These cars all have shoddy engineering, questionable taste, or poor manufacturing quality. Or all of the above.
This is a selection of comments made by readers on the original Worst Cars story.
AMC
".....ANYTHING made by AMC was complete crap and that was when the Japanese started building reliable, smaller, more gas efficient cars while Big Auto in North America let their industry decay beyond repair."
".....How about the AMC Spirit? A p.o.s. I foolishly bought a brand new one in 1981. It was a perfect companion for a second vehicle: A tow truck! It spent more time in the shop than actually driving it. The bucket seats kept snapping at the back (I jammed a milk crate behind the drivers' side), otherwise it looked like we were Apollo astronauts! AMC going out of business after Chrysler bought them out was a good thing. "
Audi Fox
"I had one of the first ones sold and what lemon that was! To change the struts you had to pull the engine, to change the starter you had to pull the engine! Nobody, not even the dealer wanted to work on that thing. It was ironic because the Audi Fox commercial on television bragged about German engineering as a selling point. What a joke!"
Austin Marina
"....besides having the usual British crappy engineering and the Lucas electrics it was so light in the back end it was undriveable in the rain and a death trap in the snow."
".....If memory serves (and it might not!), part of the marketing ploy around the Marina was to emphasize its connection to MG through shared parts and platform. Pure smoke and mirrors; or, in this case, smoke and fire. The lowest point must have been the MG sedan of around 1973. I had a friend who bought one from a dealership on Vancouver Island. It caught fire as he drove it off the lot. Funny now. Not so funny then."
BMW X6M
Take a look at a Pontiac Aztek and a BMW X6M side by side: They are damn near identical! Just slap a BMW front grill and headlights on an Aztek and you've got this new BMW. Who'd have thought that ten years on people would be paying $100,000+ for an Aztek clone?
Buick Rendezvous
".....I get angry when I see that wretched looking vehicle."
Chevrolet Chevette
".....I owned a '76 Chevette for nine years. It was crude, slow, and had one of the worst "heaters" (or so they called it) I've ever come across. It was a pretty chilly winter ride. On the other hand, the car was cheap to run and just wouldn't die. I finally got rid of it after I snapped the second clutch cable, and couldn't be bothered fixing it."
"......My Chevette would not start up in damp weather and stunk of rotten eggs if you tried to pass someone. It died at 100,000 km."
".....When I was learning to drive, my Mother let me back her Chevrolet 'Chevette' (AKA Pontiac 'Acadian') out of the driveway. Before embarking on my mission, I carefully adjusted my seat, adjusted the mirrors, and checked my blind spot. I then started the engine, pressed my foot onto the brake and shifted the vehicle's automatic transmission into reverse - at which time the entire transmission shifter assembly came off in my hand leaving a gaping hole in the vehicle's center floor console!"
Chevrolet Cavalier
"........It spent more time in the garage than it did on my driveway. It stalled, shimmied, electrical failures, burned oil, you name it. I swore never again to buy a first-of-its-kind car.'
Chevrolet Camaro
"The four-cylinder Camaro of the early 80s deserves a place on this list too. Not for looks or anything, just for putting a four-cylinder in a Camaro, with a whopping 92HP."
Chevrolet Vega
"...... suicidal engines..... hands down the worst car GM ever made. My experience with GM dealerships is worse than their product. Even though I recognize that GM makes better cars now, I can't forget the BS I had to endure at the dealerships.
Ford Explorer
".....Badly built, under-engineered, and completely unreliable, it's the only vehicle I've ever owned that went through three (THREE!!!) starter motors and a transmission in less than three years. After all these years, I still won't consider buying a Ford product."
Ford Maverick
"......If we're talking about rust buckets, the Ford Maverick should be on the list. I bought one in 1971, and by the time it died 6 years later, it had more fibreglass patches than metal
Ford Torino
".....EVERYTHING that came out of Detroit in 1971 was a rust bucket. I owned a Torino that met the same fate (scrap yard) after three years, with only 70,000 miles. The quality was so abysmal that Japanese manufacturers got it right and the rest is history. North American manufacturers deserve what they got and it all started in the 1970's."
The Harper Pro-Rogue
" .....I nominate the Harper Pro-Rogue as worst vehicle of all time: 1. Uglier that a Trabant, 2. Won't start in the Winter, 3. Guzzles gas and spews noxious fumes, 4. Extremely dangerous in local and international conditions, 5. Has a built-in speech synthesizer that salts the wound by continuously telling you how lucky you are to be riding in it."
Honda Civic
".....And no mention of the early Honda Civic with it's Asian female anthropometrics? I personally helped a neighbour yank the bumper off one rustbucket so it could be driven without dragging the part down the road."
".....If the early Explorers are going to be on the list, despite having evolved into very popular vehicles then it is only fair to add the early Honda Civic and the Hyundai Pony. Other losers for consideration that would get my vote would include the Pontiac Fiero; Chevy Citation; Dodge Omni; and the K-cars."
Hummer
"..... now that is an ugly piece of junk."
Hyundai Stellar
"....even worse than the Pony."
