The Worst Vehicle I have owned

Disused Categories Modern
1

The WORST vehicle I ever owned:

1989 Jeep Cherokee (purchased brand new)

This vehicle was towed 8 times in the seven years I owned it. I was always
replacing parts that shouldn’t wear out in less than 140km, like the coolant
reservoir bottle, several hoses, track arm, catalytic converter, MANY engine
management bits, several brake jobs, THREE clutch salve cylinders, one
clutch master cylinder, o2 sensor twice, exhaust manifold, clutch fluid
line, rear wiper motor, front wiper motor, and so on. Why did I keep it
seven years?? – I couldn’t afford the loss of selling it (and my wife kept
saying “well, after we fix this, it should be OK…”)

Oh yeah, and most of this happened after the one year warranty ran out!

Second worst was a 1988 Ford Mustang 5.0, also purchased new, which had to
have the transmission rebuilt and catalytic converter replaced twice in the
first year! I sold it at 13 months.

YES, I have done a lot of maintenance on my 11 year old XJ40 in the three
years I have owned it – but it has NEVER been towed!

Let’s hear more “Worst Car” stories…

Mike Everatt
1987 XJ40-----Original Message-----
From: Brett Gazdzinski Brett.Gazdzinski@mci.com
To: Modern@jag-lovers.org Modern@jag-lovers.org
Date: Wednesday, April 22, 1998 8:18 PM
Subject: Breakdowns

Hello all Jaguar lovers!
I don’t agree with Nicholas on the break down deal with Jaguars.
I am not afraid to go anywhere in the Jaguar because of a breakdown.
I think the idea is silly.
I took the family on a long trip to Canada, and had one fault…
a stone through a headlight.(bulb fail worked)
My last car, a chrysler had a lot more trouble at a lower
mileage than the Jaguar has.
I cant see how any brand will not blow a hose or belt if you don’t
check under the hood.
I have owned many unreliable vehicles, that I never had problems
with…Triumph motorcycles were known to have electrical problems
but I rode it all over the USA coast to coast, and never had a
problem.
Can a mercedes go 200,000 miles with no maintenance(belts, hoses)?
I think they are well made, but so are hondas and toyota,s.
I don’t buy a car because I want it to run well even if I don’t
do any maintenance to it…
Silly thing to get a Jaguar to look at it in the driveway…
Brett
1990 XJ6
93,000 miles, and no break downs…

2

Let’s hear more “Worst Car” stories…

[Claus, Mike]  Worts car I ever owned was a 1987 Nissan 300ZX.  In 4

years/58K milesI had to

1.  Replace the rack and pinion!
2.  Replace the gas tank  (old one broke open at the seams!!)
3.  3 sets of tires (OK maybe this was my fault - I did drive pretty

hard)
4. 2 clutch replacements (same caveat as number 3)
5. Ignition rework
6. Constant fiddling with the T-Tops to stop them from leaking
7. Plus it talked! “Please fasten you seat belt.”, “Left door is
open”, Aaaaakk! I had to spend money to get it to shut up.

Worst car I ever owned.

- mclaus

'93 XJ-S Convertible>
3

Well, I have not owned many bad cars, but my last one was about
the worst…I fix things at the first sign of trouble, so some
of the stuff would have lasted for a bit longer, or could have
been ignored if you didn’t mind listening to odd noises from the
car, but here is a partial list(cause I forget bad things)
1986 chrysler lazer turbo 2.2l
Bought new in 1986 from a bad dealer for $13,000…

no real problems until 50,000 miles except a bad radiator fan relay
(on very hot day of course)
then…
back shocks
timing belt jump(put on a new belt)
front strut mounts and struts(noise, low damping)
new back axle (sway bar cracked)
new(used) stub axles in front(worn)
new radiator(cracks on side)
new hoses
new motor mounts(ripped)
new head gasket (started leaking antifreeze into oil)
new expansion valve(ac)
new pressure switch(ac)
new turbo(with head gasket job…was whining)
new oil pump(slick 50 victim)
new bearings in differential(front wheel drive, ate shim, wore
bearing, driveshaft jumped around at speed)
new brakes(disks and pads)
new brakes(disks and pads)
new front caliper pistons(replace bogus ceramic ones with metal)
new wheels(dents, broken hub caps)
3 sets of new tires
new timing pickup(started missing on hiway)
new back springs(sagging)
2 new batterys
new(used) steering wheel from junkyard(all the bearings fell out)
new lift shocks for back hatch

This was in addition to intensive maintenance, and fluid changings.
When I sold the car at 93,000 miles, it was like new, except the
paint was starting to look rough up close…and the seats were
wearing out…
I got $1500 for it, and still see it around once and a while…
I liked the car quite a bit, it was sharp looking, fast, somewhat
sporty, handy(hatchback) got good mileage for a 3 speed automatic,
was soft and plush inside, easy to work on(It had better be!)
but I should have gotten rid of it at 50,000 miles!

The Jaguar has been much better!
Brett
1990 XJ6

4

At 10:53 AM 4/23/98 -0700, Mike Everatt wrote:

Let’s hear more “Worst Car” stories…

My '69 GS has never been towed in the 10 years I’ve owned it. Not that it
has never been in the presence of a tow truck (several few times -
delivering petrol - surely you’ve heard the old saying about “passes
anything but a gas station”). I’m on the third transmission (burnt a
clutch in the original after only 305K miles, and the one I dropped in to
replace it was bum within 5 months), and the second engine (currently a
350HC tho - the 455 is being prepped for complete overhaul). But it has
never up and failed on me. The biggest sticklers I’ve had with it was when
some water got in the distributor (after a carwash), and when I had a bad
fuel pickup “sock” in the tank - you’d accelerate, and it would starve
itself by collapsing the filter.

