[IancoleTX]

2011 VW GTI. Every bit a cheap, poorly-designed, gutless turd. I couldn't be rid of that thing soon enough.

edit> seeing some 135i hate in here. I absolutely loved my '11 135i. One of my favorite BMWs ever

[Wolfus Aurelius]

I'd have to throw it down to the '84 Ford Escort 4-door. White, a dark gray plaid cloth-and-vinyl interior, A/C (it helped to turn it off if you wanted to run uphill), 1.6L sewing-machine engine. I came to it after a bad experience with a '74 Volvo that burned up while I was driving it, saying, "No more foreign cars." Well, the Escort stranded me or cost me a big repair almost every year of the 6.5 years I owned it -- and my finances were very weak then, so each problem seemed bigger than it would today. Car died in the middle of a city street on a hot August day; timing belt broke as I got off the bridge at two a.m. outside a housing project; and more. Finally a tire went out. As I sweated to change it, I said, "This relationship is over."

Shopped that week and found a nice silver '89 Olds Cutlass coupe, very quick and comfortable, and it never stranded me. Literally, I never looked back.

[Wolfus Aurelius]

Originally Posted by rbhjr01462

1987 Sterling 825sl. Instrument cluster would shut down for a second or two then come back to life. Rocker panels behind front wheel well rusting after 18months, steering wheel would find itself off center by 15-30 degrees after a few months after being realigned again. Had car for 2 years - had a real nice interior and a good Honda sourced V6, but, yikes, the electronics and interior/exterior hardware were a mess.

Haven't heard of, or seen, a Sterling in about that long. I recall a radio ad around the time with a posh-sounding lady saying, "The only car I ever cared for was a Jag . . . until I drove a Sterling."

Who sold those, Honda?

[Viffermike]

Originally Posted by stbm5

2002

That'd be a MkIV, which had a few quality quirks -- brittle window regulators, for one. I had to replace one on my '02 when the passenger-side window wouldn't go back up ...

... but that's the only major thing that went wrong on that car, which was chipped, cat-backed, bedazzled with self-installed VDO gauges, and had an upgraded stereo, among other things.

Mine was made in Brazil. Some MkIVs were still made in Germany; It tended to be those that had issues. Sorry yours did, but overall the MkIV was not a terrible car by any stretch -- it was the MkIII that had the severe quality issues that compelled VW to begin righting its ship with the MkIV and concurrent Jettas and Passats.

(BTW, worse car I owned: 2004 Jeep Liberty. HATED it. Glad it was stolen, though the '05 Wrangler that replaced it wasn't much better. At least that had some, uh, 'character' ... )

[GTFM3]

Originally Posted by Wolfus Aurelius

Haven't heard of, or seen, a Sterling in about that long. I recall a radio ad around the time with a posh-sounding lady saying, "The only car I ever cared for was a Jag . . . until I drove a Sterling."

Who sold those, Honda?

As I recall, they were a version of the Acura Legend, but built in UK. Don't know who sold them. They weren't a Legend, that's for sure.

[Red Bread]

Yep, a Rover joint venture with Honda. A Legend chassis with Honda V6, but Rover suspension tuning, and their body and interior. Surprised to see they sold 35k of them.

[TSM330i]

I had a 1987 Chevy Blazer (full-size) for a hot minute. I was young and had a 1965 Corvette coupe that I thought I was going to trailer to shows etc. What a mistake!
It was a manual transmission with the first gear as a creeper, so useless. The clutch went and the pivot for the clutch broke on a trip. The air-conditioning didn't work and the power windows stopped working (hot wired them to get them to work). After a few months of ownership I decided that I'm not going to trailer anything with this thing and sold it. What a POS.
I got a 1988 Jeep Wrangler that I kept for six years and loved every minute of it! No issues at all with the Jeep other than a leaky windshield gasket that I changed myself. Loved doing my own oil changes on that thing - didn't need to jack the car up. Just slid under it.

[SteveinArizona]

A close call between a Ford Festiva and a Dodge Neon. .

[purextc]

1984 dodge Shelby charger. that thing had a coolant leak in a different place like every week it seemed. Replaced the clutch cable 3 different times.

[1QuikWS6]

My wife's Chrysler Sebring Convertible with the 4cyl engine

[bravehart38]

Saab 9-3 Aero. Fun car when it was running which wasn’t very often. Didn’t do my homework as I started to notice most of the parts under the hood had GM stamped on them.

[pz619]

Mazdaspeed Protege. It was a great little sport compact when everything worked right, the problem is, it never actually worked right. I picked up this car over a civic si and I regretted it.

Charge Pipe - would routinely blow off. You N55 guys that lose charge pipes have nothing on this car. And by routine, I would carry all the tools I need in the glovebox to reattach the pipe to the turbo on the side of the road. Also, speaking of charge pipe, it had an accordion section which would actually expand under boost because the plastic was so weak. The result was a pretty erratic engine performance and power.

Heatsoak - the intercooler was hilariously tiny and a side mount. Also since it was parked next to and behind the radiator, it probably heated up the charged air more than it cooled it.

