly compromised by the performance of the tires. For radials, their absolute grip is low, and they squeal easily. In the AII GS, we found the front and rear suspension to be well balanced, but in the GTO, the stiffening of the rear has made the front relatively weaker, resulting in excessive understeer. The front tires break away early, rolling under and making the car feel unbalanced. We ran the car at the recommended high-speed tire pressures of 1.7/2.0kg/cm², but even with these, the front end’s cornering power felt too low. Part of the blame is undoubtedly due to the narrow 4J rims; for radial tires to be effective, a minimum of 4.5J is necessary. The low lateral stiffness of radial tires is counterproductive otherwise, and the AII GS was actually easier to handle on its bias-ply tires (Bridgestone Skyway H 6.15-13s).
The servo-equipped disc/drum brakes are one of the GTO’s best features. They are light to the touch, provide reliable stopping power, and are accompanied by minimal nose dive, inspiring confidence even during high-speed driving. The handbrake is also well-positioned and very effective. The MII’s ride, however, is considerably stiffer than in the previously tested AII GS, with strong vertical bucking that is especially noticeable in the rear seat. The suspension is clearly designed for high speeds: the harshness of the ride is especially noticeable at low speeds, but becomes less pronounced as speed increases. On the other hand, there is little sense that the car is riding on radial tires on anything other than rough roads, and road noise is generally well muted.
Returning to the interior, one point that stood out during hard cornering was the excellence of the seat design. The tall backrest cradles the driver’s torso effectively, the cushions provide firm support, and in combination with the three-point seat belt, they hold the body almost perfectly even against strong lateral forces. The interior door pull also serves as an armrest, making it ideal for resting your elbow during leisurely highway drives. The three-speed heater blower is exceptionally quiet, and cool or warm air can be brought in from the vents on both ends of the dash even when the car is stationary. However, the position of the light switch on the dash and the heater controls on the dashboard should be reconsidered, as they are difficult to reach with the seat belt fastened. It is also disappointing that in such a comprehensively equipped interior, there is no tray for coins. Non-smokers will likely not hesitate to use the ideally positioned ashtray, just behind the shift lever, for this purpose. The quality of the body and interior finish is exceptionally good, and would surely even be considered “unnecessarily good” in the American market.
We are very much looking forward to testing the GTO MR with DOHC, 125ps, and the 5-speed gearbox, which is scheduled for next month.
Postscript: Story Photos
