Ronnie Defeo would be the one. He was one of my convicts 25 or so years ago.

84 Z28

Toyota corolla

1985 chrysler lebaron station wagon. Gifted to me in 2000. Had "intermittent" windshield  wipers, in the sense they sometimes worked. Radio did not work. AC did not work. Power door locks did not work. The only  window that worked was the rear passenger. Open the driver side door too far and the only  way  to close  it  was  to  kick  it  from  the outside.  Doors would freeze  shut in the  winter.  If you managed  to open the  door,  it would not  latch  shut.  Had  to carry  a bungee cord and hook  it  to  both doors. Dad  thought  covering the  doors  in  vasoline would  help, not at  all,  now you  just  got vasoline all  over  yourself when you get in  the  car. Muffler would fall off all the time. In my life I have seen two lebarons in the  wild, none in the past 10 years.

1986 Mercedes 300E that I bought in 1998.  Unreliable money pit

This might be a tie;

1985 Dodge Daytona

Drivers seat frame broke TWICE, once was on vacation in Florida. Replaced that seat in our motel parking lot in Ft Myers!

Same trip, the power steering line pinholed in a parking lot on Sanibel and I had to cut the belt & drive without PS.

Changed the MacPherson struts in the driveway, the spring compressor let go on one and nearly broke my jaw (that one might have been my fault).

1973 MGB

Replaced clutch slave kit about twice a year, sometimes more often. Finally traced it to contaminated fluid ruining the seals.

Replaced distributor caps about twice a month (mostly just rotated them. I had a supply of 3 or 4).

Piston burned through. Replaced that in my driveway, along with new bearings, rings and head gasket.

Rebuilt the rear lever shocks once.

Rebuilt the rear brake slave cylinders several times, same contaminated fluid as in clutch system.

British Leyland electrics, 'nuff said!  

Replaced dead OEM fuel pump with Auto Zone inline that worked flawlessly until I got rid of the car.

I have had a fee.  My wife’s 3 year old 08 Civic was surprisingly bad.  Fuel line splits at the pump and fuel leaked inside the car.  That coulda been really bad..  Ate a blower motor.  A window motor as well.  Once the fuel leak happened we sold it pretty fast.  We had it for 40k miles and 2 years.  My wife’s 96 Jetta was a good car for several years.  But when she fucked up she really fucked up!!  6 months of breakdowns.

I had a 1991 LeBaron 2 door.  It was a pretty good car until it hit 100k.  Then it fell apart.  Pretty much everything went wrong at once.  It had to go.

1971 Fiat 124 sedan. New. Ran like a bat outa hell, for 20Kmi. Then it needed: One short block, entire braking system, and then t 40kmi everything again. Overheating which nobody could fix.  Great idea though, it would rev to 12Krpm and would corner great.  Sold it at 55K to a guy from spain, and he loved it

Second worst was a '90 Subaru Loyale, would not go one year without 400$ in maint. Timing belts like clockwork at 15kmi.

Whoops, forgot another one, VW Corrado G-Lader. It never DIDN'T have some electrical issue. The day I sold it, the movable wing that had worked up to that point took a shit. Kid still bought it.

I swore off VW after that car and will never own another one.

1985 GMC fleet side pickup truck

I had a 99 Silverado. I had the tranny go at 44k. It was out of warranty years wise. Star gear that controls reverse, or something along those lines.
I traded on a New F150 shortly after. It just made me mad looking at the truck after I had it fixed.

1985 Chevy Malibu station wagon. Short version : put 4 alternators in the POS and two water pumps. Even the fan switch failed and had to be replaced. Last GM car I owned. Never again.

1981 BMW 525 (owned while stationed in Germany).

Miserable POS that never made it 50 miles from home without breaking down.

Boredom zero.

LT1... fair point

Window motors? Drill three holes, take the speaker out, and you can do it in 30 minutes.

BMW 325i is by far the worst car I have every owned.

Worst:
Pontiac grand am with the iron duke 4cyl. It was a five speed, surprisingly. Engine grenaded as I coasted into town...sadly, I lived in the country

Runners up:
2000ish Saturn SC1 that went through transmission solenoids. Looked up the fix online to diagnose and brought to dealer to get it done. It was fixed...for about 20k miles. Then the same thing happened. Sold it to a guy who liked fixing them for $500.

Oldsmobile regency 88. Despite rigorous maintenance, engine sucked coolant on the freeway. Damn GM and their terrible gaskets/intake design in those engines.

