There are so many great cars in the past, and plenty of efficient, if unremarkable ones too. But then there are the turkeys. Cars that had perhaps not the worst constitution, but for one thing that adversely affected them: Appearance, or engineering, or assembly quality. Cars with redeeming features in one area or another, but at the same time, having some huge flaw that made them unattractive, unreliable, or–perhaps worst of all–a laughingstock.
They may have sold well new, and made a lot of money for their parent company, like the Mustang II, but became nigh-on universally derided–then and now.
They may have been a shallow attempt at making a silk purse out of a sow’s ear Granada, but at the same time been a well-assembled, comfortable and luxurious car, like the Lincoln Granada Monarch Versailles. And that’s Ver-SY, not Ver-SAYLES!
Or they might have been attractive, useful, and spacious–but with totally terrible execution and baked-in shortcuts, like the FWD General Motors X-cars. Great on paper, but not quite the same in practice.
I think my favorite turkey is the 1985-86 Sedan de Ville and Coupe de Ville. While they looked like “biggie” cars that shrunk in the wash, I found them attractive in their early form, especially if they happened to be that classic light yellow with matching leather! But they had that 4.1L time bomb under the hood, when cheaper and less prestigious Electras and Ninety-Eights offered a much more robust powertrain–and for less money. A turkey? You bet.
The later 1988-93s (1991 CC here) were solid cars with their 4.5 and 4.9 V8s, but they weren’t quite as clean as these 1985s and 1986s, aesthetically.
My least favorite turkey is probably the Vega. Simply because it was such a great-looking car. Stunning, really. A little Italian flair here, a little dollop of Camaro there… It stole your heart with its looks, then broke it in short order when it dissolved into iron oxide before the note was paid off–unless the engine blew up first. And it could have been so good. True, later ones were much improved, but the damage done in 1971-72 resulted in the better, later Vegas being less successful than they could have been. And it all could have been avoided; it’s not like GM didn’t have the cash to make them right the first time. The Vega was like Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown at the last instant: Not cool.
And there you have it: My favorite turkey is a car that was let down by its engine, and my least favorite is ANOTHER car let down by its engine. And both are GMs. What can I say, this is highly subjective to one’s taste!
image: lov2xlr8.no
So now I turn the microphone over to you, as it were. What is your favorite turkey, and what is your most derided four-wheeled contraption?
image: lov2xlr8.no
One favorite turkey of mine is the Mopar J car trio. The Cordoba LS and Mirada, specifically. Great looking cars that suffered from Mopar’s reputation for building some half baked cars in those days. These weren’t immune…like other Mopars in that era, you either got one solid as a rock, or a clanking pile of doo doo. It wouldn’t have affected sales much, but I always wished the ‘normal’ J-doba didn’t exist at all…they already had the Imperial. The Mirada should’ve been a Plymouth completely unaltered.
And the LS very well could’ve been competition for the contemporary Mustang and Bird/Maro. The LS as the 2nd gen Dodge Magnum would’ve been HOT with the hi-po 4bbl 360 (from the Lil Red Express Truck and Chrysler 300 of ’78-’79), mandatory 4 spd/buckets, no vinyl roof option at all, and optional T-tops. As I said, it may not have been a hot seller but such an item would keep street cred on the menu for Mopar during the malaise era.
I have a hate/love relationship with the Avenger/Sebring coupes. I truly WANT to support them more since they were the only 2 doors from Mopar at the time…even though they were rebadged shitsubishis and a total downgrade from the G body Daytona. Those cars aren’t ‘bad’ in and of themselves…but just a total chud in terms of missing the market entirely. We all know that coupes as a fashion statement (all show and no go) just wont fly, except as the bottom feeder variant of a more serious machine. I mean, if your new car with the options maxed out is barely a match for the crappiest girly mustang or F body, then that’s a recipe for enthusiasts jumping ship for the other guys. And a nicely styled coupe that performs ‘decent’ sitting next to a lumpy 4 door sedan that is the most bang for the buck (SRT-4) sends some pretty mixed messages.
Favorite:
Mopar: Volare/Aspen. Such a good looking car and with a 318, they moved along pretty good after you got it started. IF you got a good one, you got a good one and you were in the minority, at least in the first 2 years.
GM: 71-72 Vega and it would have to be V8 powered, or maybe a Buick turbo six.
Ford: LTD II. I like it, OK?
Most hated:
Its a 3-way tie for my #1 GM:
1980 GM X cars
1985/86 GM C/H cars
1988 GM-10 cars
-terrible, terrible replacements for fine cars.
Chrysler: K-cars and all of their variants. I understand that they sold a lot and they singlehandedly saved the company; I get that, but they were horrible cars and as a Chrysler performance car fan, I am allowed to hate them.
