were american cars ever reliable? (insurance, van, plugs, fuel)

[Fleet]

Originally Posted by sunsprit

Similarly, the cars of the 60's weren't so great, either. In my first auto shop, my partner did a lot of domestic ring/valve jobs on all brands of cars.

I think '60s were probably the peak for American car reliability. Very rare when one of my cars or family or friends '60s cars needed a ring or valve job.

He also did a lot timing chain/gear replacements ... I recall a lot of plastic toothed timing gears that wore out/broke up, as well as the steel gears that wore out the chains

.

I owned a '66 Dodge Dart GT V-8. Got it in 1979 with 109,000 miles. The engine was rebuilt in 1990 with about 170,000 miles. The only reason for the rebuild was because it was burning oil; it was running fine and still had a lot of power. The oil burning could have been solved without rebuilding it but I decided a rebuild would be a good idea. Anyway, the timing chain was never touched in those 11 years. The timing chain in my brother's '66 Plymouth was also never touched until a rebuild. Other family members cars also didn't have any trouble with the timing chain. My mom's '70 Cadillac Coupe de Ville passed the 200,000 mile mark with the unrebuilt engine and transmission. The timing chain on a neighbor's early '70s Chevy station wagon did break when it was about 20 years old.

We did a lot of brake jobs, and honing out of cylinders (and replacement seals) was always required because the cylinders were sludged up.

I remember the brakes lasting on my '66 Dart from 1980 to 1988. It was a daily driver, about 7,000 miles per year.

Shocks weren't very durable, nor were tie rod ends, idler arms, etc.

They have been durable on my and my family and friends '60s cars. Lasted for many years, in some cases over a decade.

Early alternators weren't so durable, either.

Those lasted quite a few years on my cars. I owned my '66 Dart from 1979 to 2002 and it needed an alternator only one or two times (ran it up to 235,000 miles).

Belts and hoses were still pretty common failure items.

Lasted a reasonable amount of time. Those things can and do fail on modern cars, too.

Switches weren't terribly durable.

Considering the fact that myself and my brother were driving 20-year-old cars in the mid-'80s, the switches were VERY durable, along with the rest of the car(s).

I recall that many an American V-8 needed a valve job around 50-60,000 miles, so there wasn't much improvement in the materials or design at that point.

With proper care valves should last much, much longer than that. My '69 and '76 Cadillacs have not had a valve job. My '66 Dart went 170,000 miles without a rebuild or valve job. So did my brother's '66 Plymouth. So did my parent's '69 Cadillacs. I should point out that I did not baby my car! Numerous full-throttle burnouts and taking it up to 75 mph in 2nd gear.

[Radiators still needed rodding out fairly frequently

Again, with proper care radiators on most '60s cars lasted a long time. My '66 Dart did not need any radiator work whatsoever until 1984 when it developed a pinhole leak near the top. I would say that 18 years is not "fairly frequently!"

... and we saw a lot of A/C work with failed compressors and hoses, as well as expansion valve failures.

My '69 Cadillac had some A/C work done before I bought it in 2004. The A/C equipment hasn't been touched since then, not even a freon recharge and it blow very cold.

[Tennesseestorm]

Reading some of the other posts/updates...

I agree with Fleet.. the 60s were the peak I think for American car reliability... also I think this lasted until the early 70s for many models, but it did decline on some models... I think Ford actually improved in build quality on their big cars starting in 73 and mid-size starting in 72. GM kinda went down with it (like quality of interior materials vs. the 1970 models) on their big cars starting for the 71 model year, but kept very reliable drivetrains. The 455's in the Pontiacs, Buicks and Oldsmobiles were hard to beat, as was the Chevy 350.

Hoses... this is strange, but my 73 Pontiac still has one of the original coolant hoses (as well as many other, except the fuel lines, which I have replaced for safety)... no joke - the other hoses are original. I really should replace that radiator hose that I know is original, but it still looks fine and I hate to change it since its holding on... I would like to see how long it will last I guess.

[RcHydro]

I agree with an earlier post. They might not of been reliable, but you could repair anything that went wrong yourself, and not need to plug your car into a computer to tell you what the problem is. I still have my old tach / dwell meter.

[Fleet]

Yes, Tennessee, some cars were still reliable into the '70s. Especially with the engine and drivetrain.

[Fleet]

Originally Posted by Tennesseestorm

Reading some of the other posts/updates...

