Find Reviews by Make:
Sitting here in China, I nearly forgot (if Ed wouldn’t have reminded me: ) It’s Turkey Day. The day to wax poetic about giving thanks to … nah, let’s do something different:
Once you have stuffed yourself with stuffing, sit back, have a little burp, and contemplate:
Which car was the biggest turkey of all times? The absolutely worst one? The biggest insult to the driving mankind? The car that should have been banned under the Rules on Land Warfare? If you want, let’s even remember the less fortunate who had to suffer through owning the thing.
Don’t hold back. Flaming rules are not in effect.
If you post a link to a picture, we’ll run it tomorrow. Something like TTAC turkey sandwich.
And Happy Thanksgiving.
86 Comments on “Ask The Best & Brightest: Which Car Was The Biggest Turkey Of All Times?...”
Read all comments
*insert obligatory Sebring mention here*
Not even close. While it was the car that nearly killed Chrysler because of its 15 years without fundamental redesign, the Sebring is basically serviceable, but tacky and uncompetitive.
That’s a long way from the Yugo, Renault Alliance, Dodge Aspen, last-legs U.S. market Fiats and MG’s, and other true turkeys.
Bottom feeding compacts designed in an eastern european barn are supposed to suck. Chrysler faces a higher bar.
Hmmmmmmm I think we need to define “turkey.” To me it would be the car with the biggest hype and then the biggest letdown.
Chevy Volt?
Chevy Cobalt? (Decent car but the market still thinks its J-car underneath)
Ford Focus? (huge number of recalls in it’s first year, not that much better than the Escort it replaced)
Studebaker Avanti? (Awesome car too late to save its maker)
Any Cadillac with the HT4100 or Northstar system?
Lincoln Versailles?
Lincoln Continental FWD
Opel by Buick of the 1970s?
GM “Dustbuster” minivans? (My best friends dad was a GM dealer salesman back in those days, he thought that those suckers were going to set the world on fire.)
AMC Pacer or Gremlin? (Pacer was sabotaged partly by GM and the non-starter Wankel)
Edsel?
Lincoln Mark VI?
1980-1982 Ford Thunderbird & Mercury Cougar (hey I’d like one to give it a Mustang GT treatment but I’m talking stock here)
Chrysler holding onto the K-cars too long until they were turkey’s?
Chrysler’s disastrous 1960s downsizing? (sales wise disaster, I wouldn’t mind owning one)
Crappy Mercedes products of the late 1990s?
Anything built by Chrysler under Mercedes ownership?
Chrysler Crossfire? (I LOVE them but I’m in the minority and I worry about parts prices and availability which is why I’m not seriously considering one, my lady thinks they’re sexy.)
Let’s see guys what am I leaving out?
A contract not hitting at the right time is the only reason I don’t have a Crossfire in my driveway right now. I still want one.
How about…
2002-05 Ford Thunderbird
Chevy SSR
Plymouth Prowler
K-car variants of New Yorker and Imperial
1978-85 Oldsmobile diesels
Saturn (yes, I mean the entire brand)
“the biggest hype and then the biggest letdown”
Chevy Citation. The first real attempt at FWD for domestic-buying Americans, timed perfectly for the second gas crisis… and perennial contender for Worst Car Ever Made.
Time will tell on the Volt. If they sell a bunch of them and the people that buy them like them, is it a turkey?
The Henson M30.
The Auto-Bi-Go.
The Subaru B-9 “Flying Vagina” Tribeca.
And of course, the Pontiac Aztek.
Maybe I was under a rock, but why the did the B-9 Tribeca turn into the flying vagina? I haven’t seen one in quite awhile so maybe there is a look that I’m missing.
https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2005/08/subaru-b9-tribeca/
The most infamous New Car Review in TTAC history. Required reading for all new to this site. Got Fargo banned from so many places he must have thought he was Fidel Castro.
@tanknbeans (under this) I was never quite sure how to react either. “I may (or may not) agree with a word you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” – That was how I felt about Fargo.
I’m not sure if that review was funny or just plain sad, but I understand now why Farrago is a love-him-or-hate-him guy. I remember last year or the year before when he announced he was leaving and some were upset while others were saying good riddance.
I sort of like having the Tribeca around, because now we know what Edsels of the 21st century would look like.
That was one of the reviews that justifies the name of this site. “Truth” – Farago said what he felt, which is rare to find in media (any media) these days.
But then, I am one of those eccentrics that actually supports what Wikileaks is doing, so YMMV.
Abominable last gasps include the 1958 Packard, with the weird fiberglass additions; and the 1957 Hudson Hornet, with enough chrome add-ons to sink a battleship. What made both cars doubly sad is that they stood in stark contrast to the storied heritage of their brands.
