Got to be an A reg Triumph Acclaim, bought when my Cavalier died. It came from a dodgy back street garage, and had an equaly dodgy MoT. It kept going long enough for me to buy a decent car. Strange ripples in the bodywork and an amazing ability to scrub front tyres were signs of some problems somewhere. Problem was that I couldn't kill it - it even survived freezing up the rad... it boiled on the way to work one night, so I left it where it was until morning. I drove it home and went to bed. In the afternoon, I got up and thawed it out and drained the radiator and re-filled with proper anti-freeze. It ran OK after that, although there was always a little mayo in the oil filler cap!
Cheap motoring, not too sure what plod would have made of it though!
Edited by DH73 on 03/11/2007 at 14:51
|
|
They were very good cars for their time though.
|
They were, largely because they were basically Honda Ballades badged as Triumphs. DH73's story is of a rather heroic old fighter which performed above, rather than below, expectations.
Dept of useless information vol. xxx - the German for Triumph Acclaim is Sieg Heil....
Edited by Avant on 03/11/2007 at 23:36
|
Orion saloon 1.3, solid red, mud brown interior, even the wheel.
I loathed that car with every fibre of my being.
|
Taking the title literally, I have owned many cars over the years. Some were a little unreliable but had redeeming features (Alfasud x2), Some were boring, but remarkably reliable and trustworthy (Cortina). The one I couldn't wait to get rid of was a Uno, which let water into the cabin and no-one could find the point of entry, but otherwise was typically Fiat. Otherwise nothing to report on the ownership stakes.
As company cars however, the two worst cars I have ever had were a 1989 Astra (blancmange shape) which has done 30,000 miles in two years, had been treated like a dustbin and was simply noisly, crude, uncomfortable and with the world's worst gearbox (like all Vauxhalls of a certain era and mileage). In close second was a Citroen AX GTi, I had for oooh, 3 hours before I handed it back. Cardboard with an engine attached. I felt so unsafe.
|
Hmmmm not sure if this counts as such but a mate on mine in the mid 90's had a relatively good MkII Escort. He felt flush after working for a couple of years, so bought an old A reg Audi 80 (or maybe 100 ?) diesel with 160k on the clock "because it would be economical". He borrowed the £1500 to buy it and the car was from some back street garage in midlands.
then it started losing water, but yet no visible leaks...oh look, HGF, audi dealer quoted £1500 to sort it but a recon head & fitting could be done by another garage for £800, so my mate borrowed another £1k then had the head work done.
Then a month later the bottom end started knocking and eventually kaput. He scrapped the car for £200 and bought a horrid old W reg Metro for the same price at auction.
He finished off paying the loans (for a car he no longer had) 2 years later, the metro caught fire, broke down, rusted, rusted and rusted but was kept on the road for 2 years whilst he recovered from the Audi disaster. Come a new job he bought a brand new M reg AX and since then has always bought new cars.
about the same time (ish) Audi had that ad where they showed someone broken down by the side of the motorway using the emergency phone with the caption "an Audi driver doesn't have to do this" (or similar phrase). I found it ironic, cos that's all my mate ever did when he had his Audi.
|
My first car, a one-previous-owner 1936 Wolseley 14 bought in 1956. I was so young, inexperienced and naive I didn't spot it had a hole in the top of one of the pistons until I had paid the cash to the "bomb-site" entrepreneurial taxi driver. The crankcase breather and the oil filler cap were stuffed with rag to try to stop the smoke escaping! I sold it for scrap after only a few weeks.
--
L\'escargot.
|
I could answer this a couple of different ways:-
Most gutless and cheapest - a 1994 Ford Mondeo 1.6 LX that I bought from the scrapper-trader at work, it was actually in mint condition, I paid £250 for it, spent £250 on it's MOT, kept it for a few months and then sold it for £500, so it was actually my cheapest ever car to run.
Just the ugliest one - A 2004 Ford Fusion 2 1.6 - This was my company car and was what I was given as been the shortest time served salesman there, it was a daily insult when I left the house and stared at it's ghastly appearance, that car was unnecessarily ugly! Pretty quick though, and as with all company cars, it beat the manufacturer's stated times.
Blue
|
Until this thread i thought I had erased it from my memory.
