Most unrelieble car?

[combemarshal]

badred said:

There is 300 odd highly skilled people out of work in Blackpool partly due to adverse comments made by people who know feck all.

Sorry, but haven't they sold more recently than ever before?
And isn't the only job they are out of work is cause someone cold it to the Russians and they are moving the production elsewhere??
As if people considering a TVR would base there decision on this forum!!!

[adam quantrill]

My most unreliable car was my grey wedge. It broke down twice in 12 years/50,000 miles of motoring. In comparison my white wedge and my green wedge have been quite reliable.

[blindswelledrat]

Land Rover ing Freelander.
I cant see them without getting angry.
2001 car which I got rid of in 2004. In the last year (after warranty expiry) I was averaging about £600 per month in rectifications.
ing pile of shit rubbish car.
How can a chassis split on a 4 year old off road car thats never been off road?
How can the 4 wheel drive system knacker when it was always in 2 wheel drive?
I passionately hate all things land rover now.
Crap car s

[mc_blue]

Rover 400 series is pretty bad as is the Freelander. Thinking about it - pretty much anything with a K-Series engine in it is quite unreliable.

[wedg1e]

adam quantrill said:

My most unreliable car was my grey wedge. It broke down twice in 12 years/50,000 miles of motoring. In comparison my white wedge and my green wedge have been quite reliable.

[chunder]

My red TVR 350i was very reliable, new clutch at 75k but otherwise nothing more than standard servicing whilst I owned it.

My current wedge had a few issues in the first months of ownership but I half expected that and it was reflected in the purchase price to a certain extent. Since then never let me down even in extreme high temps.

My most unreliable vehicle has been a Toyota Prado 4WD turbo diesel. Within a week of buying the electric hubs all melted. Radiator split in half going over a 25mm bump. Resultant overheating cooked the motor which, when stripped was found to have been guzzling as much water as fuel and it had only covered 25,000km. Was going on holiday at the time and left me, the family and the luggage stranded in the middle of no-where. Luckily I wasn't bush and it was a fairly busy road and someone came past next day.

Traded it as soon as the motor was replaced under warranty - for a Disco. This has been nearly as annoying although it has never let us down it's the little things that fail all the time. Door lock actuators every other week, cruise control pipework, stupid factory fitted immobiliser. Least it's British though and understands the swear words.

[Arif110]

blindswelledrat said:

Land Rover ing Freelander.
I cant see them without getting angry.
2001 car which I got rid of in 2004. In the last year (after warranty expiry) I was averaging about £600 per month in rectifications.
ing pile of shit rubbish car.
How can a chassis split on a 4 year old off road car thats never been off road?
How can the 4 wheel drive system knacker when it was always in 2 wheel drive?
I passionately hate all things land rover now.
Crap car s

Yup - the Freeloader should definitely be up there in the A-list unreliability stakes. They were (and are) simply notorious - to the extent that even current owners overcome any natural tendency to cover up one's lack of wisdom in choice of car - and happily disparage them in public (Landrover) fora! It's now 'okay' to diss your Freelander - it's part of the ownership experience.

I'd say that Landrover overall though is average to good in terms of reliability, depending of course on model and engine.

[Marquis_Rex]

Arif110 said:

I'd say that Landrover overall though is average to good in terms of reliability, depending of course on model and engine.

Yes, thanks to Jaguar and Ford, something they should be grateful for

[DennisTheMenace]

1999 t reg Golf mk4 , utter pile of junk , and a dealer that looked at you as if you came in on somebodys shoe .

Wont have another pile of the german junk .

[vrooom]

Citroen AX GT. in 6 month, i spent 1 grand fixing up, and nearly killed me, as the car like to swap rear end for front, and brakes doesnt work.....

[jonsey77]

vrooom said:

Citroen AX GT. in 6 month, i spent 1 grand fixing up, and nearly killed me, as the car like to swap rear end for front, and brakes doesnt work.....

I wanted one of these for ages, didn't they have different rear wheel arches to the normal one?

[dcb]

blindswelledrat said:

I passionately hate all things land rover now.

A friend of mine had one for a couple of years.

Got tired of it breaking down all the time and
went and bit the bullet and got a boring reliable
car - a BMW 325.

He's very happy now. No more motoring worries.

For a large section of the motoring public, reliablity
is everything. Hence the rise of the Germans and the
Japanese.

[blindswelledrat]

dcb said:

blindswelledrat said:

I passionately hate all things land rover now.

