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We’ve all had one. A shit box. A junker. A lemon. A car that you actually hated to even look at, let alone drive. Now is the time to spill the beans on the worst car you’ve ever owned. Lots of BangShifters have owned a slew of cars, so just by the law of averages, there’s going to be at least one total pile amongst the group.
My open hatred of the 2004 Chrysler Pacifica that serves duty as my wife’s daily driver and our defacto family truckster is pretty well known by regular readers of BangShift. Seduced by the utilitarian features of the thing as we were expecting kids, we broke the cardinal rule of car buying. We bought without doing a lick of research. Had I spent a tenth of a second on Google, I would have run from the dealership like my hair was on fire. The one funny thing is that I have written so much negative crap about this car that the people at Chrysler won’t even talk to me and when I go to races or meet people they always ask, “Hey does your wife still have that Pacifica thing?” Sadly yes.
So the thing really, really sucks. It eats front end parts at a clip that would amaza Baja racers. It gets the fuel economy of a Sherman tank, it is a little slower than a city transit bus, and I have invested more time and money in keeping it roadworthy than any other daily driver I have ever owned.
It has ferried the family on a couple road trips, but it now feels that with each sucessive trip, I am tempting the automotive gods.
In short, this thing is a steaming pile of automotive refuse.
Your turn…
What is the worst car that you’ve ever owned?
(This is the face of personal failure right here….)
My old 1987 Jeep Grand Wagoneer was the biggest piece of crap I have ever owned. In the 4 years it was in my possession (with less than 75K on the clock), I replaced the transmission, transfer case, radiator, starter, alternator, water pump, all the power window motors and all eight of the rocker arm pivots on the anemic 360 engine.
The worst car I’ve ever had was a Mazda 323, I owned it for only a year before I got rid of it as it always over heated and blew head gaskets. The car I replaced it with was a Olds Ciera which had twice as many miles as the Mazda and was more reliable.
My mom M-B ML320. That thing was awesome on the highway… when it worked. Sensors would just quit one after the other and once changed would just quit again.
No one wants to work on them but the dealer which is a pain to deal with, charges WAY to much money especially when you consider the crappy service you get.
The thing would ride like it had concrete shocks when driving in town or on anything that wasn’t super smooth pavement (which is pretty rare in my part of Canada).
It would take a little less fuel than my Suburban but since it needed premium fuel it ended up costing MUCH more.
So no comfort, no reliability, no fuel economy, bad dealer service… apart from having a M-B there’s no point in owning one of those.
I had a M-B 300sd which my ex wife insisted upon having. That car was constantly leaking something or other, the climate control, and other accessories would work if you were lucky.
I think that the engine would last forever, but the rest of the car was pure junk!
’65 GTO which I owned back in ’72. Yuck. I guess it would have been more appealing if it at least was one of the more heavily decaled models, which must surely have been their true appeal. It was a dog.
1986 C10 305 th350c … stalled so bad from the time it had 10k miles on it I hated taking it anywhere but highway. At 40k it wouldn’t cross intersections without flooring it and then praying it didn’t stall. I took it in and they said “needs a carb job and an ignition recurve” so matter of factly that I became… uh… a little cross with them. When I got it back I accidentally laid rubber for 50 feet coming out of the dealership. It actually made a little power. I was so pissed at GM for letting people drive those death traps, well, I still am pissed at them. The thing was dangerous.
1981 Z28 Camaro, silver just like the one Chuck Yeager used in advertisements, first year of the computer, the locking torque converter would lock and stay locked!. You had to start it in park, jerk it into gear, and you were starting out “locked”, push it into neutral at stop lights until you got to the dealer. Did this three times, dealer said the transmission was a “mixture” of metric and SAE?. The center caps for the wheels would fall off (same wheels installed on Camaro since 1970), Got an appointment with the factory rep when he visited the dealer, and he gave me a new set of center caps and told me to give them to whoever bought the car from me. The computer would go “full rich” on the carb, black smoke rolling out the back, but it gave no “codes”. Was told to drive it until something bad happened and they could then fix it. It leaked into the floor when it rained, filling the driver’s side rear floorboard. The paint started chipping off and GM refused to paint it, saying “you should have known silver chips”. Worst car I ever owned.
