Junkyard Find: 1986 Hyundai Excel GL
I find more Porsche 928s, Alfa Romeo Alfettas, Buick Reattas, and Datsun 810s than I do first-gen Hyundai Excel s during my travels in high-turnover self-service wrecking yards, in spite of the 1985-89 Excel selling in tremendous quantities in the United States. You saw these things everywhere on the street until about 1992, at which point the import sections of American junkyards became choked with low-mile Excels that crapped out in not-worth-fixing fashion. I believe the first-gen Excel was the worst motor vehicle you could buy new in the United States in the 1980s, and maybe for the entire fourth quarter of the 20th Century. Yes, even worse than the Yugo.
This is the second first-gen Excel I’ve found this year, after this ’87. That’s something of a record; I don’t think I’ve found two of these cars in the same year since Bill Clinton was in the White House.
47,932 miles. This car probably clanked to a halt in a cloud of smoke in about 1990 and then spent the next 22 years forgotten under a tarp in a driveway.
With the world to choose from when shopping for engines, Hyundai went with Mitsubishi as its supplier. The 4G15 wasn’t in the same reliability league as its Toyota, Honda, and Nissan counterparts, but the Excel had many other weak points.
I keep hoping to see an early Excel in a 24 Hours of LeMons race, but so far the teams choosing Korean cars have gone with Kia Sephias, Hyundai Accents, and Ford Festivas.
Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.
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Narrowly beaten to the title of 'most ironically named car' by the Mitsubishi Carisma.
What a crock. This was not the worst car sold in the 1980's! The Yugo was far worse - the Chevette was horrific and a slug. Hyundai to this point was a really limited production company and was very late to the automobile market with North American sales pretty much being limited to Canada. Those models were subpar. With the Excel there was a fair amount of cross pollination with Mitsubishi through license - essentially a reworked Dodge Colt. Engine was made by Hyundai under license from Mitsubishi. While these vehicles were indeed budget oriented, they weren't awful for the time period - it is so easy to judge by today's standards, but this website has a distinct bias (and is not truthful) about these products. It would be one thing to sell them for $2k more and you'd expect much out of it, but at that price point, there was no comparison with a Yugo - to suggest a Yugo, which was a Fiat under license, was better is to show how dishonest this site is. I'm a Ford guy, but what has been said about Hyundai is not truthful - my Mom bought her first new car without my Dad's name on the financing as a Hyundai Excel and she never had any problems with it - and because I helped with the negotiations, she got a great deal and she basically paid interest on the loan and lost $500 additional off her new car purchase price. She got back less than $500 off her original sticker price - I detailed it and it looked brand new and drove like it. And I know first hand about the Chevette - it took nearly 20 seconds to get to 60 mph from a standing start with two people in it. I know - I timed it from a toll booth standing stop. So don't make false statements on the worst product.