The biggest suicide mission cars: The AMC Matador and Pacer. I get making one mistake, but two really expensive ones back to back? Mental illness must have pervaded AMC management at that point.
The Edsel is the worst car Ford ever made. It illustrates what happens when you try to outcompete GM. And when you mistakenly think that the public is more interested in whiz-bang glitz than a decent ownership experience.
The Cadillac Escalade may have made GM decent coin, but it’s not just an embarrassment to branding experts, but to human kind. Even the Hummer had more of a reason for being.
The Cadillac Escalade may have made GM decent coin, but it’s not just an embarrassment to branding experts, but to human kind. Even the Hummer had more of a reason for being.
I understand your point, and I would NEVER own one, considering it to be an embarrassment along the “same cake more expensive frosting” lines but… If you look at the Escalade objectively it seems to be a closer spiritual ancestor to the truly awesome Cadillacs of the 1960s than the crap-tastic DeVille of the last 20 years.
The only thing I like about the Cadillac Escalade is that they’re very easy to steal, meaning it costs their owners even more money in increased insurance premiums to drive around in one.
I don’t see any problem with the Escalade existing either, my personal tastes aside.
I agree with Dan that it was the spiritual successor to something like the 76 Eldorado, only on stilts.
In case anyone’s noticed, “cars and trucks on stilts” is exactly what 108% of the North American market wants.
Despite the Edsel being always dredged-up in these kind of discussions, I find it hard to believe the Edsels were REALLY worse than the 1986 Ford Aerostar that my parents ordered brand new for my mom. The side window leaked and we had it back to the dealer 3 times before they finally removed the interior to seal it properly. I think there were problems with the sliding side door that resulted in a dealer trip too.
No sooner was it out of warranty when the rear heater rusted out and had to be replaced, then the oil pan rusted out. It had to be made of tinfoil-thick steel to rust out that quickly! To change a headlight you had to remove the front bumper. For whatever reason, the engine had mechanical lifters, not hydraulic, so they needed periodic adjustment. There was no room to work on that engine. You got to the back half of it by removing an access hatch inside, and the front of it from underneath the hood, and neither opening provided much room to work.
It’s a good thing they unloaded it when they did. It wasn’t long after that I saw Aerostars of similar vintage with rust forming along the exposed seam on the side of the body where two panels meet. Terrible design, reminiscent of the Jeep Grand Wagoneer. I imagine ours would’ve started to break out with rust there shortly after we sold it.
They got rid of that lemon and bought my grandma’s 86 Monte Carlo when she decided to buy a new car. Usually, when my family is done with a vehicle it’s REALLY ready for the scrapyard. The Aerostar was quite the exception.
Another vote for the Ford Aerostar. I had an ’87 that basically just rusted into oblivion. It was like it was designed to slowly disapear into nothingness.
And another vote for the infamous Ford Aerostar! I didn’t have one, but one of my friends bought one and I drove it a few times and rode in it dozens of times. Most of the time though, I saw it in front or behind me, going to the dealer, over and over again. Sometimes under it’s own power, sometimes behind a wrecker or on a flatbed. It waited until it’s third year to really start messing up, before that it was just “ok”, with a lot of minor issues, mostly having to do with stalling, and refusing to restart. At first, it happened a couple of times and it would start again, but as time went by, it started stranding him or his wife. It was worse in cold weather, for some reason. Then the transmission went out. And it went out again. Now the warranty was up and it began cracking A/C condensors, and ate a couple of compressors. They finally took and traded it in on a leased Windstar, a vehicle that actually made the Aerostar look good! The leasing of it was the best thing they could have done with that turd, as it ate SIX transmissions in 3 years. One didn’t even make it all the way home before it started slipping. And that’s not counting all it’s other problems, and there were many. He usually got stuck driving the loaners the dealer gave him for both of the above lemons, mostly older Tauruses, or Rangers. He hated them all, but for some reason, stays loyal to Ford, having just dropped a ton of money on an F-250 a few months ago.
My votes:
1. Dodge Caiiber. this car gets it because it’s so ugly that if all cars looked like that I wouldn’t own one.
2. Chevrolet Vega. This one because the engine so lacked durability.
@Ed.Dan: any car that’s awesome does not belong on the list imo even if it was too late to save it’s maker. And, I’m not sure what you’re referring to with xler’s “disastrous downsizing” but I think the ’60s were the zenith years for xler in no small part due to the slant sixes. But they had other great engines as well. And much of the styling was tops. My favorites: the ’60 Valiant, the ’64-5 Imperial, the ’64 NYer, and the 1970 Valiant.
I also take exception to the Pacer ,which I think is a cool looking car, but I may well be in the minority.
Definitely agree on the late ’90s Mercs and the FWD Lincoln.
