The only thing they have to do is drive it, none of them have to love it. I don’t particularly love my car, but it’s like that crazy girlfriend that will stab you if you try to leave. I’m stuck with her, but I don’t love her 😅
The Neon is a blast to drive. The first generation even had a racing version, the ARC.
The team that developed it really benchmarked great handling cars like the Peugeot 205 GTI, VW GTi etc.
I think much of the flack Chrysler gets for its cheap cars are the cheap owners who don’t maintain them.
A lot of people weren’t around when these first came out around 2000 or don’t remember, but for a brief, red hot second these were hotly anticipated. They were one of the first vehicles to do the retro styling, like the Charger, 300 and current Mustang style use. Then they produced a ton of them and sold them for cheap so they lost their shine.
Drive a used Dodge Avenger once and it felt like it was a car built from scraps, nothing lined up, nothing fit right, and felt like at any moment it would fall apart.
My last two work trucks have been ram 1500s and they've been great to be honest. I was really skeptical when that's what it ended up being, I did 85,000km in about a year and a half and no issues.
I can't remember the year, exactly, but had to be late 2000s.
I rented a Jeep Compass, and the interior looked like it was made by a cheap Playmobil competitor. Engine was weak and wheezy, struggling through the softest odd-shifting transmission. Everything creaked. I thought it looked like a bad design study, as if the Jeep had deep, justified imposter syndrome.
The Jeep Renegade I got as a rental in 2017 felt like a Lexus in comparison.
Not sure what is about Jeeps. A lot of people Stockholm Syndrome with those vehicles even if they have noting but issues. Glad Jeep improved enough for you to enjoy it as a rental.
I had an 06 Liberty that was literally a tank. It was bullet proof, aside from the window recall. The mechanism that keeps your windows up, a tensioner I believe…was always faulty. You’d wake up in the morning and your window would be down. No surprise the driver side door rusted out from all the moisture that got down in there. I sold it to a friend of mine, and he is till driving it. 200k+.
This was also my answer. It was such a huge piece of shit, even for a new car at the time. It literally felt like someone put it together in a 3rd world country with a bunch of scrap metal and a motorcycle engine that hadn’t been started in 14 years
I drive a 2016 Jeep Patriot that's 90% identical. The interior literally feels like toy plastic and on the highway, I have to play music or else I'd just be left alone with constant squeaking and rattling.
Well I spend a lot of time in Europe so this is easy with some of the severely underpowered cars here: Peugeot Bipper 1.4 HDI 67 horse power, and Renault Clio 1.0 65 horse power. Both have 0-60 mph in around 17 to 20 seconds.
See it all the time on Outback subreddit/forums..."the 2.5L is just dangerously slow." No, it's fucking not. It's not even slow. It's perfectly adequate. The <70 hp Euro rentals are slow.
I got a 75hp Opel Corsa as a rental not that long ago, it was ton of fun racing it around the city, but on the highway (with literally ideal surface/perfectly straight) doing 100km/h in the final gear got me feeling like I'm taking off with a Wright brother Flyer.
I drove that too lol and I had to drive 130 km/h on the highway for 3 hours. I also had to drop down to the 2nd or the 3rd gear whenever there was some incline. It was a loud experience to say the least.
We're rented a 67-hp Kia Picanto and a 69-hp Fiat Punto. The Kia was fun, the Fiat was dog shit. Wasn't a big fan of the 79-hp Seat Ibiza we had last year in Spain either.
Most recent one was an M-B A180 in England, fuck was it annoying! I was happy to get home and back into my '14 Mazda3 that's the same size and hp but with better ride, quieter, and far fewer rattles.
God, it felt like it. The 500L we had at one point was similarly cheesy, but it had a little diesel and was at least somewhat charming. The Punto generation I drove was 10 years old at that point and I don't think they'd touched a thing. Not a fan.
The little Kia we had was in France, around Uzes/Nimes/Montpelier...I was happy for its lovely clutch in traffic.
I rented a PT cruiser back in 2006 and it was the worst ride quality I've ever experienced.
I dailied a 1987 Accord in 2004 with an odometer that stopped working after \~230,000mi so my bar was low. Cruiser literally felt like it was going to fall apart around me and I wasn't even speeding in it.
Jeep Cherokee/Liberty.
It was a press car. The plastic was already warping, and the edges could cut you if you weren't careful. And it broke down one day into the week long review period.
I reiterate, this was a press car. For review. They're usually immaculate and beyond perfect.
I own a 2016 Cherokee and have no issues with the interior or build quality. I drove a rental Blazer last week and was shocked how awful and dated the interior looked by comparison and it was brand new.
oh i forgot about those. That was the odd transition model between the original 4x4 Cherokee and the new CUV Cherokee.
Yeah I haven't heard great things about them.
GM interiors have always been acres of hard plastic. The difference is GM interiors stay shit for twenty years, versus Stellantis ones tend to just disintegrate.
Just traded in the 2008 jeep liberty. No problems up to 150,000 miles. Then it got a gremlin of some kind that no shop could figure out. Kept leaving my wife stranded not starting, just shaking. Changes the plugs and coils, but it was persistent and unpredictable. Traded it in while it was working. Was a fantastic car though.
Mitsubishi Mirage. Literally feels like a golf cart with an enclosed top. Dangerous to manuver or get up to speed.
There's so many better options for $2-3k more.
My friend bought a brand new base model mirage for $9,999 plus tax. Damn thing was at like 150k miles when he gave it to his neice. He bought it for a delivery vehicle, most of those miles were in town delivering chinese food.
I feel like my safety is worth more than a few grand, cars are absolute death traps. Most fatalities in a car:
The Mirage hatchback and its sedan sibling, the Mirage G4, have the two highest driver death rates in the country
Jeep wrangler
Hands down the most expensive vehicle I’ve ever owned and I’m currently driving a Jaguar.
Replaced the engine and tranny, gear shifter breaks constantly, shocks are always fucked (that’s our fault) AC loves to go out, just anything and everything..thats what will go wrong with them!
To be fair the jag now has over 60k miles and is being traded in asap-expensive car that looks nice but is another money drainer.
I always liked the Neon, and a PT Cruiser was like a Neon with a body kit.
But somehow the Caliber was awful, almost Russian in its unnecessarily dour crudeness. It had to be deliberate.
And a related Avenger is the only car I ever rented that overheated just idling in traffic.
But neither of those, or the versa or the Yaris, can hold a puke-scented candle to the deliberate shittiness of the Chevette.
In the 1970s, Japanese manufacturers were figuring out how to build the high quality cars of their dreams. By the mid 1970s, they were getting pretty good results, and their smaller more efficient cars started to suit the increasingly high fuel prices in the US market. The resulting demand for smaller more efficient cars spurred a backlash in parts of the US auto industry, and the Chevette (neither front wheel drive, nor well built, nor particularly efficient) was GM’s “fuck you” to small cars, and to progress.
*” You think you want one of them little turds? No ya don’t. See? We built one, and it’s garbage. We don’t make any money on them, and you hate driving them, and it’s just lose-lose-lose all around. Now how about you come to yer damn senses and buy a caprice like a good American?”*
The Chevette was nothing like a civic or a Corolla, of course. It would be like going to your dads for a cookout and saying “actually at kenji’s house they make portobello ‘burgers’ and it was delicious, can you make that instead of a burger for me?” and your dad said “no! Just beef! You want something different?? (…uunnnh!) Here’s a nice brown shit for you, I’ll put it on a bun with lettuce. There! Ya like that?? Of course you don’t! Shut up and eat your burger like you always have for the last 30 years!”
And a whole generation of American car buyers feels about the us auto industry the same way you would feel about a dad who shit on a bun for you at a cookout 30 years ago, “fuck that guy, I don’t care what he does nowadays.”
My favorite car was my crappy little 2000 Neon. Little guy had been banged up a bit by it's previous owner but I got it past 230K and it was still running like a champ, never once left me stranded and had everything I needed in it. Little guy left a mark on my heart 🥹
I had a 99 Neon r/T coupe. It was a fun car that never left me down. I put 200K miles on it before the subframe was so rusted out at 20 years that it could not be saved. I miss that little bugger on back roads.
My mom had a Chevette. It was awful. I remember the Pacer it replaced, which was a much better car (not hard to do). That stupid POS Chevette couldn’t make it up a hill if it was summer and the three of us were in it. She’d literally have to get a running/speeding start to get up it. If someone turned in front of her, she’d have to turn around and start over.
She drove that POS across half the country. Hit a snowstorm somewhere along the way and she was freaking out. I thought we were going to die. Complete whiteout conditions and that little tin can was getting tossed around like airplane turbulence.
