QOTD: Worst of the Worst?
In a Question of the Day post earlier this month, Matthew Guy inquired about the manufacturer which had the greatest number of great cars in their company’s history.
Today we’re going to flip it, and talk about all the awful things. Prepare your fingers for the incoming salt.
Reading the request for greatness, my mind went to the segment from Top Gear all those years ago where the trio from Guildford, Oxfordshire, or wherever named Lancia as their winner. Commenter Notapreppie had the same thoughts, though he pointed out that most Lancia models were never available in the North American market. Perhaps the negativity should be honed and distilled for today’s question.
Our basic question is thus: What single auto brand has foisted the greatest number of bad cars on its unsuspecting customers? To this we’ll add in a single provision — only models available from new in the North American market qualify. Don’t offer up some random Lada models as worst contenders today.
I suspect there will be mentions of Malaise, of platform sharing, of head gaskets, and perhaps of faulty electronics. At least those are a place to start.
Prepare your lists — the broken plastic plaque for Worst Models Overall is at stake.
[Images: Ford, General Motors]
Interested in lots of cars and their various historical contexts. Started writing articles for TTAC in late 2016, when my first posts were QOTDs. From there I started a few new series like Rare Rides, Buy/Drive/Burn, Abandoned History, and most recently Rare Rides Icons. Operating from a home base in Cincinnati, Ohio, a relative auto journalist dead zone. Many of my articles are prompted by something I'll see on social media that sparks my interest and causes me to research. Finding articles and information from the early days of the internet and beyond that covers the little details lost to time: trim packages, color and wheel choices, interior fabrics. Beyond those, I'm fascinated by automotive industry experiments, both failures and successes. Lately I've taken an interest in AI, and generating "what if" type images for car models long dead. Reincarnating a modern Toyota Paseo, Lincoln Mark IX, or Isuzu Trooper through a text prompt is fun. Fun to post them on Twitter too, and watch people overreact. To that end, the social media I use most is Twitter, @CoreyLewis86. I also contribute pieces for Forbes Wheels and Forbes Home.
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Over the last, say, 50 years? GM, hand's down. X cars? Absolute garbage. The Vega? Possibly the worst car from anyone in the last 50 years, shit body, shit engine, just shit, period. V4-6-8 engines? HT4100 V8s? Olds diesels? Odd-fire V6s? Quad 4's? All garbage. Second RWD X bodies that dog-tracked off the showroom floor? Rubbish. Northstar V8s? I could go on and on and on...
GM, obviously. Junk, year after year after year. Sure, there are a few exceptions as even a terrible car company like GM gets lucky once in a while after pumping out garbage long enough. The percentages catch up. Still, for perennial over all crappiness, no other car company can match GM. It truly is a joke.