Worst Cars Of All Time Rated

prostoalex writes "Forbes magazine complains that people nowadays do not have a real understanding of how awful a car can truly be. Hence they compiled a list of the worst cars available in the US, or 'lemons' created after World War 2. In the former Eastern Bloc, there are plenty of other choices, including this Ukrainian jewel, as well as many Soviet cars did not make it to the Forbes article."

Ahhhh...

[Demanche]

They Are Making Fun Of my dream cars...... :

What car does Darl drive?

[Anonymous Coward]

A SCOda.

The Holden

[So Called Expert]

In New Zealand, there was a joke about the Holden that went something like this:

Q: What's the difference between a sheep and a Holden?
A: You wouldn't want to be seen getting out of a Holden.

What about the K car?

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

What about the K car? Currently Red Green's car of choice for "case mods".

Soviet cars rock.

[nate1138]

What about the Trabant? With a plastic body, approx 30Hp in a noisy, dirty 2 stroke engine, what's not to love?

Forgot One

[CavyDriver]

Pontiac Aztek!

That car is so bad, it must have been hit twice with the ugly stick.

Doh

[NanoGator]

Figures. I have 3 from that list sitting in my front yard. At least I don't have to mow the grass, just move the cars around once a month.

A slow news day at Forbes

[Anonymous Coward]

This just in: The Pinto was a piece of shit!

Thanks, Forbes.

Ford Escort?

[onyxruby]

Where is the Ford Escort? I have personly been in 2 that had the engine catch fire, and have known of two others that caught fire. Meanwhile, the Edsel, quite possibly the ugliest car Ford ever made was a fairly decent car for it's time. As for Pontiac Fiero, I owned one once and had it catch fire while it was parked and being washed in a stall. I had to rewire the /entire/ car. On the other hand it had the best handling of any car I have ever driven.

Ah, the Simpsons:

[Anonymous Coward]

Dealer:"It can get 300 hectares on a single tank of kerosene"
*starts pushing car*
Dealer: "Put it in H!".

Russian: LADA

[Phil John]

...I remember my dad got one for my mum when her 15 year old fiat finally gave out, he thought it would be a good deal, (i.e. it was cheap).

Well, they got it home and found out one of the tires had a slow puncture...so before we could go out in it for a test drive, that had to be fixed. And that was just the start of it.

Over the next 7 years that car had so much money spent on it just to keep it going through Control Technique (the belgian M.O.T.) that the decision was finally made to get my mum a new car. So my parents went to the V.W. garage and she decided to get a polo, at which point they found out that if they took the LADA to the scrapyard they would give them more money for the car than the V.W. dealership would give as a part-ex. Yes, it was worth more as scrap! :o)

Reminds me of all the old lada jokes we used to gall my dad with,

Q)Why do LADA's have heated rear-windscreens?
A)To keep your hands warm whilst you are pushing it.

I also remember the first aid kit that came with the thing had phials of Ether in it...good thing my mom never crashed!

OTOH, that polo has been going for well over 10 years and shows no sign of dieing yet.

Ah, happy days! :o)

Re:Personal Experience: Fiero

[telecaster]

How the hell can a Yugo be worse then a Pinto?
The Pinto actually blew up and killed people!

Yeah, the Yugo was bad. But I don't remember the damn thing blowing up. You have to run to blow up....

Re:Personal Experience: Fiero

[Bombcar]

That's what reverse is for. 25 miles backwards, and viola! It's under warranty again!

Not that you should do this.

Trabant stories

[Charles Dodgeson]

Since when is the Trabant an American car?

But the real question is whether it is a car at all. In Hungary, if said, say, that you arrived at a party by car, but in fact travelled in a Trabant, your statement would be considered misleading at best. These things were not really considered cars.

The brother of a friend of mine (yes, this is a friend of a friend story) drove his Trabant from Hungary to Amsterdam in the 1970s, where Trabant's hadn't been seen before. Whenever he returned to his parked vehicle, there was always a small crowd around wanting a closer look and asking if he'd built it himself.