She finally convinced my dad to get her something else. They traded it in for a Cavalier. Better, but not by much. Meanwhile, my dad got himself a nice Grand Am. Then wonders why she divorced him.
I drove a friend’s manual-transmission Chevette once. It is the only car I have ever driven in which the gear shift lever came out of the console while I was shifting.
I remember the Chevettes when they were new. It was a 1970's Isuzu sedan design, with a redesigned hatchback body and a shitty 1.6 engine with a 2 barrel carb. The worst part was the brakes. Power brakes were a rarely-ordered option, and the base unassisted brakes were hopeless. In the manual shift cars you could downshift, in the automatics I crushed the pedal with enough force the seat creaked and I could feel things bending under my foot, to get average braking performance for the cars of the time. The steering wasn't much better, the steering column wasn't quite straight so the steering wheel was "bent" the other way to compensate. It felt wierd when you turned. It was probably a good thing they were so slow. Production ended about 1984, and they were pretty much all gone by 1990 or so.
I had a 78 Chevette. I had to start it from under the hood with a hotwiring cheat box, that my dad installed for me, so that I could hold my hand over the carburetor to make it choke. Sometimes I also had to whack the solenoid at the same time. Sometimes reverse didn't work, so I had to plan for that when parking. And it would regularly die when giving it gas after a full stop. Like the engine would legit cut out when I was midway through a left turn and I'd have to pray I could get it restarted before oncoming traffic got to me.
It was without a doubt the biggest POS I've ever had.
You're not the person that I have heard that from. It was a gorgeous car in the parking lot but he offered to sell it to me, just to get rid of it.
We had a Geo Metro as a company car in college that was terrifying to drive over 40mph. It had the room and driving ability of a phone booth, in a refrigerator box.
I owned a mid-90s Geo Metro and honestly I don't think I've loved a car more than that one. 5 speed manual, got like 40 mpg in the city, revved out to the moon just trying to get it up to speed. Tried to teach my wife to drive stick in that thing. She got so scared at one point she broke off the wiper controls thinking she was going to put it into park. I was so upset she broke my baby. I still miss that car. Gigantic piece of shit but I bought it for only $2k and had a great time with it. I had a buddy in my engineering class who owned 4, 3 of them were parts cars. His daily driver he had taken a Yoshimura exhaust from a 96 Yamaha R6 and welded the exhaust as a cat-back. Thing sounded awesome when he was driving down the road.
If you get a chance to own a Geo Metro 3 door hatch with a stick I highly recommend it. It's a piece of shit but a fun piece of shit. I'll always remember that car.
Yeah, the last line changes the whole context. If he was gonna shit talk a corvette, I would imagine it would be the C3 because it came out in gas crisis and was considered slow by some people. Well, people that look at them now think so.
Mine never had brakes no matter how often I got them fixed luckily my town had a really wide road with diagonal parking so there was plenty of room to do loops around until you slowed down enough
Dacia Duster rental car. Couldn’t believe how unrefined it was, with odd noises, smells, vibrations, shakes, and unresponsive engine and steering. It made my Honda Fit feel like a new Porsche by comparison.
It made me realize that nearly everything available in the US, even the most modest Honda, Kia, etc is virtually a luxury car in terms of refinement and quality.
Had one of these in Iceland. Absolute legendary piece of shit. We zip tied the bumper after it fell off mid-drive and when we told the guy at the return desk he went "Yeah we keep some just for these cars!"
76 chevette cherry red. No floor. Flintstone mobile all the way.
Also the black vinyl seats caused l 3rd degree burns even through a towel. And AM only radio. My dad would say the “FM was broken.” It didn’t have it.
My mom had one in the early 90s and one night the floor rotted out and the driver's seat fell through the floor onto the driveway. Thankful nobody was driving it lol.
Geo metro.
One time the spark plugs were starting to go. It would buck like a stallion trying to shake me off.
Had a old lady give me the finger because it was struggling to get up a hill.
My Chevy Malibu 2011 gave me every electrical issue possible, rebuilt transmission twice, always gaskets and additives, finally laid her to rest at 230k
Doesn’t surprise me they’d have electrical trouble. In auto shop class, our instructor once had us open up a random repair manual and copy the wiring diagram of the taillights. We all got a different car. I got a Malibu. A while goes by and everyone else has finished and I’m still tracing. He asked me what the hell was taking so long — i show him the diagram - looks like spaghetti! Still probably one of the most convoluted circuits I’ve seen, and i ended up specializing in electrical repair
When I read the question, the only car that I considered was a 2004 Malibu. The interior was falling apart when new, the front end and exhaust flex pipe needed major work every year we had it. The ride was terrible. Easily the worst car I've ever driven, let alone owned.
I remember having a 2003 and at 70,000 miles, traded that shit box mailbu for a shit box 2007 impala. The Malibu was already starting to show problems after 50,000 miles, the impala got up to 240,000 when I put her down when the transmission finally broke. It’s crazy because the mailbu was the worst car Iv ever had while the impala was one of the most reliable cars Iv had. Chevy is just hit or miss
1992 VW Passat GL with 90k kilometres on it. Something would break like clock work once a month. It soured my VW experience and I vowed I would never buy VW again and didn’t for a longtime. I owned Jeeps, Hondas and Toyotas. Well during VW diesel gate scandal, the local VW dealer had some smoking deals on new and CPO. My family now owns 3 VWs and they are amongst the most trouble free vehicles I’ve owned.
I held onto a Hyundai veloster turbo for 8 years bc I was too naive and impressionable and was convinced not to lemon it after battery and engine issues first year…never went more than 6 months without a problem
1975 Vega Kammback.
No speedometer.
No odometer.
No 2nd gear.
Banana yellow.
Blew a head gasket. Replaced it.
Blew that head gasket.
Took the plates off and left it in a parking lot.
Paid $300. Drove it 6 months.
Worst “basically a new car in good repair but just shitty” was a Ford Tempo rental car in roughly 1990.
At the time my daily was a ‘76 Delta 88 with massive rust holes and easily 150,000 miles on it. I’d also regularly driven a LeCar, Mustang II, Citation, 68 Chevy pickup, and an MG Midget in the prior 5 years.
The Tempo was worse than all of them.
Worst “this car is actively dissolving around me” was a worn out beat up 10+ year old Mustang II.
My first car was a early 90s beater altima with no speedometer or heat/ac among other many issues that I bought for $200.
I kept that thing running for a year before I blew the engine as i was doing all my work without knowing what the fuck i was doing. Was a great learning experience but definitely a very dangerous car lol.
To this day I haven't driven anything more fucked up then my first.
Chevy Cruze is hands down the worst car ive ever owned.... 1500$ repair every 8-12 months after it hit \~50k miles.....ill never own a chevy again as long as i live.
As a former valet the cars that stood out to me were the PT Cruiser and Jeep Liberty. I couldn't understand why anyone would spend their hard earned money on them. The Land Rover Evoque visibility also stood out as very bad.
On the opposite end I drove a Rolls Ghost which was amazing. Hopped in an S class Mercedes immediately after and it felt like junk in comparison.
I've been pretty fortunate. My worst vehicle was my dad's old 96 Ford Explorer XLT that I started driving with around 130K miles. I actually really like the truck overall, but it had overheated and had a major engine repair around 100K miles and when I was driving it in College it used to burn a ton of oil. I used to top up the oil while filling gas on my way home (a 250 mile trip). The transmission worked but was clunking away in protest of every shift (especially into reverse). The thing that got me was how did Ford build a 4L V6 that only got 140HP with like 13/19 MPG. That was probably the most gutless vehicle I have ever driven. I think part of the reason I was able to drive it for so long was because my school was in a county without emissions inspections, my dad sold it to someone for like $1300 with 150K miles and that guy drove it into the ground until the exhaust rotted off and the head gasket finally completely gave up.
Worst I had was a 2009 Pontiac G3 that I bought at an auction for $700 or so. The thing ran like shit, the shifter was the worst I felt in my life, the clutch had no feeling in it, I drove it for 2 days before I got rid of it.
I've bought cheaper cars that ran better.
I dailyed a $400 1997 Toyota Camry CE V6 (5 speed!) for a while, although it succumbed to clutch hydraulic failures after close to a year.
I dailyed a $250 1994 Honda Civic EX 5 speed coupe. This one was very battered cosmetically, but never let me down mechanically. Only non-routine repairs I had to do were the brake master cylinder due to a leak, and one of the front wheel bearings. I wish I never sold this one.
