First, Best and Worst Cars

[bajacalal]

Since we were just talking about the cars we like/dislike, lets hear some car stories. So, what was your first hunk 'o junk like? Also, tell us about your favorite and least favorite vehicle (I have a feeling most people will mention their current Jeeps- thats ok). But, please keep this based on actual experiences! I'd like to hear about cars that you have actually owned, driven, worked on or at least rode in. Don't go talking about Lamborghinis or Yugos unless you can back up your experience. Also, tell us about the car and why you hate/like it, i.e. "the ranger ate 3 trannys in 2 months" is good. Please don't give broad generalizations like "Mercedes because its high class."

Anyway, my first ride was an 86 Chevrolet s-10 truck, complete beater with the 2.8l v6. Worst engine ever. It completely turned me off from the v-6 configuration. It was totally gutless and leaked and burned oil like the Exxon Valdez, maybe 1qt/250 mi. It really formed puddles flowing out the back of the intake manifold, I couldn't park it on concrete. It was terribly hard to work on, everything important (oil filters, starter, fuel filter) was jammed into some forsaken place the sun don't shine. It sucked @$$ off road, but the previous owner diddn't think so, it was lifted, had a spool type locker (I hated highway cloverleafs), 32s (33s?) so it sucked on the road as well. It needed gears so it was slow, topped out at 65 and got horrible mileage for 6-beater. It also lacked working power steering & had tranny issues so there was a HUGE learning curve to be able to drive it, a lot of my friends just couldn't do it. Perfect to learn to drive on though, can probably drive anything now inc. double clutch. I called it GIMIC for that reason. The ignition would start w/o a key and people who knew this would borrow it without asking. It worked 3 of 4 days since it always broke. Fuel system issues, starter, everything. About the only things I liked were the comfy seat and light bar w/ 4 hellas- you could see for miles. I was in high school, it vave me a lot of fun, I learned a lot, got into wheeling, it was what I could come up with at the time so it served its purpose, I was lucky to have any ride. I sold it to someone my dad knows and he loved it- go figure.

A friend of mine had an (88?) BMW 635csi. Big BMW, comfy, fast handled great, 5 spd. Great car. I wouldn't want to try and fix it up but it feels like flying a plane to drive those. Anyone who has driven BMWs will know what I mean, such responsive cars even old ones. Plus the interior looks like a cockpit. It had a lot of gauges and on the celing, a dozen or so idiot lights for things like "brake linings" and such. I really love high end 80s import but I posted this because its more familiar than some of the others (944s) I like better.

 

[Beej]

First car ever:
1978 Ford Fiesta
Rusty german crapmobile, but ran until the cows came home. It once towed a 2.5 ton double axle trailer with a huge amount of stolen plywood, 2x4s and boxes of nails over 20kms before overheating.
I once slid around a corner on an icy road and bumped up over the curb completely destroying the running gear and costing over $1500 to repair, and this was in '86.

First car I bought:
1968 Ford Galaxie Convertible
Bought it off my uncle for $2000 in '86, ran it for one summer and sold it back to him for the same amount as it guzzled too much gas for me to afford. Hell of a chick-magnet though. Uncle restored it professionally and gave it to my cousin, for free, the prick.

2nd car I bought:
1982 Chevrolet Camaro Z28
Bought it in the fall of '86, ran it into the ground. Every cop I ever passed in that car pulled me over. Young long haired kid in a fancy red car i guess. Blew the motor at 130000k and replaced it with an aluminum block Corvette 350. Nothing could beat it after that. The biggest downside was that the steering wheel broke off in my hands while driving on the highway at 80mph. I slammed on the brakes and grabbed the steering column and manoeuvered it to the side.

Then I owned a bunch of other cars, including a Mercedes, which I liked due to its high class...

Finally, in 2000, my XJ. Ain't looking back...

