what was the worst car you ever owned?

[Kaleigh]

I had a Mercedes Benz station wagon, it was a demo from the dealer''s wife who is a good friend. But right after I got it, it needed a new transmission. He took it back and gave me a sedan.

 

[luvmyhalo]

a Mazda Miata. Can''t remember what year it was. POS!!!!!

 

[MichelleCarmen]

Date: 2/13/2009 1:52:52 PM
Author: appletini

--check engine light would come on for various things, which meant wasting my time at the dealership

Ah, the infamous check engine light drives me nuts! This is no joke: THREE of the cars I''ve owned had/have that problem. For no reason the light would come on, then go off and then sometimes stay on for days. The Nissan I owned around 12 years ago had the light go on and simply never went off. I drove around with it like that for a couple of years!

My husband''s light also stays on for days at a time.

What is the deal?

 

[OUpearlgirl]

1991 Acura Legend.

I put oil in it at least once a week.. The steering wheel made clicking noises when I turned, the cassette player wouldn''t work, and it smoked out the back.

 

[Dancing Fire]

OU
sounds like my 89 Mazda truck. when i pull into a gas station,i would check the gas and fill up the oil.

 

[OUpearlgirl]

Date: 2/13/2009 7:06:35 PM
Author: Dancing Fire
OU

sounds like my 89 Mazda truck. when i pull into a gas station,i would check the gas and fill up the oil.

Haha yes! It got expensive.

 

[FrekeChild]

Date: 2/13/2009 1:13:32 PM
Author: lyra
A 1981 Volvo diesel that looked beautiful (fluid rounder classic lines), but left thick black smoke everywhere, died on us on a freeway, left pools of oil everywhere and just generally always had something wrong with it. It was my husband's parent's car, and we bought it from them in 1995 I think. The funny part is we sold it at our garage sale of all things! Someone asked if it was for sale and DH said sure, why not, and we got $900 cash. We were moving across the country and it cost more to insure than it was worth at the time anyway.

This sounds familiar...

I had a 1981 Volvo Diesel too, that would conk out going around corners, and I'd have to get up to 60mph to be going 45 at the top of a hill. The good news about it was that my parents bought it for $1k from my dad's friend, and we traded it in for $1k at the car dealership. I had had it a year.

ETA: At the end of its life, it welded it's own engine together because it was running so hot. The auto repairman told us to get rid of it as soon as we could, so we took it right over to my dad's friend's dealership. Which led to another bad car, but that's another story. (1999 Pontiac Grand Am GT)

 

[LGK]

My first car was a 1987 Hyundai. Boy, was that sucker INTERESTING. It sounded like a... I don''t know, a muffler-less POS?... by the time it died. I have *no clue* how it passed emissions ever. It burned so rich, it would blow holes in catalytic converters in like weeks. It also burned mass quantities of oil, had an unfixable clicking axle, and by the time it died, I counted eight separate, distinct loud noises it made. Squealing belts and backfires were part of it, as well as the loud clicking every time you turned right. And when you turned it on, you had to STOMP on the accelerator to warm it up, or it would die. It wouldn''t run at all until it was perfectly warmed up, and it would sound like a bomb going off while it warmed up, complete with clouds of blue smoke. Finally the vast amounts of oil it leaked kept making the timing chain slip, and it had an "interference" piston set up where if the timing got screwed up you could wreck the pistons. Well, it finally did. I was thankful actually. I''d sworn I''d drive it until it died for good, and I did. I think it was at 120K when it died, probably around 2004 or so. Oh, and like every single piece of plastic in the car had broken. Door handles, sun visor etc. Fun!

My 2002 Ford Focus, which died this last month, also gets the POS award. It had a porta-swamp- an unfixable leak. Well, I''d spent several hundred and weeks trying to get the leak fixed and no luck, so I had pretty much given up. I sprouted some poppy seeds on the back carpet at one point- awesome! My DH also KEPT throwing his newspaper down into the swamp pit, and guess who had to then extract moldy dripping newspaper. I begged him to stop doing that but he never did. The Focus just stopped running one day- apparently it had about three things go critically wrong all at once, and the cost to fix the known problems (of course there may have been more) was way more than the car was worth to begin with.

The Focus at least had an excuse. It was a salvage title car I''d paid $2K for. It was actually great for a good number of years, and was fairly fun to drive, at least until the advent of The Swamp.

 

[LaurenThePartier]

I''ve had 13 VW/Audi products in my life, a Subaru, a Toyota, a Honda motorcycle, and one Porsche.

The 1991 Passat I had was AWFUL. I think I was on my 5th water pump by the time I traded it for the 81 911SC.

All of the rest of my VWs/Audis have been great, aside from a 1995 Audi Cabriolet that had a constant oil leak, but proved to be fairly bullet proof despite it.

 

[AmberGretchen]

Dodge Neon.

