VCCA Home Forums GENERAL DISCUSSION General Discussions Worst Three Cars You Ever Had and Why

New thread and because the ones we list may trample on familiar ground in the club, some explanation may be in order. Mine are:

a. I969 Chevette. Bought it to save on gas. It loped like riding a horse, no room, and no pleasure to drive. With wife and 5 kids, it was very tight inside. How could Chevrolet have done this? (No answer needed. It was what it was.)

b. One of those Olds with a Diesel in it. Don't remember the year. Nice care after I spent a bundle changing out the diesel to a gas engine. Still, I wasn't sad to see it go. Sold it a giveaway price.

c. 1975 Chevrolet Convertible. Gray, white inside with black top. Couldn't wait to get it and couldn't wait to get rid of it. Drunk gas, when driven in the rain, water came through in buckets where the top and windshield met. Traded it even for a 66 Mustang GT Convertible. Still got the Mustang, but body-wise it ain't nothing to bragg about.

BTW: Don't badmouth anything too much. You may step on sensibilities, which is not the intent here. And, I'll guarantee that, whatever make, model and year you post here, there'll be someone who will say that one of them is the best car they ever had. So tread lightly. Please.

Charlie

Vega - could never get the front brakes to stop squeaking.
Ford Tempo - Need I say more, head gaskets, strut bearings, head gaskets, seizing part under the hood, and on and on.
Sunfire - parts with a short lifespan.. Kinda biodegradable.

Never had a terrible vehicle even though I drag home clunkers and get them running,I do stay away from FWD cars and anything newer then 95.

1987 Plymouth Horizon
Choke, carb. problems mostly. Hard to come up with two more. They were all pretty good.
Neil

1992 Buick Roadmaster Wagon, a huge POS great looking car had to put a new 700R4 in it every 18-25,000 miles. I was in the parking lot at Hershey last year and there was a bunch of guys saying how great they were, I guess if I paid only $1,000 it might not have been all that bad but as I recall it was close to $40,000 in 1992 more than a few of the Caddy's

1974 340 Duster way to many clutches, and water leaks, body was made in a soup can factory. Fast but very fragile broke when ever I beat on it

1988 Ford LTD Wagon, nice looking car but the oil pan rotted out, and it was on the shelf at the local Ford Dealer, parts manager said it was common, need I say more..

Jeff the best cars I owned were made after 1996

John

I want nothing to do with the OBD II (96 and newer) vehicles since if you fart wrong in them it will set off the check engine light.

first car 1958 ford .used more oil then gas. 1968 corvette looked good motor ran good. never knew when lights.wipers.brake.would work even left it at chevy dealership.sold it for 5000 dollars had 5 cars then..

have always had GM cars and trucks so haven't ever had a worst car. mike

1962 Corvair with Monza engine and PG, purchased new. Could not keep ignition points in it and the oil pressure sending unit split filling the entire fresh air heating system with smoke, never could get the smell out of it. On top of that the condensation would freeze in the heat system and about 15 minutes of running all the windows would frost up from the inside. 1955 Chevrolet station wagon, ball joints at 18,000, new mast jacket at about 25,000, broken piston, and hard start after running all day. (starter would not turn it over).

I had a 1985 ford LTD company car with a V/6 that lasted me about two months. I knew another employee that had a 1985 Impala with a 305 that was a really strong ford guy, and we traded. I had to do all the paper work, but I drove the Chevy for 160K miles before I had to trade it in for a leased car.

The owned car that I thought was a dud was a 1972 orange hatch back Vega that we bought for our daughter when she left her husband and drove the wheels off 20K before she went back to her hubby, he turned out to be easier to live with than her daddy. My wife drove it to work for two more years, before we traded in in on a 1980 Buick Le Sabre. It was a tough little bugger, leaked oil and ATF, but never failed to start and run, absolutely no power with a 4 banger and powerglide, and AC.



I haven't owned anything besides a GM car or truck since my brother and I went partners on a 1950 Studebaker Champion overdrive car work car,that used hardly any gasoline but drank a couple of quarts of bulk oil a day. I drove a lot of ford company cars that were gas guzzlers, but gave good service.

1. My first car, a Corvair Monza coupe. 4spd trans and just had no power. Heater stunk up the interior and I put a rod thru the block downshifting.

2. Got out of the Navy in 72 and bought a brand new Vega GT because all my buddies had them. We all hot rodded them and mine lasted 27,000 miles when I burned two valves and scored three cylinders. I was lucky to get a replacement engine under the GM fix for the problem and quickly sold it.

3. Non other, but I did learn a lesson to stay away from cheap trendy cars with small displacement engines.

A 1969 Camero rs! I still get upset thinking about it. It was a limited edition thing called a Snowbird. I bought it new in Hampton, VA. It was white with a white vinyl top and a luggage carrier on the trunk. It looked sharp! It had black and white hounds tooth upholstery, a wooden steering wheel, and about all the accessories you could think of. I don't remember the engine/transmission combination but it was a small V8. The first thing I noticed was that when it rained, the windows leaked. I took it back for adjustment and the windows were so tight, the power to them would not put them down. The padded dash was cut too short and kept coming out at the bottom. They replaced that. The carpet was cut too short and kept falling out from under the console. They replaced that but covered up the dimmer switch in the process. The transmission made a noise on occasion that sounded like a spinning ratchet. I took it back again and they had a service bulletin describing the problem as sounding like a spinning ratchet. They told me they could not do anything about it unless they actually heard the noise. I left the car with them a week and they claimed they never heard it (I guess they didn't realize the car had to be moving). There were no lemon laws then but I certainly had the car back often enought to qualify if there had been. I finally got so fed up I went to the dealership and let the general manager have it right on the showroom floor. He asked me to go into his office but I declined stating I had purchased the car on the floor and I was going to complain about it on the floor. They finally "gave" me a new car of my choice at their cost. Even so, I lost $2,000.00 in about 4 months. The 1970 Impala I got was an excellent car. Beamer

It was probably built at the Norwood Ohio plant,I heard some stories about that place and I understand why it was closed.

