The worst car you've ever owned

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

Mine was a Chevy Vega- one of the original ones with the aluminum engines. It was a hideous, bright orange- the exact color of a pumpkin. I blew that damned engine up three fucking times (my BIL's dad repaired cars, so it wasn't any big deal to get it repaired), but it got so frustrating I finally gave up on it.

This was my second car- my first one having been an old rattletrap Morris Minor 1000cc that got passed from person to person on the Air Force base I was stationed at in England (I REALLY loved that old Morris- me and the gang would go cruising the countryside in it at 4:20).

The Vega finally sprung a radiator leak, and before I had a chance to fix it it was stolen from my driveway. Since the radiator was dry the thief didn't get very far. He was arrested a couple miles down the road, minutes after I called the cops. The car was towed to a used car lot in town, and I was so fed up with it I never bothered to claim it- it was a heap of rusting junk as far as I was concerned. Fuck it. I rode my bicycle until I bought a car off a friend. It was a Pontiac Ventura II, and it was SWEET. I rode that machine into the ground and never bought another Chevy again.

[gemdem]

1. Chevy Vega

Bought it used. It ran for about six months. Worked on it with my dad and could not get the POS to run. Some guy in the neighborhood gave me $50 to take it off my hands. I was happy to take it and still feel like I got the better end of that deal.

[BOSSHOG]

22. We bought a new Pontiac Astre in 76

The Vega's better looking twin. Actually did not have too much trouble with it. Didn't like it as well as my 68 Nova, four banger, three on the column stick shift. What a hog!

[QMPMom]

2. Well, I have owned 8 cars, all bought new, and the worst of them

all was an AMC Spirit followed closely by a Mercury Cougar.

The best, so far, is the 2006 Dodge Caravan we have now.

I've owned:

1. 1975 Plymouth Gold Duster
2. 1977 Mercury Cougar
3. 1981 AMC Spirit
4. 1983 Chevrolet Celebrity
5. 1987 Hyundai Pony
6. 1988 Nissan Multi (Stanza in the USA)
7. 1997 Dodge Caravan
8. 2006 Dodge Caravan

[frogcycle]

24. meant to respond to op

I hate it when that happens

[Vidar]

3. Renault LeCar.

[qdemn7]

4. 1987 Hyundai Excel

Worst POS I've ever owned, I swore I would never own another Hyundai again.

I had a classmate in High School (1971-1975) that had a Vega. Drove the hell out of it for over 5 years. Ran great. She named the car "Peanut Butter" because of it's color. I guess your case was mad it didn't get a name. :rofl:

[Puglover]

18. When Hyundai's came out they sucked

completely. Ironically, now they are one of the best values out there. We have a Hyundai Tucson and we love it. You can't beat a 100,000 mile warranty.

[qdemn7]

19. Agreed

Amazing how much they have turned things around. Detroit should take note, but they won't, they're Detroit.

[Maine-ah]

5. Jeep Grand Cherokee

what a piece of shit. Nothing but problems with the breaks and Chrysler kept refusing to do anything about them. They kept telling me "it's because you live in a wet area" "it's because you live in a salty area" blah blah blah...yet there were several thousand jeep owners with the same problem. Now it looks like they still haven't fixed the problem and it's gotten too big with their 06/07's and have done a recall. Fuckers. Chrysler ruined Jeep. We had older Jeeps with no problems.

[NewWaveChick1981]

6. Damn...my parents owned a vintage Vega.

:yoiks: They bought it the first year it came out. It was metallic silver. It worked well for a while, then it started having engine trouble. They drove it until it fell apart (which wasn't all that long). :( The capper---i.e. the death knell---was when we were driving back to our home in suburban Atlanta from the SC coast, and the wheel bearings melted. MELTED. Yep, on a Sunday afternoon in Darlington, SC, when blue laws were still in effect. A very nice gas station owner took pity on us and called a friend of his with an auto parts store, got the parts illegally (yep, illegal to sell auto parts and work on cars on a Sunday afternoon with blue laws :eyes:), and got the car going again so we could get home. And he didn't charge us a lot either. My parents traded it immediately when we got home.

Worst. Car. Ever. :cry:

[YellowRubberDuckie]

7. It was a Pontiac.

It was your basic run of the mill sedan. It was like 600SE or LE or whatever. The electric system was never quite right. It didn't last too long.
And the rest I've owned were from the Daimler Chrysler family. They've all been run into the ground and when I traded them in, they were still going strong...except the first one was totaled by this idiot who did a U turn on a 2 lane highway in front of me.
Duckie

[Mutley]

8. A Mitsubishi Galant

It was used, but no more than three or four years old. I spent more money per month getting that thing repaired than the car payments. I actually celebrated when it finally died.

[RetroLounge]

9. VW Diesel Golf

Biggest POS I ever drove.

Front axle seals opened up at highway speed, releasing transaxle fluid, leading to total disinigration of the transmission.

Glow plugs always going bad.

Parts falling off it all the time.

RL

p.s. Any car built without a V8 and after they put all that emission and electronic shit on them is crap anyhow.

