Probably some hideous appliance like a Civic or a Camry.
Top Gear says the Lamborghini Murcielago LP670-4SV is #1.....sounds good to me!
Probably some hideous appliance like a Civic or a Camry.
Top Gear says the Lamborghini Murcielago LP670-4SV is #1.....sounds good to me!
I've had 22 cars from BMWs, to Audis, Vettes, MR2s, Miatas and more, if I had to go back and own just one of them again it would be my 05 Impreza 2.5RS. It did everything well.
Worst car I've ever owned (and I've had two Land Rovers!) my current 05 Cadillac CTS. Massive engine failure at 60k miles - I won't even begin to go into it 
What about a "10-best for 5-grand or less" type story? Then you don't have to worry as much about the age of the cars, but rather can focus on whatever traits they're best at.
You could also stipulate they need to be readily available across most of the country in reliable and driving-condition, or with only minor repairs, for under $5k.
So if I read Tim's initial thesis correctly, he wants the best possible compromise? This is quite a challenge because subjective and objective reasoning aside, you also have to factor in what I would call 'subjective objectivity' which is snarky person for determining objectively the subjective usefulness of the utility a vehicle provides to a given person. For example, a car that does 0-60 in 3 seconds may be better to one person who prizes straight-line acceleration vs another who prizes the ability of a car that can tow 3 kids, 2 dogs, and pull a small boat, vs another who prizes the ability to 'look cool' with the top down cruising the beach in search of a mate. I'm just saying the 'how' a vehicle is used can be as important as it's ability to deliver...
I think that's why this board developed the 'holy trinity' to begin with. See if you can take the factors of those 3 cars: Miata, E30, and P71, and compare any entrant to all 3, take the sum of the scores, I think you'd have a winner, plus it would be cool to see a comparison test where 3 cars are the baseline...
Just for how it still has the looks and the moves, after all these long years, Etype Jag...
Sounds like a series of articles to me. I look forward to reading them.
For me, right now, the best in the world is a 89 Thunderbird Super Coupe. Tomorrow, who knows.
Raze, I think you can put some objectivity into practicality. You can measure ingress/egress, fuel mileage, leg room, truck space, carry capacity, but yes, some of it is still subjective.
And I am not so much suggesting that this is a competition for best all a-rounder. But, if it the car is not practical, or fuel efficient, or comfortable, it better have incredible performance to make up for it.
Maybe we give double points for track worthiness, so cars like the Miata and Corvette, can hang. We are a performance oriented bunch and I don't want a damned Camry to win. Obviously something like that is the most practical car, but it is not for me.
The WRX is a great car.
That said, reliability (especially during motorsports use) needs to be one of the highest priorities of this mythical car. Of the people I know who autocross Subarus, about 2/3 have had a great experience, and the other 1/3 have had massive failures. 2.5RS motors have blown headgaskets, transmissions have E36 M3 the bed, 2.0 turbo motors spun bearings, 2.0 and 2.5 turbo motors with oil burning issues, 2.5 turbo motors with blown ringlands... the list goes on. Hell, I remember when the '08 STi came out, and people running AS were blowing ringlands apart on the completely stock motor.
Tim Suddard wrote: Obviously their are subjective factors like comfort and styling, and objective factors like fuel mileage, 0-60 times, lap times on a track and/or autocross course etc. Price when new and value now obviously enter into the equation as well. Would you have to rule out new cars, as they haven't stood the test of time? Would you factor in repair records? Ease of repair? Parts prices? Would you set a budget? Sure, a new 911 is better than any of the cars I have mentioned, but at what price and what if you factor in price and value and depreciation? See where I am going with this?
FWIW, I think fuel mileage is a somewhat subjective factor as well. Aside from the fact that numbers vary like crazy, and the only real data you can use is the EPA numbers (and the driving cycle ratings were changed around 5 years ago, making comparisons before/after that point apples to oranges), what people accept as "good" mileage varies a LOT. The 23-25 you state in the OP isn't bad, but I don't consider it good at all. The next guy posting may DD a truck or a V8 knocking down 18mpg, and it may seem great to him.
I do think brand new cars should be ruled out (i.e. FRS/BRZ) as there is no historical data. I also think (from a GRM standpoint) that the performance comparisons should be done from a bolt-on/ST prep level. In stock form, some cars make leaps so far ahead that the old models seem pretty terrible by comparison. The WRX is an example of this... while still in DS, a 2011+ car will absolutely demolish the 2002 bugeye on an autocross course (and probably on track as well). It will dyno with significantly more power, has a much stiffer suspension, and will fit way more tire on its much wider and slightly taller stock wheels. However, in STX the 2002 through 2007 are pretty competitive, and although the 08+ WRX is still in STU, I don't think you'd find the times far off. The disparity in performance is certainly much less than stock vs. stock.
Tim Suddard wrote: And I am not so much suggesting that this is a competition for best all a-rounder. But, if it the car is not practical, or fuel efficient, or comfortable, it better have incredible performance to make up for it. Maybe we give double points for track worthiness, so cars like the Miata and Corvette, can hang. We are a performance oriented bunch and I don't want a damned Camry to win. Obviously something like that is the most practical car, but it is not for me.
Excellent, so now we have more insight as to where you want to take this. I'll refine my idea above that each entrant be compared against the following 3 cars:
1) Miata as the test basis for autox/track comparison ~ weighted 40%
2) E30 for road perormance (0-60, slalom, braking, etc) ~ weighted 40%
3) P71 for practicality (ingress/egress, # of adults you can carry without stuffing them in the trunk, etc) ~ weighted 20%
I think this would make it interesting in that it would allow a high performance coupe or sedan to make up ground lost to a Miata or Corvette in the first two categories with the third, kind of how the concourse at the Challenge can elevate teams into the running...