I agree with Fleet.. the 60s were the peak I think for American car reliability... also I think this lasted until the early 70s for many models, but it did decline on some models... I think Ford actually improved in build quality on their big cars starting in 73 and mid-size starting in 72. GM kinda went down with it (like quality of interior materials vs. the 1970 models) on their big cars starting for the 71 model year, but kept very reliable drivetrains. The 455's in the Pontiacs, Buicks and Oldsmobiles were hard to beat, as was the Chevy 350.

Hoses... this is strange, but my 73 Pontiac still has one of the original coolant hoses (as well as many other, except the fuel lines, which I have replaced for safety)... no joke - the other hoses are original. I really should replace that radiator hose that I know is original, but it still looks fine and I hate to change it since its holding on... I would like to see how long it will last I guess.

It is amazing how long some of the things lasted on old cars. I've seen several times at cars shows vehicles which have the original belts, hoses, spark plugs, spark plug wires, distributor, coil, etc.

[Tennesseestorm]

Originally Posted by Fleet

It is amazing how long some of the things lasted on old cars. I've seen several times at cars shows vehicles which have the original belts, hoses, spark plugs, spark plug wires, distributor, coil, etc.

Yeah, I think mine may even have the original spark plug wires... or pretty close to it! lol. The plugs are at least 15 years old as well. Sad to say, but they are working fine, so I havent changed them.

Originally Posted by Fleet

Yes, Tennessee, some cars were still reliable into the '70s. Especially with the engine and drivetrain.

Yeah, like the big block GM engines, the good old Ford 429, 460, the Mopar 318, 440, and even those old trusty inline 6-cylinders from ALL of the big three... were great engines.

Originally Posted by Fleet

My '69 Cadillac had some A/C work done before I bought it in 2004. The A/C equipment hasn't been touched since then, not even a freon recharge and it blow very cold.

Yeah, my 1972 Buick Electra I purchased in 2001 still had ICE COLD A/C. I bought it off of the original owners son... he told me his dad had never had the A/C serviced! Still had the original freon in it! I was amazed.

Originally Posted by Deez Nuttz

American cars were well built into the early 70's. About 1975 or so they decided to start to use thinner engine castings and such.

I will say this I've owned a mid 70's American car that was actually a pretty well built car.

I totally agree... some of the good ones lingered into the mid 70s and even around 1978 if you consider the big Ford LTD which was a good car until its downsizing in 1979, which from what I have heard that was still a fairly good car save for some issues with the carburator on those with that "venturi" set up, or whatever it was. lol. Even with the '77 downsize of the big GM cars, they were still fairly good cars... or else GM would not have kept that design until 1990 and sold over a million of them. They were underpowered though with weak transmissions in some, but the cars overall body was good as far having issues.

[jc76]

Originally Posted by bisjoe

Very true, rust will destroy all cars in time. Those old cars were built with thicker, heavier steel because no one cared about smog or gas mileage then. Even without today's rust treatments and undercoating they did last longer. When I sold my '72 El Camino in 2007 it was just starting to get a little rust under the doors. I have seen totally rusted out cars from the early 90s. The metal is a lot thinner to save cost and make them lighter to meet EPA mileage standards. I do think there should be better technology by now to make even thinner metals last longer, but then if people kept their cars a lot longer the manufacturers would not be selling as many new ones.

I understand that, but your in Washington state, not here in the rust belt. In Northern Indiana you will rarely see a car older than ten years without some sort of rust. Your 72 El Camino would have probably sold for much more here because it's rare to find anything that old without rust unless it was trucked here from the west.
A guy I work with has a 2004 Dodge Ram and the wheel wells (rear) have holes already. I just hope the newer cars last longer than the cars of the past.

[Wilson513]

Can I help straighten this nonsense out? Prior to 1960 a brand new car stuck in traffic in Summer would over heat in about a half an hour. I can remember watching people taking containers over to the ditch on the side of the road for water. Many other things were wrong with pre 1960 cars but cooling system failures is enough to make the point.

After 1972 the government got involved with automotive engineering and everything went to hell.

[burdell]

Originally Posted by bradyischamp

i read an interesting thing today about the japanese in ww2 being amazed that american tanks did not leak any oil. tanks are not cars i know but its still interesting to see how far down weve gone. i think unions are mainly to blame but oh well.

I think blame the unions for everything is just a popular, baseless past-time. Many car problems during the 'bad' years were due to design/engineering flaws and cost-cutting instituted by the bean counters. There was a period when the big engineering decision was how tall to make the tail-fins. The designers, engineers, or bean counters weren't union workers.

[frankgn87]

fyi- the mid 80's mid and full size GM cars with fwd and 3.8 v6's were rock solid and most went well over 200k with no issues