 

[bbaker80]

First car ever:
1996 Jeep Grand Cherokee (my parents)
Rolled it when I was 16, the day before Thanksgiving, most sobering experience of my life to this point.

It's pimp replacement:
1987 Subaru GL Wagon (worst car ever)
Broke down 7 times in 5 weeks, cost $1600, sold it for $1400 after dumping $500 in parts to try to get it to pass inspection, still needed frame reinforcement when I got rid of it.

Jeep:
1988 XJ Limited
Daily driver from '97 to '03, trail rig/trailer queen since, never broke down, looked good 'till I wheeled it

Daily driver #1:
2002 Subaru Impreza 2.5 RS
Daily driver from June '03 to Jan. '05, looked great until my bro ran it over with our parents Tahoe, $2700 damage to RR corner, horrible shimmy, wouldn't allign for crap after that, ate tires, looked like a WRX but in it's condition couldn't be driven like one

Daily driver #2/Auto-x car:
2005 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon
WRC Blue. Not quite as quick in a straight line as my buddy's Cobra, but handles like a dream. STI short throw shifter, STI tarmac springs, KYB AGX struts, Perrin rear swaybar and mounts, MRT cold air intake, 1200W stereo. As big a financial drain as the Jeep, but can acutally be driven on the street. Probably the most fun vehicle I've ever been in, driver or passenger. Eventually I'll buy a truck and make this a dedicated auto-x/track car.

Other vehicles I've driven
1997 Mercedes E300-nice car overall, not a big fan of the electronic suspension stuff

1998 Tahoe-not the one that my car got trashed by, but it DID back through a garage door with my bro at the wheel

2003 Tahoe-the one that squashed my Suby, I wish I could to with it

1990 Chevy 1500-what I get to tow with instead, the most uncomfortable seats ever made, nothing to tie things down to because its a stepside

1997 TJ, 1998 TJ, 2000 TJ-my bro's Jeep and his friends' Jeeps, all the same to me, all have 3-4.5" lifts, 33's yada yada yada

198? Samurai-another friend's rig-34" LTB's, SOA, knuckle-over steering, VW turbodiesel, Toy axles, pretty sick for such a little rig

198? Samurai-what the same guy is building now for a customer, 36" IROK's, Ford V-6, Toy axles, 18" extended frame/body, eventually will be a comp rig

1986 RX-7, 1987 RX-7, 1988 Turbo RX-7- rotary engines are fun, I love the fact that there is only one buzzer, lights left on, door open, WAAAAYYYY over rev, same bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

2000 V-6 Mustang-fast for what it is, 4.2 block, cam, full exhaust, programmer, intake, suspension......still not as fast as my WRX but it looks good

2003 Cobra-fastest car I've ever been in while moving, actually pretty scarry

200? Mini-almost as fun as my WRX, only rode in it for a test drive, if you're ever in Pittsburgh look up P&W BMW/MINI and ask for Rhett (MINI sales manager)

2005 Viper-one of the guys I wheel with owns a Dodge/Subaru dealership, moved it about 30 feet to get into his trailer for tools

2004 ZO6 'Vette-the same guy that is having my buddy build the second Samurai went to the strip once to see what it ran, and ended up spending around $80,000 to get it into the 9's. rode in it from the trailer to the staging lanes

I'm sure there are more, but these are the ones that come to mind at 2am when I need to wrench all day tomorrow

 

[5-90]

First car - I bought it for $200 and had it restored for $1200 and "payment in kind." Ran like Hell, and I ended up selling it for $3000 by the time I was done.

Worst car - 1980 Honda Accord. Ran nice at first, but ended up needing a new carburettor (and those Keihin 3-barrels are NOT cheap!) and spun 3 sets of bottom bearings for no good reason - nothing I can find, anyhow.) Got rid of it for $100 to the Honda salvage outfit in Santa Clara.

One of the best I had was a 1974 Toyota Corolla 2-door, which ran Highway 17 like you woudn't believe. Did good on Highway 92 to Half Moon Bay as well.

