Let's talk about cars!

Your first car, your favorite car, your worst car? How many cars have you had? What color car do you like?

What are the things you MUST have? (for me it's power windows and cruise control, and white)

I didn't learn to drive until I was 35. At that time I bought a program car, A 1993 Dodge Spirit with 80,000 miles on it for $6,000. I bought it in 1995. I knew the business that owned it, and how well the car was taken care of. That car gave me 6 years and 235,000 miles. It was a GREAT car, and of course they stopped making it, because it lasted so long. V-6 engine, 33 miles to the gallon highway.

My next car was a Dodge Stratus, a rental with 12,000 miles on it. I took a 5 1/2 year loan, but paid it off in 3 1/2 years. I only got 8 years out of it, and 165,000. So I was disappointed in the Stratus, especially in the poor mileage. Terrible mileage. When she (her name was Penny) died this past March I bought a 2008 Dodge Avenger.

The Avenger (her name is Caterina) gets GREAT mileage, 33 miles to the gallon highway, 24 city, 27 mixed. I am very happy with her so far. I took a five year loan, but it will be paid off in three.

All three cars are white, with power everything.

Who's next?

First car - 1992 Sunbird 4 door, royal blue - Someone hit me and totalled it 5 days after I bought it.

Fave car - Current one, 1997 Honda Civic, "Blueington"

Worst car - 1995 Pontiac Sunfire, black - what a lemon! Both my Pontiacs were lemons.

Wow, I just realized I have had 4 cars already! I also had a 1989 Honda Accord and it was AWESOME!! It was 17 years old when I got rid of it and it still had the original alternator

I MUST have cruise control, air conditioning and a cd player

I Honda

I've never driven and truthfully, so far, I am super nervous to learn. I know I should though, I just keep putting it off. Dana drives however and we own a 2005 black Dodge SX 2.0 named Peppy.

First car 1995 ford escort - it was a great car 30 miles to the gallon in town.... it was a limited edition that I got with 1500 miles on it ... "Baby " gave me 10.5 great years

Worst car 2006 Pt cruiser... 15000 miles prior rental ... owned for 18 months and it was in the shop 6 times

Best car 2006 B9 tribeca - decent gas milage ( better than cruiser) , big tank of car/suv and loaded

My worst car was an '82 Ford Escort. That stupid car kept trying to kill me. Due to bad timing belts with that year's Escort, that car eventually committed suicide by breaking said timing belt, seizing the engine, and was never the same again. Ford "fixed" the car, but it was never right. When I drove it onto the lot when I traded it in for a Honda CRX (awesome car!), that thing died on the lot. I don't know if they ever got that bad boy started up again.

My favorite car was either the CRX, or my current car, which is a Honda Element...I love my car!

I have never actually owned a car of my own. I do, however, absolutely adore dad's Chevy dually crew cab diesel truck. I can just feel the power!

As for cars, we have an '05 Impala that is wonderful - has me sold on Impala's (just not their pricetag!).

Such interesting responses! A good question!

First car: 1970 Chevy Nova. Rusty brown.

Another car was my 1984 Plymouth Turismo. I loved that car. He was bright red, he went in the snow, he went in the ice. Unfortunately, one night I was coming home from work and I flipped it over twice and was going into the third flip when I hit a house. Yeah, I was lucky (no seatbelt). Poor car was totaled. His name was Terrence.

I went from the Turismo to two different Oldsmobile Calais. I liked them both and really like the MPG....back in the 80s, both of the cars were giving 40 miles to the gallon.

The worst car on the face of the earth: 1999 Chrysler Sebring coupe. Beautiful car, just beautiful. But it was the worse piece of crap I've ever had. I went through tires, I went through brakes, I went through everything in two years. I couldn't wait to get rid of the thing. I swear that I was ready to crash it into a brick wall. Her name? The B!tch. (Sorry, but it's the truth; that car was bad and she didn't deserve a name other than that.)