My ’95 VW Passat wagon. I’m used to driving busted up pieces of junk, but VW found new and amazing ways to break crap. The heater core blew up like a geyser, which requires complete disassembly of the dash to change. All the window regulators failed thanks to the weak stamped steel “gears” cracking. This meant that you could never get the window to stay up. The replacement parts all fail the same way. Rinse, repeat. The heater blend door had foam on it that fell apart and blew into my face while driving. The same blend door had gigantic holes in it that were covered with said foam, which upon its dismissal meant that you could never again have truly hot or cold air from the vents. The VR6 leaked oil from various sensors/adapters that were all difficult to reach. The coil packed exploded. Let me say that again, the frickn’ coil pack EXPLODED. Notice said “pack” and not “packs” as there is one massive 6-prong coil pack to run the engine. Heck, even GM ran them in pairs to make it easier to fix. Oddly the second worst car was my wife’s 2005 Beetle, which managed to wear out its transmission valvebody in less than 60k miles. I’ve never in my life seen a valvebody wear out. Oh, and all four window regulators failed within the same week. Never again VW, never ever again.
I’m not surprised at all. Been a tech for 15 years now, and I can honestly say that VW’s (and all german cars in general) are horrible junk.
Yep, I owned a 2004 VW Jetta. Worst car ever. Electrical problems, a chunk of the engine block broke off where it connects to the motor mount, just to name a few. For every 800 miles I would drive the car it would cost me $800 in repairs.
1981 Oldsmobile Omega. Iron Duke 4cylinder that sounded like a coffee can full of marbles when it was running. A chassis designed to squat like a girl peeing when you stepped on the brakes. It was a total peice of shit. The perfect car for commuter warfare. I used it to commute in New York city.
2009 Chevy 3500HD with the duracrap diesel goes down as mine. Got the truck brand new, by 20,000 miles it had already had a transmission, 5 injectors, head gaskets, and a new set of tires. Conveniently, at around 37,000 miles the cheap GM interior started slowly falling apart. By 60,000 miles it was on its third DPF. Then finally at 106,000 miles (6,000 miles after the powertrain warranty expired) it stuck another injector and ruined cylinder 7. That is the vehicle that swore me off of GM for as long as I live. I bought a got a 6.4 powered F-350 and it now has 220,000 trouble free miles…
My brand new 1965 Corvette was the worst car I have ever owned. The body shook, squeaked and leaked water into the interior like Niagara Falls not to mention unbearable wind noise. The paint had a very noticeable orange peel and runs. The steering was rough and difficult. Chevy dealerships from New Mexico to Oklahoma could not fix an initial hesitation or stumble problem when accelerating. I know you Chevrolet lovers are going to be alarmed and will want to rebuff my statements but so be it. Out of frustration, I traded the Corvette for a 1965 SS Chevy and lost a left front wheel when the 7/16″ lug bolts broke off at the brake hub. 1965 was a bad year for Chevrolet and me!
I was using a ’86 Corvette with about 200,000 miles for an 80 mile commute. It seemed to have an electrical gremlin strike every 2-3 months – one of the more memorable ones was losing the cooling fan in stop and go traffic, and had the A/C manage to die in two separate ways in a year. So I decided to sell it and get a clean, low mileage (around 72,000) Honda Civic.
You were probably expecting the post to end there. Nope. This is about the nightmare that clean, low mileage Civic turned out to be.
Let’s see… first sign this one was bad news was probably when I had a tire go flat because of a dry rotted valve stem, a couple weeks after I got it. I pulled over to put on the spare, found that not only was the jack missing, but a jackass previous owner had lost the spare and replaced it with one with the wrong bolt pattern!
Cooling system issues required replacing the head gasket, radiator, and a bunch of hoses that blew out at random times.
I once dropped it off to fix some noise in the brakes that I didn’t have time to repair myself. Shop called me up to tell me the passenger side brake disc was 1″ smaller than the driver’s side disc. It was about $1,000 to get all the right parts on there to untangle that mess.
