The 1983 Plymouth Scamp GT

I used to be the owner of this Scamp but sold it in 2012.

Chrysler corporation introduced the Plymouth Horizon in 1978. The Scamp is based on that car line. The Scamp pickup truck was produced one year only - 1983 (do not confuse with the other Plymouth Scamp whioh was a 2dr sport Valiant from 1971-1976). The Dodge Omni Rampage was the same basic truck and was produced from 1982 to 1984. The Plymouth Scamp in the GT form is a very rare vehicle.

Below are the specifications from the sales brochure. The Scamp shared some body and interior parts with the sports version of the Horizon - the Turismo. The doors and windshield forward are pretty much the same car/truck but the Scamp had all different sheet metal from the doors back. It also had leaf springs like a rear wheel drive car from the past. One interesting feature was the load adjusting brakes, when you loaded the Scamp down, the proportioning valve would increase pressure to the rear drum brakes. If you were running empty, the front disks did almost all the work.

Notice that the 2.2 liter engine was the only power plant offered in the Scamp. My Scamp was a GT with the standard five-speed manual transaxel. The big difference with the GT and the standard Scamp was in available options. The dual outside mirrors on my scamp and the hood scoop are part of the GT package. The all vinyl interior is also part of the option package. The GT had a little higher empty weight and resulted in a little higher Gross Vehicle Weight than the standard Scamp.

One of the interesting features of the Scamp was the self adjusting proportioning of braking front to rear depending on how much load was in the box. The little truck is rated at a half a ton and was the only front wheel drive vehicle I can remember that had leaf springs in the rear.

Below is a scan of the sales brochure cover.

While the Scamp was not a big hauler, it was big fun! The little truck handles like a sports car and gets over 30 miles to the gallon in the process. Too bad they were never popular but then I probably would not be collecting one of them if everyone had them.

I am a member of the Plymouth Owner's Club - if you like old Plymouths, you should be too. The Jan/Feb 2003 issue had a great article on the Scamp by Don Bunn - I also had a short story of my Scamp in there too.

Click here - or the above image of the cover, if you would like to read that article - it is large (1.8 megs) if you have a slow connection - be patient.

Click here - or above logo, if you want more information about the Plymouth Owner's Club.

If you know anything about Fender Tags, here are two. One from my old Scamp GT and the other from my long gone parts truck.

If you want Option Codes and Production Numbers - Click This!

Last edited on 3/3/2013