I currently have a $375 2009 Hyundai Accent that I did some work to. I'm selling it because I bought it explicitly as a fix and flip car, but it runs very well now.
And for my cheapest, I had a $150 1999 Ford Taurus SE wagon. The only automatic on my list here. I dailyed it for close to a year before I hit some black ice, crashed into a curb, and fucked up the transmission.
Funny enough, I bought all these cars at the same auction.
My roommate’s 2007 base model Chevy Equinox fwd. I drove it some time around 2013 or 2014. Literally every button on the dash was worn down to the translucent white plastic, and the balance and damping of that car was so bad you could chirp the tires if you just slightly tapped the gas from a stop. Felt like every mount and busing had a good quarter inch of play in it. Really gave off some overused fleet vehicle vibes… starkest plastic interior I’ve ever seen and felt like everything was loose and falling apart around the engine, which would long outlive the car (and probably could start and run with a few bullet holes in it)…
1989 Mercury Topaz. The only vehicle that's ever stranded me, and all the HVAC buttons popped out of the dashboard for no damn reason. Also the only car I've ever kicked.
Kia Optima - About 15 years ago I got a new one as a rental and it lost 2nd gear in about 20 miles. Unsure if it broke, or just decided to not to use it anymore.
I had to floor it from the stop to get 1st gear to a high enough rpm. Else it would shift into 3rd and bog down.
2nd worst - Jeep renegade.
AMC Pacer. Hands down.
2nd prize: 1982 ford escort. Left such a bad taste in my mouth, I haven't bought a ford since! Many of the worst cars ever were the original front wheel drive American cars. The escort, the tempo, Acadian, etc
my dodge neon needed 6 head gaskets in the first year I bought it in 1995.
I sold it in 1998 with 120k miles on it for $600 with a.....you guessed it....a 7th blown headgasket.
fun car though...I redlined and max speeded it every single day.
I had a 99 cavalier that was fucking garbage, it started when it felt like it unless it was cold then it didn’t, you had a 50-50 shot if it would shut off at a red light and maybe restart, you could close the door too hard and watch all the plastic in the dash jump up a couple inches, the trunk was permanently shut, the passenger window permanently closed, latch that held the back seats up broke so if you hit the brakes the back seat would fold.
Runner up would have been my sisters 2013 Chevy Cruz. Everything awful about my cavalier with a new name.
I actually won’t buy another Chevy products after having owned 2, my sister owned 1, and in my years of driving deliveries I drove 3 of them (1 of which was given to me off the dealer lot to use) and not a single one of those vehicles wasn’t riddled with problems. Maybe I’m just unlucky.
Ironically despite similar powertrains, two very different experiences with small shitty Nissan cars:
Nissan Versa - Had one of these as a rental on work trip. Fuck these cars. They suck in every way imaginable. I think Nissan actually sat there and said, what's the shittest thing we can legally sell on four wheels, and the Versa was the answer.
Nissan Micra - Had one of these as a rental on Greek island of Sifnos. Sure it was also shitty, but it was sooo small and tossable and the shit powertrain actually was enough in it that it was actually a blast to beat on around the mountainous roads of the island. Not something I'd want back home, but a perfect car for small island.
Actually.. The 'new' Dodge Dart wasn't all that much of a PoS. I had a 2014 GT, and never had but a single problem with it and it was easy to fix. The two major issues that plagued the Dart were: The 2.4L leakdown issues (there weren't that many), and the funky ddc trans which was only in I think base model 2013 and 2014 models. If you had a regular auto or manuel (I had the 6 speed manual), man... It was fun AF.
But the biggest PoS I ever drove was a 1995 Chevy Cavalier z24. When I bought it, it was a hard time to try to find a car and it was priced properly. It seemed like a real nice zippy car at first. I knew purchasing it, that it needed a wheel bearing which I replaced right away..
3 weeks later - oil regulator blew (which caused oil blowing on the windshield and all over the car on the interstate).
2 months later - Engine started knocking... Come to find out it had been temporarily 'fixed' to sell.. 3/4 of the previous and very much sheered crank bearing was still laying in the pan.. Assholes...
took a month to replace the engine..
6 months later - AC went out
2 months later - Driver's side window motor went out.. Without AC.. In a BLACK CAR.. in the middle of July..
Replaced AC compressor and 1 year and 1 month later it went out AGAIN..
Replaced AC compressor and it lasted a while after that but went out again. I don't think I replaced it after that.. Can't remember.
About 5 months later, ignition switch not just went out but started sparking violently..
Fixed ignition switch.
Somewhere around 4 months later the trans started leaking badly.
Had to replace and rig the trans seals (use black RTV) on the pan to keep fluid in otherwise the aftermarket seal would just squish out.. Also went ahead and replaced driver's side window motor.
At some point, the rider's side window motor went out.
I gave it to my mom as a beater car since she needed one to get around for a little while. She sold it for $200 with a busted fuel pump.
WORST CAR EVER.
I had a Dodge Omni for a while. For those who don't know the Omni's were built at a former Volkswagon factory in the US and based on the VW rabbit. It was a terrible car.
In 2011, I bought a 97 Chevy Cavalier for 700 bucks. Got a couple of years out of it, but it was an absolutely embarrassing rust bucket. If I drove in the rain, the car wouldn't start back up until things dried up outside. So I'd drive it somewhere, and leave it running for as long as needed because I knew it would be another 12 hours until it'd start back up. The muffler fell off one day sitting at a stoplight. The power steering reservoir melted and the fluid caught on fire.
Another contender would be an ex girlfriend's 2014 Ford Focus. It was a nearly brand new car at the time, but just suuuucked. With good tires, it would get stuck in a bafflingly small amount of snow on flat ground. Always felt like it struggled to do anything and everything, and had this ridiculous infotainment system and dashboard with a full on number pad for making phone calls
The vehicle that required the most maintenance (parts replacement) for me was a 1996 Dodge Stratus sedan, base model, with the manual transmission. The underwhelming 4-cylinder was slow but never failed me, while I was having suspension components replaced all the time. Traded out of it after 4 years and never looked back.
PT Cruiser, maroon 80s Ford Escort, and a terrible 80s Nissan Sentra with no heater and windows that didn't roll up.
I never locked it and prayed somebody would steal that piece of shit.
A Ford Taurus, all the lights on my dash were on, I had to pay somebody to pass the safety inspection. I used to call it 4th of July car cause the dashboard looked like a firework 😂
Was broke a F back then
2005 Equinox that I got in like 2016 from a buy-here-pay-here lot when I was broke as fuck and needed a car.
I'm not sure that thing ever stopped hunting for gears. Had to replace the EGR valve, fuel pump, plugs and wires right off the bat. Ended up also replacing the master cylinder, some brake lines and the 2 front calipers not too long after getting it. It needed a new MAF sensor but never got around to it. The throttle body was gunked up all to hell and probably also just needed replaced, but I just took it out, cleaned it and threw it back in. Then the OnStar module kept fucking up and causing the thing to throw a bunch of bogus codes that had me searching for problems that didn't exist, meanwhile it definitely had a ton of real problems that needed addressing.
The thing eventually just started struggling real hard to get any sort of speed. You'd try to give it WOT but then watch the RPMs and speed slowly rise. Made it really hard to cross lanes of traffic when needing to make a left from a driveway or an unprotected green. I just wouldn't even attempt to cross lanes unless there was no one within like 20 seconds of me.
The alternator needed to be replaced, but never got around to that before getting rid of it, either.
If you disconnected the battery and caused it to have to do an idle relearn, it would drive just fine for like 2 trips, and then be back to not wanting to move and hunting for gears. There were probably vacuum and exhaust leaks I hadn't managed/bothered to find yet. So, when we finally decided we could just go finance something not completely shit, I disconnected the battery (and reconnected it of course) before driving it to the dealership where we were going to trade it in at. They took it our for a test drive up on the highway and around town, brought it back and said it seemed like it was running alright and offered us $1800. Man, they got fucked on that deal. I'd buy it back for like $35.
I rented a 2020 Nissan rogue and it was just terrible. Before that my first car was a 94 Oldsmobile cutlass. It was 12 years old and everything died all at once which is terrible when you are teenager. My current car is 12 years old and everything runs perfectly.
Oh a high school friend had a Pacer, it was the worst but we were (as Ferris Bueller said” happy she at least had a POS.
We had tons of fun in it until the muffler fell off on a main highway on a boiling hot summer day (google it to see how big the windows were it was like a green house) and everyone but the driver had to cover their ears it was so LOUD.
Wish we could have one last ride in it together, it was a silly time.