Marina 1.8TC Coupe in purple...can't believe I paid for it with my own money.
|
|
Austin alleggro estate, in to put it politly, brown. I hope I have recovered enough to give the good taste transplant a miss.
|
Two spring to mind...
The 1985 Fiat Uno which was my first car. Typical Fiat in that was was totally unreliable. A crashing ride, vestigial boot and a pourous cabin didn't help matters.
It always started mind... providing I kept it in the insulated garage overnight. Show it a whiff of damp and I'd have to bump it in the road. The final straw was the windscreen wiper packing up in the snow across the Weald of Kent... I had to drive 30 miles with my head out of the window in the freezing cold just to see where I was going. Ah happy days.
The death bell tolled when head gasket blew up out in the country... towed to the scrappy where the bloke gave me £5 for it. Just enough for the train fare home and some chips to eat on the station.
Also the Fiesta Mk3. A 1995 model it was slow, used oil faster than petrol and rusted at warp speed, especially around the rear wheel arches. The OHV Kent engine produced a distincitve note that became unbearable whenever it was revved up. I never massively disliked the car but it had to go once the engine tick over started to play up... you'd take your foot off the accelerator to scrub off speed and the car would just surge on. I'm told a common problem with many Fiesta's of that ilk.
Still I now own its spiritual son (the Mk6) and its a lovely little car to own.
Edited by northstar on 05/11/2007 at 19:50
|
Another great thread! I'm torn between a Fiat 127 when a student, in puke yellow, brown seats, and rising brown doors. Gave it to the American boy-friend in law for £500, who loved it small size. He was dumped even faster than the car, so don't know the final scene.
A green Hillman Imp also sticks in the mind, in a none to unpleasant dark green, but when the throttled was floored, gently so's not to go through it, the noise from what seemed like 2 inches behind my head [rear engined] was extraordinary, like a Lamborghini Diablo [probably] while pulling away like Steptoe's horse. The "boot" at the front took a wash bag and not much else. I did like the rear window which hinged from above to let even more rear-engine noise in, if you wanted it. Held the road as well an overloaded 40-tonner.
A light blue Ford Anglia with the overhanging rear window [at least it never needed demisting - clever really] excelled itself on return from uni once, when the gearstick broke off leaving me around half an inch. Managed 70 miles of drving in 4th [non-motorway throughout] , and the clutch survived 6 sets of lights. Probably my best banger. Survived 6 years of student use in the family, aged 10 - 16 [the car].
|
To name but a few....
Hillman Imp, back wheel over took me.
Hillman Minx, ( Hunter shape) major tin worm
Chevette from a back street garage, right wing was 1&1/4 inch higher than the left.
Fiat 131, rust, rust and more rust, followed by dodgy electrics.
Ford Cortina MKIII, cambelt failure and 2 sets of replacement wings due to rusting.
Vauxhall Viva HC, cam chain jumped, loads of bent valves. Knackered gear box.
Ford Cortina estate MKIV, car used to fill up with water when it rained, always smelt musty, would never start when hot.
Ford Cortina MKV, never liked starting when hot.
Renault 19, HGF.
|
Easily the worst was a 1974 Triumph Dolomite Sprint, renamed by my father the Sodomite Sprint! Bought after some L-driver wrote off a line of cars of which mine was the front one.
It arrived with an inability to run normally. Either full bore or nothing. Paid for one of the mobile tuners to look at it. He took his money. He did not do a compression test, more on this later, and failed to cure the fault. A motorbike mad friend of mine eventually spotted a missing spring in the Carb linkages and that cured it. Car went like stink, for about 5 minutes (I had always lusted after one of these) then started to miss. Was not electrics turned out to be a burnt valve or (worn valve guide.) Sent to main dealer for repair. They reported the engine needed at the very least a rebore. (blowing past the pistons, blowing oil everywhere.) Persuaded me to fit a new short engine. I was absolutely skint at the time and for weeks had to go to work via lifts and me and the missus wheeled our laundry a mile or so on the back of a bike to the launderette.