There is a joke (told back in the days when they made Trabants) about some Saudi sheik who'd heard about some car built in one of those northern European germanic countries (Trabant was produced in East Germany) that was so special that it took them years to build one for you (in socialist economies it was typical to wait several years between ordering a car or Trabant and it being available for you to pick up). So this sheik thought that he would order one and had one of his secretaries send away for it. Since he'd paid in real money, the vehicle was shipped immediately. It arrived and the sheik was happily puttering around in a local village when he saw a friend of his and shouted out, "Hey, Abdulla! Look I ordered a car that takes years to make from one of those nortern European countries, and they sent me a paper model that actually runs!"

I won't go into what carrying on a converstation was like in one of those things. I would say that it would be like carrying on a conversation on a lawn mower, but the lawn mower probably has a more powerful engine.

Re:Aren't all American cars in this category?

[nate1138]

Kay, here's some of your own:

Citroen. No, wait, they won the WRC manufacturers championship, can't bash them (even though they are ugly as hell).

Ok, here's one
Peugeot. Can't find anything good to say about this one. I rented one on my last trip to Europe. Blech. Felt like driving a Civic with a cold.

Or, the mother of all European mistakes - The TRABANT! (East German, it counts ;-)

Of course, you can laugh at American engineers all you want, but at least our probes LANDED on mars!

Re:Russian: LADA

[roman_mir]

another old anecdote:

A soviet drove his Lada(01) to Munich and it broke at some point there. Some Mercedes driver offered his help and used a rope to tie the cars together to pull Lada to the nearest mechanic. On the way a Volvo decided to race the Mercedes, and apparently the Merc. driver forgot about Lada at its back.

Later local newspaper had a headline: Lada participates in a race! A Mercedes and a Volvo were seen to race each other on the autoban, but apparently a Soviet made Lada was seen chasing them from behind and honking the horn, so that the two cars would move aside and let it through.

Re:Personal Experience: Fiero

[Jason1729]

That sounds exactly like my experience with an 86 Olds Regency 98. They also shopped around for cheap parts and replaced the Olds engine with a cheap Buick engine.

Less than 1 month after the warranty expired, the Transmission completely died and had to be rebuilt. I got the same sort of response that after warranty, they don't car if the car melts down. They wouldn't even appologize for it.

Then at 128,000km, the timing gear (which was made of plastic) threw off all its teeth and the flying timing chain did a lot of other damage too. The engine had to be completely rebuilt. Every time I got an oil change in the 130,000km's, they warned me that if I hadn't had the engine rebuilt recently I'd have to soon. Apparently nearly every single one of those cars had the engine self destruct withing a few thousand kms of 130k.

Now it's still on the road, on it second engine, 3rd transmission, 4th starter motor, 3rd alternator, 2nd fuel pump, etc...The last original part to go was the muffler :).

Jason
ProfQuotes [profquotes.com]

Yugo joke

[Mr_Icon]

A man enters an auto parts store and addresses the mechanic:
"I'd like a pair of windshield wipers for my Yugo."

The mechanic looks at him thoughtfully, then says:
"Sure, sounds like a fair trade..."

Re:Personal Experience: Fiero

[breon.halling]

This was moderated "Insightful"?!?!?! WTF? Hasn't anyone ever seen this [imdb.com]?

Re:Personal Experience: Fiero

[ackthpt]

Now it's still on the road, on it second engine, 3rd transmission, 4th starter motor, 3rd alternator, 2nd fuel pump, etc...The last original part to go was the muffler :).

As the joke went when I was keeping my T-Bird going into it's senior years...

You're buying a new car ... one piece at a time.

Re:I agree....

[breon.halling]

"I drove a Yugo as a delivery guy out of high school for an auto parts place."

Wow. Talk about irony. =)

Re:LADA Niva

[Anonymous Coward]

Simple rule: If your car is built anywhere between 13 (the Skoda factory) and 144 (Japan) degrees of longitude, don't buy it.

Re:Ah, the Pinto.

[iamhassi]

"I have a ford escort, 100,000 miles, 8 years. Never broken down on me. Still has original battery, starts up everytime."

So that's where that car ended up! Ford's been searching for the only escort they made that was decent, but some delivery driver lost it (it's Ford! They can't wipe their own....).

Well glad to hear someone got it and they're happy with it.

burn karma burn...

