WashPost Loves the Cavalier. Well Cavalier Lovers.
Also in today's Washington Post: an profile of Chevrolet Cavalier fans. Yes, fans of a car that would have made TTAC's Ten Worst (had the award existed then). The article starts with the sad fate of the last production Cav (MIA) and quotes from Edmunds such as "the worst [drive] we've experienced in recent memory", "homely," "[engine vibration] like a caffeine addict going through withdrawal," and "seats are uncomfortable for any length of time." WaPo then heads to the flat trailing end of the automotive bell curve with fan testimonials, pimped rides, and the disturbing fact that the Cav is #2 (after Camaro) on CarDomain's directory of vehicles with >9000 entries. The print edition managed to devote just about a whole page to this article, and it shows: serious padding about the apartment complex where a Cav tuner and his family live, the dozens of mods and hundreds of related pictures on his iPod. Click here, if you dare.
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Just came to this entry, so I'm late as always... I have two J-bodies, one is a Cavalier with 229,000+ miles on it, the second is a Sunfire with 140,000+ miles on it. The Cavalier is my daily schlepper to work car. If I drive like grandma, I get about 25+ MPG in town. On the freeway I get closer to 37+ MPG. The Sunfire has the 2.3 Quad 4 HO motor, with Isuzu 5 speed (junk, the later manuals were Getrags) with the lower final drive ratios I get about 22+ MPG in town and 33 on the highway. Dirt cheap (I bought both used) easy to fix, not hard on fuel, cheap for teenagers to insure and feed. The front seats suck, but most GM seats from the 1990's did. The Cavalier rattles (but it's been broken into twice, they trashed the entire dash the second time), but the Sunfire is relatively quiet. I can't kill the OHV engine in the Cavalier, I think I will see 300K before the body rusts away around it. The Pontiac like an earlier poster noted is more abused, and I keep finding things that need attention. I can't complain about either one that much, my other cars never treated me that well, (including the Honda Accord that ate my wallet) and I'll drive that Cavy anywhere, has never let me down.
Didn't Toyota sell a rebadged Cavalier in Japan for a while, as part of the NUMMI deal? I'm pretty sure they did. What I would LOVE to read is a profile of Japanese Cavalier drivers. They must be a whacky bunch.
Cavaliers are terribly unreliable they are just bloody awful with worse seats ever, uninspiring engine, etc.
Waaaaay back in 1984, my first wife's dad bought her a brand new 1984 Oldsmobile Firenza ES - loaded with every option and "euro-sport" styling feature GM could slap on that J car. Shortly after we got married, I had bought a Mazda 323(her family wouldn't touch a foreign car), and she liked it so much I got stuck with the Firenza until the motor literally cracked parts of the unibody frame from the horrible vibration of the craptacular motor. Nothing, nothing, nothing to like about that car. Pick any part on it, from nose to tail, and I could go on about how horrible it was. And short of a Cimarron, I'll bet it was the most expensive J car around.