What's the most unreliable car of 80's/90's/00'-s!

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trogedon, Jan 1, 11:32am
My '77 MGBGT (I have others) doesn't drip any oil - not from the steering, engine, g/box, overdrive or diff.
greenwing, Jan 1, 12:22pm
Toyoya Corolla S/W - bought a 3 year old NZ new one at 105,000kms. Shortly after purchase rear wheel bearing got noisy, bearing not replacable, so had to replace the whole housing. At 140,000kms the stud that postions the cam belt tensioner (stud is a pressfit in the block) actually worked its way out and chewed up the cambelt. Car also had an intermittent squeal from front wheel that I never got to the bottom of before the car thankfully gpt written off at an intersection by another driver going thru a red light.
socram, Jan 1, 2:12pm
What a load of bias (worse than mine)! The Toyota Surfs were owned by family members in the motor/marine trade. Not idiots at all and both with extensive marine engineering and electrical experience.
The Rovers were just serviced regularly, nothing more was required.
bashfulbro, Jan 1, 2:19pm
Yeah, true.i was meaning something beginning with Mits
kwaka5, Jan 1, 2:37pm
Seems most of you guys are just full of s#$t. Basically any vehical that is abused will give trouble and be unreliable. How many have actually bought a car brand new, done all the regular servicing on that vehical and have had it well into 300k's and have experienced issues. There have been some cars which have had known faults but in reallity most is due to bad ownership by the current or previous owner. Last mitsi,4wd triton non turbo, was well over 280k when it was sold. Only issue was the gearbox bearing at 110k and that was a known fault. We had 4 of those and all had the same issue. Bearing replaced no further problems. Known issue fixed. Not unreliable just known issue. I think alot or you have just bought problem cars and end up getting the pip with a brand not the peice of crap you paid money for, or your mate,family member etc.
trogedon, Jan 1, 4:26pm
Haha.
magicmat, Jan 1, 5:14pm
I cant think of any car that I would say was entirely unreliable or broke down without good reason (neglect or lack or servicing) though I will say the biggest repair nightmare I ever had was a Mercedes. Once things started to go wrong it became a nightmare and I ended up getting rid of it "as is where is" as it had so many niggling little issues and a few larger problems that were not worth the effort.