Another worst - 1992(?) Ford Tempo. Spot welds on the front subframe decided to start popping loose at about 80mph - hair-raising to have everything up front go swimmy at speed...

Another good car I had - 1992 Chevvy Corsica with the 3.1 V6-60. One of the best handling 4-doors I've ever owned... Kept running, no matter what we did to it. Had a girlfriend that went through four wheels worth of brakes every year (two-footed automatic driver...)

Best vehicle - my XJ's. You can beat them, thrash them, tow nearly anything, and it runs no matter what I do to it. Everything I've been replacing on them recently has been OEM, and that's on vehicles with a minimum of 16 years and 150Kmiles on them! No complaints here.

What all have I owned? In no particular order...

1966 Volkswagen Bug
1980 Honda Accord
1974 Toyota Corolla
1972 Porsche 911 (There's a story for you... Maybe I'll tell it over a fire and booze sometime...)
1985 Chevvy Cavalier
1992 Chevvy Corsica
1987 XJ Pioneer
1988 XJ Laredo
1989 XJ Laredo
1989 XJ Limited
1985 Puch Moped (yeah - had one of those. Got it in parts, and put it together over about a month...)
1984 Kawasaki 650
1972 BMW 2002 (Not bad - got it for damn near free and it got me around for a while...)
1982 Chevvy Corvette
1979 Chevvy Camaro
1977 Yamaha 750

(Note - this list is not all-inclusive. I can't remember every car I've owned, and some I didn't have long, since I'd buy something every now and then that I knew I could turn around for a few bucks...)

5-90

 

[Bent]

First car: 1958 Volvo 544, front pass. seat was a bean bag chair, need I say more?

Worst car: 1990 Oldsmobil Cutlas Supreme, POS beat out a pinto for this spot. Nickled and dimed me to death.

Best car: 1999 Chrysler Concorde, quiet, smooth, plenty of room, VERY reliable.

Favorite car: 1970 Triumph GT6+, a blast to drive anywhere that you didn't mind walking home from. Side drafts are one thing, but Lucas SUCKS!


Tim

 

[5-90]

Favorite car: 1970 Triumph GT6+, a blast to drive anywhere that you didn't mind walking home from. Side drafts are one thing, but Lucas SUCKS!

Do you know why Britons drink their beer warm?







































Because Lucal makes refrigerators as well.

Used to work on an old Triumph for a buddy in school - Gawd, what a pain. As if dealing with Lucas parts wasn't enough, try finding Whitworth sockets without going to one of the "pro" tool dealers and spending a damn fortune!

No more British cars for me, thanks (the old carburetted V12 Jags were an adventure to tune up as well...)

5-90

 

[Sarge]

First car I owned:

1962 Ford Falcon, straight six, surprisingly good car, turned over 50's on the back with will and managed good mpg doing it

Favorite car/truck:

1956 Ford F150, 390 TBird racing motor...oh my!

Preferred:

Anything with two wheels.

Worst:

Never really had one.

Cheapest:

Old Plymouth. Paid $100 for it, no floorboards, snow tires in the back in Corpus Christi and it ran dunes like a sand rail. Rear bumper fell off and landed me in jail for a night. Sold it to the salvage yard before joing the Corps for $250.

Sarge

 

[planefixer]

First car:1967 Dodge Dart
Worst car:1976 Nova---What a P.O.S.
Favorite : Tie--My old 1970 Chevelle and my current ride-1997 XJ

 

[DrMoab]

First car...68 VW baja bug...This was a very fun car...if I could keep it running.

Best car...75 Dodge Dart Swinger. Got it from my dad as a handmedown because the VW would never stay running. Puke green,slant six with a manual 4 speed OD.
I did everything in my power to destroy this car because I was so embarrased to drive it. After highschool I decided it wasn't so bad and had it fixed up and painted. I still wish I had that car.

