Classic Cars that Disappointed

[Xtriple129]

I did reply when this thread first appeared to slate the venerable MG B. I still don't rate them in the slightest (late rubber bumper ones at least) but drove an extremely ratty GT a week or two back (chrome bumper one, wires) and it was a revelation. Yes, it was noisy and slow but HUGE fun! It just felt 'right' but had been mechanically looked after whereas the owner could not give a fig for appearances, solid but not shiny...

I have driven/owned dozens of classics over the years and they mostly disappoint, because they are worn(out?) or not set up right and need copious quantities of the folding stuff throwing at them before they handle/drive as they should.

Putting my money where my (big) mouth is, I have over the last year spent £18K on having an elderly car restored mechanically to the point that it is 'right' and as it was when new... or a couple of years old at worst. I drove it quite a bit before and it was... fine, but not what I really expected. Now, it is bloody beautiful to drive; silent, smooth, refined, effortlessly fast and everything works as it should. Everything!

It has been an expensive and long-winded process but the results do seem to indicate that we should allow a certain 'latitude' to old cars due to general wear and tear, where nothing seems obviously flawed or faulty, just the cumulative effect is to have a fairly 'tired' example.

[cptsideways]

Most of the British stuff was dreadful in its day, truly dreadful, let alone now. More of a case of, that's what got churned out so we accepted it.

In a 1989 when these classics were young I had a Citroen GSA, it was lightyears ahead at the time in every way over anything British that my friends owned, eg Mk1 Escorts, Toledo's, Beetle's & etc.

Likewise a Datsun 140y was lightyears ahead of an Escort in every way but it wasn't British

[imagineifyeswill]

As a teenager I lusted after a Lotus Esprit, in fact still think its a thing of beauty but the driving experience was a huge dissapointment, heavy steering, clutch and gearbox, poor visibility but oh my you could go round a roundabout at 60mph all day and it wouldnt step out of line.

r

[iSore]

imagineifyeswill said:

As a teenager I lusted after a Lotus Esprit, in fact still think its a thing of beauty but the driving experience was a huge dissapointment, heavy steering, clutch and gearbox, poor visibility but oh my you could go round a roundabout at 60mph all day and it wouldnt step out of line.

r

I found the late S4 to be pretty nasty, yet a very well preserved S1 was absolutely lovely. The S4 is a 'better' car as well. Better......or preferable?

[S47]

Driven plenty of cars over the years, these are a few that I remember usually coz they're bad.
:-
Mk1 Jag XJV12 - Fast, quiet, Terrible brakes - a seriously dangerous boat on the road.
TVR vixen [1600 X flow] - slow, slow, awful around the bends, brakes what are they?
66' Sumbeam rapier - Vague steering, a slow fat overweight slug.
Mk 1 Mini cooper 'S' 1966 - tiny & fabulous go kart, crap on motorway,low top speed.
BMW M5 V10 - fastish in straight line - avoid bends at all cost - Pointless, Fat, overweight barge.
TVR Cerbera - Need earplugs, Hot & stuffy, poseurs car for Carlos Fandango types.
Lotus Elise Mk1 - Nice driving balence, difficult entry for ladies, underpowered IMO.
Nissan GTR - Stunning in straight line, too heavy to drive fast on 'B' roads, not for me.
MGB - truly awful, slow, heavy, bouncy, no brakes, no image, nothing good to say bout it.
MX5 - underpowered, poor hairdressers image, good open car for lady drivers.
Morgan 4/4 [1800 zetec] - Looks fab, simple mechanics, crude to drive, slippery seats.
Audi RS4 - Dead handling, heavy horrible engine - No dynamics at all, a boring repmobile.
Sierra Cossie RWD - awesome machine to drive fast, great fun, a must have saloon IMO

[Huntsman]

The Gordon Keeble. Build quality was appalling.