Due to its place in the culture, the Edsel is so bad it’s good.
Happy t-day everyone!
http://ateupwithmotor.com/family-cars/146-chrysler-downsizing-disaster-1962.html
Sales wise. That’s what I meant. I think they were a step in the right direction at the time but the rest of America didn’t think so.
1985 Isuzu I-Mark. The car started failing as soon as I left the dealership lot.
Re xler of the ’60s: I discussed that here:
https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2010/11/beating-the-one-brand-blues-circa-1960/#more-374169
Any car made in France.
I know there are francophiles out there who love their quirky design – I don’t. The only good looking cars to come out of France were the Peugeot 206 and 306 in the mid 90’s – and they were such a flimsy vehicles that when I got shunted into the back of someone else at 2 mph whilst in my 306, both front wings caved in completely, meaning the car was a total write off.
Citroens? Don’t get me started. Mechanically challenged pieces of crud. Sure the French say the 2CV has got ‘charm’ – but then again the French consider eating snails and frogs the height of sophistication.
And Renault? In the UK we are bombarded with advertising saying that their cars are stylish… Has anyone seen the Megane?
Am I biased? Most definitely. But no other cars have let me down quite as much as those made in France. I’ve been left stranded by French made crap more often than all the other cars I’ve owned combined.
My dad had a diesel ’78 Peugeot wagon. Fun to drive and offered mpg in the mid 30s but did it’s share to give diesels a bad name. But talk about tough to find parts and someone able to work on it. Parts would take weeks to obtain. Once it hit 100,000 miles in ’86 the engine blew and the car went to the junk yard as it would cost too much to repair it.
Since i was a 10 year old car nut…in 1982 my parents let me pick my mom’s next econo bucket….I picked a 1982 dark blue Ford Escort L.
It looked ok, it had a tachometer, but it was crap.
I remember reading about ford’s world car, blah blah blah…it was a HUGE hunk of shit.
The back window shattered by itself, in the garage, in a brutally cold 45F Los Angeles night, The water pump failed just out of warranty, the wheel bearings sounded like nails on chalk…then at 60,100 miles the timing belt snapped, and both my parents breated a sigh of relief, and junked it.
They have never bought a Ford since, and they have never again asked me for car buying advice.
My experience has to be a 1980 chevy chevette 4 door. Had a three speed auto and on the highway 55mph felt like 85mph in any other car of the same year. 0-30mph I could run faster. The front drivers side floor completely rusted out, my friends nicknamed it the flintstonemobile because you could literally put both feet through the hole and use your feet to push the car!! It also leaked oil like crazy from the rear main seal, 1 quart every 200 miles or so, would keep a case of oil in the trunk. Could not afford the repair at the time because I was in college and $500 was alot of money. The front springs sagged almost to the tire tops. Remember, this was a car that had less than 100,000 miles at the time as well. Swore I would never own a GM product again. My buddy had a 1982 Civic that was like a Cadillac in comparison. By far the worst car I ever owned.
The 1971 Ford LTD. This was such a turkey because it suckered so many people in with its good looks, its smooth ride and how it seemed to be such a quality car at a reasonable price. Then the fun started. What was the worst? The fist-sized rust holes by 1974? The squeaking squawking, twisting bodies? The interior materials that cracked and split when you looked at them funny? The transmissions that would slip into reverse just for the fun of it? These may have been the worst cars of the 70s with the possible exception of the Vega. The Volare was better than these.
I owned a ’71 Ford Custom 500 with the 351W 2bbl, the stripper LTD. It wasn’t THAT bad, at least not mine, but it wasn’t perfect either. I drove it around Atlanta when I was at Ga Tech from ’84-’88. While I was at Tech, it smoked like a chimney and looked worse for wear, but it always started, ran ok, and got me where I was going. The previous owner had replaced the breaker point ignition with an aftermarket solid state distributor. And the hot air metallic pipe for the automatic choke was rusted through so I bought an aftermarket electrical heating element choke opener from JC Whitney. The beauty of this car, at least for a single college student, was that I didn’t have to worry about it getting dinged, scratched, wrecked, totaled or stolen in the streets of Atlanta next to the housing projects. When I “traded it in” for a new ’89 Toyota, I was sorry to see it go – I had absentmindedly just filled it up on the way to the Toyota dealership and it was on its way to the junk yard (I’m sure) with a full tank of gas. After I bought my new Toyota, I asked the salesman how much the Ford was REALLY worth. He hemmed and hawed and finally told me it was worth $79, no joke. I miss having a car I can just flog and abuse the hell out of and not worry.
“Cadillac” Cimarron . OK, “by Cadillac”.
I believe that Car and Driver called it “a Honda Accord that doesn’t run very well”. Honda must have been appalled.
