[Phillyred]

I always wondered how reliable were these old cars? I know late 70s to 2000 was bad but were American cars previous to that reliable?

[RegulatorCountry]

They were always having to have the carburetor, points and plugs looked at, and they overheated in hot weather far more often than modern cars. But, you could work on all of that yourself in your own garage or under a shade tree. What went wrong more frequent but more minor then. Pollution controls beginning in the early ‘70s changed all that.

[CrazyIvan]

See post #6. Some were terrible. My ‘Cuda was really nothing more than a streamlined Valiant, one of the icons of dependability in that era. It had a 318 V8 that very reliable and was actually made for bigger cars and trucks. Pushed a compact car around very well.

[roamer_1]

I always wondered how reliable were these old cars?

I am still driving a 78 4x4 pickup. And I am looking pretty hard for a 65 or 69 Chevelle, or maybe a Goat to restore and drive.

Simple systems. Easy to fix. Very reliable.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

My Cougar was very dependable. The only problem I ever had was when the spring for the accelerator peddle snapped and the pedal floored and the throttle went wide open. I was up to 75 before I could react. Threw it into neutral and shut it down fast. Even still the over pressure from the high RPMs when it was in neutral blew out the muffler.

I replaced the spring with a stainless steel one after that.