Put an equal amount of cash into the A/C system. And still had to bypass part of the wiring with a jumper because something would keep the A/C from coming on when the temperature inside was over 100.
I had to replace one distributor, two starters, and one ECU that literally went up in flames. (Some pictures of the burned ECU made it into my book on EFI.) And that’s not counting one time it randomly died a couple of times, refused to start for 5 minutes or so, then went about like nothing had happened. Never did figure out what that was.
Had a window come off its track, get stuck, and shatter when I closed the door.
And several other issues that I can’t quite remember, in the space of one year. It got rear ended a year after I got it, and my main thought at the time about the car was, “I hope they total you out, you bastard.” They didn’t, but I put it up for sale instead of repairing it.
2001 Audi S4 Avant … the thing broke more often in less miles than any Italian iron I ever owned . 3 years – 18,000 miles … $16,000 worth of repairs ( under warranty … but still ) The only thing worse than the reliability of the car being the way Audi USA handled all the problems and the crap service I received from not just one …. but three different dealerships in my area . Suffice it to say I’ll never darken the doorstep of another VW-Audi dealer for the remainder of my car buying life
1963 brand new Volkswagen. I purchased car for reasons of economy; it turned out to be a loser all the way and during my sixth month of ownership, a valve shot through the body’s rear end, naturally, because that’s where the air-cooled engine was located. After car’s body and engine were repaired under warranty (I had to fight Volkswagen all the way) I traded that POS for a five year old Oldsmobile station wagon, which I drove for years without any problems whatsoever. Purchasing a vehicle for reasons of economy was, and still is, stupid, to say the least.
Every time I pass a Prius, I laugh in a fit of hilarity.
88 350 Chev Pickup. Put probably eight grand into it, sold it for two. That guy put another couple grand into it and sold for $700. There were periods of time where every 20 minutes of driving time, something broke. It was bizarre…trying to work with that thing. Horrible.
65 Thunderbird
Try driving Thunderbirds instead of drinking Thunderbird . . . . Just sayin.
Round northern parts they are known as ‘Thunderchickens’
8/15 Of the above cars that people listed were GM products. Why am i not surprised? I drive one myself and the quality is cheap at best. 2003 Monte Carlo LS. Door Hinges are going bad already, Rusting from water leak off from sunroof, center lights in the dash for the heater went out, door lock light went out, trans slips when its cold, shifts hard sometimes, the paint on the interior chips off of all the controls, the car creaks like old wooden floorboards, the panels do not line up, window switch is bad, Fuel gauge bounces from full to empty once you go under half a tank. All on a car that is only 10 years old. Im at 160k miles. Im glad im getting something else within the next year. IT WILL NOT BE GM
I won’t ever buy another GM vehicle as long as I live. I tried it once, and regret it still….
Have owned just about everything over the years but more GM than any. The GM’s have been much better the the others. I’m still driving a 2000 GMC Sonoma (commuter) with 207K on the 2.2. I’ve had nearly zero problems. Treat them right, they treat you right. At least that has been my experience.
Free Chevrolet Vega . . . a fetid, putrid heap of corrosion and decaying plastic disguised as an automobile . . . worth less than I didn’t pay for it . . . .
My ex wife’s 70 VW convertible. Engine no. 1 leaked all the oil out and blew up on the freeway. Engine no.2 burned all the exhust valves to the point it wouldn’t start. Clutch cable broke. Relacing that was a joy. Broke 2 (two) steering columns in half while driving. Fun. After the 2nd steering column broke I pushed it off a cliff. Not really. Or did I?
1986 Chev Celebrity w/2.8L V6. Total POS. Last car I ever bought from a dealer. And go figure, notwithstanding my experience and for reasons completely unknown to me, it was the best selling car in America that year.
