Worst engine you have know - must be based on personal experience

[grumpy2]

By popular demand!

I'll start by nominating the heap of junk fitted to my 1975 hillman avenger, no power, difficult to start, rough running and used almost as much oil as petrol

Away you go..........

[72BLUE]

Can I add the 2.5 turbo diesel as found in the Jeep Cherokee circa 1998...........

Keith

[4x4]

No idea what the engine was in a Chrysler HHR (the bigger PT Cruiser) I had on rental in the US a few years ago. All it seemed to do was make a lot of thrashy noise - as it falied miserably to propel the vehicle with any increasing rapidity towards the horizon. Or should that be oblivion?

[Stagsongas]

There are two that are indelibly burned into my mind.

One is relatively recent, I still have the dubious pleasure of having to put up with it. The Honda (Yes, Honda) V twin in our ride-on mower. nothing but hassle, fails every weekend, erm....., without fail. I like nothing more than fixing things on a weekend, after I've spent all week fixing things - NOT!

The other is the gutless and loosely labelled 'engine' fitted to the Enstrom Shark Helicopter. This was fondly referred to as the Skoda of the air, having all the torque of 3 sticks of Rhubarb tied to a catherine wheel. For me, the term 'engine' suggests power unit or energy source, but if If you tried to do a LH spot turn the ERPM actually decayed and the ground came closer very quickly! I haven't seen one of these for 10 years or more, and I hope there's none left on the register.

Regards

Steve

[SaskStag]

Pontiac Aztek
Google it
Owned one for 3 years, loads of room, carted me and the 2 kids (my single mum days) around skiing and camping, hauling bikes and everything except the kitchen sink. Ugly, but mine was schoolbus yellow and it had character . But it was forever being rerpaired. Fortunately I bought an extended warranty, everything was replaced including head gaskets (sound familiar?). I hope it's now reliable for the nice couple I sold it to with a baby on the way! I see it around town still.

Oh yes, my old 1972 Hillman Avenger was also well known to the AA......

Tanya

[Westfaling]

Pontiac Aztek????

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omApdPl0ovI

[staginhiding]

My personal favourite is the Alfa Romeo 2.0 Twin spark circa 1998..used in the 145/6/ 155/6 etc

A fantastic sounding engine and when on song a brilliant performer.
The downside was that without any warning they would "let go" big time.Pistons through the block,camshafts and crankshafts broken etc etc..

A car dealer I know had bought 6 brand new complete engines (from Alfa) at the time to keep as spares for the cars he sold that just blew up.
The cars were very popular and cheap to buy at Auction back then so it was worthwhile for him to take a chance..

[38rover]

Back in the seventies I had a Sherpa van with a 2 litre O series engine in the first 18 months I had 3 new engines fitted under warranty could not live with the problems and sold it bought a Renault Trafic no problems

[m9fdb]

K Series in the MGF - I had 3 head gaskets on my one in 8 years !

One of my mates earns his living from these cars www.britishlegends.co.uk and does 2-3 head gaskets on them a week at his place in Southend

[ChasR]

The problem with the K Series IME is that most places do not change the HGs properly. A friend of mine had a Rover 216 which had previously had 2 HG changes prior to him buying it (he actually bought the car with a 1 month old HG). His uncle (who was a specialist and Ex-Rover employee) changed it using various methods (Genuine LR HG, new studs, brass dowels, and IIRC work hardening the fire ring area on the head). £500 later, and that engine is still on that HG despite it covering 30,000 miles around town.

As for my experience of engines, it probably comes down to an old Mondeo V6 I once bought. Every other week something was going wrong with regards to the cooling system (sound familiar?). The previous overheating of the car and copious amount of Radweld used pretty much finished off the cooling system in that car (when I sold the car on its second engine, I think the only original part of the cooling system left was a hose!).

I don't blame the design of the engine for that, but bad maintenance and many bodges being performed on the way. The 3.0 V6 Mondeo I purchased afterwards has been smooth sailing in comparison with very little required doing to it over the time I have owned it (bought at 100,000 miles, now on 230,000 and rising).

[m9fdb]

The problem with the K Series IME is that most places do not change the HGs properly. A friend of mine had a Rover 216 which had previously had 2 HG changes prior to him buying it (he actually bought the car with a 1 month old HG). His uncle (who was a specialist and Ex-Rover employee) changed it using various methods (Genuine LR HG, new studs, brass dowels, and IIRC work hardening the fire ring area on the head). £500 later, and that engine is still on that HG despite it covering 30,000 miles around town.

As for my experience of engines, it probably comes down to an old Mondeo V6 I once bought. Every other week something was going wrong with regards to the cooling system (sound familiar?). The previous overheating of the car and copious amount of Radweld used pretty much finished off the cooling system in that car (when I sold the car on its second engine, I think the only original part of the cooling system left was a hose!).

I don't blame the design of the engine for that, but bad maintenance and many bodges being performed on the way. The 3.0 V6 Mondeo I purchased afterwards has been smooth sailing in comparison with very little required doing to it over the time I have owned it (bought at 100,000 miles, now on 230,000 and rising).

Yes the newer LR gasket is a lot better and thats the one my mate fits - he thinks they are a great engine funnily enough

[4x4]

Toyota D4D 2.2 Diesel.

First one died at 50K miles - warped head and block.
Toyota stumped for a new engine.
Dealer fitted it, and took the car for a test drive.
The more they drove it, the worse it sounded.
Toyota wanted them to give it back to me, they insisted on taking the new engine back out again.
Centre main bearing shell on the crank had slipped - and ripped the crank to bits.
Another new engine sanctioned and fitted.
That was ok - but along with everything else that went wrong with that pile of s**t (try an average of one day off the road for repairs every two weeks for my first two years of ownership), and Toyota's "We've paid for it - what's your problem" attitude - it had to go in the end.

So me?
I will never, ever buy a Toyota or Lexus again.
And that's down to Toyota's attitude as much as anything else.

[new to this]

By popular demand!

I'll start by nominating the heap of junk fitted to my 1975 hillman avenger, no power, difficult to start, rough running and used almost as much oil as petrol

Away you go..........

my dad had one, it would only start if you sprayed easy start down the carburettors, also had a milky/brown film in the air filter

dave

[Kevin Garrod]

Vauxhall's 1256cc engine as fitted to Chevettes and Vivas, I had both and the one in the Viva definitely used as much oil as petrol in the 2 weeks I owned it.
It only lasted that long because I kept it topped up with used oil from my dad's car that hadn't made it to the tip.
The Chevette was ok in comparison but difficult to start and wheezy at best.....thinking about it I got a 100mph on the speedo once or twice so maybe not that bad after all.

[SaskStag]

Pontiac Aztek????

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omApdPl0ovI