Has the Protegé ever been available in North America with four-wheel-drive (4WD)?
The only 4WD Protegés in North America were sold in 1990 and 1991. They were available with the base-level SOHC (B8) engine only, and almost all were sold with automatic transmissions. Almost none were sold outside of Canada and the far northern states of the U.S. These cars did not sell well, and they suffer from reliability problems. According to Canadian sources, the 4WD system is a light-duty version designed for Asia/Pacific cars with engines even less powerful than the SOHC B8, and various parts tend to break under hard use. Poor sales prompted Mazda to discontinue the 4WD Protegé in 1992, and reliability troubles have forced most of these cars to retire to the junkyard. These cars are best avoided due to the high price and limited availability of replacement 4WD parts, and attempts to modify them are not recommended due to the weak drivetrain.