[jith]

S47 said:

Driven plenty of cars over the years, these are a few that I remember usually coz they're bad.
:-
Mk1 Jag XJV12 - Fast, quiet, Terrible brakes - a seriously dangerous boat on the road.
TVR vixen [1600 X flow] - slow, slow, awful around the bends, brakes what are they?
66' Sumbeam rapier - Vague steering, a slow fat overweight slug.
Mk 1 Mini cooper 'S' 1966 - tiny & fabulous go kart, crap on motorway,low top speed.
BMW M5 V10 - fastish in straight line - avoid bends at all cost - Pointless, Fat, overweight barge.
TVR Cerbera - Need earplugs, Hot & stuffy, poseurs car for Carlos Fandango types.
Lotus Elise Mk1 - Nice driving balence, difficult entry for ladies, underpowered IMO.
Nissan GTR - Stunning in straight line, too heavy to drive fast on 'B' roads, not for me.
MGB - truly awful, slow, heavy, bouncy, no brakes, no image, nothing good to say bout it.
MX5 - underpowered, poor hairdressers image, good open car for lady drivers.
Morgan 4/4 [1800 zetec] - Looks fab, simple mechanics, crude to drive, slippery seats.
Audi RS4 - Dead handling, heavy horrible engine - No dynamics at all, a boring repmobile.
Sierra Cossie RWD - awesome machine to drive fast, great fun, a must have saloon IMO

I'm sorry, normally I wouldn't respond to this kind of thread, but I can't ignore this.
I'm responding from a lifetime in the motor trade and still working on classics.

I'll respond to them in sequence.

Mk 1 XJ12. A simply brilliant landmark car with a genuine 150MPH top speed, this is in 1971 remember! Phenomenal performance and faster than virtually any sports car at that time, incuding the E Type! Set new standards of ride quality. A truly magnificent V12 engine of turbine smoothness.
The first short wheelbase cars set the standard for handling on large saloons with the then new development of Dunlop SP Sport tyres, unbeatable in the wet. Only the very first cars had braking problems, and only when pushed hard, the later cars having the front caliper size increased with vented discs. Dangerous barge? I have never heard them described in anything resembling those terms.

TVR, ANY MODEL. As a motor engineer I have never been able to take any TVR seriously as the build quality is just atrocious.

Sunbeam Rapier. A very nicely made, comfortable tourer. Not the fastest, but then it was never intended to be a sports car.

Minis. At 6ft 2in I find them impossible to sit in. Noisy, rust buckets and a death trap in a crash. Awful to work on.

BMW M5 V10. No idea, never driven one. Is this a classic car?

TVR again! See above

Lotus Elise. Not my cup of tea. Once again dreadful build quality.

Nissan GTR. Like all Nissans an appalling rust bucket. Grossly over priced spares.

MGB. Early cars were very well built British sports car. Unpretentious, comfortable and economical. You should never expect huge performance from a 1.8 engine in the '60s.

MX5. The ultimate in rust buckets. They rust everywhere quicker than you can weld them.

Morgan. Probably the worst ride quality ever made. A true liver and bone shaker, and seriously over priced.

Audi RS4. One of the quickest, most competent cars ever made, particularly in bad weather. Blistering performance and legendary Quattro handling with an utterly superb power unit. The power unit including the turbos is lighter than the equivalent BMW or Mercedes unit. Can be chipped up to well over 400 BHP with absolute realiability. Avante will carry 4 adults and dogs in the back at 150 MPH! And they just don't rust!

Sierra Cosworth. Out of all the performance cars I have worked on, the Cossie ranks as the singly most unreliable. Constant problems with head gasket failure. Gasket kits in the day only available from Cosworth dealers at eye watering prices; in fact twice the price of a V8 Mercedes. An absolutely awful, rough noisy engine. The 4x4s were dreadful; transmissions similar to a tractor!
The most stealable car of all time due to the pathetically simple Ford locking system.

Sorry, but my take on these things comes from my workshop experience, in other words reality.