Since I hauled cars for a living for six years I have driven about everything.
Problebly the coolist though...just for the noveltey of it was a Lamborgini LM200 Truck. V12...Manual tranny,big as a hummer. When I picked it up it was out of gas so the guy that ran the Lambo store took me up to the gas station to put some gas in it....What a ride! I never got to really drive what I hauled so this was a real treat.
After that I told him I always wanted to ride in a Diablo....He told me if they ever were doing a service on one he would give me a ride...
A couple of months later I got the chance....It was very very very fast but other then that I wasn't really impressed.
If I am going to spend 300K on a car I want it to go more then 12,000 Miles without needing a $5000.00 tune up!

 

[hillbilly_jeeper]

Do you know why Britons drink their beer warm?







































Because Lucal makes refrigerators as well.

Used to work on an old Triumph for a buddy in school - Gawd, what a pain. As if dealing with Lucas parts wasn't enough, try finding Whitworth sockets without going to one of the "pro" tool dealers and spending a damn fortune!

No more British cars for me, thanks (the old carburetted V12 Jags were an adventure to tune up as well...)

5-90

AH, lucas, the man who invented darkeness!

 

[DDCxj]

First car I have ever driven was a 1986 GMC 3500. When we would work at the farm I would weould drive it around there and I loved every second of it.

First car I have owned is my 91 XJ and even though shes been giving me a lot of attidtude lately I still love her.

Worst car I have driven is the 1980 Ford f250 2wd truck that we use at the farm and for landscaping all my boss' properties. For some strange reason my boss keeps fixing it even though it is a complete piece of shit and barely stays running. Unfortunately that GMC that I first mentioned was replaced b this as our main truck because the frame bent.

The best car i have ever driven ends in a tie between a customers 77 Trans Am w/ a 455. I have never had more fun bringing a customers car back to there house. The other is a 2004 International 4300 21' Jerr-Dan flatbed. I'm sure I'll forget all about the Trans Am and International when I get to drive the 1950 Farmall or the 1957 John Deere tractor. I just love driving old, big powerful stuff as long as I dont have to pay to fix them when they break.


Dean

 

[casm]

AH, lucas, the man who invented darkeness!

Looks like the auction got yanked, but someone was recently selling replacement Lucas wiring smoke on eBay. Truly a godsend for anyone who has ever had to curse British electrics.

First car: 1982 Ford Capri 1.6LS. Pretty much the European equivalent to the Mustang. Mine was a press/testbed car for the 5-speed gearbox intially owned by Ford for a year, so was registered as an '83. Had a ton of luggage space with the rear seats down and, for a Ford, was surprisingly reliable. Performance from the 1.6-litre 4-banger wasn't bad given the weight of the vehicle, and 30-32mpg was possible on main roads. Piss-poor suspension design nearly killed me one night after putting it head-on into a stone wall at 60: went into an uncontrollable spin after hitting black ice and ended up spending the next six months learning to walk again.

Best cars: there've been a few, but I'll stick to three.

Hands-down my 1987 Citroen 2CV Charleston is still the benchmark vehicle. Two cylinders in a 602cc, 29.5bhp air-cooled flat-twin engined designed to run with your foot to the floor all day (75-80mph on a flat was entirely normal), front-wheel-drive, astounding handling and ride quality from the simple but highly-effective suspension, removeable seats, full-length roll-open roof... Still the only vehicle that has done absolutely everything I've ever required it to, and routinely squeaked 250 miles out of its six-gallon tank. Incredible for a design that was completed 22 hours before World War II was declared.

1972 Rover 2000 Automatic: really underrated cars, and my first automatic. Originally designed to run on a gas-turbine unit, all had unit-body construction, 4-wheel disc brakes, excellent handling from a very unconventional front suspension (no vertical springing) and rear DeDion axle, were superbly comfortable, and were arguably the vehicle that started the Sports Sedan market currently dominated by BMW. Not bad for 1963. V8s with transplanted 5-speeds from the later SD1 model could be turned into serious sleepers.