Cimarron – An unalloyed disaster for the dowager American luxury marque, it revealed, in essence, that the emperor had no clothes.
Cadillac has never recovered.
Yes, Cadillac Cimarron FTW !!!
Link: http://www.productioncars.com/vintage-ads.php/Cadillac/Cimarron
Honorable mention, any 3 wheeled Brit or Chinese car.
Zaporozhetz
I will look strictly through the prism of cars that killed the brand. These cars are…
2000’s: Saturn Ion: Once this car was released Saturn had absolutely no hope of surviving. Possibly the most corner-cut, inherently ugly and difficult to maintain small car of the past decade.
1990’s: Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera: This car should have never been manufactured and sold in this decade. These cars became such a perennial part of the Oldsmobile line-up that any mention of the brand being an ‘import fighter’ was quickly hooted down. The Buick Skylark of this decade is a very close runner-up.
1980’s: Maserati TC: I can’t think of one good thing to say about this vehicle. Not one.
For the 70’s and beyond I’ll let the TTAC historians ferret it out. I wasn’t there at the time.
I know someone who owned both a Chrysler TC and a Pontiac Aztek – at the same time.
In no particular order –
This:
http://auto.howstuffworks.com/1974-1978-amc-matador4.htm
1974 AMC Matador coupe.
Or this:
http://www.tocmp.com/brochures/Ford/1975/Elite/pages/frontpage_JPG.htm
1975 Ford Elite
I included these two due to some of most egregious styling ever.
Or how about this:
http://www.moparmusclemagazine.com/featuredvehicles/f_m_j_body/mopp_0905_1976_dodge_aspen/photo_02.html
The 1976 Chrysler F bodies (Aspen/Volare twins). Not because of styling (I still think they’re attractive vehicles), but because of how Chrysler so badly mishandled replacing the Dart/Valiant twins. By 1975 the Dart/Valiant had become dowdy and associated with an elderly demographic. So Chrysler, hoping to attract new younger buyers, replaced the Dart/Valiant with the under-engineered and poorly assembled Aspen/Volare twins.
I owned a ’68 Dart GT with the 273 V8, and about ten years later my wife and I bought the neighbour’s 78 Aspen 2 door coupe. What a piece of shit compared to my Dart. I owned my Dart when it was 8 years old, and we bought the Aspen when it was only 6 years old. The Aspen was already the auto equivalent of a 80 year old alzheimers patient, compared to my Dart, which was in awesome shape at 10 years old when I mistakenly traded it in for…(nevermind, it’s another long story).
My vote goes to the Chevrolet SSR – a two-seat Chevrolet Trailblazer that isn’t particularly good at anything other than saying f-u to the environment.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_SSR
Honorable mention to the Cadillac Catera. When the various auto magazines were doing their long term tests on the car, at least one of them ended up with a Catera which would have qualified for lemon-law buyback in most states.
Marginally off topic, if you are wondering what R.F. has been doing the past year, check out http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com.
GM FWD X-cars. Not because they didn’t sell (they did) and not because they were bad cars (the later ones were ok). But because there was so much hype about how advanced they were. Yet, early reliability, durability, build quality, and recalls gave GM a huge black eye for years to come. Worse, the X-cars sat in the volume part of the market unlike the 1971 Vega which was in a smaller and less influential part of the market.
This. In terms of the yawning gap between the hype and the miserable reality, multiplied by the number of units sold, the X-Cars are the biggest turkeys in my living memory.
It’s when I realized Detroit was not about to catch up to the Japanese challenge anytime soon (in 1979). Cost-cutting with the subtlety of a meat cleaver, cynical engineering corner-cutting and papering over the difference with Herb Tarlek-style idiotic marketing hype seemed to be the only way the Big 3 knew how to operate.
I put my vote in before reading all of the comments so as not to be influenced. This was my choice.
Just to try and make this comment as short as possible I will say, the 1990’s. I can’t think of many cars at all that I would be able to live with that was built in the 90’s. I think alot of my old car love really comes from a sincere hate for everything built in the 90’s, But as I write this my brain does come up with a few cars that were Ok. The Dodge Viper. Well, I’ve only seen 3 or 4 up close (and two of those were at the New York autoshow in ’98.) Up close they still have a light look of typical household appliances (speaker grills on the hood anyone?), but still, it’s a plastic piece stretched over a truck engine. Pure genius. A few other things that went really wrong during the 90’s. Audi, VW, No more RWD Euro-Fords, Lexus, Korean cars, and designers started realizing design was dead, so they started making really nasty retro cars. IMO the best thing about the 90’s was Chryslers concepts and (some of) the cars that were launched based on them. And that really says alot about how bad the 90’s were…
Yes I know, alot of people will say the 70’s were worse ( mostly for US and UK cars though, the rest of the world built some decent cars in the 70’s) , but at least some of the stuff built in the 70’s can be looked back on with humour, and anecdotes ,and will be memorable, the 90’s will hopefully just be forgotten.