Car came back and promptly went bang, stuck valve. Went back again, came back again, went bang again. This time it was a sheared bolt , camshaft to camshaft sprocket. Went back, came back ran OK for about 5 minutes then started missing all over again. At the time of the original repair I told the garage to replace any other valves or guides that they thought needed it. They had not. By this time I had given up on them being able to repair it and worked on it myself. Head off, fixed and back on again, over and over again. Replaced head. But new problem started. Could not get the timing chain to shut up and it started over heating. By this time had bought and gone through a series of old bangers which were all far more reliable. Started the Wessex Kit Car Club and then sold it to someone who built a kit car round it successfully! He could sort out what I failed to sort out! Sickening! The worst thing was that the rest of the car was superb having been Ziebarted from new etc. Cost me an absolute fortune, never did many miles and so far is the only car I was unable to fix myself. (discovered later the timing chain tensioner had to be primed before it would work. This one was not in the manual. Once the timing was out on it it overheated just like that.
|
|
A recent thread bemoaned the passing of cars with character. Never really sure what that character is a car but reading some of these posts and recalling similar stories of my own car ownership in the 1970s and 1980s I'm really happy to settle for a modern bland boring reliable non rusting motor
|
|
Renault 21. Went 5 miles before it blew up. Was worth fixing tho just for the digital dash.
|
Some of you will know that I am a bit of a fan of Fords. It therefore pains me a little bit to admit that one of the worst cars I had foisted upon me was Sierra 2.0 GL auto. I had gone to work for a new employer and was fortunate enough to be issued with a company car. "Yippee" would be the word which would now spring to mind were the scenario to be repeated, but in those days I was rather complacent about things like that. I had moved to a better job but from a company who were outrageously generous on the car front.
So, anyway they give me this Sierra. It was only a year old and had but 15k miles on it but it looked as if it had had a deprived childhood. It had already begun to rust in places and it was painted a hideous shade of flat nondescript mid blue. this not only did not suit the shape of the car but served to clash badly with the rust. It had deep pile velour seats which I loath, complemented by random sharp edged fag burns. It also smelled incurably of wet dogs.
The performance was not too bad given the limitations of the Pinto engine grappling with an auto box but the famously sharp Ford handling was mysteriously absent.
The front had no lateral grip to speak of and despite numerous visits to have the reasons checked it simply ate front tryes by wearing them rapidly on their outside edges.
It was denied by my employers that it had previously had a catastrophic bodywork re-design but I'm sure it must have.
I suffered that horrible car for 12 months until it was replaced by another Sierra which rekindled my enthusiasm for them mainly due to the Cosworth badge on the boot.......
|
Well, I didn't really own it, and it wasn't actually bad, so I'm stretching things a bit, but my "least loved car, forced to use as my main transport through circumstances" was an M reg Nissan Primera estate. We were without car because our Fiesta had been written off in an accident, and the Berlingo we ordered from the dealer had not yet arrived, so we asked the dealer about a courtesy car. They had taken in this well used Primera as a trade-in, so were quite happy to let us use it.
What was wrong with it? Well, not a lot really. It had just been well used, as estate cars in rural areas tend to be, and wasn't quite as clean or sweet smelling as the other cars I've had. But we had to be grateful for something that got us from A to B and was reliable - and that we were getting for free.
|
The arrival of our first-born forced us to forego the pleasures of our stylish and nippy Fiat 127 Palio and look for something more practical.
My dad, then an Austin-Rover dealer had the perfect solution :- a seven year old Morris Ital 1.3 Estate he had taken in part-ex against a new Montego.
It had glacial performance, appaling handling, zero charm and a four speed gearbox that I had to replace twice. It's only redeeming feature was the size of its boot. It was fun to drive on only one occasion, and that was the day it snowed.
It was so bad that the Maestro 1.3LX that my company gave me to drive seemed like a Jaguar to us!
|
I posted to this a year ago but I'll post again...
in 1993, after crashing my 3500 SD1 and realising I couldn't afford to insure it for another year due to moving out from my parents (and just having to pay £££ for repairs to the SD1); I bought an 'S' reg 950cc Fiesta from my brother with 3 months tax and about 4 months MoT. He said "you can have it for £75 but it needs some new rear wheel cylinders" so we had a deal. It had already had one replacement engine installed by him after he tried to race a helicopter (or something he had no chance of beating in a 950 fiesta)
I fixed the rear wheel cylinders and off I went, slowly, oh so slowly.
