We've come a long way since Ralph Nader's book 'Unsafe at any Speed' , I suppose only the OAP posters will remember it. Many years ago I had a car with a steering column which was a long rod starting a few inches from the chest and ended somewhere near the front wheel! Sadly, the UK motor industry did not pioneer the introduction of safety developments, e.g. airbags, seat belts, crumple zones etc.

As for engineering bad/impractical design, there have been many....not enough crank bearings, hollow camshafts, inboard disc brakes, water pumps in the wrong place, swing axle suspension, inappropriate use of crackable plastics and other poor original equipment failures known to experienced mechanics.......' oooh, they all do that...'.

Various Mercedes of the 90's, engine wiring loom made of a plastic which biodegrades after about 10 years in the engine heat, handily shorting the coils out which in turn spike output transistors in the ECU, leaving you with a miminum bill of £500 via an indy and repaired loom, £1000 if including a complete wiring loom and ECU repair or £3000 if you used the main dealer who only fit new ECU and complete wiring loom, ask me how i know all this, mine cost the middling amount but £1200ish cos had new coils fitted at the same time and the loom repair kit hadn't been made available at that time.

Still with Mercs, coupe's especially often have/had laminated rear screens with a multi wired element similar in how fine they are to a heated windscreen, element sandwiched inside, rear windows delaminate at the edges leading to various strands failing, you don't want to know the cost, think i'm on the third or fourth screen.

Still with petrol Mercs, same years, CHG degrading will allow oil into the water at around 100k, and you'd better get the oil cooler changed at the same time cos that will do the same thing at some point.

I'm an idiot, i worked on hundreds of cars in years gone by and realised long ago that Datsuns (i really don't know if its still the case, they haven't made anything i like for many years and i've had nothing to do with them), Toyota and Subaru made and still make cars with mechanical and electrical integrity even if the bodies rusted as all cars did at one time, barring some howling mistakes of their own in recent years, ie Toyota MMT gearboxes and CHG probs on 4 pot Diesels, and Subaru dabbling in Diesel.

Why its take me so long to return to older Japanese for the home fleet (bar the one remaining Merc i still can't decide what to do with, its cost me £thousands) i can't answer maybe me bumps need to be read, at one time we had three W124 Mercs, talk about glutton for punishment, the more upmarket the model the more they go wrong, the fairly basic E300 Diesel saloon we had appeared to be hewn from granite, completely trouble free.

I had a Landcruiser for years previously, nothing ever went wrong at all, that was written off (but saved SWMBO completely considering it wouldn't have made a single NCP star), why i didn't go straight out and buy another and stick with them for the rest of me driving life is a question that will bug me till the end of me days, i finally returned to Toyota 4x4's in 2007.

Some other makes lists of engines to avoid plus gearboxes of doom, one could probably write a book on, no up to a point it doesn't matter for those who buy new and change when the warranty runs out if it packs up 4 months later, but not all of us actually like new car designs for various reasons nor do we wish to support certain makers nor do we wish to keep paying out for depreciation, so long term durability concerns us more plus we prefer our own individuality whilst its still legal.

replacing perfectly adequate buttons on the dashboard with a touch screen,

All the gubbins to make a diesel cleaner and less polluting. It's an extremely old design that still operates the same as it did years ago. It highlights the fact that it is a dinosaur as far as modern life is concerned, trying to collect all the soot, stop the vibration reaching the drivers feet, clever electronics and high precision injectors to try to smooth the combustion, and although you might not feel the vibration from a diesel, it's still there under the bonnet putting a lot of stress on the electrical components and connections, which chafe and wear out quickly.

Non of it is durable as the car gets older - as we have been finding out.

Toyota Safety System. This ADAS is touted as a safety benefit, but is very unreliable in some models, and verging on hazardous. It is affected by low sun, and brings up a flashing bright warning sign in the dashboard, and ceases functioning until the engine is turned off and then on again. In the rain, in cold weather and sometimes for no obvious reason, the useful automatic headlamp main beam system switches off, despite the windscreen being clean. Can be switched to manual, which required the selector to be turned through "off" whereupon all lamps extinguish. Dipped beam only when you need (and can use) main beam is not a strong selling point on unlit rural roads. Warning signs flashing up time and again are distracting.

It seems to be a problem with Auris and Avensis. Later designs, Prius 4 and CHR have a better basis (millimetric radar) apparently.

Toyota are struggling to solve this: there are a lot of examples.

There's ten screens of the problem on the Yaris website: www.toyotaownersclub.com/forums/topic/171123-toyot.../

Austin Maxi gearbox.

All black car interiors.

A few years back, when VAG Audi's were fitted with aluminium washers in the brake system, and our salt coated winter roads rotted the brake system.

The Citroen C5 has a version of that in that the aluminium brake caliper is bolted to a steel trailing arm, and sacrificial corrosion causes the caliper to distort and scrape against the inside of the wheel. And the calipers are a pig to remove because the bolts are threadlocked the whole length.

This next one isn't a worst design feature, but more a design feature that has been lost. Many old cars used to supply cold air through the centre vents and warm air through the footwell vents at the same time, a feature I really liked, but it only seems to be confined to BMW's and Mercedes these days.

Some cars have abysmal flow of air through the cabin too.

Edited by corax on 07/02/2017 at 09:20

BL Metro. Watched two idiots race each other on the North Circular and smack into an artic. The driver of the first Metro that hit the artic had the engine on his lap. The driver of the second Metro that hit the first was on the road rubbing his kneecaps. Deffo shortage of bulkhead material.

I had a lift in a Metro once. Felt very uneasy looking through the windscreen and seeing no bonnet, and being driven by a nervous driver (he wouldn't drive on motorways or dual carraigeways). I never liked Minis either - deathtraps.

As this thread is getting long is there any benefit in creating a new say second/addendum or shall I just get "me coat" :-)

Just a pain scroll down....

"As this thread is getting long is there any benefit in creating a new say second/addendum or shall I just get "me coat" :-)

Just a pain scroll down...."

Press End.

Err where is it?

PS I'm using an android phone.

Off-set pedals - so instead of sitting with your legs in line with your body your legs are shifted to one side - doesn't feel right and not good for one's low back..

That gets my vote - its just sheer laziness on the part of the engineers designing the car - if many other manufacturers can manage to put the pedals in the correct place for a similar sized car (or smaller/narrower), then so should they.

Number two on my list was the aforementioned cars that you need to go through the front wheel well (spending an hour doing so) to replace a headlight bulb, when it should be a 5 minute job accessible via the back of the light cluster by opening the bonnet only, as it was in my old K12 series Micra.

One additional one I found was on a neighbour's 99 plate Passat (I think a 'feature' on many VAG cars) whereby the battery is tucked right under the middle of the front windscreen, making it almost inaccessible to clamp jump leads to.

Not helped by the UK being a minority RHD country, especially in cars with relatively narrow footwells - still better than American brands who can't manage RHD at all!

One additional one I found was on a neighbour's 99 plate Passat (I think a 'feature' on many VAG cars) whereby the battery is tucked right under the middle of the front windscreen, making it almost inaccessible to clamp jump leads to.

And extremely difficult to lift the battery out and back again without putting your back out ! Not to mention a pesky plastic grill that gets in the way.

Perhaps that is why nobody cleans the drain holes beneath the battery causing the footwell and the electronic comfort control module to fill up with water