My '88 XJSC though, in less than a month of ownership lost the starter -
less than two blocks (well, around a couple of corners on the SAME block)
from the Jaguar specialist. Thats repaired now, but it looks pretty glum
to have it less than a month and have already thrown $600 at it for what is
a fairly simple repair on my GS - only requiring that the car be put on
stands or ramps, not have the entire exhaust removed to provide access to
the starter. Sheesh. Add another $60 to keep the old starter (the
mechanic installed a rebuild).

Anyway, as for worst car, that would either be my wife’s '82 Skylark (intro
year of FWD on that line, and riddled with transmission and steering
problems - and absent minded service personnel). When she’d bought it at a
dealership (new car dealer, used lot), it skipped second, but they had it
in for service to repair that. A while later the transmission when out
again, and we had it towed for service and when she got it back, they’d
forgotten to put in a cotter pin in one of the bolts holding the front
passenger wheel to the steering assembly. She was fortunate to have just
gotten off of the freeway (let’s say conservatively 70mph) and was at a
stop light and as she crossed the intersection, the passenger tire came off
at a right angle to the car. Got that fixed (though steering was never to
be the same again), and then her transmission went out AGAIN a while later

  • completely, while driving it to a service shop (actually coasted into the
    driveway!). Ended up having her younger brother who was in college get the
    car serviced in shop class, and the transmission never grumbled again in
    the two years after that before we unloaded it. When she had it in for a
    routine check, some outfit overpressurized the cooling system, and blew out
    the water pump gasket (can you say, REMOVE THE ENGINE to replace - $400
    repair (elsewhere) for a “freebie” check). Another shop did an oil
    change/air filter/etc - charged to replace an air filter which I’d just
    replaced days before with a new one, AND drained the oil but didn’t
    refill it (stopped at two quarts). Nearly fried the engine finding out
    about that screwup. Managed to sell it cheap to someone who didn’t much
    care about the history.

Needless to say, I don’t touch my wife’s car. Yech.

My first car (I’m bowing my head in shame) was a mid-late 70’s Toyota
Corona 6 cyl. The Toyota overheated one day on a 20 mile freeway trip at
night (exhaust manifold was actually glowing cherry red and the heat
blistered the paint on the hood). A few days later when taking it off the
freeway, the block cracked (possibly from a dropped valve or thrown rod -
but I never opened it up to check), and that was all she wrote. It was a
cheap used car at the time (which fit my budget), but I vowed I’d never
again own a car from Asia.—
Sean Straw '88 Jaguar XJSC 5.3L V12
Marin County, California '69 Buick GranSport 455 V8

5

Brett

You beat me to it again. The worst vehicle I ever owned was a '86
Chrysler New Yorker Turbo. Those turbo engines were the worst. I can’t
possibly list all the work done to car so I’ll just say replaced engine
3 times. Everything else on car replaced only twice. The only good thing
about it,
it was the easiest car to do a “J” turn in I ever had, if you went fast
enough you could even do a “540”. Maybe this is the reason the engine
kept blowng up.

Hal Cline
The only good Mopar is a dead Mopar

6

Let me tell you all something about the worst problem I ever had with a
vehicle:

It was having no vehicle!

So stop complaining and imagine what a pain in the a** it is to commute
to university every day for about 4 years by public transport, spending
about 1.5 hrs
in the morning and 1.5 to 2 hrs in the evening waiting for busses,
trains, and
cable-cars.

When I finally had enough money to buy a car this trip was shortened to
about
30 min in the morning (traffic jam) and 25 min in the evening (no
traffic jam).

Every car is a wonderful piece of engineering, time-saving, comfortable,
…
…but a jag also is a wonderful piece of art (and a nice toy) (and fun
to drive)

… as is a merc to people who love it (or a bmw) (or a vw - even a bug)

…but continue with the stories, they are amusing

Martin Niehoff
88 XJ40 138k

7

Public transportation?
I used to ride a bicycle to work (5 miles) and back every day
for a year…then it was a motorcycle, what luxury!
Brett
…From: “Niehoff, Martin” NiehoffM@whiteoaksemi.com
To: “‘modern@jag-lovers.org’” modern@jag-lovers.org
Subject: RE: the Worst Vehicle I have owned
Date: Thu, 23 Apr 1998 16:57:29 -0400
Sender: owner-modern@jag-lovers.org

Let me tell you all something about the worst problem I ever had with a
vehicle:

It was having no vehicle!

So stop complaining and imagine what a pain in the a** it is to commute
to university every day for about 4 years by public transport, spending
about 1.5 hrs
in the morning and 1.5 to 2 hrs in the evening waiting for busses,
trains, and
cable-cars.

When I finally had enough money to buy a car this trip was shortened to
about
30 min in the morning (traffic jam) and 25 min in the evening (no
traffic jam).

Every car is a wonderful piece of engineering, time-saving, comfortable,
…
…but a jag also is a wonderful piece of art (and a nice toy) (and fun
to drive)

… as is a merc to people who love it (or a bmw) (or a vw - even a bug)

…but continue with the stories, they are amusing

Martin Niehoff
88 XJ40 138k