Kompressed's photostream  

Only the second Sterling I've seen in the last 5 years. It appears that a lot of Ford dealers dabbled in Sterlings when the car was introduced in the US, at least in the northeast. The placement of the Sterling badging on the trunk lid points to a repaint - the font of the badging is from the UK version of the car, and on UK cars should be on the other side of the trunklid. On US cars there should be a model number on the right side of the trunklid.

Developed with Honda, and sharing many components with the Acura Legend, the Rover 800 series cars were sold under the name Sterling by Austin Rover Cars of North America from 1987 till 1992, with about 35K cars sold during that time.

A successor to the SD1, which was received with a collective meh by the American public, the Sterling was only available with a 2.5 liter Honda V6 engine in the US market. Only sedans were sold during the first year, with fastbacks arriving in 1988.

Common componentry with the extremely popular (as well as extremely reliable) Acura failed to rub off on the Sterling, and many cars had electrical issues and build issues. The fact that this was essentially the only car in Rover's passenger car range offered in North America did not help either.

The contrast to the success of the Acura Legend could not be more glaring, and the various quality issues experienced by Sterling were emblematic of British Leyland quality of the time (remember the Jags of this era?)

The rare 1989-only trim, easily distinguishable by the European-market bumpers, tail lights, and some other trim pieces. I think this is only the second 1989 Pug 505 I've seen with these lights/bumper.

STX was one of the US-only trim levels for the North American market 505, one of the better equipped ones, featuring a 2.8 liter V6. This trim level was available only from 1987 till 1989, and this particular example is in great shape.

First snow of the year.