As it turns out, we’ve all had a bunch of absolute junk cars in our past . Some of you have had worse cars than others, and some have been more unreliable than others.

That being said, one thing unites all of us: these vehicles were garbage. It’s almost a right of passage to own one in becoming a car person. Bonus points if you’ve had some real flaming hot piles of crap in your vehicle history — it only adds to the experience, gearhead or not.

So, join me as we look through the automotive misfortunes of our fellow Jalops.

Purchased used with under 10K miles from a dealer who was later indited for shady business practices. Too many issues to go into, but it seemed to be in the shop at least once a month and I maxxed out two credit cards to keep this turd on the road.

First engine blew at 68,000 miles, I paid a friend $750 and my VCR to drop a used 32K mile engine into it. That engine blew eight months later, leaving me stranded in the Poconos about 125 miles from home.

I had the car towed to the nearest garage and found a motel for the night. The next morning, I grabbed my gear out of the car, ripped out the Krako cassette deck I had installed in the car and hitchhiked to the nearest Greyhound station and got home 14 hours later.

The mechanic called me a few days later, told me the timing belt had snapped, so I decided to cut my losses, mailed the title to the mechanic and told him to scrap the car.

I bought a 1983 Mercury Capri for $700, it lasted me 2-1/2 years without a whimper.

The Escort is one of those cars that just represents 1980s American junk to me. It’s horrid. Good move on scrapping it, though I fear you may have held on too long. Also replacing it with another 1983 Ford product is a bold move.

Submitted by: Earthbound Misfit I

When it was working, it was an absolute *joy* to drive; the electric assist (a motor in the gearbox where the torque converter would otherwise be) supplemented the 2-liter turbocharged engine with some low-end shove - a total of 443 lb-ft. During the gas price hike this summer it would have been able to drive me to and from work on electricity only.

Unfortunately it had a fondness for air suspension collapses, check-engine lights, and random inexplicable electronic maladies (phantom collision alerts) - all made worse by parts that took months to arrive. In the two and a half years I owned this car it spent six months undriveable. But I loved it - and hated it - and now I have a goddamned Accord.

forgot to mention the sidebar to this:

During the time of $6/gal premium gas in my area my plug-in hybrid was undriveable so I was dailying my 2000 XK8 - dailying a car that gets 15mpg on premium.

For those in the back: my trustworthy, reliable car was a 22-year-old JAGUAR.

Gotta love German cars, don’t ya? I’ve always thought this generation C-class (pre-facelift) was desperately pretty. That engine is pretty neat too. Shame yours went to shit, though.

I can honestly say a new 2022 Model S Plaid is the worst car I’ve ever owned.

I bought it new with 14 miles on it, but the detail guy putting on the PPE assumed I had gotten it used since it looks like the rear quarter panel had already been repainted (and poorly at that), and there was a lot more pot-marking on the flares. Sounds like Tesla botched something up before delivery and did a shoddy job repairing it

The fit and finish is worse than my British-built car that was put together by three guys in the back of a barn. Hood contacts the headlight; entire panel shapes don’t line up; interior panel alignment is all off.

Stupid yoke and even dumber turn signal and horn button placement. I was hoping I’d get used to it, but the opposite happened: you don’t realize how horrible, fatiguing, and painful the yoke ergonomics are until you try driving it for a few hours. And good luck finding the turn signal buttons in roundabouts or the horn—ever.

I was also hoping I’d get used to the ugly Tesla-humpback design....but I swear, every time I look at her, her butt gets bigger and bigger.......

At least it was cheap, right?

Worst thing? It’s actually made driving boring. It’s fast, but not fun, and I no longer find myself going out on drives just for fun like I used to.

I truly don’t know how you managed to buy this car and not know all of the issues with it beforehand. On the upside, you can probably sell it right now for more than it’s worth. That’s worth something.