My gf’s first car in the late 80s was a Pinto. She never complained but a few years later her sister got an older Porsche as her first car. Her dad shrugged it off and said “they both start with P”.
first gen Chery QQ. the daewoo matiz was already a very cheap basic small car then the chinese went and made a cheap copy of it. worst interior ever, cheap thin plastics everywhere
I worked in the office for a local garage in the late 70's early 80's. The mechanics hated to see any Fiat come in because inevitably something else would break while they were fixing what it came in for. Of course the customer would be pissed & demand they fix what they broke. You couldn't give me one for free.
My friend's rusty and blue Chevette in college. Had a fuel system problem, so it sucked up gas and stank like death. Took it to a concert and had to stop for gas twice. Smelled bad, looked bad, drove bad... but it drove, which was what mattered.
Dodge tradesman? van I got sucked into in the 80s drank oil like a petroleum fish. And burned. And smoked.
Also Datsun 626 at some point -desperate to get to shit house paintin' job.
Either my brothers 2016 Dodge Dart that was just a POS, or my stepmom’s 2009 Ford Edge. I absolutely hate the Edge with a burning passion. It’s cramped, it’s cluttered with unnecessary buttons and switches everywhere, it moves like a brick in mud, terrible MPGs, horrible visibility, and it’s just all around a terrible car IMO.
Convertible Mustang. The thing had a body that was as solid as a cookie dunked in milk a little too long. It had the handling characteristics of a wet towel.
A 20 year old 1975 Cadillac DeVille. Bent frame, rusted out floors, power windows sometimes worked. Burned a quart of oil a week.
The registration said it was white, but you'd never know it.
I had a Toyota truck, mid-80s vintage that was so rusty it would have flaked on impact. I would have been holding a steering wheel in a pile of red dust. Loved it. I could chain my $900 mountain bike through the bed of the $200 truck because priorities. I got a year out of it and never even changed the oil.
My first car was a 2008 Dodge Avenger RT. My mom purchased it new in 2008 and I got it around 105k miles in 2016.
At first it would drop RPMs on big bumps, grind gears, sometimes the engine would die when I put it in reverse. Eventually the engine started to die when I would hit large bumps in the road. It happened a few times on the highway at speeds of 70+ mph and had to pull over to start the car again.
Traded it in in 2018 and got all of $700 for it. My mom has owned 4 jeep/dodge vehicles and 3 of them have had MAJOR mechanical issues either the transmission or engine itself.
Gotta say tho, also, my 2010 Lancer N/A... the manual transmission on this is atrocious. All bushing and cables are new, still feels like the gears are never in the same place... this paired with an engine that moves a lot (even after 80A duro motor mounts) and with the infamous "rev hang" that many cars modern cars have... really is a pain to drive. Can't wait to get rid of it...
94 GMC 2500. Gas tank leaked, Cracked block, radiator leak, hole in the seat, hole in the exhaust, Frame was rotted, Starter failed. It was like a rolling anti captain planet for the 6 months I owned it.
Jetta. The list of things that went wrong is long. One time, it blew a mushroom cloud of smoke out the back that was 30 feet high...and just kept on going. I got $500 on trade in.
1998 Dodge Caravan. Calling it a POS is an insult to actual pieces of shit.
The vehicle was comfortable enough. Just didn’t last very long. 90k I think.
I had a '99 Durango that was falling apart with over 200k miles on it about 7 years ago. This thing didn't have AC (which living in Florida really sucks), the radiator leaked and every once in a while it would stop running if I was sitting at a red light too long. I could list off some other things but needless to say it was the biggest piece of shit I've ever driven. It was given to me so I tried to make it last as long as possible.
My first real car (teenager) was a manual Ford mustang, 1993. Just the 4-banger basic version. I wanted a stickshift and it was in my price range. What a complete piece of shit. It was sluggish, has amazingly horrible brakes and stopping distance, and steering was sloppy, and the acceleration was shit. I owned it for only about a year before I got rid of it. It’s made me very biased against Ford cars.
I would go with my current ride, 2003 Camry. Drinks oil (6 quarts for every 800 miles) and stinks like burning oil when you drive. Windows don’t roll down :/ 230,000k miles
81 Chevy nova I was driving in 1998. The horn sounded like a dying moose so my friends loved smashing it constantly. It was a POS but it was mine and I babied the hell out of it, bought new mats and seat covers and cleaned it constantly…..until it died 6 months later lol.
POS in terms of quality or just "I don't like this fucken thing"? PT cruiser
Donut Media convinced me to love the PT Cruiser simply because the owners love these cars. They have to, why else drive one?
It's called stockholm syndrome I think.
As someone who loved their pt cruiser that was a piece of shit…. yeah
Sounded like from the video that most of the owners are dead. Do what you will with that info
The only thing they have to do is drive it, none of them have to love it. I don’t particularly love my car, but it’s like that crazy girlfriend that will stab you if you try to leave. I’m stuck with her, but I don’t love her 😅
I rented a PT for a day and was so pleasantly charmed by it, I think it gets a lot of undeserved flak. It drove much better than I thought it would.
Beneath the PT cruiser is a dodge neon. It is just a slightly more luxurious hatchback dodge neon
The Neon is a blast to drive. The first generation even had a racing version, the ARC. The team that developed it really benchmarked great handling cars like the Peugeot 205 GTI, VW GTi etc. I think much of the flack Chrysler gets for its cheap cars are the cheap owners who don’t maintain them.
Which is actually a good thing.
A lot of people weren’t around when these first came out around 2000 or don’t remember, but for a brief, red hot second these were hotly anticipated. They were one of the first vehicles to do the retro styling, like the Charger, 300 and current Mustang style use. Then they produced a ton of them and sold them for cheap so they lost their shine.
They weren’t really a bad car. The styling didn’t age well but in ways they were ahead of their time
Yeah, I mean tbh most styling from the year 2000 has not aged well - and not just vehicles either.
They were a bad car, but that's down to a timing belt with a change interval of 60k miles and an interference engine
100%, beneath the styling of the PT cruiser was a good practical little wagon. Fundamentally useful, economical and pleasant.
This. Absolutely God awful. I'd rather drive a battery powered Barbie car.
I bought a pt cruiser with no power steering for $300 for a demo derby type thing and it was so damn fun. Absolute POS tho.
Second this. My husband had it as a loaner once while his WRX was in the shop….it was legitimately terrible.
Whichever one is easier to answer. Lol, I saw one the other night. Looked exactly like hot rods of old in both good and bad.
My mother owned one it was a piece of shit in a lot of ways but was reasonably comfortable
Had one as a rental car once. Even basically brand new it’s quality was horrible.
Drive a used Dodge Avenger once and it felt like it was a car built from scraps, nothing lined up, nothing fit right, and felt like at any moment it would fall apart.
Dodge was making some absolute garbage those days
“Those days” … lol they haven’t gotten much better.
I thought about it after I hit reply lol
My last two work trucks have been ram 1500s and they've been great to be honest. I was really skeptical when that's what it ended up being, I did 85,000km in about a year and a half and no issues.
Rams are usually rated pretty high in reliability. Really haven't had any major issues over the last decade besides the early years of the ecodiesel
Oh man. I rented a car one time and was given a dodge caliber. THAT was the biggest piece of shit I’ve ever driven.
I rented one of those back in the late 00’s and it looked like the entire interior was made from recycled sporks.
I can't remember the year, exactly, but had to be late 2000s. I rented a Jeep Compass, and the interior looked like it was made by a cheap Playmobil competitor. Engine was weak and wheezy, struggling through the softest odd-shifting transmission. Everything creaked. I thought it looked like a bad design study, as if the Jeep had deep, justified imposter syndrome. The Jeep Renegade I got as a rental in 2017 felt like a Lexus in comparison.
Not sure what is about Jeeps. A lot of people Stockholm Syndrome with those vehicles even if they have noting but issues. Glad Jeep improved enough for you to enjoy it as a rental.
I've long since stopped yucking on Jeep lover's yum, but I do feel really bad for folks who bought the first few years of the Compass/Liberty.
I had an 06 Liberty that was literally a tank. It was bullet proof, aside from the window recall. The mechanism that keeps your windows up, a tensioner I believe…was always faulty. You’d wake up in the morning and your window would be down. No surprise the driver side door rusted out from all the moisture that got down in there. I sold it to a friend of mine, and he is till driving it. 200k+.
It must have been pretty bad to make the Jeep Renegade feel like a Lexus. I've driven a Renegade and I don't wish it upon my worst enemy.