Best was a 1991 integra. Had a 1.6l dohc b16a from Japan shoehorned in along with all sorts of other goodies. It would have little quirky fits occasionally but never stranded me and cost next to nothing to repair. All repairs could be done with hand tools and beer in the driveway. Little sucked was fast too, made it to 145 before letting off with throttle to spare. Averaged 35mpg to boot. Fun little car, sold to a kid who turbo'd it and blew it up in short order from too much boost.

Chevy Corsica.  Company car.  It was a total piece of shit...like most Chevy products.

89 Chrysler LeBaron.  The wife and I bought it right when we got married in 94.  That fucking thing almost put us in bankruptcy just to keep it running.

1986 Chevy Blazer.  Transmission needed rebuilt at 90K and 120k miles.  Barely enough power to get out of its own way.  Getting on highways I would always find myself flooring it and leaning forward as though that might make it accelerate faster.

Never had a really bad car.

The most problematic has been my F150.

Fuel rail sensors went, seized calipers, Leaky power steering line that rotted out, steering shaft seized.

It's only got 79 k on it.

Best have been Toyota Camry,, Nissan pathfinder and Acura Integra

>works for Kia

2013 Ford Focus-Clutch

I have two entries

1969 AMC Javelin

It dropped 3 transmissions.  Two under warranty.  The third time I went to the junk yard and found a 3 speed manual.

Other than the transmission it was a great driving car and lots of fun.

1980 something Oldsmobile Delta 88 diesel.

The car was great, the engine was a money pit.

Gubmint Motors 3/4 ton truck

too many weird problems to list. Including randomly downshifting straight into 2nd gear from 4th on the highway at 80mph every couple weeks. A/C would only work on max blast or off.

I had two POS's.
An 89 (I think?) GMC "S-15 Jimmy" (thing was a death trap), and an '84 CJ-7 that was a POS just because it was so rusted out (the mechanicals were fine).
The CJ was fun though... but the GMC was total garbage and I regret ever wasting my $ on that turd.

1993 BMW 325i.  I bought it on emotion without doing any kind of title check or even a good going over (it was dark and raining when I test drove it and I hadn't brought a flashlight). Turned out it had been wrecked, the odometer was off by at least 40k miles, and it had basically been subject to defered maintenance its entire life. I took a big ol bath on it when I was finally able to get rid of it, and the buyer told me the alternator blew up on the drive home. It was pretty fun to drive though.

1986 Renault Encore hatch..... what do I win??

I was young and reckless!

Seriously, I was 16, got it used for way under blue book, and it lasted me through high school and my first year of college before the transmission started acting up, and I traded it.

It was, however, a very, shall we say, unrefined vehicle.

If you took it to 70 on the Interstate, you took your life into your own hands.

I've stuck with Fords my whole life (22 years behind the wheel now) and have never had any sort of problem that could remotely be classified as major.

1973 Chevy Vega.....worst American car of all times.  Even Pinto drivers looked down on it.

Almost 40 years passed before I bought another Chevy.

1983 VW mini bus.  Fun to look at.  Shit to drive.  Hell to work on.

Ha, '77 Ford Mustang 4cyl, Red with mag wheels.

Fucking Dodge Intrepid.
Fuck that  POS!

In 2003 or 4 the fucking sky turned black and the monsoon season started. Crazy winds, crazy rain. It was that type of rain that you can't see through even though the wipers are on max. I was on a crowded freeway and after about 3 minutes of this shit my driver side wiper gave me a great big fuck you and flew off the car. I thought I was going to die. Good times.

That's easy. '79 VW Rabbit Diesel. Bought it for $900, sank $2300 into repairs in a year, sold it for $500 and was tickled to death to see it go! Oh yeah, 60mpg when head gasket wasn't leaking.

Triumph TR6  and  Audi Quattro.

1993 Ford Thunderbird LX.

I bought it new.  At less than 1000 miles, the Engine computer died, cutting the engine off completely.  While I was doing 80mph on the interstate in traffic.  For 9 years, it ALWAYS had something wrong with it, from catalytic converter coming apart to wheel bearings needing replacing.  Worst of all, it had some weird knocking/thudding noise in the rear end when going over bumps AND it had a perpetual pull to the right (like, let go of the steering wheel and it would immediately drift right; nobody could find the problem).  Finally the head gaskets blew at 170,000 miles and 9 years.  I got them fixed, sold the car for what it cost to repair the gaskets.

I swore off American cars after that and only own Japanese or BMW/Mercedes (except for a 2014 Mustang GT I bought new on an impulse; it held together for the 9000 miles I owned it, but it drove like a 1965 pickup truck, just primitive as hell).

