my recollection of the mitzy petrol motors of that era is they were pretty thirsty.....dont know much else...

  i own a 1998 3.5v6 5spd pajero ,80lts gets me 600 to 630 kms

been very good 4wd is in good condition ,and is 4 sale at $4400

basic gl model done 252000 kms.

I had a 1989 Paj with that motor. Bloody awesome piece of kit. Fantastic off road, heaps of room & good economy. The motors do have a problem with the hydraulic lifters for the tappets. If the tappet noise doesn't disappear in the first seconds after start up they will need replacing. One side is easy to do, the other side is a bit harder.

sold mine not long ago. went good offroad but needed more HP. not good on fuel. I think the clear coat on the paint work is prone to peeling as i see this on alot of Pajeros. All in all, they're not too bad of a vehicle for the money. I bought mine(1994 GLS) for $1500, which i thought was a good deal for a vehicle you can take offroad, with A/C, power steering, all electric, C/C etc. Remember, it is 20 years old, more than likely has 300k plus on the odometer, so i wouldnt be paying anymore than $4k ( thats if its immac and low low kms).

G'day Faulkners- I've got the Turbo Diesel 2.8L GLS Paj and have done 200,000k in her. Been a brilliant bus - not the fastest thing on the road but once you wind the lackeys up and engage cruise it goes as quick as you can travel legally in W.A. I don't drive her too carefully and still manage between 8.5-9 kms a litre which is pretty good for what most would classify as a medium size 4x4.

I had the fuel pump rebuilt 2 years ago and its given the diesel a new lease on life - don't see myself selling it as it does all the things I need in relative comfort - I like the styling of the car with the flaired guards. Would replace it with a 3litre Prado but would prefer to spend the 30k change over on other things that give me greater enjoyment ie my boat/holiday etc. Although the petrol motor is relatively thirsty there are plenty out there which demonstrates that they were a popular choice in the day, but if you get the chance of a Turbo Diesel in my opinion that'd be the way to go just for longevity of the power plant!

We use to have one that we sold for $3500 it had everything   in it like dual batteries, thermo fans, spotlights, electric brakes controller, full sound system heavy duty clutch etc . They only problem with them is with most old mitsubishi they smoke like no tommoro we had to fully rebuild our motor from top to bottom to stop it from smoking.

 thanks guys.

 the one i am looking at has all the fruit on it and asking $1600 for it. i have a backyard mechanic looking at it for me and as he is a friend he wont do me wrong (i hope ) he will be letting me know over the next couple of days as to weather its worth me taking it for a run to see how it goes.

 i know its not a Nissan or Toyota but it will be a 4x4 if its any good. good to get some feed back from everyone that has responded

Thanks

I wouldn't be doing the yearly Exie trips that's for sure or even consider towing a boat too far. For local running it's just a matter of replacing boken lackies with new lackies. Take a bag full of spares with you. Avoid peak hour as the boys in blue may want to take a closer look LOL.

Good luck Russ.

 Stuck with me russ lol, I will show you how

iv got a 3L 91 model 5 speed manual, its a great 4x4 on road and its brilliant offroad, doesnt smoke and is just a great car all round, bought mine for 3 800, only 3rd owner and had never been offroad, great car would defenatly recomend

I don't know much about 92 models, but I know of 2 97 DOHC 3.5L petrol models that have spat the balancer bolt, causing all sorts of problems.

I helped work on one of these and due to it spitting that bolt we had to replace all belts including timing belt, hydraulic tensioner, water pump, balancer and bolt, timing belt cover, crank angle sensor, crank gear, and a few other bits and pieces. While we were at it we put new platinum plugs and new leads in as well. Plugs were impossible to get to without removing manifolds. This may be the case with the 92 model as well.

I'm not sure if you are a DIY when it comes to your cars, but these were painful to work on.

Noisy tappets are pretty common in the old Paj as well.

i had a 96 3.5 manual....decent torqy motor, running about 16/18ltrs per 100kms......off road would go anywhere and had the manual choke set which was handy

i test drove the 3ltr and they got less power = sluggish.....mitsy motors are fine...just look at the service history

otherwise 3 checks i always do apart from going to lthe log book 1st

compression test

co2 test

cylinder leakage test

and if ya have a decent mechanic get him to have a look at the oils transfer case etc....but for 1500 i woulndt expect much other than beach basher

I had a 94 3.5L on LPG a couple years back. Was my mowing vehicle, towing a big heavy trailer all day everyday. Never failed me and was pretty comfortable to drive. Never really did a lot of off roading in it though. I paid a couple grand for mine from memory.

basically the same motor as the magna, the 6G72 is a pretty good little motor, might struggle with a full sized LWB Paj but not bad on a SWB model, spares are very easy to come by and the main thing to look for is the tappet noise. If you do go through with it take it to RPW Service Centre in Osborne Park, they are mitsu specialists and have works on so many of the mitsu family motors/cars they can tell you very quickly what is good and what is not, also save you in labour as they know their way around all models of mitsu's.

Certianly an underrated bus for sure and good value for money, even the newer ones are much cheaper than their Prado equivelents. I wouldn't hesitate getting back into a GLS Turbo Diesel down the track when the cruiser dies.

 by the looks of it the bitsamissing havnt been too bad a 4x4. i know roughly what to look for when it comes to wear and tear on motors just wasnt too sure about these particular 4x4's.  i do have a friend that is a qualified mechanic that will give it a going over if it doesnt seem too bad, would rather get it checked out properly rather than buying a lemon and getting stuck somewhere in the middle of no where. this one is the 7 seater version, so its the wagon

im sure the 92 pag won the dakar that year and many other years i think 12 i total

i know they are modifyed but it still counts