From recent times, I think that you have to tip your hat to the Land Rover Freelander.
Worst Motor produced during the last decade.
The Cimmaron and Catera come to mind from the 80’s and 90’s.
Subaru Baja was dud of large proportion as well from the early 00’s.
The mid 90’s VW Passat (first generation) was a rotten car from a reliability stand point.
Catera and CTS, if for no other reason than together they spell “Cateracts”. Truth in advertising.
How about a Ford Pinto?
Interesting choice. Apart from being prettier (maybe), nicer to drive, faster and safer than its competition at the time, yes, a turkey.
If you feel like challenging ‘safer’, ask NHTSA. Don’t do groupthink.
Sorry, can’t go along with that awful (as long as you weren’t rear ended, of course). I used to run against them in SCCA B Sedan autocross. Take the 2 liter version, add sway bars, heavier shocks, wider rubber and they could almost hold off the BMW 1600’s and 2002’s. In the early 70’s, they were THE way to go in B Sedan if you couldn’t afford something imported
There are so many turkeys I want to write a book on them. So I’m going to go extreme. I’m going to pick a car that had been out of production and forgetten before I was even born.
The Mercury LN7.
http://jalopnik.com/assets/resources/2007/03/82_LN7.jpg
Why was it a turkey?
It failed utterly at the basic premise it was created for and resembled. Sports coupe? Yes, I’m the pope. A 1.6L CVH that will shake itself to death before 60 mph is cognitive dissonance with the swoopy sports coupe body.
A failure compared to it’s competition. The Chrysler/Dodge Laser/Dayton K-coupes could punch the EXP/LN7 turbo in the face, with the high compression 2.2 non-turbo. With turbo motor, not even close. The CRX had less power but could still run circles around it. MR2, Fiero… it was slaughter.
It was so ugly it should have been a controlled substance. It was so ugly it would make your brain melt. It was so ugly I can’t think up a good hyperbole here. It was REALLY ugly.
TURKEY.
I nominate the VW 411/412, major water intrusion issues, combined with overly complex none-too-reliable wiring systems and everything was difficult to access.
Ford is riding high now but I think they made some horrendous decisions in the early 1990s that created several turkeys, at least in terms of sales. The vehicles themselves were quite OK for the time.
1. The 1991 Escort should never have been so-named. It was a quantum leap upwards from the old boxy Escort and its’ sales were seriously handicapped by its association with it. A different name would have made a big difference. As it was, as a salesman I found it very difficult, almost impossible, to persuade people trading in Tempos, Cavaliers etc. to even look at them, never mind drive them. Which leads to….
2. Turkey decision 2 was to replace the best-selling Tempo with the Mondeo-based Contour. A good car but way too much money for a Tempo/Cavalier type buyer to climb up to. So now we couldn’t sell compact buyers either the Escort nor the Contour. Great strategy there then.
3. Couple of years later Ford took the #1 selling Taurus (albeit by offering huge incentives to stay ahead of the Accord that was selling at almost full price) and created a fairly ugly (my opinion of course but backed up by the marketplace) replacement that led to a tumbling down the sales charts. They somewhat rescued it with the subsequent facelifted version a few years later but the damage was done.
Add in the failure to add a 4th door to the Aerostar/Windstar until years after Chrysler, then the horrendous retro Thunderbird and it is truly miraculous that Ford survived at all, let alone be now able to crow about record profits and not owing the taxpayer a dime.
Ford created enough turkeys to supply a whole extended family for Thanksgiving dinner!
BTW, Happy Thanksgiving all. (even though we had ours up here a month ago even though we were still harvesting like mad! Go figure)
To be fair to turkeys (and people from Turkey) here are my first-hand recent automotive disappointments:
First Gen (USA) Ford Escort…My wife’s family handed it to her in 1985. Sloshing around in the hatch were power steering, automatic transmission, engine oil and coolant containers. The only fluid system that didn’t leak on that car were the brakes and windshield washer. Oh, the car came with its own 2″x4″ to keep the hatch open. Disappointing because it really wasn’t any better than my sister’s (purple) 1972 Pinto. Turkey.
Mexican assembled VW Golf/Jetta. Having road-tested a veteran 250,000 mile 1.8l German Jetta vs a brand-new Mexican Golf I bought the 13 year old Jetta and ran it as hard as (il)legally possible for four years. Every person I handed the keys to came back remarking how the car liked to be “run hard”. Needing more respectable looking transportation four years down the road I bought a 2.0l 1998 Golf (Mexico). No cojones, no joy. Disappointing. Turkey. Oh, and the manual transmission failed within two years, and no it wasn’t covered by warranty.
