1980 quality cars?

[briwill70]

Ha! I bought one of those when I was younger for iirc $600 and drove it like a demolition derby car. It didn't last long obviously, but it did last long enough to make it to ~2000 when I got it. I'll never forget telling a girl I was trying to date that I had a Vette and showed up at her house in a Chevette. She didn't get my humor at all.

Ha! me and my friends liked to joke that I had a Vette!

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[MountainGoat]

Ha! me and my friends liked to joke that I had a Vette!

Yep we did the same! That thing really was terrible. Later I bought a 1984 Celica with a stick for iirc even less than the Chevette and the difference was huge. That Celica was actually a really fun to drive car.

 

[Toytec]

Yep we did the same! That thing really was terrible. Later I bought a 1984 Celica with a stick for iirc even less than the Chevette and the difference was huge. That Celica was actually a really fun to drive car.

Had one myself. Very fun car.

 

[MountainGoat]

Had one myself. Very fun car.

Nice! I had a hatch. Notchbacks were a little harder to find but nicer imo. 80s and 90s Japanese cars were the best. We won't see anything like them again.

 

[Trigganometry]

Wow, that brings back some memories. Had a 1984 Toyota Celica GT-S Coupe brand new for like 4.2K Loved that car. Stick 4 speed ended up driving it for 9 years and sold it cash for 2.2K. That thing was a blast

 

[Floyd]

My first car was a 1980 Chevette handed down to me from my parents. What a horrible piece of garbage. At only 36k miles the timing belt broke, AC stopped working and the carb had to be rebuilt. Vinyl seats were ripping and various interior parts were breaking.

Still better than a Citation!

 

[Floyd]

Wow, that brings back some memories. Had a 1984 Toyota Celica GT-S Coupe brand new for like 4.2K Loved that car. Stick 4 speed ended up driving it for 9 years and sold it cash for 2.2K. That thing was a blast

Better than the Toyotas I've bought or had in my shop 'cause the owners couldn't fix'em!

To fix'em...Ya gotta be a three-handed ambidextrous contortionist with a wallet thick enough to cause hip dysplasia along with a high tolerance for pain and the patience of Job.
Other than that... MEH

 

[DakotaGuy]

Still better than a Citation!

I would agree with that.

 

[RangerRandy]

Not all '80's cars were terrible. I've had this guy since 1988. It was my wife's daily for 4 years and was very reliable. Lots of mods on it these days but It's actually been a goodun! LOL

 

[Dgc333]

My worst car by far was a 70s Toyota Corolla my first wife brought to the marriage. It would eat a voltage regulator about every six months. Finally fixed that for good by wiring in a 2 wire Mopar electronic voltage regulator. The ignition switch would fail about once per year. Fixed that by gutting the locking mechanism out of the steering column and picked up a heavy duty switch from the local marine store and wired that in mounted in the dash. Every year when I tuned it up it also included replacing the timing chain, gears and tensioner, if I didn't it was so loud I was afraid it would break and take out the rest of the engine. Got into the car one day and the frame of the driver's seat back snapped off, wound up welding it back together. With a little over 100k on it my wife was driving to here sisters and a rod broke and came through the side of the block. That was a blessing in disguise, I replaced it with a 74 AMC Hornet that we got almost 200k trouble free miles out of.

A friend of mine had a Celica of the same vintage as the previous posts. He had to replaced the cylinder head three times in somewhat over 100k miles. Both of us swore off Toyotas and I have still not bought another.

 

[Cmar]

I owned an 81 Bronco many years ago.

As 4x4's went it was pretty good, the Australian assembled ones used quite a few local Ford Falcon parts in the L to RHD conversions to keep costs down which meant the steering column, front seats and engine were all locally sourced. The rest came in a flat pack from the US and was bolted together here.

The gearbox was some giant cast iron thing from New Process gear, and the transfer case was also a NP unit. Never had an ounce of trouble with either of them. Front diff was a Track Lok Dana 44, rear a Ford 9 inch, once again with limited slip standard.

The engine was the same as was fitted to the local Falcon here, (replaced the 300 Canadian six in the very early builds) 250Cui I6 with cast iron block and cross flow alloy head, another near indestructible part, it wasn't uncommon for local Taxis to get a million kilometers out of one.

The only issue I ever had with it was rust, Ford only seemed to paint where you could see, and in those days there was no cathodic dips used. Also it leaked, but I guess that what happens when you try to marry up a polycarbonate rear roof to a steel body.

In more than 15 years I had that car I only ever did routine maintenance items, had the rust repaired, replaced a rear pinion seal, a power steering seal, a set of ball joints, two clutch pressure plates, and two sets of universals in just on 500,000 Km. Some of these breakages could be blamed on being well and truly used off road.

Yes it was basic - you actually had to wind up your own windows, (the back one was electric) there was a lot of internal plastic, and by to day's standards it was pretty old fashioned.

But I drove it to pretty much the 4 corners of this continent, including Cape York, the Central deserts and South Australia and the Northern Territory as well as Fraser Island and the coastal beaches. Well renown vehicle breakers many of those places. Never let me down, or stuck me up, always comfortable, and nice to drive. The pic is camped by a salt lake in the Simpson Desert back in 1992.

If I could buy a new one today, yep I would in a heartbeat.

