Many years ago, I was a manager at an Auto Center attached to a full-line Sears store. I drove a gutted interior, mismatched panel, hot-rodded Civic Wagon. One day, the manager of the full-line store (who was and wasn’t my boss - we had a stupid chain of command) called me into his office. I was told that I needed to…

Any used BMW introduced after 1987.
Any water cooled VW.

There are others, but those were the first to come to mind. I’m also not saying *I* wouldn’t buy one, just that I don’t recommend them. I tell people to buy Toyotas. Mostly because it cuts down on the angry phone calls. When they buy something that’s not…

This list is bad, and it should feel bad.

First, the Mini is not a hatchback. Second, once you move the engine into the cargo space, it’s no longer really a hatchback. Not functionally, anyway.

Cars that should have been on the list, but weren’t: Mk. 1 Golf GTI, the Peugeot 205 GTI, the 4th generation Civic SiR, and the…

The MGA to MGB to rubber bumper MGB is one of the worst evolutions in car history.

I don’t think the O.G. 900 (even in turbo guise) was a good sport sedan. The 9000 Aero was pretty impressive, but not as poised as other cars of the era (looking at ze Germans, here). The Viggen was what I was thinking of.

The 3.8 S certainly was a sports sedan. Having owned several Jaguar sedans over the years, I would class most of them as four door grand tourers.

No liftbacks is bogus, because SAAB is therefore out.

Going with that rule, of the cars I have driven, the Alfa Giulia Super 1.6. Drives and sounds like a Duetto Spider, but has four doors. I almost picked the Lotus Cortina, but the pedants might get stroppy since it only has two doors.

Of the cars I have not driven,…

Look, I only wired money to Nigeria one time.

No. But it was free, had 50k miles with a full maintenance history, and more reliable than my at the time decade old 250k mile SAAB.

The single biggest thing I miss about the SAAB is the joy of driving it. To add insult to injury, the Pilot is so aggressively dull and doesn’t get any better fuel economy. It’s actually…

I currently have a 2008 Honda Pilot, which is a glorified minivan that barfs nearly irrational amounts of petrol. But it’s godawful boring. I suspect the Stellantis products would not be that.

I would like to have an IROC and a Stellantis Hellcat SUV. I promise I am not an awful person.

Well, I can guess your opinion of the Cybertruck owner at my church.

Nothing wrong with alternative shifter designs. If Chrysler had ever figured out the park pawl issue, I think the pushbutton transmission would have lasted longer than the 1956-65 period.

Not a terrible price, but speaking as someone who used to restore these, they aren’t really fit for human occupation. Jaguar design staff must have been shaped different in the 1950s and 1960s than the rest of humanity. The seats, while adjustable, are not really adjustable enough or in the correct directions. The…

Bring on the hate, but I say it’s the GMC Syclone.

Not disputing that it is an amazing vehicle for GM to have built. Not saying I wouldn’t want to own one. But it’s a pickup truck with a 500 pound load limit and puny 2000 pound towing capacity. Great car? Heck yeah. Incredibly awful pickup truck.

The slowest car I ever owned took around 19 seconds to reach 60 mph. But when I owned it, we still had a 55 mph national speed limit. I didn’t have to worry about a 4000+ pound pickup truck rear-ending me at a measurable percentage of the speed of light as I tried to merge onto the highway. These days, I really want…

There’s a large Buick dealer just outside my neighborhood, and I was certainly struck by the looks of the Envista when they began showing up on the lot. But the performance numbers are awful. 9.3 seconds to 60 and a 17 second quarter mile does not encourage me when merging onto the interstate with all the dudebro…

The Smart ForFun monster “truck” was built in Greece, supposedly with help from Mercedes Benz. It’s a Unimog, with a Smart grafted on top for a cabin.

As someone who used to make his living working on this generation of Aston Martins, I would not buy this to fix. I would, however, consider buying it as a drivetrain donor for a swap or hot rod project. The engine and transmission in these cars are fantastic, and as reliable as Astons get. The rest of the car,…

Those Rolls-Royce interiors tend to hold up pretty well, since under the leather they are mostly wood and metal. No fiberboard door cards here.