Currently, I'm driving a 2001 Chrylser PT Cruiser. His name is Clarence and he's the greatest car I've ever had. I bought him new. I wanted a Cruiser so badly I could taste it. I actually bought him sight unseen, I wanted him that badly. I had ordered one from a dealer, but two days later, I found another dealer who had Clarence. I called down and said, "Do NOT sell that car! He is mine! I'm on my way!" (Not the best way to buy a car, I admit, but back then Cruisers were really hard to find in my area.) He's Inferno Red, he's got a moonroof, great music system, 5-speed on the floor. He goes everywhere; that boy has been all over the country. My only complaint about Clarence is that he doesn't know how to stop in snow. Seriously. The boy is not a good winter car. But I just love driving him, even now. He's 9 years old now and he still looks great.

I mentioned in another post that I'm getting to the point where it's time to start thinking about a new car. To be honest, I haven't really seen anything that trips my trigger. I do like the 2010 Buick LaCrosse and we are going into a dealer this weekend to drive one. It has to be in red. Of course! (Although DH is willing to look at Cruisers again, too. I would love to have a convertible.)

My first car was 1999 toyota corolla which I got when I was 17 in 2006, and now I have a 2004 honda civic.
I've had a lot of problems with my civic, the timing belt broke on it at 70,000 miles And that was its biggest problem, somehow it always has small issues that keep coming up. Although my mom has an accord and it's so much better, it has no problems. I think I just got unlucky with mine because I know many people who have honda civics with no problems.

My first car was a '72 Ford Pinto, bright turquoise color. Forever scratch Ford off my list.....I really do believe FORD stands for "Fix Or Repair Daily."

My next car was a '74 Chevrolet Vega, sort of glow-in-the-dark orange color. Forever scratch Chevy off my list, it also needed to be fixed or repaired daily. Although, I certainly learned how to wrench on cars with this one. I did my own oil changes, tune ups and most repairs (with the help and training from my then boyfriend), and learned a lot about cars by doing so.

My next car was an International Harvester Scout II, '79 I think. 4 wheel drive, 345 V6, oh man, I loved that truck!!!

My first new car was an '85 Pontiac Sunbird, navy blue metal flake, hatchback. By 30,000 miles, the entire drive train needed to be replaced. Also the paint job bubbled up and chipped off the hood. Talk about a piece of crap!!! I will NEVER EVER own another Big 3 car as long as I live!

The last car I bought was a White '92 Honda Accord 4 door, with a dark blue interior. It's still running strong. It has 93,000 miles on it, and has never had anything done but routine maintenance. I absolutely love this car. I've thought about getting a new Honda, but there's nothing wrong with this car. I just can't justify making car payments and out-of-sight insurance payments, when this car is still absolutely fine and dandy!

ive had 3 cars my 1st was an X reg vauxhall corsa it had nothing bless it no power steering no central locking no cd player but i loved it should never of got rid of it

then i had a 2007 Renualt Clio gorgeous car it had everything but its gearbox blew at 6months old so i got rid

then i got a 2008 Fiat 500 in yellow it was love at first sight and then quickly turned to hate the list of problems was longer than my arm its gone now which im over the moon with, was my worst car ever

im now saving up to buy on old classic of some sort

Originally Posted by Pookie-poo

My first car was a '72 Ford Pinto, bright turquoise color. Forever scratch Ford off my list.....I really do believe FORD stands for "Fix Or Repair Daily."

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I hear you about Ford. DH had several Mustangs. The last one was a 1974 lemon. Now, I have a very mild-mannered DH; he doesn't get upset that often, he just kind of goes with the flow. Doesn't get real angry. Nothing. He got so frustrated with that Mustang that he took a sledgehammer to it one day. He hated that car; it was nothing but trouble from the time he bought it. And that ended that with Ford.

I'm not saying that their products aren't good now; they probably are. And people like what they like; there are a lot of people who like Ford vehicles. But when you've had that bad of an experience with a car, you don't tend to go back for seconds.