Ford: Tempo/Topaz. See GM reasons. The Fairmont/Zephyr were fine cars too.
If all of the above were RWD, I wouldn’t hate them.
My Mopar L-body (Plymouth TC-3) is V8 powered and RWD. You just have to make them the way YOU want them if they won’t
To me a car that fails in the market place is a “Turkey” and these posts have mentioned many. That is not important to me because I buy used/older cars that are fully depreciated. “Dogs” are cars that are notorious because of reliability issues. And many of those were mentioned in all the posts above.
My Dogs were the 1966 VW Type 3 Squareback that was the family car when I got my drivers license. Why because it would refuse to start when it rained, snowed, or high humidity. Those 6 volt electrics just didn’t cut it. And my second Dog was my first new car a 1969 Fiat 124 Spyder. Parts would literally fall off the car while in motion. It drank oil almost at the same rate as gasoline and the instrument lights had to be replaced on a weekly basis. Good thing that the instrument cluster was easily removed.
During the period of 1976-1977 my employer had two company cars used by the office staff, a Pinto Squire wagon and a four door LTD. I hated these cars! Out of the two I preferred driving the Pinto because the LTD was always a white knuckle ride. You would aim it and hope for the best. A great deal of my time was spent taking these cars to the repair shop, at least once a week.
I’ll just pick 2 my family unfortunately managed to own.
Favorite: My parents’ 83 Chevette Scooter. Total POS of course, died at 75K in 1988. But there’s something endearing about those little penalty boxes.
Least Favorite: One of the two replacements my parents got for the Chevette: an ’88 Hyundai Excel GL. Also a total POS, but unlike the Chevette, so bad you couldn’t even laugh at it. Stolen, at one point. Actually recovered. Lasted 3 more years than the Chevette had, died on the trade-in lot (parents already had cash in hand) at 96K. The Hyundai had been purchased for my mom (both parents had lost jobs and were getting back on their feet at the time) and she got the new car because of the longer commute.
(My dad picked up a beater ’84 Civic hatch. It had 220K when it was sold, still running fine, to a young minister just out of seminary. Funny how the beater put the two new cars to shame. Also, all 3 of these cars and my grandfather’s influence are what drove me to fall in love with big cars from about age 3)
I just noticed the picture of the Datsun B210. Back in the mid ’70s In liked the hatchback model. Now I want the base “Honey Bee” Because of poor build quality, there are no longer any of them around. But if there were I wouldn’t mind having one.
Terrible turkeys are the obvious culprits like the Vega and Pinto and first year 1980 X body GM cars. Truly horrible miserable cars. The 1986 Hyundai Excel ranks a close second to these or any 1978-80 GM 5.7 diesel equipped vehicle. Certain 1970’s Japanese cars make the cut too like the Datsun’s of the era.
Not so terrible turkey’s would be the Aspen/Volare’, 1981-83 Imperial, GM C body’s, The Chevette/T-1000, the Lincoln Granada, The Mustang II, the AMC Pacer or Gremlin or the Omnirizon from Chrysler, especially the 1.7 VW or 1.6 equipped variants.
The Pontiac 301 turbo has been referred to as a turbo turkey by some but as the owner of a mint 1981 Trans Am I actually find this engine to be a decent mill and with proper knowledge it can be a reasonable performer and reliable at the same time.
1988 Eagle Premier. By the time I bought it used in 1995, it had 60,000 miles on it and I got it for $2,000. It was fully loaded. When my sister’s then boyfriend backed into it and shattered the turn signal lens, I wen to the local Jeep/Eagle dealer in Toledo, and the informed my that I must have got the only decent running one with no transmission problems ever built. I would still have it today if was not for a giant F-150 that rear ended me in 1999. With only 110,000 miles on it, the insurance company totaled it. That was one of my favorite cars out of the dozen that I owned.
My biggest turkey: a 1972 AMC Matador wagon, and honestly I don’t entirely understand why. My dad bought it new although I guess he didn’t maintain it all that well. He overheated it until the heads bent. Maybe the machinist he hired to fix it didn’t do it right although I’ve talked to other owners who have had bad experiences with head gaskets in 304s and even when new that 120 something hp engine with a terrible Autolite 2bbl carb was a dog. It had what I considered a truly handsome body in its gold paint, wood and two tone interior and was a homologation of proven Ford, GM and Chrysler components but by the time I got it it seemed none of them would work for more than a couple of months at a time. When the windshield wiper linkage broke on the way to work in a driving rain storm that was it. I pulled her over, totally cussed her out and told her our relationship was over and that if it wasn’t for my dad she would have been gone a long time ago. Lately I’ve been watching my DVDs of ‘Adam-12’ and thinking I might want to try another Matador (although this time maybe with a 401). Am I glutton for punishment for what?