Road Rumble: Top 20 most famous auto failures

Folks, it's not easy to make a car, after much planning, design, concepts, retreads, building, testing and promotion, by the time you actually get your car to a showroom it's taken several years and cost hundreds of millions of Pounds. But sometimes all this work is for naught, either through unfortunate timing, poor reception, or due to the fact that the people building it simply didn't put enough effort into their work. So I'm going to honour these automotive travesties in my own Top 20 list, not basing these on any critical bias or reception, but more on how well they sold, the one's that were so bad that even the people couldn't be bothered to buy them!

Again, this is all opinion based, if you know any cars you think should be on this list, feel free to put them in the comments!

#20. Ford Scorpio (1994 - 1998)



Ugly and hopeless? Perhaps. It's certainly ugly yes, but that's what made it really fail. I've put it at the bottom of the list because it did sell, and was especially popular among company car's and car rental agencies, as well as a fair number being sold during its short lifespan, mainly by people who appreciated that internally and performance-wise it's a very good piece of kit, but were somehow able to overlook its hideousness. It also became a popular car for conversion into Hearses and Funeral Limousines, mainly by Cardinal, of which you'd probably find more of those driving around than regular Scorpio's! But the car was indeed a failure, so much so that it tarnished the reputation of Ford's Executive Car brand for good, leading to them killing it off in 1998 and handing over the reigns to their Swedish subsidiary Volvo with the S80.

#19. Ferrari F50 (1995 - 2001)



To be honest, in spite of the all the hate this car gets, I really quite like it, it's well designed, still very powerful, cramped and underequipped internally perhaps, but then again all Ferrari's are. But sadly that wasn't enough to get Ferrari's 50th Anniversary special off the ground, with only 349 cars ever built in comparison to the 1,311 F40's built in the early 90's over the same time period. Again, putting it quite low down the list because it's impact on the Ferrari company was fairly minimal, and the Enzo Ferrari that followed it, as well as the 360 and then current products were enough to oversee this dent in their otherwise perfect resume.

#18. Citroen C6 (2005 - 2012)



Not a bad car actually, with saucy looks, fantastic suspension and acceptable amounts of power, but sadly botched in production. Due to delays in the design and development of this car, it's launch to replace the XM was pushed back by 5 years meaning that BMW and Mercedes could happily gobble up the market and leave Citroen in the dust. In all, only 23,000 examples left the showroom and since then a replacement for the executive model hasn't been announced.

#17. Chevrolet SSR (2003 - 2006)



Plagued with problems from the very start, killed off by a mix of industrial relations breakdown and a lukewarm reception as to its looks and performance, meant this promising pickup ended its days prematurely. In all, only 24,000 of these trucks were sold in its 3 year run, making it one of the poorest selling Chevy's ever. However I do feel that such a truck has been unfairly maligned, with it not being the worst car ever made, so I put it quite low on the list.

#16. Triumph TR8 (1978 - 1981)



I know it's a TR7 in the picture, but they're basically identical.

What killed the TR8 was the reputation of its forebear the TR7, which was so badly built and poor in every conceivable department that it absolutely wrecked any chance a descendent Triumph TR had of being successful. Thus the TR8, although far more reliable, optionally a convertible, and fitted with a far superior engine, failed to sell even 2,500 cars before production ended after 3 years, finishing off the Triumph TR's, one of Britain's most iconic sports cars, for good. What a waste!

#15. Yugo 55 (1980 - 2008)



Now, before anyone tears my head off, let me be clear. The Yugo was not a failure in its own right, selling the best part of 795,000 cars, but not that many in Britain. In the UK this car was a huge failure thanks to a mixture of mudslinging and bad press to try and depreciate Soviet Car brands that were just starting to make their way into the British market. Although LADA rightly deserved such terrible press, the Yugo's weren't actually that bad, and could have been a competitor against the Metro if it had been given the chance! Instead only a few thousand of these cars were sold for a brief period in the late-80's, with British sales ending in 1991, a sad end to a plucky car.

#14. Pontiac Aztek (2001 - 2005)



Now this one was rightly deserved, stupid design, stupid price, it was never going to work!