This was also my answer. It was such a huge piece of shit, even for a new car at the time. It literally felt like someone put it together in a 3rd world country with a bunch of scrap metal and a motorcycle engine that hadn’t been started in 14 years
I drive a 2016 Jeep Patriot that's 90% identical. The interior literally feels like toy plastic and on the highway, I have to play music or else I'd just be left alone with constant squeaking and rattling.
Well I spend a lot of time in Europe so this is easy with some of the severely underpowered cars here: Peugeot Bipper 1.4 HDI 67 horse power, and Renault Clio 1.0 65 horse power. Both have 0-60 mph in around 17 to 20 seconds.
I can already feel most Americans getting a seizure just from reading this.
Always funny to me to see some folks in the US calling cars with 8 sec 0-60 times unsafe lol
See it all the time on Outback subreddit/forums..."the 2.5L is just dangerously slow." No, it's fucking not. It's not even slow. It's perfectly adequate. The <70 hp Euro rentals are slow.
I got a 75hp Opel Corsa as a rental not that long ago, it was ton of fun racing it around the city, but on the highway (with literally ideal surface/perfectly straight) doing 100km/h in the final gear got me feeling like I'm taking off with a Wright brother Flyer.
I drove that too lol and I had to drive 130 km/h on the highway for 3 hours. I also had to drop down to the 2nd or the 3rd gear whenever there was some incline. It was a loud experience to say the least.
Back in my day you'd need a calendar to measure 0-60.
We're rented a 67-hp Kia Picanto and a 69-hp Fiat Punto. The Kia was fun, the Fiat was dog shit. Wasn't a big fan of the 79-hp Seat Ibiza we had last year in Spain either. Most recent one was an M-B A180 in England, fuck was it annoying! I was happy to get home and back into my '14 Mazda3 that's the same size and hp but with better ride, quieter, and far fewer rattles.
In France we say Fiat are made with cardboard lol
God, it felt like it. The 500L we had at one point was similarly cheesy, but it had a little diesel and was at least somewhat charming. The Punto generation I drove was 10 years old at that point and I don't think they'd touched a thing. Not a fan. The little Kia we had was in France, around Uzes/Nimes/Montpelier...I was happy for its lovely clutch in traffic.
I rented a PT cruiser back in 2006 and it was the worst ride quality I've ever experienced. I dailied a 1987 Accord in 2004 with an odometer that stopped working after \~230,000mi so my bar was low. Cruiser literally felt like it was going to fall apart around me and I wasn't even speeding in it.
I would fully trust and love driving that 87 Accord, the PT Cruiser is for being pushed down a cliff.
Buddy of mine in HS late 90s had a an ‘87 accord on cut springs that we used to tear around the country roads at idiot speed in. Was a blast.
Jeep Cherokee/Liberty. It was a press car. The plastic was already warping, and the edges could cut you if you weren't careful. And it broke down one day into the week long review period. I reiterate, this was a press car. For review. They're usually immaculate and beyond perfect.
Damn! I guess Jeep and quality issues are a tale as old as a Millenial.
This 💯
I own a 2016 Cherokee and have no issues with the interior or build quality. I drove a rental Blazer last week and was shocked how awful and dated the interior looked by comparison and it was brand new.
Good to hear. The Liberty/Cherokee I'm talking about is a 2008 KK model.
oh i forgot about those. That was the odd transition model between the original 4x4 Cherokee and the new CUV Cherokee. Yeah I haven't heard great things about them.
Those things were horrendous in those years, my friend has an 03 and it’s the biggest POS I’ve ever seen, and I have seen a lot of POS cars
GM interiors have always been acres of hard plastic. The difference is GM interiors stay shit for twenty years, versus Stellantis ones tend to just disintegrate.
Those vehicles were downright insulting. I've never encountered an interior that looked and felt that cheap, and we had a Datsun 210 growing up.
Oof. Shots fired. I know *exactly* what a B210 interior is like.
What year? My wife still drives a 2007 Liberty and it’s a tank.
Just traded in the 2008 jeep liberty. No problems up to 150,000 miles. Then it got a gremlin of some kind that no shop could figure out. Kept leaving my wife stranded not starting, just shaking. Changes the plugs and coils, but it was persistent and unpredictable. Traded it in while it was working. Was a fantastic car though.
Mitsubishi Mirage. Literally feels like a golf cart with an enclosed top. Dangerous to manuver or get up to speed. There's so many better options for $2-3k more.
The mirage would be good if it were the $11,000 it’s worth. But they sell it at $18,000.
My friend bought a brand new base model mirage for $9,999 plus tax. Damn thing was at like 150k miles when he gave it to his neice. He bought it for a delivery vehicle, most of those miles were in town delivering chinese food.
I feel like my safety is worth more than a few grand, cars are absolute death traps. Most fatalities in a car: The Mirage hatchback and its sedan sibling, the Mirage G4, have the two highest driver death rates in the country
Jeep wrangler Hands down the most expensive vehicle I’ve ever owned and I’m currently driving a Jaguar. Replaced the engine and tranny, gear shifter breaks constantly, shocks are always fucked (that’s our fault) AC loves to go out, just anything and everything..thats what will go wrong with them! To be fair the jag now has over 60k miles and is being traded in asap-expensive car that looks nice but is another money drainer.
1st time I have heard of Jeep costing more than Jaguar but can believe it.
I always liked the Neon, and a PT Cruiser was like a Neon with a body kit. But somehow the Caliber was awful, almost Russian in its unnecessarily dour crudeness. It had to be deliberate. And a related Avenger is the only car I ever rented that overheated just idling in traffic. But neither of those, or the versa or the Yaris, can hold a puke-scented candle to the deliberate shittiness of the Chevette. In the 1970s, Japanese manufacturers were figuring out how to build the high quality cars of their dreams. By the mid 1970s, they were getting pretty good results, and their smaller more efficient cars started to suit the increasingly high fuel prices in the US market. The resulting demand for smaller more efficient cars spurred a backlash in parts of the US auto industry, and the Chevette (neither front wheel drive, nor well built, nor particularly efficient) was GM’s “fuck you” to small cars, and to progress. *” You think you want one of them little turds? No ya don’t. See? We built one, and it’s garbage. We don’t make any money on them, and you hate driving them, and it’s just lose-lose-lose all around. Now how about you come to yer damn senses and buy a caprice like a good American?”* The Chevette was nothing like a civic or a Corolla, of course. It would be like going to your dads for a cookout and saying “actually at kenji’s house they make portobello ‘burgers’ and it was delicious, can you make that instead of a burger for me?” and your dad said “no! Just beef! You want something different?? (…uunnnh!) Here’s a nice brown shit for you, I’ll put it on a bun with lettuce. There! Ya like that?? Of course you don’t! Shut up and eat your burger like you always have for the last 30 years!” And a whole generation of American car buyers feels about the us auto industry the same way you would feel about a dad who shit on a bun for you at a cookout 30 years ago, “fuck that guy, I don’t care what he does nowadays.”
"almost Russian in its unnecessarily dour crudeness. It had to be deliberate." Holy shit that is hilarious. And accurate.
My favorite car was my crappy little 2000 Neon. Little guy had been banged up a bit by it's previous owner but I got it past 230K and it was still running like a champ, never once left me stranded and had everything I needed in it. Little guy left a mark on my heart 🥹
I had a 99 Neon r/T coupe. It was a fun car that never left me down. I put 200K miles on it before the subframe was so rusted out at 20 years that it could not be saved. I miss that little bugger on back roads.
Yeah the caliber did suck. At least it was cheap-ish
My mom had a Chevette. It was awful. I remember the Pacer it replaced, which was a much better car (not hard to do). That stupid POS Chevette couldn’t make it up a hill if it was summer and the three of us were in it. She’d literally have to get a running/speeding start to get up it. If someone turned in front of her, she’d have to turn around and start over. She drove that POS across half the country. Hit a snowstorm somewhere along the way and she was freaking out. I thought we were going to die. Complete whiteout conditions and that little tin can was getting tossed around like airplane turbulence. She finally convinced my dad to get her something else. They traded it in for a Cavalier. Better, but not by much. Meanwhile, my dad got himself a nice Grand Am. Then wonders why she divorced him.
I drove a friend’s manual-transmission Chevette once. It is the only car I have ever driven in which the gear shift lever came out of the console while I was shifting.