This commenter didn’t write anything. It leads me to believe Bob’s 8 Series is so unreliable that its driven them to tears and cannot type. Poor Bob.

My worst was my first: a ‘73 Vega wagon.

You want to talk about a POS that probably did more to damage the Chevy brand than anything else boneheaded GM did, I can’t think of one. The Vega is it. (I’ve never owned another Chevy vehicle.)

One-by-one the gauges died. The lousy black carpet turned to dust from being baked by sunlight. After a few months, I blew up the damn awful aluminum 4-banger. The short block replacement leaked oil like a sieve—I had to keep quarts of oil in the car to keep the engine topped off—so ”fun”.

At least when the Vega died, it did so at the best possible time—it caused me to hunt for new wheels and I lucked into the Charger. Good job Vega, you truly awful car.

Jesus Christ, what an unfortunate-looking vehicle. The ‘70s were a real, let’s say tough, time for the automotive industry. Look on the bright side though, this swore you off GM and probably played a hand into you falling into Mopar’s loving embrace.

Submitted by: the 1969 Dodge Charger Guy

fist of all it was a penalty box to drive. uncomfortable seats, vague steering, mushy shifter (at least it had a stick, the one redeeming feature), terrible suspension, loud.

all this shit happened before 80,000 miles: the fuel filler neck rusted out at (w t .... F), cylinder head warped (fuck dodge forever for refusing to do _anything_ about this design flaw which had about 100% failure rate across that model), paint stated peeling off, seats were falling apart, car in general was starting to rust through.

the only good thing about that car was it got pretty good gas mileage.

That’s all terrible but the Neon was so cute. Can’t we forgive it for being a piece of shit for that reason?

I grew up driving larger cars with lots of buttons. Power windows and locks, tilt wheel. Auto transmission. It’s what I grew to prefer for my day to day driving. The Mazda had none of that and I hated it for that.

Worst was the manual transmission. There was nothing wrong with it mechanically and the car drove fine. but in Orlando rush hour traffic, it was horrid. My left knee still isn’t the same 20 years later form all the shifting.

I hated that car for not having the usual options I like in a car. I hated it for making me shift hundreds of times a day. I hated so much of it. But I loved it for sure. It never broke down. It got amazing mileage.

I only had it for a couple of years and it was a nicer car when I sold it than when I bought it. And I made a little profit on it because of the shape it was in. It was what I needed at the time. Just not what I wanted.

Why did you buy this car??? Like, I do not understand at all.

Submitted by: Lars Vargas has high hopes for 2022

Oh, I win. Or at least I have an interesting take on this. Hear me out.

I present the first-gen Honda Ridgeline.

The Honda Ridgeline, adequate in almost every way, and therein lies the problem. It is the perfect blend of adequacy and practicality, peppered with a heavy, heavy dose of Honda reliability. You’ll be bored driving this thing 100% of the time, you’ll regret not buying a more fun, yet less practical vehicle.

It will take all the miles you can throw at it, as long as you do the minimal amount of maintenance it requires.

It won’t let you down, but it will never pick you up. You’ll never feel bad driving it, but you’ll never feel good driving it. You’re invisible to car enthusiasts. Its design though unconventional, is inoffensive and forgettable.

It is a toxic, love-hate relationship.

The love: On one hand, you love that you can confidently drive it across country, up and down mountains, miles off the beaten path, and in all types of weather and road conditions all despite the fact your Ridgeline may have made it to the moon and is on its return flight. You’ll enjoy that it is adequate as a truck for nearly everything the average American family could need a truck to do.

The hate: Everything above. Yes, for the same reasons it is good, are the same reasons why you’ll hate it. Because it is just so damn good, you can’t bare to part with it. Despite it being worth less than a night at the movies with your family, you just can’t help to keep it as your 3rd, 4th, or 5th vehicle. It is worth more to you than the few dollars you’d get even in today’s highly inflated used car market.

It is the worst car I’ve ever owned because it is as boring as watching hunting, fishing, or golf on TV.

