http://www.cars.com/go/advice/Story.jsp?section=top&story=topScary&subject=more&

silverkris: “The honor (or shame) of the worst car would go to the Pinto and Vega.

Mustang II? Pretty sound, mechanically, but unfortunately, and a brave step in downsizing the vehicle when it had gotten bigger and heavier over the years, but in terms of image and impression, perhaps didn’t live up to the expectations of the original Pony car.”

I’ve now seen a couple of posts where the Pinto has been reviled as horrible and the Mustang II praised as ‘okay’.

You guys all know that the Mustang II was based on the Pinto, right?

The honor (or shame) of the worst car would go to the Pinto and Vega.

Mustang II? Pretty sound, mechanically, but unfortunately, and a brave step in downsizing the vehicle when it had gotten bigger and heavier over the years, but in terms of image and impression, perhaps didn’t live up to the expectations of the original Pony car.

I remember a Ford ad in a magazine around 1978 comparing the Granada to the Mercedes 300SD. The ad showed them both parked in the driveway some rich guy’s mansion, with rich guy explaining how he drove the Merc and bought his wife a Granada (I bet that marriage lasted) because they were so comparable: “The kids call it ‘Mama’s Mercedes!’”.

I was about nine years old at the time and loved all cars, but even I found this scarcely credible.

My parents owned a Dart in the late 70s and it was great for them, solid and reliable and they didn’t challenge its dynamic limitations. In the 80s I was given a Pinto van, which was somewhat interesting to look at with its fishbowl windows, but horrid to drive and terribly unreliable – it went to the junkyard before it reached 70k miles.

Then there was this.

I remember a new ‘75 Granada 4 door backed into a concrete pole at a supermarket parking lot, tapping the right rear bumper end.

None of the doors could be opened.
———————————-
Pinto’s: The cars were NOT recalled till 1975 to “correct” the exploding gas tanks (the wagons were not affected).

A plastic shield was installed between the seam of the gas tank (the tank was made of two pieces spot welded together, forming a seam) and the center of the rear end housing, a longer fill pipe was installed.

That’s it.

It turned out this new car purchase had been in a wreck before I purchased it and Chrysler put it on the lot as new. The odometer had been rolled back–which also broke a few months after purchase.

But a friend had a Ford Grenade and I would say it was better than the Astre. I thought a Pinto with automatic transmission was worse.

I would say the worst car I have ever owned is my current Buick Century. There are way too many problems happening with it that I don’t know how to fix.

Also, maybe the early Ford Explorers should be included. They roll over real easy, and they decide to burn up whenever they so desire (along with every other Ford built over the past 15 years or so.)

I want to also nominate today’s Dodge Caliber and Chrysler Sebring. Taking “technological inflation” into account, they suck big time. Had a Caliber loaner, and couldn’t believe that 1. someone conceived this; 2. someone designed this; 3. someone approved this; 4. someone built this; 5. someone sold this; and most mystifying 6. someone bought this.

I believe a very large percentage of both cars end up in rental fleets. Rental car companies don’t actually care-at all-about the cars, beyond that it fits in the size category they need and has an automatic, A/C, and a radio of some sort. So they buy whatever they can get for dirt cheap.

I found stats for 2006 that state 35.0% of Calibers and 72.4% of Sebrings went to fleets, although that’s the end of the last gen of Sebrings and the Caliber was brand new then, so the numbers might be different now.

http://www.automotive-fleet.com/Statistics/StatsViewer.aspx?file=http://www.automotive-fleet.com/fc_resources/stats/26-Registrations.jpg&channel=Vehicle-Research

There are just so many choices …..

But the reality is/was, the II was called a MUSTANG!
And as such, it wasn’t supposed to be anything else.
It had baggage to confront and a reputation to uphold.
If I wanted otherwise, I would have gotten the economy cars.
I had one…purchased used from a brother…and it was a hollow memory of my 1967 and 1970 (way to large!) mustangs.
It was, really, a sad period in the Mustang’s history.

who Aspired to own one of those things?