I’d like to defend the hono(u)r of the first generation Dodge Stratus EX-V6. I haven’t driven the later Sebring, but my 1995 Stratus had the best “feet” of any car I’ve owned, including my last ride, an Infiniti M35X. Winter tires on the Stratus made for the most confidence inspiring cross-Canada motoring I’ve had.
Back to turkeys. They are fairly easy to identify, and when smart people don’t buy them they wither and die. Just as nature and capitalism decree. Let us not mock thee. Whoops, too late.
While we’re so gleefully picking on the Detroit 3, in our narrow-mindedness we’re missing a couple of the most truly awful automobiles ever made:
The Austin Allegro – Replaced an Austin model that was the best selling car in England (sorry, can’t remember the model name off the top of my head), and turned out to be completely inferior to it in every respect. From the stories I’ve heard, be grateful this car never came to the States.
The Morris Marina – In American, known as the Austin Marina. British Leyland’s last gasp in The States. According to Top Gear, “England’s answer to cars built by Communists”. My brother-in-law had one. Top Gear is being WAAAAAAY to kind to that automobile. The combination of GM’s X-cars, Vegas and Cimmarons showed absolute brilliance compared to the Marina. I still remember the day the shift lever came out of the floor on a shift between second and third.
I’ve never driven one, but I had to find Richard Hammond’s quote on the Morris James May is driving in one episode: “I’ll guarantee that nothing exciting, vibrant, dynamic, new, creative, hopeful or beneficial in any way to humanity has ever been done, thought of or driven to in that drab, dreary, entirely beige, wilfully awful pile of misery.”
Ah, the Allegro was better than it looked, it was light and with the 1300 engine it was reasonably nippy by the standards of the time. Ride and handling were ok, accomodation was excellent. The square steering wheel (Quartic) was not, but it had gone by the time I drove one. Its predecessor, the 1100, was pretty and used much the same mechanicals, I never drove one.
I agree the Marina was an unmitigatedly nasty car. I can’t think of anything nice about them. I can’t even think of anything even averagely nice about them. They were bloody horrible, and I knew someone who bought a new one.
Of the dozen or so cars I’ve owned, including a Pinto and Chevette, the absolute worst was a 1979 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme. I owned all three of the cars mentioned in college. The Olds was nothing but a continual stream of problems. I mainly remember spending more money that I could afford at the time getting the car repaired. I was driving back to my apartment, thinking that it was Friday, I had my car back, I didn’t have a gig that weekend, so I should take a trip somewhere. Then I head a thump and screech, pulled over, got out and saw that the right side of the bumper had fallen off. I looked at this and just started laughing.
A girl came by, told me I had a great sense of humor to be laughing at this, then went in to her apartment and gave me some rope. So, on the upside, I met a nice girl who had rope.
I’m surprised that no one has mentioned the following:
1. Merkur XR4Ti or Scorpio. Something just got lost in the in translation.
2. Speaking of lost in translation, the Saturn L-Series didn’t transition well from the Opel Vectra upon which it was based.
3. Any Sterling from ’87 to ’92. They all sucked.
4. Honorable mention for the combo of the SVO Mustang (as expensive as the XR4Ti, but in a Mustang wrapper) and the 3rd gen Camaro Berlineta (and its goofy pod mounted stereo).
Cadillac Cimarron. As much as the govt has made regulations that have limited car design, none compare to the self-defiling of an icon that GM engaged in with the Cimarron.
It was as if the govt let Ralph Nader run the design team and he set out to un-Caddify the car as much as he could. Like taking sugar cane based Coca Cola and turning it into a diet soy powder drink.
It’s an unconventional choice, but I nominate the X5, for the following reasons:
1. Along with the Escort, this was the most recalled vehicle in the history of the American car market.
2. It was an awful vehicle — heavy, small on the inside, not half the vehicle a 5’er station wagon was.
3. Its sales success opened the door for the creation of the Porsche Cayenne.
Wow harsh. Of the Soft roaders I think the original X5 is my favourite, and it wasn’t too bad off-road either. The later one is far too big.
Let’s talk about an as-yet unsung turkey: The Olds (Under)Achieva.
After being gut-punched in the income statement by its bland, uninspiring cars of the second half of the 1980’s, GM responded in the early 1990’s by bringing to market even blander, cynically boring cars. The Lumina and Grand Am (especially the Grand Am during the Cladding-Fetish Period) were bad enough, and the Skylark started out trying to have interesting styling (but was quickly sent to boredom school by GM), but the Achieva somehow became the worst of all. Not as spectacularly ugly as the Aztek. Not as spectacularly, leave-parts-in-the-road unreliable as a Vega or Citation. But somehow worse overall, for the way it gives off the impression that GM had thrown in the towel. That they knew they had no answer to the Camcords or even the Taurus, and they weren’t going to spend any more time or money trying.
