Best Car - Worst Car - you have owned.

gyppo

I remember reading a similar thread on another forum, so here goes:

There seems to be a lot of members here who have owned quite a number of cars throughout their driving history. Whats the best car you ever owned, and the worst?

I'll start the ball rolling:

Best Car: Mazda 626 1997 1.8L Adagio. This car had almost every creature comfort available, had a very refined and suprisingly economical engine, was unbelievably comfortable, and never gave a moments trouble over the 80k miles I ran it.

Worst Car: 2000 Volvo S40 1.8L. Most troublesome car I ever owned. Noisy harsh engine, rough uncomfortable ride and poor handling, loved petrol and oil in large quantities, and cost me a small fortune. Traded it in after 6 months of misery.

mike65

Best A6 (current) comfy, refined, easy.

Worst - proberly my late fathers 1980 Escort 1.3 but at least I did'nt buy that one! Just a piece of crud really.

Mike.

peasant

I had one car that falls into both categories;

A 1989 Mini 1000 Mayfair ...the only car I ever bought new.

positive: It handled ...well like only a Mini can, brilliantly. It had the best 1000cc Mini engine ever made (a fluke:D ). It flew like sh*t off a shovel and had a topspeed of 180 km/h. The dealer, a mini enthusiast, said it was the most responsive, unmodified 1000 cc he had ever driven or heard off ...and he drove it a lot, as I was a regular visitor ...

negative: It took several months and umteen visits to the dealer to fix the problem of the yoke pulling massively to the left when breaking. It finally turned out that one of the tie-rods was to short.
The rear windows never either closed or opend properly.
There was rust after 4 months
The roof lining regularly fell on my head while driving ...finally got a free sunroof installed, just to hold it in place

Still ...I loved that car. Unfortunately it committed Harakiri on the tow-hitch of the car in front of me one rainy, slippery morning

Guy:Incognito

Best: My current 97 Renault safrane 2.5 auto. Sooooooooo comfy, heated electric inflateable leather seats. Love the car. Auto ftw!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!eleveneleveneleven!!!!!!!!!!!

Worst: have only owned 5 cars and all have been top notch, no problems so it'd be unfair to call one the worst.

LegacyUser

My current car is CLK 230 kompressor...which is ok, auto box means you dont get to drive past many petrol stations...but when you hit the kickdown button it goes like stink

Best car is wifes 06 Honda Jazz...excellent car,lovely drive although Id agree with the critics of it...its a little bit choppy at low speeds....but has to be one of the most practicle superminis out there. The main reason I bought it was that Mrs Kaiser has a baby on the way and you wouldnt belive the number of cars that dont have the boot space to take a standard buggy.

I also have a 98 avensis turbodiesel that I have working as a taxi.For the job its doing theres nothing better....pure workhorse and just seems to go and go and go with the minimum of maintanence.

The worst car I ever owned was my first car...a 96 Ford Fiesta.God I hated that car...the interior looked like solidified vomit.....every possible part of it broke.....the exaust fell off on the way to Cork,the boot locking mechcanism seized,the stearing lock seized,the stereo codelocked the noise from the dash while driving ment I needed earpluggs.....disgraceful car and as such I would touch a ford ever again...even if mylife depended on it......

bazz26

My worst car has to have been a 1999 Opel Vectra. Very troublesome with lots of stupid electrical problems, poor fuel economy and savage depreciation.

My best car would have to have been the 1994 Honda Accord I had as a company car a good couple of years ago. This is closely followed by my current car, a 2003 Toyota Avensis which has been trouble free since new.

endplate

Owned 4 cars in my lifetime here is the order from best to worst
1. 1995 Honda Civic Saloon 1.5LSI owned it for 5 and a half years
2. 1989 Toyota Corolla HB 1.3. First car owned for 2 and a half years
3. 2002 Golf GTI. Present car a few realibility issues
4. 2000 Audi A4 1.6 had an intermittant problem which caused the engine to sometime cut out when slowing down Garage (MSL) couldn't fix owned it for 9months

crosstownk

Best - 2003 Volvo S60 2.0T - damn comfortable.
Worst - 1983 Renault 5. Terrible, practically everything gave bother.

Do-more

Worst Car - was a Mk1 RWD Mazda 323, aghh I tremble now even thinking about it, bought it very second hand from the local VW/Mazda dealer! Should have known it was cheap for a reason. It was an absolute death trap, if you jumped on the brakes it catapulted off to the left. However I managed to sell it to a friend's uncle who was stuck for a car in a hurry!:D He didn't speak to me for months after!