Mine was a 78 Chevy 3/4 ton pickup. Had 78K on it. very clean, slick lookin truck. It didnt look like it had worked a day in its life. Nightmare on wheels!!! Every week I was fixing little stuff. Heater blwer motor, windows that quit working, door handle stopped working, trim panel fell off ect. ect. but worst part was camshaft went flat and later the pressure plate on the clutch broke!!! it was still under 80K miles when I traded it off.I traded it for a 78 1/2 ton Ford with 150K on it and plenty of body cancer. Never had any problems with that truck.
i had a 1987 cutlass supreme….4 door…..3.8 V6…..poop brown. maroon colored bench seats, no tilt wheel or cruise control. so bad that the 4 door supremes didnt even have functioning rear side windows, just louvers
Weird – I have an 87′ cutlass supreme (305/Th200R4) and it has been one of the most reliable cars I have ever owned and gets great gas milage at 355,000km. But its a Canadian car and we didn’t get the computer controlled Qjet or distributor. I do hate those stupid rear windows….
The single worst vehicle I have ever owned was a brand new 2007 chevy Colorado.Second worst was the 2008 Jeep JK I bought after the experience with the Colorado.
Bought a Ford Aerostar minivan. Plenty of room, hard to keep running. Finally had an offer of $50 for it. I told the buyer I would only GIVE him $20 to take it and all the spare parts away!
92 Geo Metro, yeah top that
I always wondered if you got into a Metro, or put it on….like pants.
What was wrong with your Metro? They were generally very good cars, for what they were. A friend put well over 200K miles on one with the 1.0/5-speed power train, with very little trouble.
The worst I ever had was a 91 Olds 88 I bought in 2005 with 21,000 miles on it for $2500. It was garage kept and basically brand new. The 3800 averaged 24 mpg and got 33.5 on the hwy. It was the best responsible family car I ever owned. Everything on it worked, so my toys sat while it was driven. In 2011 a front tire came apart and instead of buying a $15 fender from the junkyard, I scrapped it. I kept the 110,000 mile 3800 and have been driving toys ever since. Mainly my 350, 5 speed ’59 Chevy PU, and turbo 302 powered Ranger.
1977 AMC Matador, paid 175.00, a/c and cruise worked. front suspension shot, wiring shot, if you beat on it, the 360 blew out the dipstick and oil shot out due to blow by. i sold for 175 to a guy that demo derbied it. and of course it caught on fire immediately. (i planned to derby it but i knew it wasn’t worth the work) poor dude had spent alot of time painting flames on the car. well that is what it did
2003 Chrysler Town & Country- minivans are practical, not fun, when they work they are very useful. This is my 3rd, but by far the worst. Transmission, steering, leaks, squeaks. Chrysler engineers should make sure their numbers are unlisted.
i am not 57 yrs old as a young man i became very interested in cars and engines…got my drivers lic. and got a 69 charger from my Dad for doing so well in school. that was the start of my buying almost 100 cars one or 2 at a time to repair and sell the hotter cars like the chargers which i had 6 and the cudas roadrunners i liked and kept for a long period of time. I started with new car dealers in the late 70s and thru a long and wonderful 30+ year career i had come to a conclusion and long ago that many problems my customers and just people in general had or complained about were self inflicted. One example is power window motors…one customer said its the 3rd time i had to replace the r/r window motor regulator, from my office window i was watching the car and the kids were loaded in with the Mom was in the writeup area and i watched the children open and close those window at least 50 times before Mom got out there, does that tell you something. and Mercedes Benz cust says her heater is always giving her trouble and gets a burnt wiring smell… we couldnt find any trouble with it, then one day the vehicel came in and the heater was inop. take it apart to find her child had forced a toothbrush down the vent and it jammed the motor. cassette play intermittant operation and noisy removed unit found change in the unit dimes pennies etc. another owner complained the engine seized and was pissed we removed the filler cap to find it blocked by hard crusty baked oil reason being? in 35k miles never replaing the oil and filter. dead battery intermittantly owner added a system with high power amps and sat with his girl friend to listen to loud music with the engine off. aother cust complained his power lock would go up and down on their own intermittantly i took this car home over the weekend with his permission and found the problem, aftermarket remote lock unlock added to vehicle. I understand that many things are out of ones control like the gentlemen above with the converter lock out switch problem, but problem cars are traded in and resold to new owners that dont have any problems with the so called lemon. I was a N.A.I.S.E. certified tech back in the early 80s now know as ASE tech certification. and i specialized in automotive electrical and heating/air conditioning i didnt like to but i could just about any other repairs on vehicles, my point is im not just a service manager i have an extensive background in automotive area. Just my 2 cents.