1961 Series 1 Jaguar E-Type roadster. Okay, not really mine, but my first memory is of seeing 130mph on the speedo at the age of three as my dad hustled it across a bridge for the hell of it. We both wish we still had that car today - not so much because of the insane prices they now demand, but just because it was one hell of a sports car.


Worst car: before I get crucified on this, read completely through why I'm making this choice. There's a very important personal reason why I've nominated this one, and it has nothing to do with a like or dislike of the manufacturer (whose products I'm generally oddly fond of, including the POS I owned).

1982 AMC Eagle wagon. So ugly they were cool, I'd wanted one since I was a kid and bought it as a $500 running beater in Washington with the intention of bringing it back down to L.A. and turning it into a desert basher - the 4WD was disconnected, but it had the 4-speed gearbox and ran well. That is, until exactly midway back from Seattle (in scenic Orland, California), one of the freeze plugs rotted out. On Easter Sunday. Found the one open Kragen in the area, bought some JB Weld (no freeze plugs that would fit were in stock) and tried to repair it at the side of the road. No dice, and the Kragen had closed early about 15 minutes after I found out the repair wasn't holding. Ended up having to trailer it back down two weeks later, and figure I probably spent about $2000 more (including towing) to try to put various issues it was having right. Later sold it for $300 to some guy looking for a 258.

Now, here's why I nominated the Eagle: I still like them, and get kinda giddy whenever I see one drive by. I've also never bought a vehicle new, and while some were better than others, I'd never bought a complete nightmare until the AMC. That vehicle threw my 'this is an OK used bet' sense right out the window and raped me financially until I came to my senses. Therefore, completely my fault for picking the wrong car to try to resurrect.

Honourable mention goes to an (IIRC) 1986 Austin Maestro, famous for being a) the world's first talking car, complete with nagging first-wife voice, and b) a complete turd. Thankfully I can't claim actual ownership, but did have one as a loaner car in college for a few days while my Rover was being converted over to twin carbs. The bloody thing decided that the perfect time for the wipers and headlights to stop working would be about 50 miles into a 150-mile nighttime dash (Derby to Holyhead, for anyone wondering) to the ferry in torrential rain. This wouldn't've been such a big deal normally, but I happened to be en route to a the funeral of a friend's mother who had died rather unexpectedly. I missed the services, and debated setting fire to the f***ing thing at the side of the road to keep warm until the trains started running again in the morning.

 

[bocaj]

first car was a 1969 ford truck with a 390. other owner put a few power mods on it and it was awsome. i drove it around until i got my license. i sold it and bought two xjs a 90 and a 93. wish ida kept the truck. wanted better gas milage, power stearing, and all the new stuff.

worst cars were the xjs. i sold the 90 soon as i got it. now my 93 is constantly broken and a horrible DD.

I payed for all my cars myself (damn cheap parents) and all of them have been manuals.

 

[Ramsey]

first was a 94 2wd xj, put 50k on it and sold it for 500 less than what i got it for. then i got my 99xj that is my current dd/trail rig. no worst car so far, if i stick to jeeps i think i should be fine :laugh3:

 

[rock rash]

First: 1997 VW Golf
Very quick little car, gpt tired of having to watch for cops so i sold it.

Best: 1968 Porsche 912
Partially because my dad and I just finished restoring it and driving it around is so rewarding

Worst: Dont have one, only have had three cars and still have mine and my dads porsche and my jeep.

 

[JAGx1414]

first: my 98 xj sport

best: see above

favorite: see above

current: see above

haha

 

[spaulman]

First car: 85 Pontiac Sunbird - 2 door, 5 speed, sunroof, no AC - I was 17 at the time and loved that thing - got a lot of love in it as well :kissyou:

Worst car: 89 Chevy Beretta - 2.8l V6 - drove it all through college - it was pretty nice when I bought it but man what a POS it turned into. I think I replaced every major electrical component at least once.