Best Car - 1991 Toyota Soarer 2.5Twin Turbo it was a fantastic cruise ship, glided along even though it was on lower than standard suspension and handled well for a big car, very relaxing with a the slush box, just stick her in D and hit the loud pedal.

milltown

Best: Current 320Ci. Iron fist in a velvet glove.

Worst: Should be my '87 Seat Ibiza 1.0l. Apart from the fact it used as much WD40 as it did petrol when the weather was any way damp, it never gave a bit of bother. Couldn't get it through the NCT for emissions so a sweet, low mileage, spotless car went off to the scrappers.:(

SouperComputer

Worst: Fiat Ritmo. Electrics were so fooked that when you beeped the horn, the speedo moved!


Best: or rather my favourite was the 97 Seat Ibiza I had. Tough as nails and "fun" to drive.

Im looking at BMW 7 series, it might just knock the ibiza out of place.

Enygma

Worst: 1996 Suzuki Cultus (import Swift) - had plenty of comforts for the price, electrics, a/c etc. and it was fairly nippy too for a 1L engine but that little thing gave so much trouble often breaking down in traffic or on dual carriageways. She had to go.

Best: 2002 Golf TDI 130 - my first diesel and second Golf. Loving it. Loads of power, comfortable, solid. Great car.

smash

best car... 2001 Toyota Celica VVTi-190
worst car... 2001 Punto

Blue850

Not the best I've had but the one with the best memories was an old Fiat 127 Sport fitted with a 127 1300GT engine,manic little car, only got into its stride at 6000rpm

Best , the 94 Vectra TD I'm driving at the moment, 235K, costs peanuts to run and hasn't broke in 6 years.

Worst, an 1985 Fiat Uno, CV joints made from chocolate...

ambro25

SouperComputer wrote:

Worst: Fiat Ritmo. Electrics were so fooked that when you beeped the horn, the speedo moved!

That one made me laugh! I had a Lancia Delta 1500 that was just as troublesome, it would drop the front electric windows like f*cking guillotines when you switched the high beams on... sometimes, not everytime.:rolleyes:

But the worst was a Fiat Brava 1.6 SX (96).

Had it 2 years and never once (out of 7 or 8 garage stays!) did the garage figure out why, as soon as a fleck of snow dropped from the sky, whether it was 2deg.C or -10deg.C, the ECU would flood the engine on start (warm or cold), to the point where the sparks would be dripping when you took then out :eek: Pity cause it drove well and the engine had a little of that Italian sonority when pushed a bit.

The best? Hard to pick, would be one amongst the Delta HFi Evo, CX 25 GTi Turbo, MX-5 1.8i and current Impreza 2.0. Probably the MX-5, all things considered.

fatboypee

Worst car:

1994 Ford Fiesta 1.6 Ghia
Fantastic handling and engine was awesome, build quality soo bad I too would never buy a ford again, ever.

A dilemma about best car:
Choice 1
1984 Nissan Cherry bought for £200, drove it for 80k sold it for £250
went everywhere, broke down only once in 6 years

Choice 2
1988 Vauxhall Cavalier CD 2.0 Saloon (8v) (old shape)
Awesome comfort, power of the 2L 8v engine brilliant...
Whats more, ppl though it was a banger

Would still have it but it kept cutting out at idle and it would have cost four times the car value to get it fixed.

FB.

Gareth Austin

Best car I ever owned, and still do:

Daewoo Matitz - very reliable, had it for 6 years now and not one reliability issue - 800cc engine means it is very affordable to run. It is getting on a bit so we use it for deliveries and the load space is surprisingly generous. Granted its a bit noisy but it is a great wee car. Nice and nippy around the traffic.

Worst Car:
Peugeot 306 GTI - 98 model in gold bought brand new - 6 speed gear box was clumsy, very very thirsty and I was dammed by regular police stops ( I was only 18 at the time so they must have thought I was a drug dealer or something!!). Clocked speeding a few times and is went like S***e Sold it after 6 months.

Best van:
Renault Kangoo - great space, affordable, comfortable to drive, good fuel economy.

bmoferrall

No bad experiences as yet.

Spent most of my formative years pedalling a rusty trusty bicycle around Dublin, so car history is brief. All were chosen to fulfill a purpose and served me well. A '91 micra, followed by a '98 Astra, took me from A to B cheaply and reliably, if soullessly.
After some embarassing traffic-light incidents in the Astra, I resolved to get a quicker car (I, rather pathetically, began to study respective 0-60 times).