Can't say that I had any bad experiences with my Chevy cars.

Originally Posted by Winchester

First car: 1970 Chevy Nova. Rusty brown.

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My first car was a 1974 Chevy Nova. Cream (with rust). You could always tell a Nova from the rear end because they were all crooked on their frames.

Next was a 1976 Buick Century, followed by a Toyota Corolla, Toyota MR2 (can you say fun?), Toyota Corolla again, Mercury Sable (hated it), Jeep Cherokee (fun but bad gas mileage), Volva S80 (cushy), and currently a Toyota Matrix (very practical).

My favorite was the MR2. It was jet black, T-tops and man that car could take corners! It was too small to be practical - once we started rescuing animals I got a bigger car. The Volva S80 was entirely cushy (the heated leather seats are wonderful if you live in a cold climate) but the upkeep was just too expensive (every trip to the mechanic was over $1000). I traded it for a more practical car (Matrix) - I had a few too many feral cats let loose in the back seat of the Volvo and I was tired or carting plastic tarps around in that car.

My must haves: power windows, a decent stereo and automatic transmission. I also prefer front wheel drive.

First car (bought in 1993) was Chitty Chiitty No Bang Bang, a 1987 Ford Econoline conversion van. Also known as the Mars Bar because it was chocolate brown with a creamy nougat band and caramel stripe. Developed an oil leak that would have cost more to find and repair than to get a new vehicle, so I just kept filling it with oil until I found...

Goldfender - a 1990 Ford Econoline conversion van, black with gold. Bought her in 2002. She is doing fine, just that medical problems are making it hard for me to climb up into the driver's seat.

I will probably need to buy a new vehicle in a year or so and it will probably be a mini-van of some sort. But, who knows what I will find.

I'm going to stick my neck out and say that I might have the coolest car of all the posters so far.

I drive a turquoise blue 1967 Ford Mustang coupe; her name is Abby (yeah, I'm one of those nuts that name their car) and I bought her in 1977. There are days in the winter that she doesn't leave the garage; you cannot drive a Mustang on ice or snow. I bake in the summer (no ac) and freeze in the winter (no one has been able to figure out what's going on with the heating system for the last 3 years!) No power anything, the radio works when it feels like it. Having said all that, I adore that car. Strangers offer to buy her on a weekly basis.

My first car was a battleship grey 1952 Chevy that my Dad bought for me. No power anything, naturally---didn't even have a radio, and had a stick shift on the column. It was a tank.

My next car was a white 1965 Mustang that I only had for a year. I was rear ended by a drunk on the highway and she was totalled.

Originally Posted by libby74

I'm going to stick my neck out and say that I might have the coolest car of all the posters so far. I drive a turquoise blue 1967 Ford Mustang coupe; her name is Abby.

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And I agree with that! Way cool!

DH's first car was a white '67 Mustang fastback. He then bought a '71 Mustang in candy apple red. Way cool car. I took my drivers test in that car; we both loved it. After that came the '74 Mustang II which was the worst piece of crap ever.....probably worse than my Sebring. But yeah, those older Mustangs are sweet.

Have a picture of Abby? I'd truly love to see her!

My first car was a Ford Pinto station wagon. It was a tough little car. I drove it into the ocean, several ditches, spun it and got it stuck between 2 pine trees, just any number of things. I am not even sure what happened to it.

After that I switched to Mopar muscle cars. I had a 72 Road Runner, a 68 Charger, a 71 Charger, and a 72 Charger. The 72 had a 440 in it and would pass everything on the road but a gas station. That was my favorite car of all.
I had a 63 Chevy Nova, a 74 Nova, and a 69 Mercury Marquis.
I currently drive an 88 Chevy pickup but am considering getting rid of it. I am supposed to go look at a silly little Chevy Corsica this afternoon.

First car was a 1965 Mustang street racer in Honey Gold (Ford's name for baby poo green).