There are a lot of really oddball comments. The Escalade? The Tribeca? The Cimmaron? Please. These aren’t all that bad at all. There are some truly bad turkeys. The Yugo, Hyundai Excel or Brilliant BS6 are three of the worst.
You can’t see the big picture. The Yugo was a bad car from a now non-entity in the US car market.
The Cimarron damaged decades of Cadillac brand equity. Cadillac is the flagship of GM, there’s the crux.
The Yugo may have been a massive Turkey stateside, but in Serbia and eastern Europe they are affordable, reliable, long lived and loved. They stopped making the last of them in 2008!
Any Renault sold in North America in the 80s.
The biggest turkey of all time? that’s pretty much a no-brainer. It was the vega, speaking from a durability standpoint. The yugo was most likely turkey number two.
Style wise, I have some votes related to modern cars:
Fiat Multipla, again.
http://www.autoobzor.org/uploads/news/2007/6/topnep/FiatMultipla.jpg
And the turd with which Chrysler replaced the Neon
http://www.dodgecalibers.info/images/2010/09/Dodge-Caliber-3.jpg
Anyone mentioned the Suzuki XC90 yet? What exactly was the point of this thing?
http://www.findtarget.com/pictures/suzuki_x90.html
The Suzuki XC90.
The Nissan Axxess.
I agree with the Chevy Citation. Worst car I have ever driven. Although my college roommate had a Le Car, which was being repaired every time he tried to drive it.
I’ve driven both, The Renault 5 LeCar was worse. I felt safer in an original Beetle, even with that weird auto-stick thing.
I remember the le car, the wheelbase was actually longer on one side than the other, and the trans was in front of the motor.
Corps du papier-mâché aussi.
I’m going to nominate two engines from a manufactuer that I really like, and readily defend. I hope this follows the rules set;
Mitsubishi Astron 4G54 with that godawful Hitachi Carb. The Hitachi 2-barrel is in the running for history’s worst carbureator. Also Jet valves. Who’s bright idea was that?
Mitsubishi 6G72 V6. Whenever I see this engine in something and it ISN’T puffing blue I’m surprised.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Let’s see…
GM L/N bodies (especially the Grand Am): Plastic cladding FTW! The looks screamed performance (well, to some people, anyway) – until you got behind the creaky plastic dash and started up the 90 hp Iron Duke.
Any Cadillac Seville from 1980 to 1991. The second generation (80-85) debuted with a noisy and unreliable Oldsmobile Diesel, and the styling was certainly bizarre. Then came the 8-6-4 debacle and the 4100 fiasco, neither of which helped its cause. In 1986, GM redesigned the Seville, and while it lost the strange-looking trunk, the shrunken third-generation Seville looked too much like…well, the aforementioned Grand Am. (To be fair to GM, the 1992 redesign helped things a lot until the Northstar problems.)
Lexus SC430 (2001-2010): The first-generation SC300/400 (1992-2000) was a beautiful car, IMHO, and seemed to influence a lot of later designs (i.e. the ’95 240SX and even the ’04 Pontiac GTO). The SC300/400 was a (reliable) homage to the Porsche 928, more or less. Then Toyota decided to stick the SC name on this UGLY turtle-shaped convertible thingamajig. And what was with the 430’s vestigial back seat that barely fit a briefcase – why even put it there? Wasn’t it supposed to be some kind of “European-style roadster” – which have two seats (a la the Mercedes SL)? I guess they just couldn’t decide what it was supposed to be. I’ve never driven one, but from what I’ve heard, the 430 has a very unfortunate combination of a harsh ride and numb steering. Maybe its specifications looked better on paper than the original SC’s did, but in real life, the rotund 430 itself was a step backwards. Toyota just couldn’t decide what the 430 was supposed to be – a luxury car or a roadster: maybe it was just supposed to look good on paper (the specifications, not the car itself).
(I know I’m ranting, but the SC430 makes me mad because the original SC300/400 was one of my childhood dream cars. I’m glad to finally get this rant out of my head.)
Car currently for sale? Dodge Avenger/Chrysler Sebring
“Classic” car? toss up between the Cimarron and Pontiac Aztec (remember those ridiculous commericals that showed yuppies trying to camp in the thing?)