A small car done as Detroit does them – horribly.

An ugly POS with lousy paint, but it was reliable and it got 25 mpg in town (If I drove it. One of the 2 kids who used it probably got that much–the other perhaps 15).

The Granada wasn’t even close to the worst car of the ’70s–early ’80s. The only thing that kept me from buying one was that a neighbor who had one said he was disappointed that it got no better gas mileage than the old big Ford he traded for it. He otherwise liked the car pretty well.

My nominee for worst would be those cheapo Mazda wankel cars that looked just like the PlymSubishi
Colt, cost $1500 more,got much worse gas mileage than a Colt, and maybe got a whole 20,000 miles before a major engine overhaul.

The bodies on those things were as bad, if not worse, rusters as any of the other crappy Japanese cars of the era.

As for ther being “nothing” from the ’70s that anyone would want, I’d say that if I could have my old gold ‘77 LTD Landau back, with engine-management upgrades to improve economy, I’d take it!

The real problem with the Mustang II was that it carried a legendary nameplate, so it was always compared to what went before. By itself it wasn’t a bad car, and probably wouldn’t be singled out for nearly as much criticism if it had been called, say, the Ford Pony or the Ford Lynx.

The legacy of the Granada/Monarch/Versailles in our shop was that the fittings on the supply and return lines for the power steering were the same. This facilitated the frequent reversing of those connections after servicing. Legend had it that if you did that, and subsequently reached through the steering wheel from outside the car to start it, the wheels would snap so hard to the right that it would break your arm. I think everything subsequent to that car had unique fittings for each line.

The 1988 Continental will always reign supreme in the minds of many a Lincoln tech as the biggest POS of the late 80s Lincoln/Ford stable. I fed my family on warranty power steering line replacements, air struts, and AXOD transmission overhauls on that car. I guess from a mechanic’s perspective it was a pretty nice vehicle. It was stinking pile of crap whose owners had enough money to fix when it broke. We always pittied the guys at the Ford dealership having to deal with Escort and Tempo owners.

Except the Mustang II sold by the hundreds of thousands. It was a great car for about 2 years, and was a reliable and durable platform.

Aside from that, well, history speaks for itself.

My good friend had a late 70’s Volare that he just replaced two years ago. We’d ride around Appalachia listening to bluegrass, 3 across up front…it was perfect.

I guess my standards are really low…i think my current 98 Blazer is reliable at 140k, but only in comparison to the crap I’ve been around and driven in the past. Crap cars are good fun, though. I’ve never heard anyone tell a funny story about a Camry.

1…Aztec (..ok that didn’t take a lot of mental effort .. Duh!)

2…mid-90’s 2 door Buick Skylark. (What were these people thinking? Seriously, what were they thinking!)

3…1982 Caddy Cimarron 4speed/4 cylinder.
(I was but a callow youth not yet in the biz and oblivious to concepts like branding, platform sharing, badge engineering, “there’s a sucker born every minute”, etc…. but I remember thinking that this was just a Chevy Cavalier with leather seats….at twice the price.)

…Hmmmm… all GM metal …. makes me recall the quote…can’t recall which exec said it; “We’ve been going out of business for 20 years, we just didn’t realize it.”

The GM X-cars were bad, but not as bad as those.

The Chrysler K-cars (Aries/Reliant) were pretty bad. They were the very essence of “cheap.” Omni/Horizon and all of their derivatives were just as bad. But still not as bad as the Vega, Pinto or Aspen/Volare twins.

The Granada was bad, but nowhere near the bottom as far as awful cars go. It was at least solidly built. It was very poorly thought out, though. Ever take a good look at the dash in one of these? It’s an ergonomic disaster. It’s as if the designers blindfolded themselves and played “pin the control on the dash”…and then just went with the resulting mess and called it a day. This is but one of its many flaws. I’m surprised nobody has mentioned how these things ate ball joints and tie-rod ends like candy, although most Ford products of that era did. But even with these flaws (and more)…nope, still not as bad as Vega, Pinto or Aspen/Volare.