[RAIV55]

Originally Posted by 1965gp

Interesting to hear about the 73 Chevy truck that rusted, our 73 K5 was completely rusted away...

I'm another one who suffered the '73 rust ravage on a K-20. Replaced all the front sheet metal and box sides when 4 years old, rusted again so it was sold.

Can't think of a worst out of all the different makes that I've owned.

[se428bandit]

Best, 1972 Lemans, I beat on that car and it never gave me any trouble. Worst 1977 Can Am, it was a stolen recovery and it had electrical problems that drove me crazy.

[389]

Best hands down 1969 Chevy el Camino SS396 I have now.. Nothing I ever had or drove in 40+ years of cars could touch it. The massive frames they put under these cars make them handle like there on rails.. Mine has a healthy big block with a Turbo 400 2;87 rear end..

Worst, I never buy junk, never had a worst...

[Charlie Brengun]

Alfa Romeo - Mito really nice to drive and the one I had was almost full options. Just a really nice and small get around car for towns and short distances, good for a crowded place like the Netherlands.
As expected it was also the worst as it needed a lot of maintenance. A lot more than the other new cars I had have ever needed..

[66sprint6]

You need a small, reliable car in Holland. How else will you get your Rookvlees or Hagelslag? I'd go crazy without mine. Fortunately, there's a Dutch store near where my wife's parents live, so I'm not jonesing for those. We make our Oliebollen and Pannekoeken at home.

[4dblnkldude]

OK I'll play..the best was an 89 F-150 my father bought new with the 300" strait six and a 5 speed. I bought it from him in 1998 with 150,000 on it. I drove it until 230,000 when I finally did a clutch and a motor mount. Drove it to 280,000 and sold it to a friend of a friend who drove it another 80,000. He then sold it and I don't know what happened after that. Other best was a Jeep XJ of 1990 vintage with the 4 liter. Bought it with 120,000, I put a harmonic balancer on it and fixed a brake line and did shocks. That thing never missed a beat and the kids loved it. The worst was out 2000 ford exploder, constant transmission issues, exhaust issues triggering check engine light, you had to clean the air intake every two weeks along with the IAC. Other worst was a 2001 chevy impala, brake lines rotting, intake gaskets, AC issues, again every month something happened to it. My daughter drove it for 6 months and the exhaust manifold cracked in the back and I said this thing will be a tomato can in 6 weeks.

[Charlie Brengun]

Originally Posted by 66sprint6

You need a small, reliable car in Holland. How else will you get your Rookvlees or Hagelslag? I'd go crazy without mine. Fortunately, there's a Dutch store near where my wife's parents live, so I'm not jonesing for those. We make our Oliebollen and Pannekoeken at home.

Those are some typical Dutch food things indeed. So are you from the Netherlands or of Dutch decent?

By the way is the Rookvlees you can get the real stuff (horse meat)?

[gtohurstjudge]

Although nowhere close to the best car I have owned, my 69 GTO is my favorite,
otherwise I wouldn't have kept it for 50 years so far. It breaks a lot, always has,
but I fix it and move on from there, because I love everything about it.
The best GM car I've ever had is my 2010 Camaro.......100K miles and only have had to change 1 tail light bulb, 1 battery, two sets of tires, and oil and filters over ten years of use.
Easily the best vehicle I've owned or have ever seen for that matter is my 1999
Ford Expedition Eddie Bauer. It's pulled heavy trailers it's whole life and is still
a gorgeous truck at 21 years of age and 325,000 miles. It still has it's original
5.4 liter engine, automatic transmission, rear end, A/C compressor, wheel bearings, fuel pump, all p/s parts, all door lock actuators and power window parts, original sound system, door handles, door hinges, headliner, etc. The headliner and sun visors still look brand new........amazing! I've changed the starter, alternator, water pump and radiator but only as a precaution due to mileage........the truck has never been towed for any reason and it still never breaks down...more reliable than the sun coming up in the morning. The original paint still looks gorgeous.
The worst vehicle is also very easy.....1993 GMC Suburban. Everything that could go wrong with that Truck went wrong, in some cases the same parts failed 5 or six times, and I was using GM factory parts. I drove it 180,000 miles and finally sold it because I couldn't drive it around the block without developing a new problem. I estimate that between 100,000 and 180,000 miles
that I spent 18 thousand dollars on repairs to keep it going. Total POS.

[goatwgn]

Here is my 500000 mile Olds 350, back in 2013, that had never been apart, except for water pump replacement. Top picture is the same unit, rebuilt, back in the '74 Olds Cutlass. This thing is tough. I didn't "baby it" over the years, but i did keep the oil changed, and never overheated the engine. Inside was very clean, with very little wear. Valve springs and rings were weak. Some carbon buildup in the valley, where the exhaust crossover had a leak.

[Gator67]

Worst, 2002 BMW M3. Random electrical problems would leave me stranded. Covered under warranty but got sick of having to have the car towed in for service.

Best, 2000 Accord. 200k trouble free miles in 8 years.

[keith k]

I'll only include daily drivers...
Best: 2002 Ford SVT Focus -- an absolute joy to drive; kept it for 6 years (the longest I've driven any car regularly in my whole life...)
Worst: A 1982 Honda Accord that I bought used with a lot of miles on it; I've had a few other Accords that were fantastic, but that one never drove right and felt jinxed (would love to have seen the Carfax history, had that existed in the late '80s!)