The most reliable car I think I ever had was an early 90's Honda Integra. It was cheap to run, flew through warrants only ever needing a bulb etc and it always ran faultlessly. My Holden I have now has also been pretty good but servicing and parts are pretty over the top price wise (fuel pump died and cost $780 for pump and filter from Ebbetts!)
richard198, Jan 1, 6:11pm
My old HQ stationwagon never missed a beat and even when it entered the demolition derby, it was the last vehicle still running!
ashwattau, Jan 1, 6:29pm
Was the bearing you speak of replaced with an updated revision of the bearing which lessened possibility of this fault occuring again in the future, or was the replacement just another new identical bearing! If the latter then your statement is wrong - the car is unreliable. But if it's the former, then you're totally right-carry on.
kwaka5, Jan 1, 7:20pm
well never had a problem with it up until the time we sold it at 280k.it's over 310k now and still no issues so you make up your mind from there.
Issues are things like bmw motors. You must replace the water pump at 100k or you may have an issue. If it's done then you've taken care of that part. Mechanical stuff will always break down at some point. Everything wears at some rate. If you decide as a vehical owner not to bother to do maintainance then it wasn't the vehical that was unreliable but the owner.
tigra, Jan 1, 7:57pm
10% of Cavaliers gave the remaining 90% a bad rep.
tigra, Jan 1, 7:58pm
LOL. So it filled inits own entry form. Smart car.
trdbzr, Jan 1, 8:00pm
Where did you get this statistic from! Also how do you know that Cavalier is still running on the same engine it came out with from the factory floor!
socram, Jan 1, 9:20pm
Replace "Cavalier" with any make or model.
Virtually no current cars are known to be unreliable when new.As earlier poster says, look after them, drive sympathetically and understand preventative maintenance and just about all cars will survive.
mugenb20b, Jan 1, 9:24pm
There you go, fixed!
tigra, Jan 1, 10:54pm
LOL.not in my book. I know personally 2 Cavalier owners who have had excellent running out of their cars which they bought cheaply because of the so-called bad rep.Maybe its a trade secret. Anyway to the experienced buyer, any car is as good as its looks and running history.
phillip.weston, Jan 1, 11:13pm
I know you were haha. I don't really mind how 'unreliable' the Mitsis are, the examples I've bought have proven to be reliable and provide more than enough excitement.
hot_v6_telstar, Jan 5, 11:00pm
Holden Camira, Honda CityFalcon AU Series1 Forte.
extrayda, Jan 5, 11:18pm
86 Mitsi Sigma SE, all of the cool electric toys and such (looked after and serviced).Was amazingly slow for a 2litre, the 1300cc Corolla I replaced it with was faster !Motor stuffed by 120,000ks, auto started failing a bit earlier.Climate control stuffed out, so you could only change the temperature sometimes.Other things went wrong too - biggest piece of crap I have ever owned.Was given an 89 Mirage Hatch that I didn't maintain properly, sat out in the rain, given a bit of a hard time - and surprisingly gave good service to me - I only sold it when the back shocks were worn out, and the brakes needed doing (decided it wasn't worth spending the money on - was even honest about it when selling :-).Best car was a 1166cc 3k corolla wagon (76) I had the short block reco'd and assember the rest myself, and put in a 5 speed and webber.Thrashed to death constantly, overheated a couple of times due to stuffed radiator (and the fan belt snapping once) - just kept on going and going (rusted out as you would expect).Excellent fun car.Recently owned a Honda Accord (MRs' car), Nissan Cefiro, Toyota Estima.All were / are good, all serviced and looked after relatively well now though :-)
It would take a mightly lot of convincing for me to but any mitsi from the 90's.
ebygum1, Jan 5, 11:31pm
We run an 05 Diamante wagon,90000km and an 07 Triton 2.4 ute on 126000, they have had no repairs other than normal sevice,and 2 recalls on the ute for minor replacements. We also run an 89 Mitzsi forklift with no major breakdowns,and a Mitzsi heatpump that keeps me warm in winter! The last time I was in the UK they reckoned there were two things on earth that could be seen from the moon with the naked eye. One was the Great Wall of China,the othe was the parking lot of unsold Rover cars!
phillip.weston, Jan 6, 12:15am
One bad experience with Mitsubishi's first front wheel drive mid-sized passenger car from the EARLY 80s is hardly enough to rubbish the entire range. you said it yourself you had another Mitsu which did very well. The FWD Sigma was a nice car in its day but it was the beginnings of a new platform which had not yet proven itself. By the time the 6th gen Galant rolled around most of the issues were ironed out.

My parents had an '86 Sigma Super Saloon, Dad originally had it as a dealership demonstrator car and then was sold, traded, sold again and then bought by Dad personally in the mid 90s as his own car, and it gave faithful service right up until 2007 and a smidgen under 200,000kms before it was sold on. It was regularly serviced and never let them down.
extrayda, Jan 6, 1:36am
I wouldn't call 86 EARLY 80's, and it was even an NZ New with service history (quite a bit of that), owned by an older guy, and was in very tidy condition.Compared to other cars of the time, it was unreliable and very s.l.o.w. most mitsis I drove in / was driven in over that period seemed to be slow for the engine size.Also regularly smokey, and then they introduced those silent shaft things that made them sound like sewing machines.I admit I would own a Starion / Saphoro if one came up at a silly price and I had any money, just because I like the look of them.
extrayda, Jan 6, 1:38am
In saying all that, the thing I like about most cars of the 70s and 80s is that you can actually work on them youself, as they are not full of computer bits and covered up with plastic engine covers :-)
bellky, Jan 6, 1:41am
yep agree. my experience with mazdas is good too.
kalebsmum, Jan 6, 1:47am
Hard to go pass the Rover for the Lemon of the decade. And tore-inforce their claim both cars and 4WD are a constant source of problems. The only redeeming feature of Rover 4WD is the constant oil leaks from engine and gearbox which leave a layer of oil all over the chassis.At least they should be free from rust in the future