“With a few exceptions here and there, American cars of the late 70’s and early 80’s were complete pieces of shit.”
Yes, yes and yes! IMO that’s how the Japanese got their strong start in the market. Their little cars of that era were good for well over a 100,000 miles.
We bought a brand new Ford Bronco in 1980. Timing chain went at 39,000, broken piston at 42,000. Oil always changed, never hot rodded. I know many other Ford owners with similar luck, including my dad’s 1979 Econoline that broke a piston. Forensic work on both engines proved the cylinders were over bored & crank journals were cut too small.
That’s interesting. What engines were in those? I always thought the 300, 302 and 351’s were stout workhorses. But I’m was Mopar guy, so I don’t really know Fords.
I had a 1985 Dodge W150 with a 360, and that thing just wouldn’t die. And I abused the hell out of it off roading. Used to get all sorts of battle damage and keep running.
-Ran a half an hour without coolant (radiator was penetrated).
-Ran it 75 miles without oil pressure (snapped front driveshaft yoke took out the oil filter)
-one time the automatic choke linkage that I disconnected at one end came off at the other end and was ingested into the engine... turned into a shot peen and only managed to close the spark plug gaps in four cylinders. Compression test was good on all cylinders. Found the ball with a telescoping magnet through one spark plug hole, regapped the plugs and it just kept on running and running and running.
Had 135k on it when I gave it to a dude on the base when I left the service.