Favorite Automotive Brands?

[AMGoff]

Balls... I forgot about Alphas - one of the few European makes I'd actually own and the only Italian one at that.

So yeah... add Alpha Romeo to my list as well!

[I~LUV~Caddys8792]

Ooh, I forgot about all the European brands they don't import over here. AlFa Romeo would be a fun one too, if they had a more solid dealer network, and oh yeah, if they were more reliable.

[orconn]

I rate my Alfa 164L as the best all round car of all the cars I have owned. It was also the most reliable. The 164 was one of the very first cars to offer a 48 month "bumper to bumper" warranty. I had very few problems with it ..... a couple of switches for the seats (fixed first and only time under warranty). Electrics, usually the Achilles heal of European cars were trouble free in US version (can't speak for non-US cars) as the cars had mostly American electrical components, courtesy of Iacocca's attempted purchase of Alfa by Chrysler. I owned and used the car as my daily driver for 10 years and 80,000 miles and wish I still had it. The Alfa 164 was known by the cognoscenti to be the best sports sedan in the world .............. as one fellow put it "the best BMW money can buy!"

I have always liked to drive Alfas especially the 1600 Giulia ('66) and the Duetto and GT varieties of the '60 through '80's.

I owned a Lamborghini 350 GT and drove Espadas and Miuras on a regular basis during the seventies, but for shear "road fun" the Alfas were the best. I also drove, Astons, Ferraris, Maseratis and Mercedes SL's during this time and none of them were as much fun. The Jags of this era, which I also drove and owned in the 60's and 70's were "over" the hill by the early seventies. The XJS was a pile from day one ...... nothing but a poseur's car, they improved later but were just another car in the eighties.

[EcSTSatic]

Geesh guys, what's left?

[MauiV]

Oops, forgot DeTomaso.

LOVE the Pantera!!

[orconn]

The Pantera was really neat in its' own way ........ kind of an entry level exotic! Not very well engineered, to put it mildly! The De Tomaso Mangusta was a much better looking car, but also suffered from "involuntary offroad exploration" syndrome.

[dirt_cheap_fleetwood]

Cadillac
Lincoln
Duesenburg (I love gigantic hoods)
AMC
Pontiac
Oldsmobile
Chevy
Dodge (60's-70's muscle cars only)
Ford (Crown Vic, Thunderbirds and F-250/350 only)

Just about anything between the 30's and the 60's I like. The styling of those eras was just gorgeous.

[TSS]

Strange that nobody even referenced Acura .

me:

Cadillac
Chevrolet (trucks/Impala SS)
Pontiac (performance models)
Lincoln
Acura

[TSS]

Originally Posted by dkozloski

LaSalle
Nash
Studebaker
Tucker
Kaiser
Frazer
Henry J
Hudson
Packard
Oldsmobile
DeSoto
Imperial
AMC
Willys
Graham
American Bantam
Crosley
Edsel
All defunct in my lifetime.

Plymouth ?

[I~LUV~Caddys8792]

DeLorean?
Eagle?

[Destroyer]

Originally Posted by I~LUV~Caddys8792

Let's see, for me...

In order:
Cadillac
Mercedes-Benz
Ferrari
BMW
Bentley
Rolls Royce
Porsche
Lamborghini
Lexus
Aston Martin
Maserati
Audi
Buick
Lincoln
Honda
Oldsmobile
Mini
Nissan
Volkswagen
Volvo
Saab


In determining this, I thought of all the cars they've made since the 1960s, and how many of them I liked, and how many of them I didn't like. Some, for example Lincoln, made awesome cars back in the sixties and seventies, but for the last twenty five or so years, I haven't much liked their offerings. Then, some like VW, Volvo, Saab and Nissan have made cars I've liked for the last 10-15 years, but I don't like their older cars, etc etc. Then you have brands like Ferrari, Cadillac, and M-B, who's cars have interested me all the way back to the 1950's.

So what about you?

Tata