 

[DakotaGuy]

I took a read through that story and it's pretty damn ridiculous, especially the part about GM hand-building "Super-Citations" for automotive journalists. So reviews said it was better than a BMW, but when customers bought one it immediately started falling apart if it didn't crash first. Despicable.

That is all true. The GM hand-built Citations and other division X-cars had excellent fit and finish for the time. They also had excellent handling with very little torque steer and a better braking system. The other automakers including Japanese brands were very scared that the X-cars would destroy them because they were so good. They were very modern looking for 1980 and so advanced in packaging at the time. Compact fuel efficient front wheel drive cars with mid-sized interiors and full sized cargo space. Every one else was way behind in the compact segment, but then reality struck and struck hard.

When the actual production versions came out the magazines and consumers went out and bought them and were shocked with what they found. The vehicles had terrible levels of torque steer even with underpowered engines. They felt like driving a semi. The front of the car would go one way and the rest would follow like a trailer. Trim pieces would just fall off and fake chrome would wash away the first time at a car wash. The brakes were dangerous and defective. The "iron duke" 2.5 4 banger made the whole car shake at idle. Transmission hoses would leak and cars would catch fire. The 1980 model alone was recalled 9 times!

Between the Citation and the other divisions about a million of these turds were put on the road in 1979-80. When you disappoint a good majority of a million people it never ends well. There are many other bad cars that have come out over the years, but because GM promised something great and delivered one of the worst lemons ever to that many people it had a profound effect. The biggest problems were fixed before it finally ended production in 1985, but no automobile before or after has ever witnessed the sort of sales decline the Citation did. From over 800,000 units sold for the 1980 model year to 62,000 in 1985.

Sorry for the long post, but I thought you might like some reasons why I and many others believe that this car really was the beginning of the end for the original GM Corp.

 

[Floyd]

That is all true. The GM hand-built Citations and other division X-cars had excellent fit and finish for the time. They also had excellent handling with very little torque steer and a better braking system. The other automakers including Japanese brands were very scared that the X-cars would destroy them because they were so good. They were very modern looking for 1980 and so advanced in packaging at the time. Compact fuel efficient front wheel drive cars with mid-sized interiors and full sized cargo space. Every one else was way behind in the compact segment, but then reality struck and struck hard.

When the actual production versions came out the magazines and consumers went out and bought them and were shocked with what they found. The vehicles had terrible levels of torque steer even with underpowered engines. They felt like driving a semi. The front of the car would go one way and the rest would follow like a trailer. Trim pieces would just fall off and fake chrome would wash away the first time at a car wash. The brakes were dangerous and defective. The "iron duke" 2.5 4 banger made the whole car shake at idle. Transmission hoses would leak and cars would catch fire. The 1980 model alone was recalled 9 times!

Between the Citation and the other divisions about a million of these turds were put on the road in 1979-80. When you disappoint a good majority of a million people it never ends well. There are many other bad cars that have come out over the years, but because GM promised something great and delivered one of the worst lemons ever to that many people it had a profound effect. The biggest problems were fixed before it finally ended production in 1985, but no automobile before or after has ever witnessed the sort of sales decline the Citation did. From over 800,000 units sold for the 1980 model year to 62,000 in 1985.

Sorry for the long post, but I thought you might like some reasons why I and many others believe that this car really was the beginning of the end for the original GM Corp.

And if I remember correctly, the set a record.... something like 50 recalls !

 

[Langwilliams]

It was no K car!

 

[MountainGoat]

That is all true. The GM hand-built Citations and other division X-cars had excellent fit and finish for the time. They also had excellent handling with very little torque steer and a better braking system. The other automakers including Japanese brands were very scared that the X-cars would destroy them because they were so good. They were very modern looking for 1980 and so advanced in packaging at the time. Compact fuel efficient front wheel drive cars with mid-sized interiors and full sized cargo space. Every one else was way behind in the compact segment, but then reality struck and struck hard.

When the actual production versions came out the magazines and consumers went out and bought them and were shocked with what they found. The vehicles had terrible levels of torque steer even with underpowered engines. They felt like driving a semi. The front of the car would go one way and the rest would follow like a trailer. Trim pieces would just fall off and fake chrome would wash away the first time at a car wash. The brakes were dangerous and defective. The "iron duke" 2.5 4 banger made the whole car shake at idle. Transmission hoses would leak and cars would catch fire. The 1980 model alone was recalled 9 times!

Between the Citation and the other divisions about a million of these turds were put on the road in 1979-80. When you disappoint a good majority of a million people it never ends well. There are many other bad cars that have come out over the years, but because GM promised something great and delivered one of the worst lemons ever to that many people it had a profound effect. The biggest problems were fixed before it finally ended production in 1985, but no automobile before or after has ever witnessed the sort of sales decline the Citation did. From over 800,000 units sold for the 1980 model year to 62,000 in 1985.

Sorry for the long post, but I thought you might like some reasons why I and many others believe that this car really was the beginning of the end for the original GM Corp.

Yeah that makes it even worse cause it shows they could have built a great car but chose to deceive everyone for a short term gain instead. I've read about "the line" where production could not stop so a mistake meant cars would get finished in the yard on OT, mismatched front ends and most of the workforce getting drunk and stoned all day. Starts at the top and s*** flows downhill.

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