but I had an old Datsun that was a maintenance nightmare.

Subaru. and then a Jeep Liberty and stayed with Subaru.

Waiting for it to say "Go"?

and that it hated him in particular.

I bought it brand new and it died after about 60,000 miles. I had it serviced according to schedule.

I had more problems with a Mercury Bobcat I bought new...like when the entire stick shift came off in my hand

drive.

Really not a good purchase for me...jazzed up Pinto that it was...

This car had carburetor issues as long as I owned the car.

He squeezed that lemon for every drop of juice.

It had the early GM V6 in it that looked for all the world like someone had taken a chainsaw to a V8. Ran like it too.

Drive it, we did. Putting at least 250,000 miles on it before the bittersweet day it was loaded up on a tow truck and hauled to the scrap yard. I saw a tear in Dad’s eye as it limped away. Probably to become the sequel to Christine.

The most unnerving part about that death trap was how the back end tried to pass the front end on icy roads unexpectedly. Of course, Dad constantly tempted fate by driving it to the ski hill.

avoid the hills or snow. The hill had no guardrail either. There where many days I came down the hill, back end first. And there were many days, I sat in the car at the top of the hill, put my foot down on the brake and came down in neutral. I hated that car and the car I bought after---the Saturn.

Was yanking on the emergency brake and only using that on slick roads. My mom refused to drive it at all.

My dad eventually formalized the rear-brakes-only solution by all but disabling the front brakes. But, as you said above the front wheel drive paired with most of the weight in the front and weak brakes in the rear meant that it was only nearly a solution at best. Maybe, even more dangerous because of it’s likely failure when needed the most.

It was DESIGNED to be a lemon, however. My dad bought it used for my mom to drive. It wasn't long and he got her a '74 Chevy Bel Air that was a much better car overall.

Or, Found on road dead.

My mom's brother worked as a mechanic for the local Ford dealership until he retired.

Chevys were all good cars. My husband came from a Ford company; His were mostly lemon. We both switched to Subaru

We got her a Saturn. And she had it for 8 years until she couldn’t drive it anymore and it sat in her garage for 7 years. When she passed I was shocked it started up and sold to a friend. It had some mechanical problem and she took it to this mechanic who lied and said the car was a junker. I gave her money back and then found out the guy ripped her off and resold the car.

To this day my friend gets angry she was ripped off as I am also.

Three transmissions
Replace AC compressor
Replaced starter twice

Never Nissan is my motto!

Kept throwing the air cooled belt. 4 speed on the floor.

When I hit the guardrail with it, the steering wheel came up and back 3 feet breaking my jaw, and cracking my cheek bones.

The trunk was in the front and the only thing to stop the guardrail was my set of golf clubs.

I didn't have many problems, but I didn't keep it very long...

Apparently they were built with an aluminum engine block... which was known to crack.

And it did. And smoked. A lot. (Fill it with oil and check the gas was the saying...)

I eventually had to go to court, after my THIRD ticket for a smoking car and came armed with a letter from the fire department informing the court that the car had since been destroyed in their auto extrication classes.

And the aluminum engine melted. Such a POS car

1988 model, the fuses under the dashboard always blew if I drove it very far and I had to keep extras for when it happened since at that point I was going nowhere.

my wife had for real estate. Only had it a few years, but the timing chain went out twice. Bought it new too, my one and only Oldsmobile.

With its extra width and large rear window it made a great make out car...

I had Saturn that went 168k miles fairly easy, but then it was DONE.

and traded it for a Mondeo before the warranty was up. The Mondeo was better, but traded that for a Subaru (kept that 10+ years - excellent car)

Bought it brand new. Always having little problems. Then, when I had it about half paid off, it threw a rod! Dad took pity and helped pay to have the damned thing fixed so I could trade it in.
Right now I am driving a 2004 Merc, a Grand Marquis. I had to have a new power steering pump put in about 4 years ago. That was the biggest repair it's ever needed. Everything else is routine maintenance.

2014 FIAT 500L Trekking.

Too much to list here. After a week, the doors wouldn't open any longer. After that issue was fixed, it would completely die if I let it sit over 24 hours. Had it towed (at dealer expense) 4 times the first month.
I can go on forever with the list. This car should've never been brought to market.

you extra traction, That really is a bummer that you had all those things wrong, John Coktoshen.Thank you for sharing.

I had had a few beers so my filters were off and I blurted out "Does it run?"

He says "Of course it runs -- I bought it from a mechanic." ROFL.