The Yugo

[donutello]

WARNING: Some people might find the following joke offensive. If you are one of those people, you should stop reading now.

Q: What's the difference between a Mercedes Benz and a Yugo?
A: You couldn't catch Princess Di dead in a Yugo.

Re:LADA Niva

[joel.br]

The only reason Lada put demisters on the back window is to keep your hands warm while you are pushing it home.

Re:Aren't all American cars in this category?

[Scooter]

You guys sent a PROBE to Mars? What with all the expense and effort, why didn't you send them a decent car?!?

Geez - was it at least the V6 "GT" version?

Canyonero

[ScriptMonkey]

With out a doubt, the hands down worst car ever is the Conynero. Just listen to its jingle! Can you name the truck with four wheel drive, Smells like a steak, and seats thirty five? Canyonero! Canyonero! Well, it goes real slow with the hammer down It's the country-fried truck endorsed by a clown Canyonero! Canyonero! Hey, hey! Twelve yards long, two lanes wide, Sixty five tons of American pride! Canyonero! Canyonero! Top of the line in utility sports, Unexplained fires are a matter for the courts! Canyonero! Canyonero! She blinds everybody with her super high beams She's a squirrel-squashin', deer-smackin' drivin' machine Canyonero! Canyonero! Canyonero! Whoa, Canyonero! Whoa!

Re:Ah, the Pinto.

[stefanlasiewski]

With a flying Pinto, you'll crash into the ground, the gas tank will spray gasoline all over you, and then you'll fly through the windshield.

What a novel idea! It's like the exact opposite of seat belts and airbags.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Forgot One

[antibryce]

While we're talking about cars, let's take a look at how they rate on the Gary Busey scale of ugliness [xmission.org]

Re:Personal Experience: Fiero

[El]

The real question is: in which vehicle have more people died from embarrassment while driving? Whether you die in flames, or simply never get a second date because you pick women up in a Yugo, either way, you're pretty much taking your genes out of the gene pool, aren't you?

We had TWO of these cars!

[sakusha]

I can't believe it, my family had TWO different cars on this list, the Olds Delta 88, and the Fiat Strada.
The Strada we owned for about a month. A new Fiat dealership started up, my dad got involved with their financing company so he got a deal on a Strada. But the car basically fell apart in less than a month. I remember pulling on the door handle, not realizing the door was locked, and I pulled the handle right off the door. The engine started smoking and blew up within a couple of weeks, it had massive transmission problems, my dad took it back to the dealer and told them to shove it.
My mom owned the Olds, it was an aging rustbucket and had continual problems. The muffler rusted through, we took it to a repair shop and they told us it was a good thing we never took a long trip, because the hot manifold was lying too close to the gas tank, it could have blown up at any moment. The car finally died one day while I was driving it, I was backing out of an angle parking spot and the front suspension caved in, leaving the front wheels both pointing inward about 30 degrees, like this: /--\ oh man it was a sight.
Yep, both of those cars were pieces of crap.

Pinto

[flynt]

Ford Pinto (Score:-1, Flamebait)

Re:What? No Skoda?

[Muhammar]

Skoda jokes:

The difference between Skoda and a Jehova Witness:
You can slam the door on Jehova Witness.

The difference between Skoda and a sheep:
It is less embarassing to be caught in a sheep.

Re:Where are the British Cars?

[UncleFluffy]

You forgot the classic: "it's not leaking oil, it's marking its territory".

Yes, I still love my MG...

Obligatory yugo jokes......

[Elusive_Cure]

Q: What is the purpose of the resistors on the rear windscreen of a Yugo?? A: So your hands wont be cold when you push it... Q: What is a Yugo on a mountain??? A: A mirracle !!

Re:MR2s rule

[fucksl4shd0t]

As old as your Fiero is, you'd probably have more miles on it if it didn't spend so much time in the shop....

Re:Personal Experience: Fiero

[lucifuge31337]

I use a paper bag for my gas cap...

Only the finest repair parts will do for classic pickups.

The floor of mine is now made entirely out of street signs. The original floor rotted away, and I've never seen a stret sign rust....so I figured why not. A few night missions, a couple boxes of pop rivets, a tube of caulk, and a couple bloody gashes later and I'm all set.