J

[paulwirral]

Corvette c1 and Porsche 356 roadster , both hired at cite de automobile , Mulhouse . Both comically bad compared to modern cars , although I guess this is relevant to all old versus new . My mates comment after driving the Porsche was " well that's just saved me over a 100k "
If you ever visit the museum definitely make a point of going out the back on your way out to the test track and hire a couple of cars , average of €50 for 7 laps , or if your a sucker for punishment they do organised tours of the region in the classic car selection , as well as the 2 we tried there was a mondial cabriolet , healey 3000 and a couple if others I don't recall now .

[ChasW]

Berw said:

I drove a friends Contach a few months ago, destroyed an image I had for 40 years, huge disappointment.

I think its the motoring equivalent of "never meet your hero".

I've been driving 40+ years. I can't think of many cars that I drove in the first 20 years that would not disappoint now. One exception would be a Mini which I always loved chucking around. It was simple fun. There are some which were dire then, such as a VW Beetle IMO. I remember my first ride in a 1985 911. I could not believe how crude it felt even then. However I think you just have to re-frame your expectations and treat the classic drive as an event.

[CABC]

ChasW said:

However I think you just have to re-frame your expectations and treat the classic drive as an event.

Exactly. Without this any experience will fail.
It takes effort. But if the alternative is an easy to drive Capture, Audi or crossover coffee holder I'll put the effort in! That's what makes cars a hobby surely?

[paulwirral]

CABC said:

Exactly. Without this any experience will fail.
It takes effort. But if the alternative is an easy to drive Capture, Audi or crossover coffee holder I'll put the effort in! That's what makes cars a hobby surely?

You are correct , I remember some of the best cars I ever thought I'd driven were in my past , 240z , rs2000 , dolly sprint , numerous 3ltr capris , tvr s2s and a Griffith 500 . Owned them all and barring the griff sold them all at a profit , however I'm talking a £100 to £300 or there's about profit . Seemed a fortune back in the day , jeez how times have changed , barring the tvrs I sold them all for less than a grand !
I take solace in the fact I'd think they are all crap to drive now , God I hope they are !

[4sure]

Porsche 356 1963 era.
Looked wonderful but was comedy slow and very uncomfy with wafer thin seats.
Brakes were scary (drums all round)
No seatbelts , not the cars fault due to age but didn,t help to inspire confidence especially when keeping 100 yards away from car in front in case they actually applied there servo assisted ABS discs and threatened to actually stop.
Painfully thin tyres that if brakes actually decided to grab would send you into the nearest ditch.


But it did not disappoint when sold after 12 months with value achieved.

But looked bloody great !

[medieval]

EnglishTony said:

Fane said:

Alvis 12-50. The VSCC hierarchy rave about them, but I found mine to be numb as a pit prop.

My father's TA21 & TD21 disappointed me when I drove them but his Speed 20 & 25 were wonderful.

Our TC21 Grey Lady was a lovely smooth drive and a pleasant surprise.

Our Silver Crest was truely appalling- under powered, heavy and listless. For very different reasons the Morgan F Type was also dreadful ....

There have been a few on reflection...

[fourwheelsteer]

I try not to set my hopes too high before driving any car for the first time. I didn't expect much of the MGB Roadster I drove (a chrome bumper car from the early '70s, I think). It was from one of these classic car hire places (possibly no longer still in business), I didn't expect much and it wasn't that great. How much of that was because of the state of that particular car and how much was down to the design I couldn't say. But I do have fond memories of late night drives on country roads, with the roof down and the exhaust making all the right sort of noises. A well-sorted B is probably quite pleasant.

I didn't hit it off with a TR6 either, but my drive was very brief and the car didn't really have a chance to warm up.

One of the more strangely enjoyable classics I've driven was a Vauxhall FB Victor estate, which was charming despite an almost total absence of performance, road holding and brakes. It is one of those strange paradoxes that lovers of old cars will appreciate; a car doesn't have to be good to be enjoyable.