A friend of mine had one for a couple of years.

Got tired of it breaking down all the time and
went and bit the bullet and got a boring reliable
car - a BMW 325.

He's very happy now. No more motoring worries.

For a large section of the motoring public, reliablity
is everything. Hence the rise of the Germans and the
Japanese.

Agreed. Unreliability is slightly acceptable in a fantastic emotion inspiring car like a TVR for example. The Freelander, however, is an awful car in every respect. If it were totally reliable I would still have nothing good to say for it.
An interesting statistic for me is that I ran a Maserati 4200 during the same period and the ownership costs were greater on the Freelander even including depreciation!!!

[skodaku]

Least reliable car I ever had was a 52 plate Peugeot 307. No mech problems at all, but a weekly electronics fault made up for that.

Everything else; from 1956 Vauxhall Velox thro' to current Favia vRS has been exemplary - apart from a Mk 1 Ford Escort 1100 van that broke a piston ring at 116k miles after just less than 3 years. Routine maintenance and mechanical sympathy are the keys, I think.

[whoami]

SL55 AMG.

Always wanted one.

Owned for c8 weeks.

With dealer (off and on) for c6 of those 8 weeks.

Back to dealer.

MAJOR tantrum.

Money back.

An absolute turd of a car.

Avoid.

[jonsey77]

One of the reasons I asked about this is because my experiences with cars over the past 6 - 7 years have been of dissappointment in terms of reliability even the brand new VAG wagons including Audi's that I used to sell.

My BMW was IMO poor in terms of reliability. It didn't actually break down but was tempremental in many ways that you wouldn't expect.

Maybe I just expect too much from a car?

In realty it is just moving parts.

[graham@reading]

jonsey77 said:

Maybe I just expect too much from a car?

I don't think so.

I've never had any problems with any of mine that made me think they were unreliable or wish I'd never bought them.

03 S2000 for a year and a half now - only two issues I've had were wear in the roof (replaced under warranty and not uncommon for softtops) and the timing belt tensioner rattling after becoming loose - understandable at 65k miles.

P reg MGF for 4 years - not a single problem ever. Until the day came to part ex it for the S2k and one of the gear linkages snapped when I selected reverse a little too energetically Oh I did get a flat battery twice but that was my fault, I left it standing for 3 weeks each time with the alarm engaged.

Civic VTi 5dr - Had two of these over the period of 3 years as company cars. Faultless.

G Reg MG Metro Turbo - Ran that for 6 years. One issue - the fuel pressure valve would get gunged up occassionally and make it cut out at about 3.5k revs. Amusing but easy to fix.

My mum's Prelude (10 years) and CRV (4 years now), my dad's Volvo 740 (8 years), Merc 300SE (6 years) and Lexus LS400 (10 years now) have all been similarly trouble free.

Edited by graham@reading on Saturday 18th November 11:40

[Carrera2]

Without a doubt my most unreliable car was a Maserati 3200GTA. Everyone told me it would be - I ignored them and regretted it.

[MJK 24]

hairydave said:

my vote goes with the vw scirocco... yes the clutch cables go, but not before the bulkhead they go through has a hole the size of your fist... then theres the filler neck, which you can't get anymore, the dodgey carbs etc etc etc... i'd say i'd have another, but the first one is sat at home waiting to be fixed still!

Lol I've got a Scirocco and you've picked on maybe the only 3 reliability problems with the whole car!

Mine's got a stainless filler neck
Repair plate to bulkhead (cost £8 and bolts on)
Injection!

Good cars otherwise. Mine's 21 years old, goes like shit of a shovel and always runs perfectly no matter how hard it gets driven. Always comes back for more!

[thegreenhell]

Marquis_Rex said:

My Alfa 75, although it wasn't as bad as that by the sounds of things, and No, it had very little rust.

I had the exhaust valve stay shut when driving thus blowing the induction plenum off all because the exhaust pushrod actuator came loose!

I had the exact same thing happen on my GTV6 a few years ago!

Leaving work at the end of the day, I jumped in, turned the key, 'chug, chug, BANG!' The plenum blew off with such force it launched the plastic cover on the top of the bonnet bulge about three feet into the air, having ripped out all of the mounting screws! Everyone else who was walking back to their cars at the time just stood and stared in disbelief. After the initial shock I realised what had happened and calmly secured the plenum back onto the manifold; it's only held on by some jubilee clips on the rubber mounts; picked up the remains of my bonnet, and drove off as if nothing had happened