I would say it’s the GM X car. See, Ford had the Fox platform which was relatively successful and gave us a Mustang again. The K platform gave us the return of the convertible, the minivan, and many other very competent cars. I owned a 93 Dodge Spirit to 200K miles without much more than gas. But the X car, which was supposed to be GM’s best shot at chasing the Japanese back to their homeland instead ended up being the best demonstration of what was wrong with GM. Recalls (including the inexplicable brake imbalance), engine and transmission issues, cut corners, and the list goes on. It was typical GM, much like the Corvair; great design, great ideas, innovation, plagued by half ass execution and bean counter involvement. The most haunting failure was the V-6 gasket issues. Those issues were still obvious over 25 years later with the 3.4L 60 degree V-6’s intake gasket replacement, a procedure more common than belt replacement. Rather than be GM’s comeback kid, the X car started GM’s death spiral. Knowing that GM’s first “Be all/end all” car was such a failure explains a lot about the Caddy Cimarron, Fiero, and Aztek.
1978 to 1980 Monte Carlo. Ugly and unreliable (even then). The plastic bumper trim would de-laminate and fall off while they were still on the lot. The blue and silver ones would oxidize to the primer in the southern summer sun.
(another vote for) the Cadillac Cimarron. The workers in Janesville must’ve known they were only years away from doom while they assembled these brand-equity destroying car shaped objects.
1992 to 1998 Buick Skylark. Uglier than (most) French cars. I recall turning these down at the rental counter (“c’mon, you have to have something, ANYTHING else?”) in the mid 90s.
2002-2003 Chevrolet Avalanche – great idea for a vehicle at the time, but then they bolted on all that plastic crap which had the effect of making it look like the Pontiac Aztec’s pissed off mothership. At least GM cleaned it up after a few years when they sobered.
-C
Those Skylarks with the pinched-up face were really terrible. I had a neighbour with one as a kid, and I don’t think they ever locked the doors on it. Take away from what whatever you will. heh.
It’s got to be the Chevy Vega (and other GM cars inflicted with the 2.3 aluminum block engine). The high-tech sputtered cylinder coating was a complete failure in practice leading to worn out cylinders and copious amounts of blue smoke in less than 30,000 miles.
Many other cars of that era were unreliable, but none self-destructed so expensively in so few miles. GM offered a discount on short blocks which came with steel cylinder liners; they knew the engines were garbage but they kept on selling them.
The engines with steel cylinder liners failed, too – the machine work for the liners didn’t leave enough “meat” at the bottom and the liners would drop a few thousandths, leading to a blown head gasket.
If this crappy engine didn’t spoil your fun, the Vega also came with GM’s special “patches of rust” paint job. Even when everything was right it was just another sh*t box. As bad as other vehicles were, nothing comes close to this bit of infamy.
I noticed someone wrote in another article on this site that chevy hadn’t made a single ugly car from 1945 to about the early 80’s. How about the 58-59 models? Even smokey himself said “I took a look at the 58 chevy and damn near puked.”
The 59 models were highly made fun of, and ford even sent cartoons to the chevy styling department in unmarked envelopes. Then there was the 73-77 chevelle, 77-79 monte, and the citation to name a few more.
Oops make that 78-81 monte.
The Leyland P76, a still-born half-baked turkey if there ever was one.
This is not a matter of opinion – its a fact! It was one big turkey when it was built.
Even Austin enthusiasts call the Italian designed Australian built product of a British company “half baked.”
http://www.aronline.co.uk/index.htm?p7682p82f.htm
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/motoring/features/leyland-p76-411854.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leyland_P76
My nominations:
Lexus SC430: UGLY and impractical. The unfortunate combination of a high price, rough ride, and numb steering. The only redeeming quality was the folding hardtop – and that was a novelty feature at best. Also, why did they even bother putting a back seat in? They really ruined the SC name with this car, as the original SC300/400 were, IMHO, fantastic grand tourers with a beautiful design.
GM N-bodies (especially the Grand Am): Plastic cladding FTW! Screams performance – the “performance” of an Iron Duke’s 90 horsepower, that is.
Cadillac Seville (any from 1980 to 1991): Bizarre designs and bad engines (4100 and diesel especially.) In GM’s defense, the 1992 redesign made the Seville a much more serious luxury contender.
Vote here for the Contour/Mistake twins. Highly unlovable. Cracked dash, anyone?
– Also agree with any Daimler-era Chrysler product. The Pacifica?
– I once worked with someone at Auto Trader who went on about how they drove a Chrysler 300, and how it was so hot, etc etc. It was a 300 M. Never trust outgoing call center reps.
– Also, how about a-twizzler-is-stiffer Solara convertible? Keeping divorced middle-aged women’s chiropractors in the black since 1998!
– The 9-2x was definitely a little poultry-esque if not a full-blown turkey…
Ford’s not-so-bright idea: the MERKUR sub-brand. Boy, did they piss money away on that one…
Mustang II. What a disgrace to Mustang badge.