Best 'car': 96 XJ - my daily driver for almost 9 years now - it has never left me on the side of the road - well, the alternator crapped out once on the way home from wheeling but I consider that self inflicted

Most rewarding: 46 CJ2A - I love cruising around in the 2A on nice summer days.

 

[bjoehandley]

Favorite/First car-85 Lebaron GTS Turbo...good handling, suprisingly quick, roomy, nice ride, but it did have it's "Herbie" moments as well as old age issues. If we lived in a saltless climate I would still have it today.

Third Car-'88 Shadow ES Turbo coupe.....Handled well, roomy, quick, but had no top end power, nice car, just wasn't the Lebaron.

Second Car-'94 Grand Cherokee.....Again, it was nice and handled well, but the air quit within a couple of months, and I ended up totaling it within 6 mo's., probably a good thing since I could have been a "problem" from some of what I've heard since.

Favorite/Most Recent-'98 Cherokee Limited......nice clean truck, and it's been the most reliable of the bunch so far.

Worst Car-Dad's '86 Pontiac 6000LE.......GM's Craptacular 2.8l V-6, Wagon brakes on a sedan (make a great drift car, touch the brakes a touch too hard and it would spin movie style), wouldn't corner worth a crap wet or dry, only good thing I can say was that it was a tough car to kill, It took three wrecks and only one of them a single car (that's because I hadn't been driving the car, I just had a permit and didn't have the skill to get it to do as much as Dad could.) That car almost turned me off to FWD and if it wasn't for the Lebaron, I'd still not want FWD.

 

[Matthew Currie]

I've never had a bad car, but one that I can put pretty much in the best, worst and cheapest categories all at once was a 79 Pontiac LeMans station wagon I bought from my (then, now ex) father in law years ago for $200. It had been a company car, and badly abused, and should have booked for about $3500, but by the time I got it it burned oil and had a host of other problems, the grille was missing, and every single body panel on it had at least one ugly dent. It was in such bad tune it barely ran, and the exhaust was bad. It was a base stripper model, no radio even, and it was an ugly color of tan. The seats were a nasty sort of cheap vinyl, also tan, and it rattled and squeaked in numerous ways. I did some tuning and repairs and got it running nicely except for the oil burning, which got steadily worse over the 50 thousand miles I had it, and it was actually a pretty solid and reliable car, despite being a total piece of s**t right down to the color. My kids (then quite little) loved it, because it occasionally caught fire, which they found quite exciting. The fuel gauge was very unforgiving, and after the 13th time I ran out of gas I stopped counting. There was always a gas can on the roof and a case of oil in the back. But the thing I REALLY loved about this car was that one winter my (then, but soon to become EX) wife got stuck driving it because the Mercedes was at the body shop being derusted and repainted. So she got to drive what she alternately called the ponti-ache, the ponti-yuck or just "that f***ing Pontiac." It drove her crazy because it was actually safe, reliable, and very good in snow, and she could have just bought another car (but of course that would have been too easy), so she had no rational reason to be angry about it, but she loathed it. She loathed a lot of things at that point, and the Pontiac may have been symbolic anyway, but I got a kind of grim satisfaction out of watching her stew in her own passive-aggressive juices. We make what we can of a bad situation.

 

[Gravely Tech]

First: `72 Datsun 1200 Great little car `till I broke a tie rod and endo'ed it

Favorite: `64 Triumph Herald drophead. Yes, I know Sir Lucas the Black Knight

Worst: `74 AMC Matador 4 door. Didn't have the power to pull itself out of a wet paper bag.

Best: `00 f350 4x4 dualie powerstroke

I haven't owned the 2 XJs long enough to form an earned opinion but they are fun to drive