the interior passenger door handle had broken off so to get out of the passenger seat, one had to wind the window down and open it from the outside. The rear wheel arches consisted of filler & old newspaper; the boot floor had holes in it that you could put your fist through so nothing small could be placed in the boot for fear of it falling out onto the road. It couldn't pull 4th on several of the hillier sections of our motorways (esp M1, M62) so 3rd was sometimes a better option. Ignition key opened the door, the inner wings were so rotten that the bonnet catch wouldn't lock into position as the catch wasn't attached to anything.... I think the car had been used to transport someones dogs around for a while as there was plenty of dog hairs on every bit of interior fabric and I couldn't shift them.
ugh. Had it for 3 months until tax ran out then sold it for £95 and had people beating a path to my door. made the mistake of not filling in the V5 with the new owners details and then getting demands for parking tickets and unpaid road tax through my door.
The X reg Austin Maxi I then bought for £350 was a godsend. 5 spd gearbox, lots of space, almost no rust (well, in comparison) and no need to change down on hilly motorways.
cheers
Stu
Edited by The Gingerous One on 09/10/2008 at 14:15
|
I'd like to nominate a vehicle. I'm not going to say what because I'm boring myself going on about it all the time. But I'm nominating it all the same.
|
Not quite owned, but a hire vehicle whilst my company car was being repaired, a
HYUNDAI ACCENT 1.5 (don't forget the GSI model tag I think it was)
This was immaculate, a 2000 X plate with 15K on the clock (Jan 2004). Had it for about 7 weeks, went back with 21K on the clock. Had to go up and over the pennines in it - it just about crawled up the hill, but only after shifting down a few gears.
How nice was the next car, a hired Astra 1.7CDTI. This was new, on a 53 plate (MT53 SVX if memory serves correct). Kept for 10K then handed back. Now normally its a bit of a dog, but it was like getting the keys to a Rolls Royce....
|
Superbuyer
Mine is also a Hyundai Accent
X reg 1.3 Automatic in a light green metallic - this wouldn't have got over the Pennines, it was positively dangerous.
This was also a garage courtesy car. When she called saying they needed the 206 I was driving (also a dog) back and could I drive an auto I was thinking of something exotic!
|
1998 Ford Escort 1.4LX. In white. My wife had bought it because it had a nice silver gear knob. I let her do it to teach a lesson in how not to buy cars (she's a wee bit stubborn), and thinking I wouldn't have to drive it much.
A few months later and my long distance driving job became local, her local job became a long distance driver. Cue demand for me to hand over the keys to my wonderful mark 2 Mondeo estate (1.8LX, pretty basic but oh I loved that car, it was just about perfection) and take the Escrote keys in return.
It was gutless, joyless, and had the worst driving position imaginable. And I say that having owned several Alfas. The ultimate pink fluffy dice car. I will say in its defence it was totally reliable, but that doesn't stop it being the worst car I've owned out of 24 in 21 years. It's the only car I've ever had which I actively disliked (and my hall of shame contains some very unpopular alleged heaps of cack like an ancient, rotting Citroen GSA and a similarly rotten Fiat 127). It got swapped for a Fiat Marea 115ELX as soon as finances allowed.
Still, the lesson was learnt and Mrs A has been extemely sensible in car matters ever since, and has even deferred to my opinion once or twice.
Edited by Webmaster on 10/10/2008 at 01:57
|
MG Metro on a C-plate.
Relatively nippy but not great compared to previous Cavalier 1.8i .
No heating, spent a very cold winter like that (suppose we could have got it fixed, but didnt get round to it).
Suspension squeaked all the time.
Tyres used to deflate constantly requiring weekly re-inflations, adding too much pressure to compensate for the expected loss.
4-speed gearbox on the motorway - not good.
Front wing and rear valance were rusting quite successfully, not good on a white car.
I wrote it off to teach it a lesson.
I think the reason I didnt mention it when this thread started was that I didnt actually own it, was just allowed use of it. But what the heck, it was a horrible car!
|
>> I wrote it off to teach it a lesson.
Wonderful line, that. :-)
|
Solid red Ford Orion saloon 1.3l
Brown interior - even the sodding steering wheel was brown.
I was about the millionth employee in the company to have it so it was a complete shed.
Plus it used to give me an electric shock every time I touched the bodywork.