1983 Toyota 4x4 pickup.

I have owned 15+ vehicles in the past 10 years and never had a problem with any of them, liked them all (all GM).

92 s-10 blazer vortec.
Thing was trash.

1995 Jeep Wrangler. Was very unreliable and wasn’t able to maintain high way speeds.

This.  When I was younger I had a 1992 Pontiac Grand Am that was the biggest piece of shit ever produced. It ate the timing belt at 60k miles. It had a myriad of electrical gremlins that were never fixed.  I finally said fuck it and used it to off road to the best of it's abilities until I eventually killed it.  Fuck that car.

1993 with the dog shot 4 cyl. Actually gave it away to a social services .org.

I'm kinda torn. Had more sex in the backseat of my '78 Cordoba then any other car, but it was a real POS.

My wife has a 2007 Chevy HHR. It finally has over 60,000 miles now because she only works 2.5 miles from home. It is the biggest piece of shit car I have ever encountered in my entire life.

I've been lucky in my 44 years to have never had a truly shitty car. I have also not own that many cars compared to most of you guys.

77 Cutlass Supreme - 2.41 rear gear was slow to accelerate but cruising at 55mph was effortless.

1985 Ford Tempo - the power steering went out but it was so effortless Drive I really never noticed the difference.  I abused it while a volunteer firefighter LOL

1982 Camaro - 2.8 V6 was truly gutless.  Rusted just looking at it.  Did not like driving above 45mph but I was at a small coastal community so that was ok.  The only reason I did not keep it was I left it behind when I moved because the thought of driving it 300 miles was frightening.  At 5 a.m. I was blinded by oncoming traffic and did not notice a dead deer in the road. I ran over the deer, got partially airborne (felt like it) and hit my head on the t-top but suffered no vehicular issues except for some meat and skin stuck underneath.

1995 Bronco - my first real adult vehicle. Black with chrome bumpers, four-wheel drive and a 351 Windsor under the hood. I really loved it but I had a few mechanical issues at about 150,000 miles (bought at 36,000) so I sold it to my mechanic brother.

1994 Caprice 9C1 - Police chief's car in a five man department. Paid $1850, sold to my brother for $1000 after three years and 40,000 miles.  Blew the transmission (shit design).

Currently owned

2002 GMC 1500 long bed standard cab 2wd - Bought at 25,000, have 169,000 and it's now in semi retirement. The only issue was the shity intake manifold gasket design that shrinks in cold weather. When I start it up below 40 degrees extra air enters the engine so it revs up by itself and it takes a few minutes to warm up. Once the engine warms up, the gasket expands and it runs fine. When it is really cold, I will go outside every few hours and run it for a few minutes while I'm at work so I won't have a problem when it's time to go home. I have lived through this for free Winters now still haven't gotten around to getting it fixed.

2018 Grand Caravan - with a wife and three kids, I needed something more than a standard cab truck in case my wife's car broke down so I got the most hated vehicle of arfcom, a minivan..  With less than 5000 miles I have no issues which is to be expected.

A side benefit is 2 days a week I have a part-time security job at a car dealership. I'm at my tablet to the back of the driver seat and sit in the middle seat behind the tinted windows and can watch free parking lot without being seen and still enjoying Amazon Prime video

I really miss my Bronco and Caprice and if I win the lottery, I would buy exact duplicates of them today as daily drivers with slightly updated powerplants of course.

So a true ''blue light'' special?

for me It's a tossup
between my first car. 1973 Toyota Celica ST
and
a 1973 Buick Opel Kadett Wagon
.
The celica taught me wrenching early on as it would eat timing chain tensioners about every 3K miles.

The Opel on the other hand Burned 2-3qts of oil between fillups. had less power than a used lawnboy mower.
only redeeming feature was the empty spare tire well that held 3 cases of beer on ice.  and it only cost me 300 bucks
that car passed between many guys in the Spec4 Mafia on FT Lewis in the 80s.
.
looked like this one if this one is the before pic.
.

Mazda GLC.

Dodge Omni.

Two Volvo's

A couple of Volkswagens and a Subaru or two.

Oh, and that Chevy Vega......an Audi by far was the most expensive. A very delicate early 2001 chevy 1500 Silverado that destroyed abs brake controllers.

Jeeps.  Jeez I forgot the jeeps starting with early 80s cj 5s.....

At least I never owned Fiat or Pontiac Fieos.

I've learned everything the hard way.

If it's got wheels or tits- you've got problems