The history of car design is studded with iconic vehicles, from the luxurious – Jaguar E-Types, Rolls Royce Phantoms, to the family-friendly. The Fiesta is a good example with over four million sold, the most popular car in Britain of all time. Yet public opinion is not always so kind. There have been a slew of unmitigated catastrophes, cars that have come close to ruining their manufacturers or seriously disappointed their owners. Here are some of the worst cars ever to drive, or be pushed, off the forecourt.
Ford Edsel
During the second season of The Simpsons, just as the show hit its creative peak, the episode Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? was screened in which Homer is employed by his recently-discovered half-brother to design a car. Given free rein with his imagination, the car is a disaster, full of unnecessary extras, hideous in appearance, and vastly expensive to boot. The car flops, and Homer returns to Springfield a failure.
The episode was inspired in part by the Ford Edsel, brainchild of Edsel Ford, son of Henry, with whom he had a somewhat fractious relationship. Edsel was convinced by spurious market research that his car was going to a huge hit with the buying public, and would blow competition out of the water. Needless to say, it did not. The pre-launch marketing left car-buyers confused, as did the pricing, and the claims that this was a revolutionary model were undone by bodywork and engineering very similar to previous Fords. The Edsel eventually lost the company around $350 million, the equivalent in today’s money of almost $3 billion, making Edsel Ford a name synonymous with failure.
Yugo GV
The Yugo holds legendary status. It had a rear-window defroster, that many joked was to keep your hands warm while you pushed it. The electrics were notoriously patchy if not downright dangerous. Apocryphal stories circulated of parts falling off while driving, and engines giving up the ghost after only a few thousand miles. On the surface, it lived up to its name (GV stood for Good Value) – it could get up to 30mpg, and sold for a then astonishingly cheap price. In 1999, the factory making them for Zastava, in what was then Yugoslavia, was itself partially destroyed by NATA bombs, signalling the end for the GV, and not before time.
Ford Pinto
Another misstep for Ford came in 1971 when it introduced the Pinto to the marketplace. Infamously, there was an issue with the fuel tank, which was unusually mounted between the rear axle, and the rear bumper. Because of the tank’s design, there was a significant risk that even a low-speed rear-ender could result in either the bolts from the differential piercing the tank, or the filler neck coming away and spilling fuel under the car – ergo, this was not safe car.
Investigations, lawsuits, and sometime later a recall followed, irreparably tarnishing the Pinto’s reputation. Worst of all, it has been suggested that testing on the rear end had been too light during the design process as Ford worked to keep the price as low as possible. The company’s cost-benefit analysis of potential lawsuit payments compared to the cost of repairs was later revealed, and led to further bad press.
DeLorean DMC 12
One of the all-time cinematic icons, the DeLorean was the time-travel device of choice for Back to the Future, but in the harsh, unforgiving light of the real world, the car was a colossal flop. One of the biggest problems was that in order to take advantage of cheap labour, it was decided to manufacture the car in Northern Ireland, where many of the production team had little to no experience in this type of work. Frequent design changes caused the project schedule to overrun, while the car’s performance left a lot to be desired. Several celebrity investors including Sammy Davis Jr lost out when the company eventually folded, and John DeLorean’s career came to a sticky end with charges of drug trafficking.
Reliant Robin
Another cultural touchstone, the Reliant Robin is actually one of the bestselling fiberglass cars of all times, and the manufacturer, Reliant, was for a spell one of the UK’s biggest. Nowadays it has become a bit of a joke, the three-wheeled design roundly mocked. Many of the myths surrounding the Reliant Robin have been debunked (one persists, that Delboy drove one in Only Fools and Horses – it was actually a Reliant Regal), but the fact remains that this is a car, if you can really call it a car, that felt profoundly unstable when taking corners at speed, or during windy conditions. A report found that Robin Reliant drivers were statistically the safest on UK roads, but then, that was because they needed to be!
