1993? Mitsubishi Magna.
Was literally given it and still lost money. Dry solder joints all through the main fuse/relay box. Got those all fixed and it blew the transmission.
1994 Pontiac sunbird. 2.0 liter iron duke had 80 hp when it was brand new. God knows what it was by 2001. Thankfully it had a manual transmission, but that thing REEEEAAAAAALLLY struggled on the smallest hills.
Sounds like a hella inefficient 2.0L.
Oh it absolutely was. It was a weak POS that would last forever. The thing was in service since 1977. I have a 2.0l in my MX-5, and that engine is incredible!
Whatever smart MG car, its software is so slow it would be outrun by a 2010s laptop
2016 Chevy Volt. Needs an EGR valve.
Chevy: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! No.
Maybe I’m totally wrong, but doesn’t EGR stand for EXHAUST Gas Recirculation? Is the Volt a hybrid? I thought it was an EV and thus had no exhaust.
Edit: This was a joke, wasn’t it?
The Volt is a hybrid gas & electric. The gas engine is there in part to charge the battery, and in part to power the electric drivetrain.
Under normal drive conditions, the gas engine short-cycles and doesn’t really come up to operating temp, which gums up the EGR valve causing the valve to pull too much current and start blowing fuses that power other critical parts of the battery charge control circuit. Left us stranded on an interstate this past spring until I could limp it to an auto parts store off the next exit to buy a replacement fuse. It ate two more before we could get home.
The workarounds to disable or bypass the EGR (for now) can cause other potential issues with the engine in the long run. Simply disconnecting the EGR keeps it from blowing fuses, but then the car isn’t road legal in many states because it fails emissions. Also, the EGR is part of the combustion engine’s cooling system, so not recirculating hot crank case gases works the rest of the cooling system harder, and potentially damages the pistons & cylinders.
The whole situation is a mess. Thankfully we have a second vehicle that’s a regular gas engine, so we use that one for distance driving, and can just use this one for around-town driving while we figure out what to do next with it.
The Volt is a PHEV, I think the Bolt is the pure EV. I was considering its Vauxhall badged version years ago as a choice for a company car.
The volt is hybrid both gas and electric
Do they not make the valve?
The OEM part is, as the service manager at the dealer put it, “on intergalactic back order.”
They don’t make the OEM part any more, and anyone who has new stock isn’t selling it to other dealers. You might be able to find a Chinese version, but if you have a warranty or service plan, you’re rolling the dice with it.
It’ll be a class action suit one day, I feel it in me bones. 🏴☠️
Should be a class action suit now. Isn’t it typical to have 10 year part availability?
That’s when you put in a block off plate instead.
A ten year old 1995 Kia Sportage. All sorts of electrical problems, the four wheel drive didn’t work and I could never figure out why.
I will say the engine was surprisingly durable. I got it stuck in the mud and a friend of a friend tried to help get it unstuck by trying to drive it out, but only managed to get it stuck deeper and cracked the block. I had to add new coolant every day, but I drove that car gor another 6 months with a cracked block and only had to spend a few minutes trying to coax the engine to start when it was cold.
Pro tip: Never buy the first year of any car, even used.
I had a 1995 Kia Sephia and my dad happened to be the parts manager at a dealership with a Kia franchise. Found out the transmission was made by Mazda. I think that or 1996 was the last year. You might have had the same thing.
Wikipedia says the sportage was a Mazda with kia branding back then. Which probably explains why I only ever had electrical problems that weren’t from unrepaired damage.
I owned a Ford Escort that ran with a similar program of trade between Ford and Mazda (I think it was 96 or so). So the engine and such was Mazda in a Ford body. It was worn down from past abuse, but it ran a long time regardless before it gave up. Apparently the flip side of Mazdas in Japan that got the Ford mechanics were terrible, so I count my blessings.
Every American made car I’ve owned has been a piece of shit constantly falling apart and needing repair and maintenance. I thought that’s just how cars were for a while. Then I started buying Asian and German cars and realized Americans just can’t make a good car.
It’s all in whether management lets the engineers make a good product or pushes for cost reduction above all else. American made Toyotas are just fine.