[Seabiscuit]

10. Renault 500.

Basically a wet fart on wheels.

[NewWaveChick1981]

17. ...

:spray: :rofl: Never heard that expression before, but you can be damn sure I'll remember it from now on. :applause: :hi:

[Seabiscuit]

27. ...

I never heard the expression either. Somehow it just tumbled off my keyboard onto this page. :)

[kskiska]

11. A Simca

It was used, and I didn't have it long, but long enough to know it was a piece of crap.

[KG]

12. what kind of idiot steals a vega?

[Wapsie B]

13. Worse yet, who in their right mind would restore a Vega?

Let it die in the ash heap of automotive history, a tribute to the brilliant leadership of GM by Roger Smith. :puke:

[KG]

15. as I racall a quote: a car so badly built it would start to rust in the showroom.

[AlCzervik]

14. 1979 Oldsmobile Cutlass, looked good on the outside and the interior was

way plush but oh how it burned oil, a total piece of crap. It was also my first car.

[Thirtieschild]

16. 1957 Renault, now pronounced Re-know, we said Renalt then

We drove it from New Orleans to D.C. in a snowstorm in 1961, trying to keep two babies warm with a heater that didn't work and quiet with a speedometer howled the whole way (not many interstates then). A year later it was totaled when a woman backing out of our driveway put her car in forward instead of reverse, hit the Renault, slammed it into the house. She couldn't have been going more than a couple of miles an hour. Terrifying to consider how we would have been totaled if we'd had a real accident.

In high school drove a 1941 Hudson affectionately known as Old Ironsides.

[conscious evolution]

20. Chevy chevette

or,as I called it,the shitvette.
The check engine light came on a mile from the dealers lot.
Things went down hill from there.

[dembotoz]

21. 87 pontiac grand am

hated it, broke down alot, she who must be obeyed got angry at it and took a hammer to the fenders which pretty much ended resale value so we were stuck with it till it died. spent a winter in wisconsin with no heater and no defrost--not fun.
Right before a memorial day my mechanic said start shopping for a new car SOON
Finally coasted to a stop right after labor day...

[IndianaJones]

23. Yugo. nt.

[frogcycle]

25. 1978 Dodge Aspen

worst
car
ever

And I also had a Pinto for a while! Better than the Aspen.

[lizziegrace]

28. 1978 Plymouth Volare Coupe

differential went out
dash lights went out
trunk rusted from the inside out (lived in Memphis at the time)
2 starters
2 carbeurators (I gave up after carb #2 and poured gas in it to start the car)

all this by the time it had 63,000 miles on it

[frogcycle]

35. yep, same animal

It was the first new car I ever bought

both front fenders rusted through in about a year - turned out there was a recall on the 77's but they had fixed the bad metal issue early in 78 so there weren't enough cases to make a recall mandatory. So Chrysler told me to drop dead.

front suspension components fell apart; wheels started wobbling side-to-side

tons of other stuff

I took great pleasure in selling it to the "we'll give you $25 for it and tow it away" folks

wanted to go to the junkyard and watch them crush it, but couldn't schedule it.

[Crazy Dave]

26. '99 Ford Ranger

I could combine all the repair bills of all my vehicles in a lifetime, including the ones I only paid $400 for and they would only add up to about half of what I've put into a vehicle that I bought brand new and that started having problems almost to the day that the factory warranty ran out.

[Richardo]

30. Wow. I bought a 6-year old 2000 model last year and love it.

What were the problem areas for yours?

[Crazy Dave]

33. Mostly with the electrical system

But there were a few mechanical break-downs due to what could only be poor quality and poor engineering. My wife's 2004 Toyota Tacoma is twice the truck as the Ford Ranger and my '98 Camry that I had for seven years (now my oldest son's) only had normal wear and tear issues
True story: About a month after the warranty expired on the Ranger a lot of smoke came out of my steering column. The woman at the dealership sounded almost giddy when she found out that it was out of warranty. No concern at all about it being a life safety issue.
With that said my '96 Suzuki Sidekick had a problem with the factory alarm two years past the warranty but the Suzuki dealer still fixed it for free as it was a known problem. Some automakers care, some don't.

[Richardo]

34. Yikes. Electrical system can be a money vacuum.

....and a huge safety issue. I understand your opinion.

[Critters2]

29. Chevette

I took to calling it "the mpj"--miserable piece of junk. I was at the Chevy garage so much that parishioners who couldn't find me at home or the office would call there. I'll never own a GM car again.

[TK421]

31. 1991 Ford Tempo, but I always called it the "coffin on wheels"

because every time I made a turn, the thing felt like it was going to flip over. It was also in the shop more times than I care to remember. It was a mechanic's wet dream..

[Richardo]

32. 93 Infiniti G20

Bought it used with about 50K miles on it. Put two A/C compressors in it in three years, one clutch, and other things I can't think of right now. A money pit. Engine blew on the way back from the beach one day and I had it towed to my mechanic (95 miles - thank you, free 100-mile AAA towing) and he pretty much pronounced it dead.

Replaced it with a sweet 2000 Ford Ranger XLT entended cab, step side, and could not be happier. :)