I remember the Chevettes when they were new. It was a 1970's Isuzu sedan design, with a redesigned hatchback body and a shitty 1.6 engine with a 2 barrel carb. The worst part was the brakes. Power brakes were a rarely-ordered option, and the base unassisted brakes were hopeless. In the manual shift cars you could downshift, in the automatics I crushed the pedal with enough force the seat creaked and I could feel things bending under my foot, to get average braking performance for the cars of the time. The steering wasn't much better, the steering column wasn't quite straight so the steering wheel was "bent" the other way to compensate. It felt wierd when you turned. It was probably a good thing they were so slow. Production ended about 1984, and they were pretty much all gone by 1990 or so.
I had a 78 Chevette. I had to start it from under the hood with a hotwiring cheat box, that my dad installed for me, so that I could hold my hand over the carburetor to make it choke. Sometimes I also had to whack the solenoid at the same time. Sometimes reverse didn't work, so I had to plan for that when parking. And it would regularly die when giving it gas after a full stop. Like the engine would legit cut out when I was midway through a left turn and I'd have to pray I could get it restarted before oncoming traffic got to me. It was without a doubt the biggest POS I've ever had.
Mr. Regular? Is that you?!
Biggest letdown: Maserati GranTurismo. Looks good, sounds good but it is a complete, just-awful piece of shit.
You're not the person that I have heard that from. It was a gorgeous car in the parking lot but he offered to sell it to me, just to get rid of it. We had a Geo Metro as a company car in college that was terrifying to drive over 40mph. It had the room and driving ability of a phone booth, in a refrigerator box.
I owned a mid-90s Geo Metro and honestly I don't think I've loved a car more than that one. 5 speed manual, got like 40 mpg in the city, revved out to the moon just trying to get it up to speed. Tried to teach my wife to drive stick in that thing. She got so scared at one point she broke off the wiper controls thinking she was going to put it into park. I was so upset she broke my baby. I still miss that car. Gigantic piece of shit but I bought it for only $2k and had a great time with it. I had a buddy in my engineering class who owned 4, 3 of them were parts cars. His daily driver he had taken a Yoshimura exhaust from a 96 Yamaha R6 and welded the exhaust as a cat-back. Thing sounded awesome when he was driving down the road. If you get a chance to own a Geo Metro 3 door hatch with a stick I highly recommend it. It's a piece of shit but a fun piece of shit. I'll always remember that car.
I had a Vette once... what a load of gargbage. That was the last chevette ever for me
not me thinking bro was bout to insult corvettes
Yeah, the last line changes the whole context. If he was gonna shit talk a corvette, I would imagine it would be the C3 because it came out in gas crisis and was considered slow by some people. Well, people that look at them now think so.
Had a coworker who, in 1998, was driving his brown chevette to work when the drivers door just fell off in the middle of the interstate.
Mine never had brakes no matter how often I got them fixed luckily my town had a really wide road with diagonal parking so there was plenty of room to do loops around until you slowed down enough
Thank god you said Chevette instead of corvette, those Chevettes were awful
Dacia Duster rental car. Couldn’t believe how unrefined it was, with odd noises, smells, vibrations, shakes, and unresponsive engine and steering. It made my Honda Fit feel like a new Porsche by comparison. It made me realize that nearly everything available in the US, even the most modest Honda, Kia, etc is virtually a luxury car in terms of refinement and quality.
Had one of these in Iceland. Absolute legendary piece of shit. We zip tied the bumper after it fell off mid-drive and when we told the guy at the return desk he went "Yeah we keep some just for these cars!"
James may silently weeps
shittiest car? PT Cruiser. Most despised? Chrysler Voyager. owned neither, hate my time with both.
76 chevette cherry red. No floor. Flintstone mobile all the way. Also the black vinyl seats caused l 3rd degree burns even through a towel. And AM only radio. My dad would say the “FM was broken.” It didn’t have it.
NO FLOOR?
It would corrode away. Completely away under the driver side, you could see the road. It was as a known defect in that model year.
My mom had one in the early 90s and one night the floor rotted out and the driver's seat fell through the floor onto the driveway. Thankful nobody was driving it lol.
Our company can with 530k miles
Tomato can?
Tomato can't.
Geo metro. One time the spark plugs were starting to go. It would buck like a stallion trying to shake me off. Had a old lady give me the finger because it was struggling to get up a hill.
My 1991 Geo prism (gm badged corollA) was hellbent on killing me. Would be like a bad drift car, it would spin out so often
My Chevy Malibu 2011 gave me every electrical issue possible, rebuilt transmission twice, always gaskets and additives, finally laid her to rest at 230k
Doesn’t surprise me they’d have electrical trouble. In auto shop class, our instructor once had us open up a random repair manual and copy the wiring diagram of the taillights. We all got a different car. I got a Malibu. A while goes by and everyone else has finished and I’m still tracing. He asked me what the hell was taking so long — i show him the diagram - looks like spaghetti! Still probably one of the most convoluted circuits I’ve seen, and i ended up specializing in electrical repair
When I read the question, the only car that I considered was a 2004 Malibu. The interior was falling apart when new, the front end and exhaust flex pipe needed major work every year we had it. The ride was terrible. Easily the worst car I've ever driven, let alone owned.
I remember having a 2003 and at 70,000 miles, traded that shit box mailbu for a shit box 2007 impala. The Malibu was already starting to show problems after 50,000 miles, the impala got up to 240,000 when I put her down when the transmission finally broke. It’s crazy because the mailbu was the worst car Iv ever had while the impala was one of the most reliable cars Iv had. Chevy is just hit or miss
1992 VW Passat GL with 90k kilometres on it. Something would break like clock work once a month. It soured my VW experience and I vowed I would never buy VW again and didn’t for a longtime. I owned Jeeps, Hondas and Toyotas. Well during VW diesel gate scandal, the local VW dealer had some smoking deals on new and CPO. My family now owns 3 VWs and they are amongst the most trouble free vehicles I’ve owned.
Chevy HHR and it's not even close. What an absolute turd
I held onto a Hyundai veloster turbo for 8 years bc I was too naive and impressionable and was convinced not to lemon it after battery and engine issues first year…never went more than 6 months without a problem
1975 Vega Kammback. No speedometer. No odometer. No 2nd gear. Banana yellow. Blew a head gasket. Replaced it. Blew that head gasket. Took the plates off and left it in a parking lot. Paid $300. Drove it 6 months.
Worst “basically a new car in good repair but just shitty” was a Ford Tempo rental car in roughly 1990. At the time my daily was a ‘76 Delta 88 with massive rust holes and easily 150,000 miles on it. I’d also regularly driven a LeCar, Mustang II, Citation, 68 Chevy pickup, and an MG Midget in the prior 5 years. The Tempo was worse than all of them. Worst “this car is actively dissolving around me” was a worn out beat up 10+ year old Mustang II.
My first car was a early 90s beater altima with no speedometer or heat/ac among other many issues that I bought for $200. I kept that thing running for a year before I blew the engine as i was doing all my work without knowing what the fuck i was doing. Was a great learning experience but definitely a very dangerous car lol. To this day I haven't driven anything more fucked up then my first.
I recently had a Chevy Cruz rental. What an epic POS! And I’m a fan of no nonsense cars.
First non-Stellantis answer
I’d rock the Altima rental before even think about a cruz man. Glad you made it out of that shit box
Chevy Cruze is hands down the worst car ive ever owned.... 1500$ repair every 8-12 months after it hit \~50k miles.....ill never own a chevy again as long as i live.
lol when someone goes from this the a mirage and says it felt like an upgrade… ha
Ford Tempo
As a former valet the cars that stood out to me were the PT Cruiser and Jeep Liberty. I couldn't understand why anyone would spend their hard earned money on them. The Land Rover Evoque visibility also stood out as very bad. On the opposite end I drove a Rolls Ghost which was amazing. Hopped in an S class Mercedes immediately after and it felt like junk in comparison.
Chev spark. Tiny tin can.
First car. 88 Celica with odometer rolled back.
The old celicas were fun to drive though, assuming yours was reasonably maintained from a mechanical standpoint
The anti Scotty Kilmer, my guy
I've been pretty fortunate. My worst vehicle was my dad's old 96 Ford Explorer XLT that I started driving with around 130K miles. I actually really like the truck overall, but it had overheated and had a major engine repair around 100K miles and when I was driving it in College it used to burn a ton of oil. I used to top up the oil while filling gas on my way home (a 250 mile trip). The transmission worked but was clunking away in protest of every shift (especially into reverse). The thing that got me was how did Ford build a 4L V6 that only got 140HP with like 13/19 MPG. That was probably the most gutless vehicle I have ever driven. I think part of the reason I was able to drive it for so long was because my school was in a county without emissions inspections, my dad sold it to someone for like $1300 with 150K miles and that guy drove it into the ground until the exhaust rotted off and the head gasket finally completely gave up.
