Worst Car You've Ever Driven?

Not to be out done!
Full List - The 50 Worst Cars of All Time - TIME

I've owned many of these over the years. '57 Edsel Ranger with push button auto trans that would stick in whatever gear you selected! 454 engine that never met a gas station it didn't like!

'85 Toyota Land Cruiser, hand choke and carbed, a bitch to start,, and 10 mpg to boot.

Anything built by GM ~65-2000+-

BMW Issetta (Or the Fiat version!)

Fiat 124 spyder (or nearly any Fiat!

Yugo of any vintage

The Canadian version of the Suzuki Samari? Sort of like a motorized wheel barrow.

Jaguars from nearly any vintange

Any British car if you have to drive it in the rain.

Not to mention the Trebant!

I could add more,, but,,,,

 

2010 Hyundai Sonata

 

Ford taurus wagon.

I think it was an 80 something and it had wood and tan interior.

 

Hands down, a 1970 something, stick shift Chevy Vega. I remember shifting it on a freeway and the stick shift broke off in my hand. What a piece of crap.

 

FSM Niki

2 cylinder 650 cc air cooled rear engined noise maker. Complete crap.
Worst new car was a brand new 1982 Holden Gemini, and the salesman tried to convince me it was better than a Corolla, great joke.

 

Hi All,

1980's something Ford Thunderbird. This was the Lee Iaococa styled version of the Thunderbird. Floaty suspension is being kind - this thing was like the Hindenberg! The 255 cu in V8 was poor also.

 

My worst cars are as follows;

1st, A 1981 Datsun Violet - it was as bad as it sounds
2nd, A 1980 Morris Marina. This was just bad, nasty, horrid.
3rd, A 1983 Honda Accord with a Hondamatic transmission.

These were all from years ago when I was much younger and money was tight

 

Volkswagen Rabbit, 2nd year it came out. What a pile.
In 12,000 miles
2 sets of brakes
The exhaust fell off
1" of water on the rear floor every time it rained

Sold it at less than trade in, and felt like I was ahead.

 

A 1976 (I believe) Dodge Diplomat rental car. 1976 was a particularly bad year for cars, especially American cars, as no one had figured out how to pass the emissions standards yet (hint: fuel injection! - which was still a few years off). It is hard for the younger people here to believe, but that rental was a BRAND NEW car. It wouldn't start. If you got it started, it wouldn't shut off (it would diesel on for a minute or two). The dash lights wouldn't work. I got stopped the first night because the tail lights were out. And, BTW, all the fuses were good. Back then, cars were actually delivered with huge faults like this, and people accepted it. I took it back to the rental place and they gave me another, almost identical in problems except at least the tail lights worked. Cars barely ran then, and gas mileage was horrible.

The second worst car I ever owned was a BMW Bavaria. Nothing worked well on it. It overheated year round, and the ZF automatic was more of a gear bag than a gear box - you picked a gear and took your chances on which direction it would go (if at all). I never liked the ride, handling, or interior. The back seat floors filled up with water when it rained (never found the leak). I traded it for a Renault Le Car . I will never own another BMW, bike or car after that one.

Many of the cars listed in this thread I would gladly take over those rental cars. Someone mentioned the Renault R5 (sold as the Le Car in the US). I owned two from new, and they were a hoot. No performance, but great gas mileage, the best ride I have ever owned, and nice seats. I'd take a brand new one today over a lot of current offerings. Most of my fiats were fine, too. All of my 8 Alfa Romeos were fun except one (I never could get the fuel delivery problem sorted out on that one).

Maybe we need a BEST car we have ever owned/driven thread! I vote for my 1991 Mercedes 560SEL, followed closely by most of my Alfa Romeos.

 

Why don't you start the thread. I also have a '91 560SEC black with gray interior, AMG wheels. The best cruiser I've owned. What color is yours?

 

She was sexy with a curvy body and I fell in love with her blindly and inexorably. She was a 1976 Jaguar XJ12 Coupe, British Racing Green with Biscuit Connelly leather and Wilton wool carpets. I knew I was in an affair I shouldn't have gotten myself into as in my youth in Tokyo I was a passenger to many friends who owned English cars like Austin, MG, Mini Cooper, Triumph and the like and I would be the one pushing the miserable POC out of the intersection when it died in the rain. But the beautiful lines of this two door coupe got the best of me and lust took over my memories from the sixties and I was the proud owner of a 36K mile V-12 feline.

Designed by the Brits in the seventies when the EPA mandated strict new emission controls the engine compartment was busy with a jumble of wires connecting sensors and switches and terminals placed haphazardly like an amateur electronics experiment. Combine that with the low morale of the BL employees of the seventies and instead of what should have been an elegant car, you got a real nightmare for the owner. My mechanic loved me and when we parted after a repair he always had a knowing smile because he knew he would see me again next week. The wretched car will limp back to him or be towed behind a hook.