I was the middle car in a 3-car accident on the Long Island Expressway, and that thing crumpled like a tin can, and the airbags didn''t even activate

I was lucky that me and the colleague I was driving walked away from that accident - the car was only 3 years old and had super low mileage and was well-maintained, but that was definitely the end of that for me. Now I have a Subaru and I love it - fun to drive, and I actually feel safe in it

 

[Dancing Fire]

Date: 2/13/2009 1:52:52 PM
Author: appletini
1998 BMW 323is Always had problems with little things,
--had to replaced both window motors in the first 3 years
--check engine light would come on for various things, which meant wasting my time at the dealership
--radio power button would fly off when I hit the breaks, so instead of replacing the button, a whole new radio system was installed, and then the sound was scratchy due to bad wiring
--my personal favorite...the car was once returned to me by the dealership with a flat tire

The car was eventually totalled in an accident...blessing in disguise. I purchased a 2003 Lexus RX300 and have done nothing but routine maintainence....80,000 miles and still good as new.

i had so many electrical problems with my 95 BMW.

 

[risingsun]

A 198something Mustang. Among its charms was to stall out on left turns. I don''t know why. No one knew why. It was an automatic and it dragged itself through each gear--sounded as if it was in severe pain. I bought from my Mother, who thought it was wonderful. I must say that it looked good, but its performance was

 

[Imdanny]

1980''s Plymouth Horizon. There will not be another American car on my horizon.

 

[iheartscience]

I had a Saturn in high school and early college that I hated. It wasn''t that bad of a car, I suppose, but for some reason I''ve never liked Saturns! I just don''t like ''em!

 

[April20]

1983 Honda Accord hatchback. I had it in 1995 or so. It leaked water into the passenger floorboard every time you ran the a/c. Enough water that the passenger had to keep their feet on the dashboard! Every time it rained, it would sputter and I''d have to stop wherever I was and spray the spark plugs with WD40. Not so fun times!

 

[swingirl]

Date: 2/13/2009 7:06:35 PM
Author: Dancing Fire
OU

sounds like my 89 Mazda truck. when i pull into a gas station,i would check the gas and fill up the oil.

Ha Ha! I had an old Plymouth just like that. I carried a case of oil in the truck and filled up the oil more often than I filled up the gas tank!

 

[mochi]

Pinto, my very first car. I was always afraid someone would rear end me.

Ranger truck. It was in back at the dealership more than 6 times in the first 2 months that I had it. Finally the mechanics said there definitely a problem but did not know what to do about it. We gave it back to the dealer and FORD promptly tried to sue me for more $$. This was before the lemon law.

I never bought a FORD again.

 

[elle_chris]

99 volks jetta. Bought the car brand new and less than two years later it developed some weird electrical problems that no one could fix.

Everytime it rained or went through a car wash the car stalled. I remember driving home during rush hour traffic, it started raining. (mind you- my decision on taking the car or not was always based on what the weather channel said and they didn''t say rain that day!). Was in Chinatown (for you new yorkers) and the car stalled making a left turn.

The windows worked when they felt like it, the engine light would go on and off it was just a nightmare.

So much for german engineering.

 

[platinumrock]

I didn''t own this car, but my parents gave me a 1989 Ford Tempo to use when I was in college. It stalled (just died) whenever we stop at intersections and the brakes hardly worked. I remember having to use the parking brakes just to get the car to stop when the light turned red.

But I am grateful for that car because it sure beat having to take the bus. It was also the first car I drove when I received my driver''s license at age 18. Wohoo!

I just don''t miss it!

 

[platinumrock]

Date: 2/13/2009 5:01:55 PM
Author: Porridge
1987 Nissan Sunny. There was the most infuriating machine somewhere underneath the drivers seat - totally inaccessible - that went ''ding-dong, ding-dong'' INCESSANTLY whenever the car went faster than 60mph. This was fine in Ireland, at the time there weren''t any motorways and the national speed limit was 60. But one weekend we took the ferry to the UK. Drove all the way through Wales to Birmingham, and back again. On motorways. At 70mph. I believe it was one of the only times I saw my father cry. I still hear it in my nightmares...''ding-dong, ding-dong...''

OMG, there is another creature that owned that car??!!! My brother used to own a 1989 Nissan Sunny (before it became a Sentra). No AC and no power steering. But it survived over 15 years and accumulated close to 200,000 miles. That car was so reliable that the only repairs it needed were the brakes and the clutch.

Then one day, in 2006, its time came. It wouldn''t start anymore. It''s in car heaven now.

LOL @ the ding dong, ding dong.

 

[Lulie]

Date: 2/14/2009 7:19:59 AM
Author: Dancing Fire

Date: 2/13/2009 1:52:52 PM
Author: appletini
1998 BMW 323is Always had problems with little things,
--had to replaced both window motors in the first 3 years
--check engine light would come on for various things, which meant wasting my time at the dealership
--radio power button would fly off when I hit the breaks, so instead of replacing the button, a whole new radio system was installed, and then the sound was scratchy due to bad wiring
--my personal favorite...the car was once returned to me by the dealership with a flat tire

The car was eventually totalled in an accident...blessing in disguise. I purchased a 2003 Lexus RX300 and have done nothing but routine maintainence....80,000 miles and still good as new.

i had so many electrical problems with my 95 BMW.

Not only electrical ....the 96 BMW 750 [locked steering wheel] almost killed dh/preggers sil