I really, really loathed that car.
|
Stackman, should we take it that you didn't get on with your dad?
Only kidding.
Steve.
|
We get on fine, it's just that his idea of an ideal car and mine aren't always the same.
I had the last laugh later when we moved to Newcastle Upon Tyne. Mrs Stack needed a car and he happened to have just the thing, a one-lady owner Maestro 1.3 Clubman in white. An M-reg, one of the very last.
He set out to drive it up from Dorset but only got as far as Oxford when the water pump failed. AA relay got him back to Dorset where he had it fixed then set out again. It took him 14 hours to get up to us in this 1.3 Maestro with a four-speed box ! Enough punishment for any man!
That car lasted two years until we moved back to Dorset. I tried to give it away before we moved but nobody was interested so I took it to the scrappy.
|
|
>> the famously sharp Ford handling was mysteriously absent.
This is the same Ford that gave us McPherson strut suspension and the directional precision of a supermarket trolley........right?
|
Easily the worst was a 1974 Triumph Dolomite Sprint
If the problems were all engine related, shame you have not still got it John.
I believe a fairly easy conversion is to drop in a Saab turbo engine; cheap from a scrapyard, and 200+bhp if desired.
Ive seen one converted thus for circuit use which had the track widened to improve the handling, with 2" wheelarch extensions and wide tyres, it looked pretty cool.
Edited by Rich 9-3 on 09/10/2008 at 15:03
|
|
Ford Orion. Still have cold sweats when I think about how bad that car was.
|
Undoubtedly a white early MkV Escort in with the horrid 1.3 HCS engine. Motoring mediocrity redefined for the 90s. Gutless, charmless, dynamically dreadful and generally without any redeeming features other than its parsimonious fuel consumption.
The Accord 2.3 SR I had afterwards felt like a Contintental GT by comparison....
|
|
Company car - Peugeot 207 1.4 S. Underpowered and horrible driving position. I was convinced it was the 75nhp version it was that slow. Upon finding out it was in fact the 'higher' brake of 90bhp I was even more annoyed!!
|
My Rover 820, bought in 2001 from a main dealer. Was second hand and reasonably low miles - 40k or so on a 5 year old car. Went back about 5 or 6 times for excessive oil consumption - finally identified by HJ no less as valve stem oil seals.
The glove box facing also fell off due to heat, and the gearbox was on its way out at the end. Thank goodness it was on a 12 month dealer warranty. I got rid of it at the end of the warranty as part ex for...
another Rover.
Very comfortable and a nice drive, but terribly terribly unreliable.
Edited by Webmaster on 12/10/2008 at 01:02
|
|
Mercedes V220Cdi bought new, must have been back more than 20 times for faults, some serious ones brakes, suspension rust.
|
<< Mercedes V220Cdi bought new, must have been back more than 20 times for faults >>
ONLY 20 times? it must have been a good one, or you outted it within 6 months!
Edited by the swiss tony on 11/10/2008 at 17:23
|
worst company car was an ITAL 1.7! had to carry gallons of Oil in the boot to complete any journey & if it went down a hill without touching the throttle when you got to the bottom & hit the throttle you couldn't see behind you!. It was brandnew & used a gallon fron Tonbridge to Haverford west & back! No wonder most of british car market died they couldn't build one that worked or was reliable.
Austin3ltr was another monstrosity that spent more time in a workshop than on the road. When I was issued with an ambassador it was time to change jobs! thank goodness. My drive way would of rotted away with all the cars leaking oil! My hillman imp was bad!. Then I had a triumph acclaim what a cracker, had 2 recalls for steering & sunp baffles but never went wrong & never leaked oil & didn't burn any iether.
|
|
I'm a Senior Citizen these days so I've had a lot of old bangers in my time. The joint second equals for worst cars have to be the Austin A30 with its dodgy fading brakes and a couple of 850cc Minis (again these were gifted with dodgy fading brakes) All time most despised car has to be the Ford Cortina 1.6 estate that I owned briefly. It had that rotten V-V carburettor that was full of flat spots. Chief problem was rust as there was no paint inside the doors, sills and box members. This killed the car at its MOT although to be honest I was glad to be rid of it. The car was replaced with a Morris Marina 1.3 which believe it or not was a much better car than the fix-or-repair-daily. The A+ engine was excellent and allowed cheap road tax. There was also the bonus of no timing belt! Another cheap (£25!) runabout was a Fiat Uno E (903cc pushrod engine) bought with a blown head gasket. Once fixed it was a really handy car. Main snag was no brake servo. Driving in congested traffic in the cold and rain was very trying as one would end up with an aching left foot. Stout soled boots were needed. Most Unos did in fact have a brake servo but not this one. Eventually the engine started burning oil and needed a couple of pints per week but I got about a year out of that £25 car!