It may have won Motor Trend ______ of the year award when it hit the scene, and they were right, but gosh, I hope for a big lottery win so that I can buy a farm and put this thing out to pasture.

This comment is about as long as the Honda Ridgeline Wikipedia page, and for that reason it gets included on our list. Congrats, friend.

I couldn’t fill the gas tank to full because the seam at the halfway point had rust holes. The return line also broke off of the tank after I hit a bump, resulting in the line just leaking gas onto the ground whenever the engine was running.

One of the rear axle mounts was more rust than metal.

Oh, and I did this to it. The idea was to make a budget death kart, of course!

Through some stroke of horribly bad luck, my daily driver 2012 Smart seized its alternator and I couldn’t afford to fix it. I didn’t have a million cars back then, so this piece of crap was my daily.

I was able to fix the leaky fuel line using fuel line meant for a 50cc scooter and I even worked around the rotting tank issue. But I could not get the doors back on, even with help.

It was a glorious and cold two months...Best/worst $500 I’ve ever spent.

Who the hell are you?!

Easily my 1966 AMC Rambler wagon lowrider.

Very rusty. No heat, no A/C, no wipers, no rear window, no highbeams, no exhaust, signals were activated by a switch on the dash. The wiring for the hydraulics were all jacked and it caught fire.

It was somehow the best and the worst all at once.

I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, pal. This thing fucks.

Submitted by:Unacceptably Dry Scones

I’ve posted about this POS before, but never actually posted an image of it. Here it is, my worst car ever owned: a 2008 VW GTI.

I had the car for just shy of three years. It had repeated problems that were diagnosed as with throttle body, throttle body wiring harness, or HPFP. I felt like it would end up in limp mode at any given moment (but it really liked to go into limp mode when it was most inconvenient: on the 401, or pulling out into traffic). When I traded it in, it started giving a new error - something along the lines of “oil pressure warning, pull over immediately and turn off car”.

At one point near the end, I was expressing some disappointment with VW’s continued inability to fix the car. A new service advisor sympathized with me effectively - he pulled a file they kept with paper records of all my visits to that day. It was about three inches thick. He said “I get it, this car had been bad.” At least they knew too.

My favourite story about the car though: I had to use the courtesy driver a lot. Drop the car off, then get a drive home to work the day. One time near the end I was being driven home one morning with a couple sharing the ride in the back seat. They were nervous - they had never owned a VW before, and were worried that their brand new Tiguan was seeing weird issues already. They asked how long I had my VW. “Just under three years.” Then they had to ask: how reliable has it been for you? Perfect timing - we just rolled up to my house. “Did you notice that our driver didn’t need directions to my house?”

I like Volkswagen so much. Why must they be so miserable to own? What sort of cruel god would do this to us?

I was going to once again mention the ‘93 Dodge Dynasty that I bought for $150 and only drove for a month before the transmission cracked in half and caught fire. However, I knew exactly what I was getting into with this car, and it served it’s purpose well - getting me to and from work while my Neon was getting an engine transplant.

No, the worst one was this.

had such high hopes for it. It was a 2000 model with reasonable miles (around 115K), a 4.3L V6, 4WD, descent body and interior, and a good price. That last one was important because I only had around $3,000 to spend at the time and the Blazer was $2750 (this was in 2016, mind you).

Right off the bat, it needed nearly $1,000 in brake repairs. Sucked but it had sat for some time and the Ohio winter rot had gotten to it. After that, it did alright for about a year.

Then, the 4WD system started acting up. I never really used it except a few times to get up my driveway, but it was that awful push-button vacuum-driven system GM used at the time, and unbeknownst to me, those vacuum lines were sucking the transfer case dry and causing the front and rear diffs to slip and bind without warning. Eventually, I had to replace the rear end, transfer case, and was about to just remove the front diff entirely when I started going through a fuel pump every six weeks. Turns out the gas tank vent was broken and causing the pump to work against positive pressure, and it needed a whole new tank. Add to that spider injectors and LIM gaskets that were starting to go, and I gave up and left it parked at the local shop for half a year before selling it for $750 so the shop wouldn’t sell it for scrap.

