Just by looking you really...
Just by looking you really can't tell this Omni is a street contender!
No, you're not imagining things. We just decided to throw a little something different into the mix of cars on our website, and a turbo Omni Horizon definitely fills the bill as different. The fact that it runs the 1/4-mile in 12-seconds definitely means we needed to give this baby a second look.
According to Lee Saunders of Lakeland, Florida, "It may not be the fastest or the prettiest Mopar I own, but the look on Corvette owners' faces when they get their doors blown off by a four-door Horizon is priceless". We here at Mopar Muscle never thought that we would hear a statement like that from an Omni owner but according to Lee, it happens. Any time that a car utilizing half the cylinders of an older musclecar can PROVE a statement like that, it's just plain cool. Lee's 1987 Horizon looks the part of a mundane grocery-getter with a few GLH dress up items. When it came time for the resto...who are we kidding, in Lee's own words, "Who would pay to repaint one of these?" What do you think of the-dare we say "survivor" interior? Again, a new interior wouldn't make it any quicker, although the addition of a few gauges to monitor boost and other engine essentials were added. Lee also hooked a multi-meter to the O2 sensor to help monitor the mix. But, enough about its good looks, (quit your snickerin') let's get to the good stuff.
Lee jokes that this is the...
Lee jokes that this is the most common view by corvette owners. The languished cries of a corvette driver beaten by this Omni is music to any Mopar fan's ears
Here's where the magic happens....
Here's where the magic happens. A turbo charged four-cylinder is no laughing matter, even in an Omni!
The four-cylinder engine displaces a whopping 135 cubic-inches. I know what you're thinking, but ponder this, that's less than a third of the size of a 440 Magnum, and it runs as quick as some of those. The block is filled with the stock rods, pistons, and crankshaft. Assembled, the engine displaces a compression ratio of 7.8:1. Sure the head is made of aluminum, but again it's a stock Chrysler piece. To make the Horizon perform like it does, a stock Chrysler turbo is hangin' on the side of the manifold. Glenn Smith of Chesapeake, Virginia, gets the credit for building this half-an-engine combination. As far as the transmission (whoops, we mean transaxle) goes, a full manual shift valve body with a stock turbo torque converter ends at the wheels with a final axle-ratio of 3.07. For rolling stock, a quadrant of factory aluminum wheels are shod with 205-50-15 rubber.
Stock is the key word here....
Stock is the key word here. Lee Saunders' Omni is as basic as it gets.
Sure, the Horizon may not be as quick as Lee's nitrous-ingesting Viper, or as good looking as his AAR Cuda, but it's nice to go for groceries and not have to worry about some butt-head slamming a car door into the side of it. Lee admits, being a member of the Shelby Dodge Auto club, www.SDAC.org opens up a myriad of ideas for the front driven crowd and can help others like Lee fend off the stampeding pony cars of brand "X". Having as much available horsepower as most factory engines twice its size definitely makes this one car-nivorous Omni.