Surprisingly there are still some very bad cars around. Take the case of a friends Renault Laguna 2.2 dci The car ran OK on short trips to the shops but after owning the car for a fortnight he took it on a long run. After 180 miles it broke down. "It revved-up, all the dashboard warning lights lit-up, it stopped and a red light came on" he said. Allegedly the engine is blown beyond economic repair so he has scrapped the car. £888 for a fortnights motoring. Duh!
|
|
>> It had that rotten V-V carburettor that was full of flat spots.
Gosh, I'd forgotten that thing. A girlfriend's father had a Mark V which I volunteered to service for him. I recall investigating the delights of the V-V and after puzzling for a while, realising that it was doing exactly what an SU did, only very badly.
|
|
AFAIK the Saab 99 had that horrible Triumph "dolly" engine (1/2 a Stag?) What I do know for sure is that it had that dreadful high-mounted water pump which was the engines Achilles Heel.
Saab reverse-engineered this engine by fitting a water pump that was low down and outboard of the engine block, Voila! or whatever they say in Swedish. The re-worked engine was then used in the 900.
It has long been apparent that Steam Trapping and Air Venting no longer seems to be studied by vehicle manufacturers. For example the worst designs incorporate bleed valves to let out the air. With such designs the words "bargepole" and "do not touch" come to mind!
|
|
"For example the worst designs incorporate bleed valves to let out the air. "
So the Peugeot 106 was rubbish ?
My sons did over 100k in three of them with no problems - and all over 7 years old.
Must have been luck...
|
|
QUOTE:...""Hillman Hunter (Arrow range). Shoddy American "engineering" thrown together by Scots. Utter rubbish in every respect.""
I had a Hillman Hunter once - an early oblong headlamp model before the ugly later facelifts. It was a GL, with varnished wooden dash. I actually quite liked it - it was reliable and quite pleasant to drive and, being a 1725 cc model, adequately quick for everyday motoring. Of course, it rusted and appeared to be made of thin steel, while the suspension was very basic. It was old when I bought it but had been well looked after and it served us well for a couple of years. One thing I will say about the Hillman Hunter was that, whatever its shortcomings, it was a nicely styled car - certainly compared to its rivals - such as the Ford Cortina Mk2, Vauxhall Victor 101 , Austin 1800 or Renault 16.
Edited by Sofa Spud on 09/02/2013 at 23:40
|
|
despite 5 years passing since I posted on this thread, and my ownership of an 18yr old Volvo 440 within this timeframe, I still stand by my post about the MkI Fiesta I owned being the worst car.
A volvo 440 is luxury by comparison. and it rusts a lot less (yes, even on the wheelarches).
Though clearly if the car has lasted 18 years then I must have had a good one.
|
QUOTE:...""Hillman Hunter (Arrow range). Shoddy American "engineering" thrown together by Scots. Utter rubbish in every respect.""
I had a Hillman Hunter once - an early oblong headlamp model before the ugly later facelifts. It was a GL, with varnished wooden dash. I actually quite liked it - it was reliable and quite pleasant to drive and, being a 1725 cc model, adequately quick for everyday motoring. Of course, it rusted and appeared to be made of thin steel, while the suspension was very basic. It was old when I bought it but had been well looked after and it served us well for a couple of years. One thing I will say about the Hillman Hunter was that, whatever its shortcomings, it was a nicely styled car - certainly compared to its rivals - such as the Ford Cortina Mk2, Vauxhall Victor 101 , Austin 1800 or Renault 16.
I had a Hillman Minx (1500cc approx) in the Arrow range. A rustbox for sure but a beautiful simplistic style that looked better than anything else in the popular car range of it's day (1967) ...and it was Coventry built (well, almost)
|
|
