Talk > Automotive Social > Vehicles you love to hate!

Vehicles you love to hate!

1980 Chevy Citation. What a disaster! Brakes were horrible. Scary bad. The ass end tried to pass the front on slippery or washboard roads. It was a company car, so it wasn't my choice. I was coming from a 79 Impala and hated every minute.

Several Chrysler K-cars. Again, company vehicles. Under-powered, unreliable, poor handling. The best one had a Mitsubishi engine, but it suffered from vapor lock on hot days.

1987 Grand Am SE. What was I thinking? Obviously, I learned nothing from the Citation experience. It was my last American car.

reply to DeltaElite
Anything domestic.

reply to DeltaElite
I've had vehicles that performed better or worse than expected, but nothing to the point that I HATED the vehicle. The secret is to NEVER but a vehicle on it's introduction year and to NEVER buy a vehicle without reviewing it's previous years reliability/performance.

reply to DeltaElite
Anything Chrysler. Roll over and die. They don't make anything worth buying. They're not even Made in America anymore so they don't have anything going for them.

I'll take my American made Toyota over a Mexican made Chrysler.

Oh baby

reply to DeltaElite
Saab 99.

Various electrical gremlins, (turning signals synchronized with the moon phase, for one) , engine mounting bolts falling out of the engine, a carburetor adjusting screw turning itself in during in a 45 minutes freeway drive (unlike some well publicized cases in the last few years, I just shifted to neutral), some random vacuum leaks, one blown brake line, and lastly, the flex plate coming loose just before Yreka on a Sacramento to Seattle trip. In spite of all these, it was still a fun car to drive.
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Arguing with an idiot makes you one.

reply to DeltaElite
'88 Pontiac Grand Prix - Everything failed on that shit box at least 3 times.
'88 Pontiac Sunbird w/turbo - ate waterpumps for breakfast, lunch and dinner. When the pump would seize it would take out the timing belt with it.
'95 Dodge 2500 w/Cummins turbo diesel - The only thing that didn't fail was the engine and turbo and that's because it was not built by Dodge.

reply to DeltaElite
I never did have problems with all my Japanese cars.

reply to DeltaElite
To be honest any serious issues I've had with the cars I've owned were of no fault of the car or the maker. I'm hard on cars and it carries over to how long they last.

I've owned a 95 Ford Taurus, Chevy Lumina 3.4ltz, Buick Century, 2005 Grand Prix and 2002 Dodge Ram.

reply to Gbcue

reply to DeltaElite
2005 Volvo S40. Spent more time in the shop than on the road. Power steering pump broke at 5k miles. Air-conditioning broke 6 times. Other various problems which my memory is thankfully forgetting.

reply to DeltaElite
1982 Pontiac P2000
Company car, the carb mount was rubber and caused stalling problems when it rotted and developed a vacuum leak. Ergonomics were horrible, the parking brake lever high on the console would be hit by my elbow at least twice a day. Torque steer to the max particularly when the throttle was punched to recover from that previously noted off the line stall problem. Handles, knobs, and trim fell off at seemingly random moments.

1974 Plymouth Valiant (divorce award)
Had a decent 318 V8 engine, but the carb was finicky and the damn car would take 3-5 minutes to start if you were lucky and did not flood it. Had the ballast resistor that would crack and leave you stranded if you hit a water puddle when it was hot. Suspension best known for bouncing, certainly not cornering.
Bench seats that broke the outer springs so the driver would tilt and slide toward the drivers side door and a slick seating surface that helped the sliding to occur. Concave rear window that distorted the view in the rear view mirror.

1974 Ford Pinto
Wife/ex-wife's car, it had the oversized bumpers of that era and a gutless 2.0L OHC engine. With the 3 speed automatic it was more about patience and noise levels than acceleration. I had to rebuild the engine when the timing belt broke. She got this one back in the divorce. Her boyfriend's son then wrapped it into a telephone pole 6 months later.

We had one of those Pintos (Ours was a wagon) at work that was swapped for a 1984 Ford Escort Wagon w/ac for a short while....The Boss gave me the Keys one evening after having to drive it up to Calhoun Georgia for a meeting with the local telephone company and he was PO'd.

He said, I put 2 tickets on you for Dunwoody and Chamblie. Take this thing out on 285 and blow it up.

I drove that car between I-85 and I-75 for 2 hours in first gear at 60 mph and couldnt get it to blow up.

I transfered out of that office and one of the fellows in that group finally killed it 2 years later when he was sruck from behind out in front of the office waiting to make a left hand turn.

They were a good car to hate....Uncomfortable, noisey and a pain to drive but they were hard to kill!
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Protect your right to keep and arm bears!

reply to DeltaElite

Re: Vehicles you love to hate!

reply to DeltaElite
I've owned a lot of vehicles, most for fleet business use. But these stick out in my mind:

1974 Plymouth Valiant (a.k.a. "The Bomb"). God forbid you shut the SOB off for 2 minutes to go into the store. It would "vapor lock" or something and take 20 minutes to start. Spent more time at the shop than on the road.

1982 Toyota Tercel. Even the f__king glass and plastic rusted on this SOB! Rust, Rust, Rust, Everywhere! The 3AC engine ran for over 350,000 miles.

1985 Toyota SR5 (pickup). Rusted faster than the f__king Tercel.
Both Toyotas were turds, bodywise.

1992 GMC 3500HD (Bucket Truck). 454 never wanted to start when it was hot. Also would mysteriously "die". No mechanic could ever find the gremlin. Check engine light went off and on like a "no vacancy" sign at a cheap motel.

1999 F-150 Lariat. Total lemon. Anything and everything was wrong with this truck from the get-go. Bad paint. Bad electrical. Bad engine (the "lovely" Triton V8). Fought with Ford to take this lemon back for a year. Finally traded it for a Chevy.

The best and worst vehicles I have owned have been Fords.
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I just might be the most "licensed" S.O.B. you know.

reply to DeltaElite
The only car I would say was I love to hate it my current ride.

2004 Pontiac Grand AM GT1: Bad MPG but knew that going in. I have had to replace the brakes every year for the past year, for some reason the calipers seize up and destroy the pads and rotors. Wife blames me for that. Also mysterious clicking sound like the turn signal going. Only happens when I am driving it, if I let someone drive it to try to diagnose it, does not happen.
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"When I was a child I spoke as a child I understood as a child I thought as a child; but when I became a man I put away childish things." I Cor. xiii

reply to DeltaElite
Any year Fox-body Mustang. I love the car as a whole but absolutely hate the exterior door handles. I couldn't manage to go through a full year without one breaking. The door lock actuators were of poor design as well.

reply to DeltaElite
Those Escort cars were definitely tough. I kicked the snot out of a 1991 Escort when I was a teen. I FLOORED the thing so many times and yet it takes it like a champ. Never did managed to kill that car (traded it in still running)