[Wick]

The biggest POS by far was a 2006 Infinity G35 Coupe, it was like a dead albatross around my neck. Sold the car with less than 25k miles. New engine due to oil consumption. The oil had to be full to the line or it would ping and rattle. Replaced clutch and flywheel on my dime because Infinity claimed abuse. I never, ever abused that car in any way. Twice lost all power at highway speeds, never figured that out. Stereo head unit replaced along with radiator, master cylinder, both headlights and a few other items I can't recall. Drivers power seat would take off when it rained, almost wrecked the car a few times because of that one. Dealer refused to replace the switch until a mechanic almost wrecked the car. All warning lights would flash at random times. The roof would pop loudly when turning right into a driveway that was elevated. Never did find that problem. Car was constantly at the dealer for one reason or another.

On a side note, Infinity had the worst customer service except for the free loaner.

[muscle_collector]

worst: 1995 chevy 4 x 4 dually with the 6.2 turbo diesel. any and everything that could go wrong almost happened. spent more time in the shop than I had it in my possession. 32k miles Chevrolet decided they were done honoring the warranty. so after several years of a lawsuit and the truck sitting in my pasture chevy lost the case and had to pay up. been driving ford trucks ever since.

best: either my 2000 f350 dually 4x4 sold it with 131k and never had one repair or my 2011 f350 dually 4x4 it had one recall warranty repair only. decided to keep it as a back up hauler and it now has 202k and I did a hose replacement at a 150k just to make sure that the plastic ends didn't bust somewhere out of town.

[Will]

From a reliability and cost of ownership perspective, best by far was my '89 Corolla. Bought it for cheap from a friend at a low point in my life when I just needed cheap transportation. Had 112K on it. Drove it to 230K and only repairs it needed were CV joints (super easy to replace both front axles, had the whole job done in under 2 hours) and a water pump. Don't know if the clutch had been replaced before I bought it, but it gave up at 230K so I had it replaced and just a few days later 3rd gear in the transmission broke. I never once changed the oil in the trans, so guess that should've been expected. Could've put a used, guaranteed trans in it for cheap but I was tired of it at that point so traded it for an '06 WRX that only had 38K miles on it. That was the second most fun car I've ever owned behind my '72 Formula. That car was also very reliable, no problems other than the heater blower motor gave up at 50K miles. Easy fix and no other problems until about 145K when the clutch was starting to get iffy, the catalytic converter was getting plugged up and it blew a head gasket. I had pounded on it for over 100K miles at that point so felt like I got my money's worth and rather than spend the $5500 to put a whole new engine and turbo in it, I just sold it.

Worst car is a tie between my '84 Nissan 4x4 pickup which blew the transmission and kept cracking cylinder heads or my current '97 Accord that has had all kinds of stupid stuff go wrong with it.

[dhutton]

Best: 2011 Cadillac CTS-V. Fantastic car. Great performance, great looks, great ride and handling.

Worst: 2008 Ford F-150. Took to intermittent bucking and Ford couldn’t fix it.

Don

[Dick Boneske]

Worst, by far, was my '63 Volkswagen Beetle. Uphill on highway couldn't maintain speed, noisy, little to no heater/defrost.

Favorite driver is my '95 Roadmaster Wagon. Tow rated 5,000 lb, 20+ mpg, no oil usage at 179,000 miles, great brakes, good performance with stock LT1. It'll be a sad day when this one is used up.

[george kujanski]

No real complaints about our cars, I tend to buy domestic. The standouts: '85 Olds Toro: bought at 12K, the only real work needed was @ 70K started to burn oil. I figure not the fault of the hardware necessarily, but it had a low numerical final drive like 2.7:1 or so and overdrive, My wife would drive it mostly and i think ended up lugging the engine a lot (307 cu in). I did a re-ring on it and then I drove it till 210K miles with no prob..kept it out of OD for city driving. Changed the trans oil at 210K just before I sold it, just because. The thing was a tank thru the snow too. Nice and comfy with all the options.

On the other side, we have a '98 Eldo with the Northstar. Going on 22 years, always something minor breaking, uses oil, (don't know where it's going) leaks oil and coolant too. The main issue I have with it you can't get to anything to fix things. Main issue was at 120K, with a cyl head leak. You need to pull the engine and put inserts into the block head bolt threads because the threads get messed up, and then reseal everything.

Steps to replace A/C evaporator: disconnect battery, remove engine. No kidding. Never needed that (yet).

George

[mgarblik]

Agree with you about the Northstar cars. They were ahead of their time 20+ years ago, but very hard to work on. And they leak EVERYTHING from EVERYWHERE! Since I own my own shop now, as of a couple years ago, I won't work on the engines. Brake jobs, tires, struts, sure. There is almost zero chance of having a happy customer after working on those engines now. Had a very nice lady with a 1996 Eldorado that had all the typical Northstar issues, but a beautiful, rust free, example. Metallic red, parchment leather interior, about 80K miles. She sold it for $600.00 because it needed 5K in underhood repairs.

[Chief of the 60's]

Originally Posted by mgarblik

Agree with you about the Northstar cars. They were ahead of their time 20+ years ago, but very hard to work on. And they leak EVERYTHING from EVERYWHERE! Since I own my own shop now, as of a couple years ago, I won't work on the engines. Brake jobs, tires, struts, sure. There is almost zero chance of having a happy customer after working on those engines now. Had a very nice lady with a 1996 Eldorado that had all the typical Northstar issues, but a beautiful, rust free, example. Metallic red, parchment leather interior, about 80K miles. She sold it for $600.00 because it needed 5K in underhood repairs.

Don't forget about the head bolts pulling out of the block because some brainiac engineer thought it was a good idea to screw them into an aluminum block/threads.

Only thing worse than a Northstar was the HT4100. Another Caddy gem.

[OG68]

Originally Posted by Chief of the 60's

Don't forget about the head bolts pulling out of the block because some brainiac engineer thought it was a good idea to screw them into an aluminum block/threads.

Same issue with Toyota four cylinders after 2000. Don't know if it was ever fixed or that Toyota is ignoring the problem