2005 Volvo XC90 – Yamaha V8 that attempted to consume itself before it made 90,000 miles. We bought it used thinking ‘Hey, it’s a Volvo they break in at about 150,000 mi. Should be good for a while.’
Nope, we drove it for 6 weeks and that was the end of it. Dealership we bought it from wouldn’t take it back, it was past the 30 day warranty. Volvo dealership wouldn’t touch it without proof of funds ($10,000) to replace the engine. Volvo corporate said we could have the dealership tear the engine apart (on our own dime) and see what happened, they would pay for it if it was a mfr defect.
tl;dr not going to buy another Volvo anytime soon…
Three cars come to mind:
1983 Dodge Challenger with Mitsu’bitch’i engine. Never has a noble brand fallen to the levels of this turd. Hard starting, ugly and a real POS. The wiper nut broke so I had one uni-wiper that covered the entire windshield. Traded to the dealer sight unseen for the next car…
1988 Eagle Medallion. This was pre-Google and I had no idea why I could buy a car with 27,000 miles for only 5 grand. Maybe because the engine in this POS was made by Renault. I had the worst of all worlds – the AMC/Eagle brand (WTF) in the 1980’s with a french engine. I should have known I was in trouble when all four tires were slashed on the first night I had it. The vapor lock was so bad on this pile that you had to sit and grind on the starter for 10 minutes if the car was not completely cold. The AC also only worked on full blast when the car started. I am sure there is more but years of therapy have removed the memories. I finally traded the horrible beast back to a dealer with a strategy of letting it sit for 30 minutes to avoid vapor lock and to have it start with AC on full blast. THE WORST CAR EVER.
My brother in law’s AMC Hornet was also terrible. He brought it to the junk yard and had to leave it running. He asked for 20 bucks and they told him to beat it – he just gave it to them.
01 pontiac aztek. trans, rear suspension parts head gaskets, lots of front wheel bearings, blower motor all before 85k miles
1999 Toyota Tacoma 4×4 extended cab. It had a front end vibration that could not be fixed; the motor was out of a car, so it was everything a truck doesn’t need “high revving” and “no torque.” Put two dirt bikes in the bed and it was on its bump stops and burning the clutch off to get off the line…. POS in both execution and design. On top of all of that, the classic line from the dealership (it was under warranty) “our cars don’t break”… so let’s see, poor build quality, poor design, arrogant dealerships. I’m not sure there’s any thing else that could be bad about a vehicle.
I should have known better, anyone stupid enough to name a truck after an armpit smelling town in Washington couldn’t be good… and I got suckered in – never again.
…. and I traded it (with 37,000 miles) for a 1993 Chevy 4×4 extended cab truck with 103,000 miles. My dad still has that truck, it has nearly 300,000 now.
A 73 Chev Vega. Bought it brand new. After 2 years it started smoking so much oil that I got a ticket for it. The aluminum 4 cylinder block was crap.
I have driven a lot of bona-fide crap over the past 45 years but the worst overall was my 97 Suburban I bought new. Weighing the plus vs minus and cost vs value it was the biggest piece of junk I ever threw good money at.
1985 Chrysler K-Car wagon from the factory.
A transmission that would routinely stick in gear and lock out reverse, a faulty carburetor which the dealer milked into a gradual piece-by-piece replacement for over $1,000 in parts and labor. All this with several other crapshoot construction and non-workmanship examples.
This was my hardworking father’s car.
He didn’t deserve this.
Lemon!
Pucker up.
English car, actually a GM import the Vauxhaul Viva 1969. I was the fourth owner in 1971. Should have known this was a lemon. The clutch went had it replaced but now the clutch was so strong it broke the tailshaft in the transmission. English vehicles of the time were known for electrical problems which in this case were numerous. It also leaked every liquid that was put in it and had cooling problems that on my last voyage seized the motor. I walked away from that car 50 miles from home and never saw or heard of it again.
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