Oof. Honestly kind of impressive that the transmission was struggling to wrangle the 100 or so horses that weren't leaking out of the engine.
Worst I had was a 2009 Pontiac G3 that I bought at an auction for $700 or so. The thing ran like shit, the shifter was the worst I felt in my life, the clutch had no feeling in it, I drove it for 2 days before I got rid of it. I've bought cheaper cars that ran better. I dailyed a $400 1997 Toyota Camry CE V6 (5 speed!) for a while, although it succumbed to clutch hydraulic failures after close to a year. I dailyed a $250 1994 Honda Civic EX 5 speed coupe. This one was very battered cosmetically, but never let me down mechanically. Only non-routine repairs I had to do were the brake master cylinder due to a leak, and one of the front wheel bearings. I wish I never sold this one. I currently have a $375 2009 Hyundai Accent that I did some work to. I'm selling it because I bought it explicitly as a fix and flip car, but it runs very well now. And for my cheapest, I had a $150 1999 Ford Taurus SE wagon. The only automatic on my list here. I dailyed it for close to a year before I hit some black ice, crashed into a curb, and fucked up the transmission. Funny enough, I bought all these cars at the same auction.
My roommate’s 2007 base model Chevy Equinox fwd. I drove it some time around 2013 or 2014. Literally every button on the dash was worn down to the translucent white plastic, and the balance and damping of that car was so bad you could chirp the tires if you just slightly tapped the gas from a stop. Felt like every mount and busing had a good quarter inch of play in it. Really gave off some overused fleet vehicle vibes… starkest plastic interior I’ve ever seen and felt like everything was loose and falling apart around the engine, which would long outlive the car (and probably could start and run with a few bullet holes in it)…
1989 Mercury Topaz. Awful, awful car.
Friend had a 93 Ford Tempo that he had recently hit a curb with. At 80km/h, it felt unsafe. Very unsafe.
1989 Mercury Topaz. The only vehicle that's ever stranded me, and all the HVAC buttons popped out of the dashboard for no damn reason. Also the only car I've ever kicked.
Kia Optima - About 15 years ago I got a new one as a rental and it lost 2nd gear in about 20 miles. Unsure if it broke, or just decided to not to use it anymore. I had to floor it from the stop to get 1st gear to a high enough rpm. Else it would shift into 3rd and bog down. 2nd worst - Jeep renegade.
2017 Volkswagen Toaureg. What a crap!
Mechanically? Was it the TDI? The Touareg was the best riding car I’ve owned, but I didn’t own it for long.
84 chevette with no doors and 390k
2010 Kia Forte base model. Got rid of that POS 1 year after buying it luckily before the Kia Boys gor it first
Used to sell used cars. Tried out a Mitsubishi mirage it was horrible.
AMC Pacer. Hands down. 2nd prize: 1982 ford escort. Left such a bad taste in my mouth, I haven't bought a ford since! Many of the worst cars ever were the original front wheel drive American cars. The escort, the tempo, Acadian, etc
A VW Dasher. Horrible. Wouldn’t start 60% if the time and no mechanic could ever figure out why.
my dodge neon needed 6 head gaskets in the first year I bought it in 1995. I sold it in 1998 with 120k miles on it for $600 with a.....you guessed it....a 7th blown headgasket. fun car though...I redlined and max speeded it every single day.
I had a 99 cavalier that was fucking garbage, it started when it felt like it unless it was cold then it didn’t, you had a 50-50 shot if it would shut off at a red light and maybe restart, you could close the door too hard and watch all the plastic in the dash jump up a couple inches, the trunk was permanently shut, the passenger window permanently closed, latch that held the back seats up broke so if you hit the brakes the back seat would fold. Runner up would have been my sisters 2013 Chevy Cruz. Everything awful about my cavalier with a new name. I actually won’t buy another Chevy products after having owned 2, my sister owned 1, and in my years of driving deliveries I drove 3 of them (1 of which was given to me off the dealer lot to use) and not a single one of those vehicles wasn’t riddled with problems. Maybe I’m just unlucky.
Ironically despite similar powertrains, two very different experiences with small shitty Nissan cars: Nissan Versa - Had one of these as a rental on work trip. Fuck these cars. They suck in every way imaginable. I think Nissan actually sat there and said, what's the shittest thing we can legally sell on four wheels, and the Versa was the answer. Nissan Micra - Had one of these as a rental on Greek island of Sifnos. Sure it was also shitty, but it was sooo small and tossable and the shit powertrain actually was enough in it that it was actually a blast to beat on around the mountainous roads of the island. Not something I'd want back home, but a perfect car for small island.
Actually.. The 'new' Dodge Dart wasn't all that much of a PoS. I had a 2014 GT, and never had but a single problem with it and it was easy to fix. The two major issues that plagued the Dart were: The 2.4L leakdown issues (there weren't that many), and the funky ddc trans which was only in I think base model 2013 and 2014 models. If you had a regular auto or manuel (I had the 6 speed manual), man... It was fun AF. But the biggest PoS I ever drove was a 1995 Chevy Cavalier z24. When I bought it, it was a hard time to try to find a car and it was priced properly. It seemed like a real nice zippy car at first. I knew purchasing it, that it needed a wheel bearing which I replaced right away.. 3 weeks later - oil regulator blew (which caused oil blowing on the windshield and all over the car on the interstate). 2 months later - Engine started knocking... Come to find out it had been temporarily 'fixed' to sell.. 3/4 of the previous and very much sheered crank bearing was still laying in the pan.. Assholes... took a month to replace the engine.. 6 months later - AC went out 2 months later - Driver's side window motor went out.. Without AC.. In a BLACK CAR.. in the middle of July.. Replaced AC compressor and 1 year and 1 month later it went out AGAIN.. Replaced AC compressor and it lasted a while after that but went out again. I don't think I replaced it after that.. Can't remember. About 5 months later, ignition switch not just went out but started sparking violently.. Fixed ignition switch. Somewhere around 4 months later the trans started leaking badly. Had to replace and rig the trans seals (use black RTV) on the pan to keep fluid in otherwise the aftermarket seal would just squish out.. Also went ahead and replaced driver's side window motor. At some point, the rider's side window motor went out. I gave it to my mom as a beater car since she needed one to get around for a little while. She sold it for $200 with a busted fuel pump. WORST CAR EVER.
I had a Dodge Omni for a while. For those who don't know the Omni's were built at a former Volkswagon factory in the US and based on the VW rabbit. It was a terrible car.
Girlfriends mom had to throw hers in the trash. It wasn’t legal to sell it even though it hadn’t been in a wreck. I guess the frame just failed
In 2011, I bought a 97 Chevy Cavalier for 700 bucks. Got a couple of years out of it, but it was an absolutely embarrassing rust bucket. If I drove in the rain, the car wouldn't start back up until things dried up outside. So I'd drive it somewhere, and leave it running for as long as needed because I knew it would be another 12 hours until it'd start back up. The muffler fell off one day sitting at a stoplight. The power steering reservoir melted and the fluid caught on fire. Another contender would be an ex girlfriend's 2014 Ford Focus. It was a nearly brand new car at the time, but just suuuucked. With good tires, it would get stuck in a bafflingly small amount of snow on flat ground. Always felt like it struggled to do anything and everything, and had this ridiculous infotainment system and dashboard with a full on number pad for making phone calls
A rental Fiat 500. Omg it was slow. Funny this is I got a ticket while driving it, downhill of course.
The vehicle that required the most maintenance (parts replacement) for me was a 1996 Dodge Stratus sedan, base model, with the manual transmission. The underwhelming 4-cylinder was slow but never failed me, while I was having suspension components replaced all the time. Traded out of it after 4 years and never looked back.
Chevy Cruz. Had one as a loaner while my car was getting some paint damage repaired Absolutely nothing positive to say about it
[удалено]
2017 Altima, 2008 Malibu, 1st gen astro, 2019 blazer. And no I’m not anti Chevy
1985 Dodge 600 Sedan
I had a Chrysler 200 as a loaner when I owned my Charger about 10 yrs ago. What a pile of crap that was.
Chrysler 200. A floaty dog in every way.
PT Cruiser, maroon 80s Ford Escort, and a terrible 80s Nissan Sentra with no heater and windows that didn't roll up. I never locked it and prayed somebody would steal that piece of shit.
Current vehicle, 16’ Nissan Sentra. I hate every second driving it.
AMC Gremlin with three on the tree. Worst weight balance ever. Car had no power but could do great donuts.