Suspension - Had a weird problem where the rear of my car would be higher than the front. Had this kind of funny drag car rake to the profile. Rear suspension replaced under warranty but sort of didn't matter. It would self destruct bushings at an alarming rate.

Tune - The engine management was so piss poor Mazda eventually recalled it to install new software. When they tuned it, it was pretty obvious all they did was add more fuel to the existing map NA protege map. It ran so rich that plugs would foul at crazy low mileages and people were blowing out stock cats well before they should have. They called it the "surge" because it would run so rich, then the ECU would adjust, then you get power. It had the lag of a T4 turbo but was actually a T25.

Wheels - the Racing Hart wheels it came with were basically made from play dough. Granted the stiff suspension that destroys bushing don't help, but bent wheels were common. Eventually replaced with a forged set which eliminated the problem.

Sound system - came with a kenwood system including a sub which was super cool for young me. The downside is that the amp wasn't up to the task and was mounted upside down (this was intentional) in the trunk. Because it was bolted onto a cheap plastic housing amp would overheat and then slightly warp/discolor the plastic housing it was on. Turns out the cooling fins really only work when facing up and shouldn't be mounted in a plastic tub that traps in heat. Also, head unit failed under warranty and Kenwood stopped making that model. So was replaced with a different model, which also failed. Eventually replaced with an Alpine unit.

Anyhow, all the problems were a great learning experience. It forced me to be hands on and actually taught me how to take care a lot of these problems myself. I would never recommend this car and it completely turned me off to the Mazda brand, but it made the car enthusiast you see today, for better or for worse. But seriously, fuck that car.

[340ix17]

2000 VW Jetta - Once the radiator went could never get it to run properly. Coasted into a dealership and traded it in.

2003 Ford Taurus - Transmission died while driving one of the busiest highways in MA. Steering wheel locked up and had to force it off the road. When I think of lousy cars, usually it comes to preference, but in this case the car nearly killed me!

[Red Bread]

Ha, funny. My dad had an FD RX7 that would blow the stock charge pipes off nearly every time you drove it. Easy to fix with aftermarket ones, but Mazda clearly wasn't paying much attention on Charge Pipe Day at car school.

[forza1976]

2002 IS300. Horrible car, and slow as molasses. Lexus basically sucks from start to now!

[Germanauto]

I grew up in a GM family. My dad got cheap leases so naturally we had them.

A list of shitboxes, all which were new by the way:
- Multiple Chevy Blazers and GMC Jimmys
- GMC Envoy
- Pontiac Trans Sport/Montana
- Cadillac SRX (least shitty)

Literally the only GM product that didn't suck was my dad's '05 Saab 9-5. Saab hadn't been beaten with the GM stick yet so their products, dealership network, and service were very well-differentiated. The brand didn't feel like a subsidiary of GM at all. It's too bad Government Motors hit Saab with badge engineered nonsense at the end and killed 'em off. Under the right management they could've had a renaissance like Volvo.

As a family we moved onto the likes of Audi, BMW, Lexus, and Toyota. Never looked back!

[See5]

E90 335. Only because of how insanely unreliable it was.

It was great when it ran correctly though.

Originally Posted by WestRace

Well it's a GM. I would say all pre - 2008 GM cars are garbage.

I don't agree. My '99 Corvette was used and abused and took it like a champ. At 120K miles it put down 355whp with boltons and with the suspension upgrades I had no problem running down cars way, way more expensive than it at the track. Miss that POS.

[Germanauto]

Originally Posted by vandridine

My dad bought a 2004 Cadillac deville and owned it for a little under 4 years. In those 4 years the engine was rebuilt 3 times and the transmission was rebuilt 4 times. When he sold it both the engine and transmission were on their way out again.

After he sold it, his sales rep told him they were having these problems with all the deville's and there was nothing they could do to fix the problem. He hasn't bought an American car since and only buys Japanese and German cars now.

Let me guess, Northstar V8?

My pops used to be an engineer at GM and would readily admit how fkin bad the company was. He got out before they went belly up and couldn't be happier. Makes 3x as much money and is much more appreciated and respected than at that nepotism-laden turd.

[Germanauto]

Originally Posted by forza1976

2002 IS300. Horrible car, and slow as molasses. Lexus basically sucks from start to now!

My DD is a 2nd gen 2012 IS250.

Slow as molasses I agree, and was a cut below the 3-series at the time (E90) in every way, but still a pretty decent car! Tight steering that puts the F30 (and probably G20) to shame.

Lexus has made a few legit products in its day. Most have been dressed up Toyotas but the IS-line has been a good product in its 2nd and 3rd gens.

[SteveinArizona]

A close call between two commuter cars ... a Ford Festiva and a Dodge Neon. They don't even make a car if you combine them.

[Alfisti]

Originally Posted by bravehart38

Saab 9-3 Aero. Fun car when it was running which wasn’t very often. Didn’t do my homework as I started to notice most of the parts under the hood had GM stamped on them.

What year? I've been driving an 08 2T for near 10 years and it's been pretty solid.

[jlo0109]

Sixth Gen Camry.