#1 worst: 2001 Dodge Ram pickup. Three engines by 10K miles..nuf said there.
#2 worst: My first car, a '58 T-bird. It had been wrecked and cobbled back together. The engine leaked & burnt oil, the tranny leaked & slipped and only one of the electric windows worked.

No number three all the rest have lived up to expectations.

I just noticed this thread is about the worst 3 cars you ever had so I guess I still have 2 coming. I will keep them much shorter than the blurb above about my '69 Camaro. The second worst car I ever owned was a 1992 Dodge Dakota. I bought it new and drove around for a year and a half with a broken throttle body. One day I was almost hit by a semi when I had to keep one foot on the gas to keep it running while my other foot was on the brake to stop at a light. It had been in the shop more times than I can count but on the way home, I dropped it off there again and told them I was not driving it again until the had it fixed. That is when they finally discovered that problem. The list of other problems is far to long to put here. The third worst one I had was a 1995 Toyota extended cab small pickup. I bought that new also. It had a vibration which they admitted but claimed they couldn't do anything about it. I complained to the District and they said the dealer said there wasn't anything wrong with it. I just sold it to a guy who wasn't concerned about the vibration. I drove Toyotas for about 25 years up until then; had 5 new ones including two other trucks and several used ones and never had a problem so I guess the '95 was just a fluke, but I never bought another one!! Beamer

Tiny- What engine was in that Dodge Ram? I had a 99 with the 318 and 100,000 mi-one tune up- and one brake job-towed my 32 or 51 to all the 6 cyl tours and even got 13.5 mpg towing! on the other hand my 83 S10 Blazer purchased used one year old and 15,000 miles I could not keep out of the shop.Probably most problems were dealer created , but after 4 years and 23 shop visits (all dealer or GM covered) I got rid of it.

A Corvair, year unknown but that's ok because apparently it was pieced together and nothing matched. The starter was held in by bailing wire. As hard as everyone tried we never could get a starter that would bolt in to it. The engine was a different year than the body and if I remember correctly the trans-axle was also different.

It would start ok until it got cold and then the starter wouldn't work correctly. I forget what was wrong with it. Fortunately it had a standard transmission and I was young so I could push start it by myself. I built a ramp in my drive way and I would back up it so I could roll off it in the morning and get it started. Whenever the temperature dipped to around freezing it required more of a roll. About a 1/4 mile from my house was an empty lot that sat at the top of a hill. If I knew it was going to get cold I would leave it there for the night and push it down the hill to get it started.

The heater worked very well, I do remember that. Unfortunately it only worked when it wasn't needed.

I sold it for a case of beer. I hated to cheat the man like that but it was too good of a deal to turn down.

It was the 318. My previous truck was a '94 Ram with the 318 & it was a great truck so I ordered it's twin in '01. Dodge was ending production of the 318 in '01. The first engine had a rod knocking. The second sounded like marbles rattling around in the cylinders above 3K RPM. I got rid of if before I could discover what if anything was wrong with the third engine. I assume the tooling to build the 318 was overdue for replacement and they figured it was cheaper to settle a few warranty claims than to replace the tooling on a discontinued engine.

#1 - Bought new, 1967 Benz 200Diesel - great fuel mileage at 30 mpg and fuel at 15 to 17 cents a gallon than. Strange rattle in eng after a couple thousand miles. Valve seat came loose and rattled up and down with valve. Replaced head - than again - than again - than again - than again. After 5 heads and 24k, replaced complete eng. Few thousand miles later, wife driving and me taking nap in back seat, looked over her shoulder and saw heat guage out of site. Traced it to a loose block drain plug, just a couple of threads left holding it in. Drove it into farmers place, tightened up plug and filled it with nice cold water. Traded it the next day.

#2 - My Dads Buick Century 4.3 diesel purchased shortly after his death. In the couple of years of ownership, poured several thousand in that thing replacing everything that kept going wrong with it. After second tranny started going, oil in water etc. happily drove it to junk yard and said good-bye.

#3 - My first "good car", my 49 Chevy. God how I miss that car!! In 1st year of owning, went through 6 trannys and on the 3rd eng. Trannys were no doubt my fault, but eng did well chewing on Fords for main course, but liked to eat its own valves for desert! Wouldn't swallow valves racing, just driving down the road. Dad traded it off when I was in Navy, his heart in right place, but man-o-man was I upset when I got the letter. Wanted to keep that car forever!! God bless my Dad for what he was and I sure will miss him forever.

Jim.

I've never owned one but i've heard the Chevy GEO was an absolute chevrolet ugly duckling that may qualify for a chevrolet WHAT WERE YOU THINKING moment