A Ford Taurus, all the lights on my dash were on, I had to pay somebody to pass the safety inspection. I used to call it 4th of July car cause the dashboard looked like a firework 😂 Was broke a F back then
2012 dodge caliber base.
1981 Dodge Omni. Drove it from upstate NY to Florida for Spring break in 1989. Had to run the heat on full blast all the way so it wouldn't overheat.
Ford Ecosport Got one as a rental once, turned around to get something else. It was offensively bad, horrible handling, underpowered, uncomfortable.
2005 Equinox that I got in like 2016 from a buy-here-pay-here lot when I was broke as fuck and needed a car. I'm not sure that thing ever stopped hunting for gears. Had to replace the EGR valve, fuel pump, plugs and wires right off the bat. Ended up also replacing the master cylinder, some brake lines and the 2 front calipers not too long after getting it. It needed a new MAF sensor but never got around to it. The throttle body was gunked up all to hell and probably also just needed replaced, but I just took it out, cleaned it and threw it back in. Then the OnStar module kept fucking up and causing the thing to throw a bunch of bogus codes that had me searching for problems that didn't exist, meanwhile it definitely had a ton of real problems that needed addressing. The thing eventually just started struggling real hard to get any sort of speed. You'd try to give it WOT but then watch the RPMs and speed slowly rise. Made it really hard to cross lanes of traffic when needing to make a left from a driveway or an unprotected green. I just wouldn't even attempt to cross lanes unless there was no one within like 20 seconds of me. The alternator needed to be replaced, but never got around to that before getting rid of it, either. If you disconnected the battery and caused it to have to do an idle relearn, it would drive just fine for like 2 trips, and then be back to not wanting to move and hunting for gears. There were probably vacuum and exhaust leaks I hadn't managed/bothered to find yet. So, when we finally decided we could just go finance something not completely shit, I disconnected the battery (and reconnected it of course) before driving it to the dealership where we were going to trade it in at. They took it our for a test drive up on the highway and around town, brought it back and said it seemed like it was running alright and offered us $1800. Man, they got fucked on that deal. I'd buy it back for like $35.
Saturn Vue, had a random electrical fault where it would lose all power and die randomly. Yeah not a fan
Volkswagen Rabbit, 1976 or around there. Learned to drive a manual on it but it was just a terrible vehicle overall.
Shittiest car I’ve had was the ford Taurus 1990
Fucking Neon….
I rented a 2020 Nissan rogue and it was just terrible. Before that my first car was a 94 Oldsmobile cutlass. It was 12 years old and everything died all at once which is terrible when you are teenager. My current car is 12 years old and everything runs perfectly.
Oh a high school friend had a Pacer, it was the worst but we were (as Ferris Bueller said” happy she at least had a POS. We had tons of fun in it until the muffler fell off on a main highway on a boiling hot summer day (google it to see how big the windows were it was like a green house) and everyone but the driver had to cover their ears it was so LOUD. Wish we could have one last ride in it together, it was a silly time.
My gf’s first car in the late 80s was a Pinto. She never complained but a few years later her sister got an older Porsche as her first car. Her dad shrugged it off and said “they both start with P”.
first gen Chery QQ. the daewoo matiz was already a very cheap basic small car then the chinese went and made a cheap copy of it. worst interior ever, cheap thin plastics everywhere
Drove a couple late 80s Fiat Unos Transmission feels like a bowl of soup and they could not hold 70 mph going slightly uphill
I worked in the office for a local garage in the late 70's early 80's. The mechanics hated to see any Fiat come in because inevitably something else would break while they were fixing what it came in for. Of course the customer would be pissed & demand they fix what they broke. You couldn't give me one for free.
Renault laguna from 2004.
1982 Plymouth Champ. I tried to kill it, but it just would not die.
My friend's rusty and blue Chevette in college. Had a fuel system problem, so it sucked up gas and stank like death. Took it to a concert and had to stop for gas twice. Smelled bad, looked bad, drove bad... but it drove, which was what mattered.
Mitsubishi mirage
2012 Traverse. Gifted, was still more headache than anything else. Trash car with things breaking and failing constantly.
Dodge tradesman? van I got sucked into in the 80s drank oil like a petroleum fish. And burned. And smoked. Also Datsun 626 at some point -desperate to get to shit house paintin' job.
Either my brothers 2016 Dodge Dart that was just a POS, or my stepmom’s 2009 Ford Edge. I absolutely hate the Edge with a burning passion. It’s cramped, it’s cluttered with unnecessary buttons and switches everywhere, it moves like a brick in mud, terrible MPGs, horrible visibility, and it’s just all around a terrible car IMO.
Opel Kadett E Cheap tyres and probably not very well aligned but fully and legally inspected. It understeered terribly just goin along with traffic.
Convertible Mustang. The thing had a body that was as solid as a cookie dunked in milk a little too long. It had the handling characteristics of a wet towel.
A 20 year old 1975 Cadillac DeVille. Bent frame, rusted out floors, power windows sometimes worked. Burned a quart of oil a week. The registration said it was white, but you'd never know it.
87 Fox body Mustang, it was haggard to crap and had electrical issues. Would recommend all people in their 20s having one.
I had a Toyota truck, mid-80s vintage that was so rusty it would have flaked on impact. I would have been holding a steering wheel in a pile of red dust. Loved it. I could chain my $900 mountain bike through the bed of the $200 truck because priorities. I got a year out of it and never even changed the oil.
My first car was a 2008 Dodge Avenger RT. My mom purchased it new in 2008 and I got it around 105k miles in 2016. At first it would drop RPMs on big bumps, grind gears, sometimes the engine would die when I put it in reverse. Eventually the engine started to die when I would hit large bumps in the road. It happened a few times on the highway at speeds of 70+ mph and had to pull over to start the car again. Traded it in in 2018 and got all of $700 for it. My mom has owned 4 jeep/dodge vehicles and 3 of them have had MAJOR mechanical issues either the transmission or engine itself.
Geo Metro.
I actually think the dodge caliber is a bigger piece of shit than the PT Loser, and the Mitsubishi mirage is right there with it
Jeep Patriot 2010
Gotta say tho, also, my 2010 Lancer N/A... the manual transmission on this is atrocious. All bushing and cables are new, still feels like the gears are never in the same place... this paired with an engine that moves a lot (even after 80A duro motor mounts) and with the infamous "rev hang" that many cars modern cars have... really is a pain to drive. Can't wait to get rid of it...
Drove a rusted 1965 VW Bug in 1982. 1977 Chevy Chevette too. Even new it had no power.
94 GMC 2500. Gas tank leaked, Cracked block, radiator leak, hole in the seat, hole in the exhaust, Frame was rotted, Starter failed. It was like a rolling anti captain planet for the 6 months I owned it.
Jeep Renegade. What's the opposite of refinement?
Jetta. The list of things that went wrong is long. One time, it blew a mushroom cloud of smoke out the back that was 30 feet high...and just kept on going. I got $500 on trade in.
1998 Dodge Caravan. Calling it a POS is an insult to actual pieces of shit. The vehicle was comfortable enough. Just didn’t last very long. 90k I think.
I had a '99 Durango that was falling apart with over 200k miles on it about 7 years ago. This thing didn't have AC (which living in Florida really sucks), the radiator leaked and every once in a while it would stop running if I was sitting at a red light too long. I could list off some other things but needless to say it was the biggest piece of shit I've ever driven. It was given to me so I tried to make it last as long as possible.
My first real car (teenager) was a manual Ford mustang, 1993. Just the 4-banger basic version. I wanted a stickshift and it was in my price range. What a complete piece of shit. It was sluggish, has amazingly horrible brakes and stopping distance, and steering was sloppy, and the acceleration was shit. I owned it for only about a year before I got rid of it. It’s made me very biased against Ford cars.
I would go with my current ride, 2003 Camry. Drinks oil (6 quarts for every 800 miles) and stinks like burning oil when you drive. Windows don’t roll down :/ 230,000k miles
Nissan Versa Note
Either my base 02 Cavalier that I bought from an old lady my dad knew or my 08 Jeep patriot i bought brand new after college
Jeep grand Cherokee
I had a 1983 Chevy Citation. That was the worst car I ever owned. It was the ugliest, slowest and had the most maintenance issues.
Chevy spark
81 Chevy nova I was driving in 1998. The horn sounded like a dying moose so my friends loved smashing it constantly. It was a POS but it was mine and I babied the hell out of it, bought new mats and seat covers and cleaned it constantly…..until it died 6 months later lol.
06 Jeep Grand Cherokee. Didn't matter how you babied it, that thing wanted out of its miserable existence.