I see your Nissan Jukes and raise you one Nissan Cube: Officially the fugliest car in the world - it looks like it was designed by a 4-year-old. I saw one of these driving along the motorway, and was so shocked I had to slow down to find out what it was...
Asymmetrical too. took out rear window post on one side to get better driver viewing. Doesn't really drive badly in US city driving. Kia Soul is still my fav rental car. Tunes, economy, reasonable acceleration. Just stay away from "That Green" as the National car rental lady called one I had. Looks like something left in a diaper/nappie(sp?). john
Vauxhall Chevette (or Shove-it, as it turned out) A close second would be a Suzuki Liana I had as a courtesy car - brand new, but felt like an Anderson shelter on skates.
Without doubt a K reg Nissan Micra - loaned when I smashed up my first car - a Metro 1.1 quest, which was undoubtledly the 2nd worst car I have ever driven!
Hmmm, hard choice, there were so many in the 80's... - any Morris Marina - any Vauxhall Viva - any Austin Allegro I could go on but anyone spot a theme appearing here?
Some model of a Volvo with a Micra strapped to the roof, engine was restricted and it rolled like hell. I also could only control either the speed or the direction at one time. Was fun at the time though.
Either a mid 90's Ford Taurus station wagon or a 2009 Dodge Avenger. The Taurus, despite its "V6", was painfully gutless and the Avenger simply had terrible visibility.
1) Fiat 126 2) my Dad's old Citroen, can't remember the model it was like driving a boat. 3) my old Opal Manta GTE, loved the looks hated the drive.
Fiat 500 from 08. Had to hold it in gear going around slow tight corners because it would pop out of gear which isn't confidence inspiring... **** visibility... gutless 1.2 engine... felt solid but just.... meh.
So this is my friend and I telling the story about the worst car I've ever driven while working at an auto auction: note: I'm not going to bother finding the lost images from the original post HIS VERSION: 2003 Hyundai Elantra-A.K.A the Best Way to End the Day.: Need I say more? Well, I will anyway. On approach I state to Eastman that I require the lavatory facilities, and per company protocol he must now take this car and chauffeur me to the auction block where I may find the bathroom. We enter the vehicle, and Eastman starts it. "Oh yes..." says Eastman in his best impression of "OH YES....YOU LIKEY LIKE THAT...." He engages the A/C, turns the dial to max, and we are greeted with...Nothing. Vent. Nothing. Heat. Nothing. He nudges the throttle, the tach sweeps to 3,000 rpm, the sound stirs...well nothing quite frankly other than the entire dashboard. We make it to the entrance of the auction block and i depart for the restroom. I return 3 minutes later to find Eastman has moved up about 2 cars, and while I could enter another car with another driver and perfectly good a/c, I am not one to let a comrade suffer a 90 degree day in solitude. As I approach the vehicle, I see quite the look of jocularity on Eastman's face "It stalled while you were in there. Then when I got it started again I noticed you can push the fan speed dial in. When I did the engine started jumping from 1,000-1,500 rpm intervals in a predictable set pace. I think the A/C is attempting to engage. See if you can't jump it while I drive. Oh and a lovely couple was interested in buying the car until they saw the Check Engine light. And that it had no A/C. And that it stalled. And that its an AUTOMATIC." So fiddle i did, and we noted that the smallest, almost imperceptible puffs of cold air would wisp forth from the vents with every dial push. But alas the rpm jump could not be recreated. As we approach the block, I see a man approach the car with a look of intent. It should again be noted that most of the people working in the more worse-off car lanes are not the best of people, and 90% of the time do not speak english. So they will attempt to communicate in hand gestures. The most common of which involves them putting their ear to the hood, and moving their arm up and down, signaling they want to hear the engine revved. Eastman was unfamiliar with this, so I informed him. Also, the man requesting was smiling quite ridiculously, but i guess thats better than the vacant stare I often receive. It should also be noted that a few weeks earlier, on a VERY warm day (tarmac temperature crested 100), and after several hours of non-a/c'd cars (resulting in me being extremely sleepy) when I was requested to perform said engine rev I forgot the car was in gear...and subsequently gave the dealer a faceful of bumper. Oddly enough, he apologized to me. (Though I was quick to dispense with the apologies. We get to the Auction block, the car CANNOT be sold. The last bid I hear as we pull away...$250. As we leave the block another car leaving another block departs further from us, Eastman spots him, and says "I'm havin 'im." We accelerate to about ~10 mph and the car holds steady. "Um, shitiest aggressive manuever ever" says I. "I had it floored", says Eastman. "GTFOH." "Alright, when we get to the straight I'm flooring it again. Watch my foot, I swear I won't lift."-Eastman. "Ok." We hit the straight, I see Eastman (for emphasis' sake) pull his foot back and then drive the throttle to the floor. The car whurrs up to ~1000 rpm...and stays there. We are now doing roughly 10 mph. I peer over the shift lever and notice, quite interestingly, Eastman's foot is in fact planted. "Well, this is different." At this point we begin giggling. And then we notice the line of traffic behind us. Imagine if you will the entire population of Florida in a mass exodus because they have heard that Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, and Louis Armstrong have risen from the dead and decided to go on tour. In CT. Basically automotive hell on earth. This however causes us to laugh even harder, because while our elderly coworkers believe we are being smartass-ed adolescents for holding them up (they usually cruise at 30, we are now the slowpokes) we are completely unable to spur the Hyundai into any further acceleration. And then it stalled. At this point tears are streaming from both mine and Eastman's eyes as he restarts the car and attempts to coax it at 1/4, 1/2, and then full throttle (as the previous two attempts yeilded NO response watsoever.) Moving along now at full throttle we are barely cresting 800 rpm, and traveling at wat started for a brief, beautiful moment with 8 mph now, slowly as the car began to resist, 3 mph. We barely make it back to the space and shut the car off. As we step from the car laughing, I say to Eastman "Wanna see if we need to move anything else?" "No," says he, "I don't think anything could top that, and honestly I think thats how I want to end the day." Lesson learned...sometimes the shittier the car, the more interesting it is. SOMETIMES.