#13. Reliant Kitten (1975 - 1982)



A four-wheeled version of the notorious Robin, built to take on the likes of the Mini, but sank and disappeared faster than you could imagine. Only 4,000 of these cars were made in its 7 year lifespan, failing to gain even close to the number of Mini's, Metro's or Robin's sold in the same time, largely due to its cramped interior, lack of equipment, poor safety and the lack of the economic benefits that made the Robin so popular.

#12. CityRover (2003 - 2005)



A last ditch attempt to rescue the Rover Company, sadly botched through the fact that they took what was a simple, cheap Indian economy car and made it more expensive by its name alone. The result was a small and under-equipped car that was only different to the original TATA Indica by way of a badge and an extra £3,000 on the cost! Rover's last stand quickly became it's downfall!

#11. Rover 75 (1998 - 2005)



And whilst the CityRover failed for it's price, poor image and lack of equipment, the 75 failed because of the exact opposite. The car was well priced, very well equipped, and gave the image of a traditional old Rover, being chocked full of wood and leather, and adorned with a chrome grille that made it look sublime. Sadly, Rover's attempt at nostalgic trip back to grand old England became nothing but a fatuous sham that no one ever wanted to buy for its Granddad looks. Thousands upon thousands of these cars were stored on the runways of UK airfields, finding it almost impossible to be sold. The spiralling loss of money and some poor decisions by the management meant that Rover was building a ton of cars that no one wanted and thus crashed into a wall of bankruptcy in 2005, bringing an end to Britain's last volume car maker.

It was tough deciding which of these two was the biggest sinner, but I put the 75 higher on the list because it was really the one which had the most effort put into it and therefore made the overall failure much more tragic. It started the terminal bowling ball rolling, and the CityRover was simply the final pin to fall.

#10. Maybach 57/62 (2002 - 2013)



I was so sad that this didn't do as well as it should have done, but unfortunately the sheer dimensions of the mighty Maybach made it less appealing to the New Money who desired a 'Driver's Car.' In all only 2,100 of these cars were built in its 11 year production life, and it cost Mercedes-Benz a mint!

#9. Jensen Interceptor (1966 - 1976)



Nope, t'was not beauty that vanquished the beast, more bad timing! The Jensen Interceptor, one of the most beautiful cars ever built, is indeed a failure, only selling 6,400 examples in its 10 year lifespan. A sad mixture of the badly planned Jensen-Healey project combined with poor reliability and the Fuel Crisis of 1973 saw this Goliath slain together with the rest of the Jensen brand, although it has been given a retro revival in recent years.

#8. Rolls Royce Camargue (1975 - 1986)



Yes its looks take a bit of getting used to, but sadly patience wasn't enough to get the most expensive car on sale at the time out of the showroom! In 11 years on 531 of these cars were sold, and today are practically worthless due to their reputation for their design. Although I personally think these cars are unfairly shunned, my opinion is not shared by all unfortunately.

#7. Ford RS200 (1984 - 1986)



In the 1980's, the Peugeot 205 GTi and the Audi Quattro had set the world of Group B Rally Sports ablaze with their speed and agility, and whilst Volkswagen, Lancia and even British Leyland set out to compete, Ford entered the fray in 1984 with this, the RS200, specifically designed for rallying and nothing much else. However, Group B rules specified that entrant cars had to have at least 200 road-legal examples so as to stop bigger car builders from making an overpowered one-off. So the RS200 was unleashed upon the rally stage, together with an intended road-going version of around 200 cars plus 20 spares, but disaster struck in Portugal when one of these cars lost control and slammed into a wall of spectators, killing 3 and injuring at least 30. The result was that Group B cars were banned from Rallying, and Ford was left with a warehouse full of 200 £50,000 obsolete road going rally cars that no one wanted because their reputation had been one of destruction, they were small, under-equipped and thirsty, and the economy had just crashed. Ford spent an absolute fortune developing these machines and barely made their money back, most being sold for tuppence.