It's waiting for another tow now. I will never buy another Dodge anything ever again. I have a Subaru Impreza Sport now. The Dodge needed a new transmission, a valve job and now we're rebuilding the cooling system. I think we're going to be trading it in next month if we can afford it. Our repair costs are almost a payment for a new car at this point.

and a Jeep Liberty-all wheel drive since the Saturn.

move to Costa Rica. I had zero major repairs in the 24 years I had it. Most expensive was a new timing belt. Think it was $350 many years ago.

My worse car was a 1986 Mazda 626. Hated it's lack of power and handling. Had it for 9 months and traded it in on a new Corvette.

same car can be a piece of crap. Which my Saturn was.

Five transmissions

and no matter how many times they replaced the transmissions, the new ones would also eventually fail because of these flaws. I've heard similar stories from other former Caravan owners.

Ex's dad bought it for me brand new, but I hated the pos.

Didn't keep it long enough to have maint problems, but it was a rattle trap pos fr9m day 1.

I also never bought an American made car. Hmmmm.

I've owned VW bugs (my first car was a '59 convertible), and various Hondas. My current car is a 2017 Fit that I purchased in 2020.

made by American car companies.

Notice that almost every single car named here is an American car. A complaint about a Fiat, and one about a Volvo, Every other post involves an American car. Hmmmm. I wonder why?

Reread all of the posts.

I had a Saturn sedan that I bought new and thank goodness I got the extended warranty because there were so many different problems with it throughout the years I had it. I also got a Subaru as my next car and loved it. Hardly any problems at all. when I checked it out in Consumers Reports, almost all the dots were black. Bad year for that particular car...

I had problems with it from almost Day One, too many to list.

But oh, how fun that car was when it wasn't in the shop!

It was my parents' car. Silver with a red interior. Legendarily bad:

72 hp at 2900 rpm
0-60 time: 23.15 seconds

And my parents were gearheads so not sure how they picked that car but they sold it less than a year later.

My mother's favorite car was a 1965 Dodge Dart -- yellow with the black roof. I saw one at a car show in September and started crying. Her 2nd fave: a 1981 Honda Civic 5-speed. We were at a stoplight and the teenagers in the next car teasingly rev'd the engine on whatever they had. Mom waited for green, screamed to 6000 RPMs and then chirped the tires going into 2nd gear. Tapped the brakes. They caught up to us and they were laughing. Gave her a thumbs up.

more oil than gas, and a 1965 Malibu SS convertible with major motor problems.

I'm not sure now what year, but it was the early 60s. It had push button transmission controls and had one problem after the other. At one point, any time I wanted to start the car, I had to take a wrench and bang on the solenoid to get it to start. Eventually all the wiring just crapped out.

My ex-husband bought it, but I was stuck driving it while he drove a farm truck.

... Ford (car, not sure about their trucks). The thing looked okay, but was just awful. AND, my friends told me afterwards... NEVER buy a Ford. They said, "FORD stands for Found. On. Road. Dead." They were correct.

It was my girlfriend’s car and came with her when we all moved in together. It would need to be tuned up at least once a month — a problem I attributed to the primitive smog control setup (this was in California), essentially a hose running from the exhaust pipe to the carburetor. Points, plugs, gapping the distributor on a monthly basis. It would run Ok for a few weeks then run rough — smoking and missing. A small car, it still managed to wallow down the road, heaving and leaning. I pretty much hated it. In recent decades I’ve had much better luck with Toyotas (4Runner, Highlander, Sequoia), putting down hundreds of thousands of trouble-free miles. I have a phobic relationship with American cars and keep my distance as much as I can.

It had an early electronic ignition package that would fail about once a year, without any warning. The AC didn't work well, and both doors sagged so badly I had to have them repaired. And then there was a lot of rust.
It was a typical AMC poor quality build.
In all fairness, the car was given to us by my wife's mother. She had it for about 1 year and never liked it; her brother convinced her to buy it. So, except for the constant repairs, it didn't cost us anything.
It was no wonder that AMC went out of business.

to enter the same door. Floorboard on the front passenger side fell off and you could see the road. It was like sitting in the Flintstone Mobile. Get this, it passed inspection.

It's worth was in the negative numbers.

Only Ford I ever owned and overpriced!

I gave it back to my brother, who was the previous owner, and it died about a year later.

My oldest brother had it first, then my older, then me, then back to my oldest. So, a combo of age and use probably did it in.