A similar thing is true with Chinese made goods. Companies that care enough to implement proper process and quality controls can have perfectly adequate quality come out of Chinese factories. It’s just that the companies that were quickest to export production cared more about minimizing every last cost than about quality.
I had two ford Tauruses and both were gems. However the Chevy Malibu Hatchback I had was garbage.
I had an American-made 2001 Honda Civic that didn’t start having significant problems until it was well over 100k miles. Had an American-made 2007 Accord that never had a major issue with 116,000 miles. Now have an American-made 2023 Integra, and I hope it fares the same.
Edit: but our American-made '96 Astro was a total piece of shit.
My dodge durango was the absolute worst. My bmws are amazing.
A Chevrolet Aveo 5 2003. All the interior was made of cheap plastic. It was pretty terrible in general.
My first vehicle was a 1971 Ford 3/4 ton. It was extremely reliable and tough. Having sat for most of the previous 30 years in a barn, it even looked good.
But it had all of the safety features of 1971. Power brakes the would lock up and throw you off the road if you more than thought about braking. Lap belts and a solid steel steering wheel to smash your teeth on. If you somehow hit the steering wheel hard enough to break it, you’d be impaled on the steel pipe steering column. Speaking of the steering, it didn’t have power steering, so if you hit a rut on a rough road, the steering wheel would spin out of control. You had to just let go of it until it stopped spinning lest it break your thumbs. Also, the gas tank was inside the cab behind the seat for extra car crash fun.
It was a beautiful death trap. I kinda wish I could have put it back into a barn for another 30 years instead of selling it.
1985 Ford Tempo. Everything broke.
Ohhhhh man. My friend’s father used to drive a Tempo to work. That thing was a steaming POS.
Ugh. Late 80s ford ranger 4 cylinder here. Everything broke, and top speed (downhill only) of about 65 mph. Good luck trying to go 55 up a hill.
Not mine, but an ex-girlfriend had a Mazda 3 with a blown clutch. That thing sucked.
What year model was it?
I don’t remember, this was back in the mid-'90s so it was no later than '95 or so.
Must have been the 323, before they rebranded to 3 in the early 2000s. Shame for you it was broken, they were good drivers cars in a modest way
1976 Dodge Aspen
Back in about '89-'90 I was the assistant manager at a fast oil change place, and we had a regular customer with a maroon '76 Aspen with a bullet-proof slant-six who got his oil changed with us regularly. I could hear him coming. I’d know it was him without even looking because of the distinctive TAP-TAP-TAP -TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP. We’d pull him in and he’d tell us to just change the oil and filter and don’t bother checking all that other stuff, so that’s what we’d do. We’d pull the plug and if more than a half a quart drained out we’d be surprised. After a filter swap, we’d fill it back up and restart it and it would go TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-tap-tap-tap-ta-ta-ta-t-t-t-t-t-t-t- etc and he’d smile and pay and be on his way. Of course, we’d see him again in about 3 or 4 months, same thing, rinse and repeat. The tapping was his signal to get it changed. Fast forward to '97, after working as a manager at other locations I came back to that same station as the manager there and I’ll be damned if that same guy in that same '76 Aspen didn’t pull in for the same service with that same oil-leaking loud-ass tapping slant-six, still hanging in there…
I’ve only owned two cars. So the worst by default was a 1987 Ford Laser I owned in 2003.
It was the “Ghia” model. So central locking, sun roof. My uncle had modified the wheels, steering wheel, carbon shifter.
I actually loved it and it handled so well on gravel roads. But eventually the cv joints went, repaired, they went again, leaving me stranded 30km out of the nearest town.
2003 Mitsubishi Galant. Just thoroughly mediocre-to-bad in literally every regard one might care about. It did get me from point A to point B.
Mercury Sable
Volkswagen Jetta. I think it was a 2012. Aside from having an oil leak that was common in that model, the gear shift computer broke, and most annoying of all, on the inside would just sort of fall off for no reason. I mean, the vent direction control tabs. And the only way to replace them was to remove the entire dash. Stupid and cheap design. I’ll probably never buy another Volkswagen.