I was waiting at a "No right turn on red" corner when a woman pulled up behind me and stated honking at me obnoxiously. Ready to flip her a bird I looked in my rear view mirror to find that fuel was gushing out like a geyser from the right gas filler. There are two gas tanks in a Jaguar, one on the left and one on the right. When fuel nears empty, a sensor triggers a light on the instrument panel telling the driver to switch over to the other tank. When switching over a sensor tells the fuel pump to send the fuel to the fuel injection system (which is a nightmare in itself). At the time, both tanks were full and I was using the left tank. For whatever reason, the fuel pump decided to send fuel to the right tank instead of to the engine. With no more capacity, the force of the pup blew open the cap of the right tank resulting in the geyser which was at least 4ft tall. So I made the right turn and parked the car and shut it off.

During the summer, the A/C quit. The brains behind the Engineering Dept decided something was better than nothing so it would blow heat at the highest temperature. The problem was that it was summer and you could not shut it off unless you shut the engine off. The sensor that went south was a $28 part but to get to it the beautiful burled walnut instrument panel had to be removed and the estimate was $1,200, so I passed on it.

Then there was the mystery kill switch hidden inside the glove box. Apparently it was a switch that shut everything off in case of an impact or roll over to prevent fire from gas leaks. That’s fine and dandy but the switch decided to shut the car off when I was in the left turn pocket in heavy traffic during rush hour. At the time I did not know of this switch and there I sat being the a**hole with a dead Jaguar taking nasty glances from irate drivers for an hour until the hook arrived.

When I was away on vacation, she was on loan to my friend who forgot to set the parking brake while he checked his mail box and the car rolled backwards down a slope and ended up in his neighbor’s bedroom. Fortunately, no one was home and the car was repairable. After she got fixed, more problems developed and I decided to donated her to a NPO. She still looked beautiful and her curves were sexy, but I didn’t feel any regrets when she left on a flatbed to a new owner. She cost me about $1000 every 100 miles in repair during my horrid ownership.

 

A 1997 Chevy Cavalier LS 4 door.
Hated it, the A/C goes in them so fast.
The whole car is just a piece of doo doo.
When the engine finally went at 132,000 miles,
we took it to a junk yard and watched them crush it,
then put it in a trash compactor, and then it came out the size
of an end table. It was quite nice to watch if I do say so myself

 

: O
why is the ev1 in that list!?
:..(

 

A best car thread? Wouldn't that be all about Prius?

I haven't owned all that many cars, and fortunately have resisted the temptation to go for looks instead of practicality. A motorcycle took care of any need for speed, so cars for me have always been mere transportation.

The worst was probably a Subaru, which leaked oil despite all efforts to seal the engine. A spark plug blew right out of the block once, stranding us on vacation. Loan payments for the new Prius were less than the monthly repairs on the Subaru - that's how bad it was. The second worst was a Plymouth wagon, gifted (cursed?) to me by an assumingly well-intentioned parent. The wiring harness developed shorts, and I ran out of patience trying to fix them and keep it running. I recall on one trip having to fix the drum brakes with pliers and a large stick I found by the side of the road. This was back in the days when I enjoyed fixing cars, instead of the more mature enjoyment of not needing to fix them all the time.

 

"This was back in the days when I enjoyed fixing cars, instead of the more mature enjoyment of not needing to fix them all the time."

Aint that the truth!!! In my youth, I had a 79 Buick Regal. I fixed nearly everything on that car myself, including an engine swap. I learned a hell of a lot about cars though, and it was cheap and moderately reliable.

One of my reservations of buying a Prius was that I always bought used and made repairs myself as a way to save money. Well, with 2 kids I'm darned glad I'm not standing under the hood anymore and now I'm not certain I was actually saving money back then anyways!

 

It is pearl black with silver bottom and light gray interior. A friend of mine now has it. I'd love an SEC, much prettier body, but my SEL had a certain regality. Lately I've had the hots for a W123 coupe or wagon, not sure why except they were really well made and cheaper to maintain than the W126. I have little interest in Mercs after the W126 until just recently, when they seem to have pulled out of their quality slump.

 

Volkswagen Rabbit diesel... hands down... biggest POS I have ever owned...

 

One of the best cars we've had in our family. 400k with NO significant repairs, 50+ mpg to boot. What was not to like?

 

With a bit of creative editing, that sounds EXACTLY like a girlfriend I once had

Great body, but strictly EVIL otherwise!

 

looking at current topic affairs.. OMG