My follow-up: HAHAHA! Elantra was the best car I've had at the auction, hands down. Much more interesting than the Suzuki sidekick/vitara/officer barbie vehicle. As Damien said, while he was in the bathroom I noticed that you could press the AC fan dial inward, and that the AC would try to start when you did this. I can't emphasize enough that this was a dial, and was NOT meant to be pushed inward in this manner. While Damien was in the bathroom, I held down this button for a good minute and half while I listened to the motor chug from 500 to 1000 RPM as the AC alternately started and failed while laughing to myself. The car stalled while I was moving it through a central area of the parking lot which sees high traffic. I was going downhill, so I let it level out before restarting it and driving it into the line, but not before I made sure every dealer that gave me a look also knew that "This car is AWESOME," which I yelled out the window as I rolled slowly by. The couple that were interested in the car had their look at it while Damien was still in the bathroom. The man did the talking and he asked "AC doesn't work?" to which I responded "No." He followed up with "...but it has AC?" Whatever, I'm not going to explain the fine details of this fabulous AC option to you. He also asked me to wind up the engine, so he could listen and hear if it had a knock. It was at this moment I discovered that, even in neutral, you COULD NOT rev the engine past 3000 RPM; it simply would not go higher. When the engine was reved to past 2000, it sounded like ENGINE BREAKING, and I can't stress this point enough. This was a legit DANGER TO MANIFOLD moment. I guess this wasn't apparent from outside the vehicle, as he simply told me he "couldn't hear the engine when I was reving it like that." Finally, it was the girl who decided to drag the guy away from the car, for a reason Damien has neglected to mention: THIS CAR HAD A TERRIBLE SMELL. Can't remember the specifics of it, but it was bad. Damien probably forgot to mention it because, as bad as it was, it probably didn't break his top 3 of worst smelling cars. When the man jumped on the hood of the car to get me to rev it up, it's not that I was unfamiliar with this maneuver, (I've narrowly avoided hitting a dealer myself; he popped the hood of my truck to rev it up, and I barely got the thing into neutral before he began playing with the throttle), but I was lit-rally concerned for this man, who basically had his nuts resting on top of our vehicle. That, and I basically could NOT believe that this car was getting so much interest in lane 13. I don't know how Damien managed to find a picture of this man on the internet but I wish we had an image to describe the look of combined disgust and terror as I got on the gas and he slowly backed away from this car. The best part about our drive back to the space was that we were rolling by so slowly that every dealer close to us could hear our conversation about how shitty this car was. I drove by a group of dealers and yelled "It's floored!" as mini vans passed me. I stuck my hand up outside the window to indicate that I was off the race pace. We needed to cross four lanes of light traffic inside the parking lot, so I threw on the hazards and we had time to talk to every car that slowed down to let us through, pedal still floored and top speed lower than a brisk walking pace, and shout things like "It's pegged!" and "Yeah baby, full throttle!" It even stalled going up the aforementioned hill (EDIT: It's not even a hill; it's how the parking lot surface is designed to slope slightly towards the storm drain). I parked it about 100 spaces short of where it needed to go, because I honestly didn't believe it would make it back to its numbered space. After one final bout of engine racing, at the request of Damien, we got out of this car, still laughing and crying hysterically.
My current ride is a 2005 Hyundai Elantra 2.0L, 5spd. A tweak or two with the laptop and it's quite healthy now. Bought it new. Marilyn liked the color blue on the dealers lot. Coundn't be more happy with it. Great fun to blow away the Honda Civic racer wannabes. Oh, and 31 mpg in town is nice. john
This was my fist car Horrendous steering roofed it a few times but luckily its quite light got my parents to help me flip it back over and without any windows it was'nt exactly hard to get out, infact i can't remeber it even having a steering wheel that worked properly i would always have to shift my weight to get it to turn Safety was alot to be desired, no seatbelts or airbags not even a windscreen to stop me flying out when i lost control on a steep hill and the tread had ran out on my trainers Space was a little limited no passangers a nightmare to get started always having to get a mate to give me a good push or find a nice hill to get some speed up, no fabric interior only hard plastic Guess the only benefit of the car is saved me a fortune on fuel!!!!
Oh dang pink fluffy grips!?! Don't tell me you plan on sticking some tassles on that beast aswell.... Maybe some spinners
Needs bigger exhausts and nitrous oxide injection if you ask me... Oh, and neons. And last but not least...WHERE'S THE SPOILER!?
Had a go in my sisters peugeot 206 the other day what a cock eyed drive that is..... Footwell is weird my feet practically bridge the break and clutch my foot does'nt even fit fully into the foot well because there to big Accelearter is way to sensitive and the clutch is way too high (hers is worn out though)