I have also owned:
68 F150 Ranger
62 Ford Unibody truck
61 Econoline Custom
73 Camero
76 Cordoba
76 Grand Prix
75 Monte Carlo
75 Ford Elite (think Torino/Cougar hybrid)
81 Mazda
73 Celica
and many others

Favorite would have to be my current.
Black 1998 Ranger XLT extended cab 4x4 full offroad package, 3 inch body lift, 3 inch suspension lift, tow package, flareside.
12 years old, still looks great, still runs great, never had any problems, and still low mileage.

Whew, you want the whole list?

1941 Chevrolet, bought in 1967. Just a cheap used car, paid $65 for it. I actually bought it with my mother, who didn't have a car and since I was only 14 at the time. My mother got it stuck in a mud puddle while I was out of town, and traded it for a wringer washer.

I had a Triumph TR3 for a few days, in about 1970. Gave it back to the guy I bought it from; I realized I was never going to get it street legal.

Didn't own another car until 1972, when my fiancee and I bought a 1966 Chevy Van, the kind with 3 sets of seats, the engine between the front seats, and lots of windows. We called it Pheidipides, the guy who ran the original marathon. You know, 26 miles and dropped dead.

We traded the van straight across to one of the professors at the college for his 1967 Buick Lesabre. Huge car, but it would pull a trailer up to PA, where I got a teaching job. We called it Bacchus, the god of wine, because it drank too much.

We traded that for a "new" 1975 Oldsmobile Omega, which we called "Alpha N" (wait for it, you'll get the joke). It had 300 miles on it. One of the local Pennsylvania Dutch farmers had bought it as a birthday present for his wife, but, being built like most Pennsylvania Dutch farmers, she couldn't get behind the steering wheel, so he traded it for an Impala. That car got broadsided while my mother was driving it while we were on vacation. It was fixed, but it was never the same. By the way, the MSRP on that car was only $3500.

In the meantime, I had a long line of "second cars," some of which weren't cars. One was a brand new 1974 Yamaha RD350. Great little bike, and I kept it long time. Another was a 1969 Chevy Caprice that I bought really cheap and ended up selling to my mother really cheap. Another was a white 1968 Chevy window van, which I kept for only a short while. Another was a used Hydrox Cookie truck that we used to move back to Texas.

In Texas, we traded the Omega on a 1975 Ford Van, which we used for taking a vacation with Dottie's folks. It was school bus yellow, and we called it "The Pumpkin." I eventually traded it on a brand new 1978 Ford Fiesta. This was the newest little car, imported from Europe. Dottie really liked it. We called it "The Apple." It was really bright red.

In the meantime, I had a 70's Yamaha 750, which I traded on a 1978 Chevy Caprice, which I needed to work in real estate. I bought it in a depressed market (the really bad recession of the early 80's) so it was dirt cheap; no one wanted a big car. Two years later, I sold it for more than I had paid for it; the market for big cars had come back.

Eventually we traded the Fiesta on a 1982 Pontiac Phoenix. Now, this was the Chevy X car that was much maligned. It was a four-door hatchback. You could put down the back seat and actually have room to sleep in it. It was bright red and had the Iron Duke 4 and a 4-speed floor shifter. We got great service from it, with never a problem. It's the one car I wish I still had.

The Phoenix was traded for a new 1984 Pontiac Firebird. This was the economy version with that Iron Duke 4 cylinder engine and a five-speed transmission. It was not a race car, but it did OK and got good mileage. We never really "bonded" with it, though, and I traded it a couple of years later for a new '86 Ford Ranger, which was handy for building our little house out in the woods in Arkansas.

Eventually, we traded the Ranger on '94 Chevy Silverado. We kept it for three years, but we were driving a truck in all 48 states, so it only had 17,000 miles on it when we traded it for a new '97 Ford F-150. That was the first year with the "third door." We kept that pickup until it was stolen in 2002.