[Little Pete]

Having driven cars from 1930s Lagondas up to 2010 V8 Aston I think I've got a fairly open mind, accepting a cars age and lack of technology but dear me the Escort Cosworth was a major let down for me. A pal had driven a pre production model and raved about it but I was underwhelmed to say the least.
A Ferrari 308 gt4 also gets a mention in dispatches.

[tonymor]

Speaking as a " senior" I think the tendency is to look upon the classics which were current in our youth with rose coloured spectacles . Having owned several mgb including v8 in the 70s one gets used to the all round benefits of the modern car mine is anE 89 zed 4. Having said that I get a great buzz of the shared interest in my sons 1997 mk1 mx5. Maybe the simplicity of it appeals but on balance no Power steering abs electric Windows etc I guess for me is a pleasant trip down happy memory lane . Ok it's consumed and continues to a lot of cash but if we are out for a drive in convoy ie Goodwood revival you can guess which car gets the waving hands and the head turning !

[williamp]

Having owned lots of classics, my first was my most dissappointing:



Bought it in 95, learnt to drive in it. I could have bought the MG magnette ZB, or the Vitesse which I looked at. But Oh no, I thought I knew better. I wanted this Rover. Why?? Front bench seat. So the laydeez could slide accross and cuddle upto me whilst I drive like in the movies, see?? guaranteed to add romance to any teenage date....

The omly problem was, women have taste, and this was the 90s. Could I even get a woman to set foot in the car??? Could I F**K

[soxboy]

finlo said:

Mk1 Golf GTI after all the hype, and this was back in 1984.

Disagree, 20 years later I bought one and it was fantastic fun. As they were still worth buttons I unfortunately let it deteriorate even more than it had done already and it was sold after 2 years of ownership, with no MoT but still looking ok for £400. I would have one again in a heartbeat but pains me to now pay 25 times that for a good enough one.

I can see why it helped to kill off the MGB, a uni mate had one and it was such a heap of junk. Yes it was a rubber bumper BGT but it just had no redeeming features whatsoever. It broke down all the time, it rusted, it looked awful, it was slow, thirsty and handled badly.

[M3333]

segart said:

Twenty six years ago very little could keep up with my Renault 5GT Turbo (120 bhp) on a spirited drive in France. Barring Porsches and supercars, which you rarely ever saw, only the occasional Peugeot 205 GTi 1.9 or Lancia Delta Integrale had the necessary get up and go and, crucially, handling, to keep with the little Turbo 5.

Fast forward a few decades and it seems every shopping trolley hatchback has 140 ponies or more at its disposal, and sporty hatches such as Focuses and Seats have well north of 200 bhp at their disposal. The point? Well any classic is going to feel very tame, in performance terms, against almost any modern. As a 'classic' driver it is about enjoying the occasion, rather than educating fellow road users on what a fast car drives like. Failure to get that is likely to result in the 'classic car which disappoints' scenario!

cheers Rick

This totally. I have a few classic car owning friends who have a real chip on their shoulders about modern performance machines and how the classic they own isn't far behind. I've stopped listening and given up caring, its all about the occasion and what your own personal preference is. They can be an odd bunch keep doing things to their classics to improve performance on an endless crusade to show up 'moderns'. Just buy a modern and be done with it or enjoy your classic for what it is, an excellent old machine.

[stuartmmcfc]

williamp said:

Having owned lots of classics, my first was my most dissappointing:



Bought it in 95, learnt to drive in it. I could have bought the MG magnette ZB, or the Vitesse which I looked at. But Oh no, I thought I knew better. I wanted this Rover. Why?? Front bench seat. So the laydeez could slide accross and cuddle upto me whilst I drive like in the movies, see?? guaranteed to add romance to any teenage date....

The omly problem was, women have taste, and this was the 90s. Could I even get a woman to set foot in the car??? Could I F**K

Do you honestly think the cat was the only problem