The previous owner also had hidden a bent subframe, had done something horrible to the headlight wiring so that I had to run new wiring and relays for the whole thing, and it had an aftermarket remote that was nice at first until it randomly began starting and running the tank dry. The font seat eventually became so loose I had to put a U-bolt under it to hold it still, it needed oil lines twice (the oil filter sits upfront by the radiator because having 4WD means the 4.3L can’t have the oil filter in its normal spot), and the driver’s side door fell off.

This was a vehicle for someone young and single and unencumbered by responsibilities other than a crappy job that you could always get a ride to if your Blazer was up on blocks, or as a second vehicle that you put on mud tires and hoon until it explodes because, again, S10 Blazer. It was not a vehicle for a new father who also needed to get his mom and grandma to monthly doctor’s appointments two hours away. After breaking down twice, once on the way to a surgery at 10a.m., I had to start renting cars just to get to those appointments - money that I realized could be paying for a new, much more reliable vehicle. So, that’s what I did.

I wanted to love this car. I liked the idea of having a traditional SUV, of 4WD capability and ruggedness. The Blazer was certainly “rugged”, in the same way an old outhouse is rugged. I even named you Cliff. I hope the guy that drove all the way from Kentucky to get you, got you sorted out. You are not missed.

TL;DR but congrats to you? Or my apologies? 

I’ve had old cars, not so old cars, wore out cars, solid cars. They all had issues from time to time that needed some TLC, but none were the bane of my existence like my first new car ever, the aforementioned FCA product. Spent six months of the first year of ownership in a loaner while the Dart sat in the dealership’s shop. In that year it rode a hauler back to the shop at least twice and twice we drove out of the dealship’s lot only to turn around less than 1/4 mile down the road because it was clear the issue that brought it in wasn’t fixed. Had it for six years and was in the shop for at least 1 year of that, all told. We had a lifetime warranty so it didn’t cost us cash but I did loose quite a few years off the end of my life from the stress and I intended to run the wheels off it to wring every bit of value from that warranty, so I was looking at quite a few years more of misery. Mercifully a yellow light runner got us and put us out of our misery.

More like Dodge Fart, am I right?

A 1995 Alfa Romeo 165 LS that I often referred to as “Pandora’s Box” because some form of horror and misery would arise every time I opened it up.

I have no room to complain. It was a big smooth-brain move I made as a 21 year old with a few thousand to spend on a car. It ran differently every week, parts had a minimum two-week lead time, and there was only one person I knew who would work on it. It was new enough to be equipped with sophisticated luxuries like heated seats and automatic climate control, but old enough that the reliability was still anyone’s guess. I treated this car as a daily for about a year before giving up and buying my dad’s Golf TDI.

However, like an insanely attractive but ultimately abusive ex-girlfriend, I loved every second of driving it despite how much pain she put me through.

My friend, that car is so pretty. I refuse to believe it was shitty. I cannot be convinced of this. That being said, I can certainly see where aging Italian tech may be an issue.

My 98 GMC Sierra 1500 comes to mind. The engine was great, ran like a brand new one. It was everything else that was the issue. Twice I spent weeks hunting down fuel and spark issues, to realize it was actually just the security lockout that either failed or just stopped liking my key. Interior was pretty bad, with a torn up drivers bench and basically no dash left. It also leaked many things. Coolant, refrigerant, power steering fluid. Its my least favorite truck I’ve owned, but I’ve only owned two and the other was a 99 F-250 with the 7.3. Regardless, it still was a good work truck, and if it didn’t sit so much I would have probably still kept it.

I can’t put my finger on it, but this truck has a threatening aura about it. The vibes are way, way off.