In the meantime, we had an '87 Cadillac Brougham that we used as a second car. We kept it until it was stolen and recovered. Lots of cosmetic damage, so I sold it to a mechanic who needed a car for his mother.

We replaced the stolen F-150 with a new 2002 F-150, the kind with the extended cab and 4 doors. That's what I'm driving now.

After we sold the Cadillac, we bought a used Chevy Lumina from Hertz car rentals. It was a good car, but it was getting older without getting many miles, so we sold it cheap to my sister and her family. They're still driving it. Believe me, we've gotten our money's worth out of that car!

Unfortunately, just after we sold the Lumina, figuring we didn't really need a second car, we lost our dedicated run to Phoenix and Dottie got off the truck and got a job teaching truck driving, so we needed an economical second car. I looked for something used, but didn't come up with anything, so we bought a really basic model Chevy Cobalt. Unfortunately, Dottie has been hit twice at intersections by young people not paying attention to their driving.

In addition to all this, we have a 1923 Model T Touring Car hot rod. I have a 1963 Chevy Impala that I originally bought for my mother and got back when it got too undependable for her. And I have a 1972 MGB I got for paying off a bad debt for one of Dottie's impecunious cousins. Those two cars will probably never be on the road again.

My first was a 1980 Datsun pickup truck. It was an automatic. I rebuilt the carb on it and did all sorts of various other repairs on it. It was a great little truck.

Next came my first manual transmission vehicle. A 1995 Nissan Pickup truck. That little thing brought me all the way out here to Ohio to welding school.

Now I have the best car ever: a 2005 Subaru Impreza Outback Sport SE. It has a 4cyl, 2.5 liter boxer engine, a 5spd manual transmission and all wheel drive. I love this car!!!

My first car was a 1970 Toyota Corolla Sprinter -- baby blue with black interior and black vinyl roof -- they were popular then. Her name was Susie. She handled like crazy, got super gas mileage, never needed costly repairs. We had nine awesome years together, and then she got totalled.

I was heartbroken, not in a good space anyway at the time, and made what was a stupid purchase anyway, and proved even stupider when I got a lemon in a lemon year. That was a 1979 Dodge Aspen station wagon -- Special Edition, hence her name: Sarah Elizabeth. She was silver with [fake] wood paneling and red "velvet" interior. She was a "Detroit Marshmallow", handled like a pig, was cranky when cold, and three months out of the warranty the automatic transmission died. Six months after I spent over a grand getting that fixed, she got totalled, and on balance, I couldn't have been happier.

Having learned a thing or six from Susie and Sarah, I returned to the Japanese, in the "person" of Rufus -- a 1981 Honda Civic. Not surprisingly, he was red, with tan interior. If Susie was great, he was probably even greater. By then front wheel drive was pretty well standard, and boy did he hug the road! Anyone who has driven the Sea to Sky highway up to Squamish (or similar roads that hang on the edge of a mountain for kilometers on end) will know that it can be a little unnerving -- windy and often narrow, rock straight up one side and down the other, and at the bottom, water. (It may be somewhat better now with the improvements for the Olympics -- I haven't been up there since they've been completed.) With Rufus it was sweet. We had 18 wonderful years, and might have had more, except that by that time DH and I had come to the conclusion that we did not need to be a 2-car family and whichever one quit first was not being replaced. So when the repairs were going to cost more than his book value, we let him go. I was brokenhearted again, when the tow truck took him away to a charity that accepted vehicles in return for a tax receipt for the amount they could sell them for.

Since then, there's only Sheba in our lives, nominally DH's car, but I do most of the driving these days. She's a 1989 Toyota Corolla, white with dark blue interior, and just under 315,000 km on her -- on the original clutch. She's a good girl. Handles nicely, doesn't drink heavily, hasn't cost us anything in repairs that wasn't perfectly normal for her age.

Sooner or later, we'll need to think about a new car, and we've been thinking about the Prius. The only downside there is that we both prefer a standard transmission, so we may just go for another Corolla. But that's probably not tomorrow anyway.