"had a Stellar in my student days. It didn't heat up properly in the winter; it was a block of ice. It stalled going up hills. It had a "choke" gadget that I had to fiddle with when starting the car. It had manual steering and I did some pretty clumsy parking around concrete columns in parkades. It was basically an ugly, dented up piece of garbage. But as other posters have noted, there is nothing more liberating than leaving the car doors open and hoping someone steals the pile of cr*p."
International Harvester Travelall
"....International Harvester should have stuck to building combines."
"..... A tractor masquerading as a truck. I have permanent hearing loss from the rear seat back banging against the hold pins..."
Lincoln Navigator
".......I happen to feel the Lincoln Navigator to be the most obscene design currently on the market, making the Aztec a gem by comparison. Mazda Rotary - CUBBR = The early rotary engined Mazdas were horrible and Mazda customer service and warranty policies are a sad joke. How do you tell if your Mazda dealer is lying? His lips are moving.
MG
".........you needed a mechanic in the front seat and a plastic sheet under the car to catch the oil."
Morris Minor
".....my father purchased a Morris Minor in the early sixties. My memories of that car revolve around the fact that every Saturday, we spent our time at the garage, getting the damn thing repaired."
Nash Metropolitan
".....In the words of Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons: "Worst car EVER."
Oldsmobile Omega
".....a friend bought one and he said they had to drop the engine to change the plugs. "
Plymouth Volare
".... what a miserable car that was...
"...... where's the Volare, and the late-70's Chryco cars that gave the company its first fling with bankruptcy? The Ricardo Montalban ads for the Volare were a classic, but the cars were gutless, subject to front fender rust-through, and had famously bad ignition."
Pontiac Acadian
".....the Pontiac version of the mighty Chevette. It was lipstick red with a blood red interior......"
Pontiac Astra
".....aptly named: 'Désastre' (the French word meaning 'disaster') by French-speaking Canadians who realized after purchasing the vehicle that due to its cast iron engine block and all aluminum cylinder head, that the vehicle would constantly leak oil (whether the engine was hot or cold) due to iron and aluminum's opposite thermal coefficients. The result? At no time was there ever a proper seal between the engine block and cylinder head."
".....My first new car in 1975 and it was a hunk of junk.....Pontiac, I have yet to forgive you! '
Porsche 924
".....a Porsche in panties!"
Renault Dauphin
"........Among other flaws it was excedingly prone to rust. My dad used to carpool to work in the 1960's, and one of the other drivers had a Dauphin, which had a large hole in the floor on the front passenger's side. This allowed my old man to watch the pavement go by inches from his feet as they drove into Ottawa...."
Renault Le Car
".....The car arrived without floor mats, just bare steel. The dealer said it was an option that had to be ordered...."
Singer Gazelle
".... I attempted to drive from Ottawa to BC with a friend in his 1959 Singer Gazelle. We made it as far as Wawa. Had to ditch it there. No spare parts for Singer Gazelles in Wawa. He later owned an AMC Pacer. He was a sucker for weird cars.
Skoda
".....The seats rocked and there was no defrost capability. I think the seatbelts were also partially detached. But it was cheap....."
Ssangyong Rodius
".....Makes the Pontiac Aztec look very attractive."
Suzuki X-90:
".....ridiculous-looking, disastrous."
Toyota Celica (1974)
"....Japanese cars back then were not what the are now. There isn't much I didn't fix on that car. By the end I didn't drive it anywhere without a toolbox in the trunk."
Toyota Echo
".....looks like a fat lady in too small shoes......"
Trabant
"......the Trabant is everything that Detroit is trying to do today - made from renewable materials (mostly cotton and alloys), little engine that could move four people and a tent to the Black Sea and back, and if the engine went kaput, you could disassemble it in your living room (as so light and small) and fix it by yourself..... Of course no one cared about initial quality, as you had to wait 15 years to get a new car. God, I don't miss these."
Vauxhall Firenza
"..... manufactured in the early seventies and sold by GM in Canada. Known for doors falling off on the highway and the famous bicycle wires controlling the brakes. The biggest lemon ever!!!!"
Volga
"......Since it was not on Western radar like the Lada and the Skoda, the other commie car, the Volga, might have been a runner up. A very clumsy and cramped attempt at a mid-sized western-style sedan. Russians are not short people, on average, but I found it impossible to get my slim six foot self comfortable in the front seat in one of the many Volgas that wound up in Laos for use as private taxis. I couldn't speak about reliability but I might make an educated guess."
Volkswagen Beetle
".....it was the best car in the summer and the worst car in the Canadian winter.... If you didn't gas yourself to death from the gas heater, you would have crashed from the fogged-in windshield. Talk about peep-hole vision."
......had its seats on two sliding rails held by a small latch that could be lifted with one finger and would bend under pressure. In any head on collision the seat would literally derail and the occupants were thrown into the metal dash about 12 inches away. Having the gas tank at the front doubled the risk factor."
These cars all have shoddy engineering, questionable taste, or poor manufacturing quality. Or all of the above.