Had a spin in my brother's 2.5L Alfa 156 and decided to get one. After 6 happy and reliable months with the V6 I learned of its big brother, the 3.2L GTA version. Four pleasure-filled and trouble-free years later and I can't see myself ever selling it, finance permitting - it ticks all the boxes for me.

My better half's '96 Clio has been very reliable, and surprisingly fun to drive.
Have recently acquired an 800cc Subaru Signet (no, not a motorbike!) to take me places where the Alfa fears to tread. So far, so good with that one.

Generally I've found that, if you drive within a car's limits, keep it ticking over nicely, and nip potential problems in the bud, they won't let you down.

cjt156

Best; Current Alfa 156 2.0, my second Alfa and now I'm addicted. Never a spot of bother, must be the only one that doesn't consume oil, rust, spontaneously combust, implode, as all the others obviously do:rolleyes:

Worst; Mark111 Golf 1.4, slow, heavy, ponderous thing. Pressing the clutch was like a 1/2 hour on a stairmaster & the steering was as responsive as Titanic. Having said that I loved it at the time & it did over a 100 thousand miles before I sold it on.

Eoin

My most reliable car was my Alfa 156, and my least reliable car was my '89 mini (cooper replica).

Having said that, I think my worst car was my Mark 4 Golf; a very over-rated car, not very reliable and pretty sluggish. My favourite car is my current one - a '00 320d. It's got a good few miles on it by now, and I've had to get a bit of work done but I absolutely love it.

Fratton Fred

Gareth Austin wrote:

Worst Car:
Peugeot 306 GTI - 98 model in gold bought brand new - 6 speed gear box was clumsy, very very thirsty and I was dammed by regular police stops ( I was only 18 at the time so they must have thought I was a drug dealer or something!!). Clocked speeding a few times and is went like S***e Sold it after 6 months.

That surprises me, I had a 306 GTi-6 and I loved it. I bought it as an ex-demo model and put 70k on the clock before part exchanging it. Out performed a Golf GTi and, imho was a lot more fun to drive.

My worst car was my first, a Morris Ital 1.3 HLS. slow, cumbersome and a naff colour, but it was my first so I shall always remember her!!

Henry Ford III

Best - quite a few good ones:

An Alfa 33 that caused endless troubles but I still loved it.
A Fiat Uno 55s.
A R4 van.
The current Focus ST is pretty amazing and thoroughly practical too. A real q car.
My Escort MkII RS2000 still wins the prize I think

Bad ones....

Toyota Corolla saloon. I hated it. Sooooo boring. A tough machine however.
Opel Tigra - bucking bronco suspension. A ladies car really.
Ford Escort 1.3 mk3 or 4? It was really slow. 4 speed.
I had a MkI Escort 1300xl automatic 4 door for a while. Guzzled fuel and was pretty rubbish tbh.

Kashkai

Best 3:
Renault Megane - bought new in 1996, sold it with 120k on the clock in 2005, never had a single problem with this car. 100% reliability

Kia Sportage - Every electric gizmo you could want. Great build quality but as I had it for just a year, don't know about its long term reliability. Very thirsty for petrol though so buy a diesel. Only lost 4k on the trade in so it held its value well for a new car.

Renault Megane2 - Latest car. Very sporty, great handling, good acceleration when the revs are kept above 3,500.

Worst Car
Fiat Bravo - Bought new but back to the garage 12 times in 6 months. Its party piece was turning off the alarm and opening the central locking all by itself - isn't that a clever car:rolleyes:

DaveD

Worst Car - Mk4 Opel Astra, gave me endless trouble.

Best Car - (current) BMW M3 - Fantastic car, can't fault it at all !

hiscan

best vw golf audi a4 very little between them both 100% reliable
worst 00 isuzu trooper everything that could go wrong with this did

GarH

DaveD wrote:

Best Car - (current) BMW M3 - Fantastic car, can't fault it at all !

Is that the current M3 or the older model, 'cause it could be my next car?

I've only had 3 cars.
My worst was a 91 Ford Fiesta. It had a different key for each door, ignition, boot etc.
And it kept overheating (even in the middle of winter) ...?????
Got rid of it after 12 months.

My current car is my favourite.
It's a Honda Integra Type R and it is the most fun I've had on 4 wheels.
The suspension is very stiff, there's f**k all comforts but once you start driving it...:D

DaveD

GarH wrote:

Is that the current M3 or the older model, 'cause it could be my next car?

Its an E36 mate, '95 3.0. If thats what you're going for, you won't be dissappointed