#6. Venturi Atlantique (1991 - 2000)



I consider this a fine car, and in fact so does everyone else. But why on earth didn't this beautiful Gallic God sell? A sad mixture of some early quality problems mixed with a lack of brand recognition meant that only around 700 of these beautiful and well performing sports cars ever left the showroom, leading to the company's 2nd and 3rd bankruptcy!

#5. Renault Avantime (2001 - 2003)



I really quite like this car, in fact a lot of people say they like this car, even the Top Gear trio, who usually disagree on everything, agree that the Renault Avantime is one of the few cars they all unanimously like. But sadly such a strange car full of French panache and style was very, very confusing, largely because of what it was, a coupé MPV. It was meant to be a coupé car, but at the same time a People Carrier, which is a lovely idea, and it was built very cleverly with double-hinged doors, a large, spacious and, dare I say, luxury interior, and its party piece of making all the windows short of the windscreen disappear for the feeling of a convertible but the safety of a normal MPV. But the idea of a luxury and spacious MPV detracted from what an MPV is normally meant to be, chocked full of seats to get as many family members in as possible, added to by the fact that it was pushed out of its market by another Renault product, the Vel Satis, and you have the chemical formula for failure. The Avantime only sold 8,557 examples, with only a few hundred being sold in Britain for a period of 18 months, and thus has fallen into many people's Worst Car Ever lists. It's a shame because the idea of a Luxury People Carrier is something I could go with!

#4. Aston Martin Lagonda (1974 - 1990)



Ambition is fine, innovation is fine, but not right after your company has just recovered from bankruptcy! The Aston Martin Lagonda is one of those special kinds of cars that could almost have been seen as an attempt at corporate suicide, with a reckless design, incredibly complicated and temperamental electrics, expensive production, a totally inappropriate engine for a market gripped by a fuel crisis, and a price tag that was just way too high! It was bound to fail, and fail it did, with only 645 of these cars ever being built, and not one of them made their money back!

#3. Ford Edsel (1957 - 1959)



Ford really aren't doing well on this list are they?

I don't really need to say anything about this one do I? It's literally become a byword for failure. A car designed wrong, built wrong, sold wrong, priced wrong, and worst of all, promoted wrong! Only 116,000 of these cars ever left the factory, half of what Ford had predicted, and it costed them $250 million in the process!

#2. DeLorean DMC-12 (1981 - 1983)



And while the Edsel is famous for failure, the DeLorean is famous for scandal, and scandal is engraved into the stainless steel of every single car John DeLorean sold. From shady backdoor deals, delayed production followed by cut-price and hastily put together cars that were antiques underneath their futuristic bodies, and sold at the wrong price bracket. In fact, even before DeLorean himself was arrested for brokering Cocaine deals to keep the company afloat, the firm was well on its way out, with the result that the hope and pride of Belfast two years earlier had quickly become a lost dream.

#1. Jaguar XJ220 (1992 - 1994)



Yes, here it is folks! The biggest flop, the most monumental failure, a car that failed to live up to its sales forecasts by an absolute landslide! I consider the Jaguar XJ220 a massive flop because it literally was the dream that became a nightmare, a match made in Heaven that became a BDSM session in Hell!

Originally designed to be Jaguar's equivalent of the Ferrari F40, the fastest production car in the world that would be powered by a hulking V12 and had £50,000 deposits being lain upon its doorstep years in advance, became a dwindling V6 husk of the original product. For this, many people who had put down their deposits chose not to buy it because it wasn't what they were promised, or because the recent recession of 1992 had stripped them of all their monetary assets, and paying £290,000 no longer seemed possible. In response, Jaguar took its customers to court and demanded they buy the car, probably the only instance in motoring history that a car manufacturer has literally taken their customers to the Dock for turning back on their deal!

It cost the Jaguar company millions and resulted in only 275 of the proposed 350 cars built at the £4 million factory opened by Princess Diana ever being made, 22 of which were never sold. It was a waste on an almost criminal scale, worse than DeLorean, worse than the Lagonda, Camargue and even the Edsel!

Well done Jaguar, you win...

...the everlasting shame you ever built this car!