I would think that as new cars came out this could be re-tested and cars re-baselined as needed, thus giving you something you could use year after year. In several years you could change the test triangle of cars to keep up with more modern variants, it would be cool to see an annual ' GRM best car' award in print given a test criteria no one in the industry currently uses that an every-man can understand. I always hated how in every performance based comparo I'd read when something like a Corvette would spank Porches, Ferraris, everything on the track, on-road, etc. and then finish last because 'the interior didn't smell as nice or look as good as the others'. I mean really? I wanted to know how the car performs, not whether the interior decorator chose the right colors...
JoeyM wrote: Well, turn it into a series of articles; a different top ten list in each issue, covering a different aspect of motorsports. If you have a magazine full of reviews of expensive cars, throw us cheapskates a bone by having a top ten list in the issue that focuses on some less expensive motorsport. If you're doing an article full of budget stuff (e.g. the $20xx challenge issue) throw in a top ten list of more expensive cars. For any of the lists, do the following: 1) pick a task that can be easily incorporated into a title: "Our top 10 cars for X". That can be "Autocrossing on street tires", "ultimate track day cars", "affordable rallycross cars", "new cars to use on the track and the street" or whatever else you want to write about. 2) Clearly define your paramenters; e.g. Ultimate Track Day Cars must have the following features, must lap a specific track in at least this time, must have been produced in this amount, must be available at this price point.......the chosen parameters don't matter as much as telling us what you chose and what your justification was. 3) borrow a bunch of cars that fit those parameters and drive the snot out of them 4) write about it 5) profit BTW, while I've got your ear, what I'd love to see in the magazine is more detail on how to do low cost, high quality fabrication. (YMMV)
This is exactly what I was thinking. Define categories a touch more, write about, explore, drive a few, write an article. One for every issue in 2013 or something. Sounds perfect.
One of the Australian Utes would rank highly.
Depends I think for a daily driver it is hard to beat the EG Civic. Reliable, cheap, easy as anything to work on, great aftermarket support.
That's a pretty huge question. One one hand, if you go by sales volumes, then the Bug, Model T, Corolla etc have to be the best. More people bought them than anything else right? If you go by quality and engineering, then a Duisenberg or Veyron would have to be the best.
Based on the cars of the 70's thread, I will throw the original Chevrolet Impala into the ring. OK, now bear with me here. It was the Car of the Year, considered a real revolution when it came out, and served for many, many years. It was the go-to car for Police and Taxis until the Crown Vic took over once it left production. The Impala SS (original and 90's version) gave a performance edge to the car, and it remains popular with the DUB crowd and the lowrider crowd to this day. Millions of families got to work and vacation reliably in an Impala, and it was available as a 2-door, 4-door and wagon. No car has a stronger racing record than the Impala (in demolition derbies of course) and it's legend lives on in Nascar.
And look at it. Just dead sexy!!!
BoxheadTim wrote: They're genuine do-everything cars and especially the E28 is "Goldilocks sized" - not too big and not too small.
This is a good way to say it. They may not excel at any one thing, but they do pretty well at most things and I like the idea of having a universal car that serves all my needs. I have a couple e30s as well and they're very good cars too, but for me the e28 is better because it's a little bigger (but not too big.)
The best car in the world... man I hate to overshadow the awesomeness and utility of an old 911 but if I could only choose one car to do all things... the E36 M3 is that car. When the kids move out... the 911 and a utility trailer comes right back into #1.
Oofff.... i almost wish one of the posters above hadn't mentioned the MKiv Supra Turbo.
I'm going to have to go with that. Fast, reasonable MPG, plenty of room inside, big-ish hatch, handles well (despite being a bit on the heavy side, but not by today's standards), nice interior, incredible build quality, and overbuilt to hell and back.
Raze wrote: 1) Miata as the test basis for autox/track comparison ~ weighted 40% 2) E30 for road perormance (0-60, slalom, braking, etc) ~ weighted 40% 3) P71 for practicality (ingress/egress, # of adults you can carry without stuffing them in the trunk, etc) ~ weighted 20%
Which one though? Autox or track? Or both? Or some pseudo mix of the two (assuming the space to properly set this up) On the track, a lot of horsepower can make up for a whole lot of suspension fail.
And where is the reliability, ease of DIY work, and cost of maintenance factored in?
Fuel economy? I would actually vote for some combination of the fueleconomy.gov numbers (which are corrected to be comparable to new EPA numbers before '07), and the median Fuelly numbers.
Also, if you are comparing more than one car, why do you need to know what a Miata, E30, P71 score? They certainly aren't the ideal performers in all of these categories.
This question is akin to "how did the universe start?" and "what is the meaning of life?"
It is un-answerable 
I'm getting rid of an albatross of a WRX this weekend, and I'll tell you why. I agree that it's got a lot of nice things going for it, and if I hadn't overheated the damn thing and cracked the heads, I'd probably be right up there with you in enjoying it.
But the damn thing is a bitch to work on.
Look at the distance between those valve covers and the frame rails. You want to change the plugs on a Miata? Pop the hood and you're there. On the Subaru? Remove the battery, etc so you can get some approximation of access. Not only do head gaskets go, but you've got two of 'em, and you've got to pull the motor to replace 'em. Lots of fun. And let me tell you, four cams at the far corners of the motor, on an interference engine, make for fun games of "is it aligned? did I just crunch my valves?".
You want to replace the clutch on this AWD superstar? Have fun.
Serviceability, whether it means access to parts on the car, access to parts at the store, quality of parts (Prince of Darkness anyone?), or just the ability to replace something without the car's brain throwing a hissy-fit, should rank right up there.
-FD Rx7 with a turbo LS swap and flares.
-A built first gen Boxster.
-A backdated 911 RS clone.
-E39 540i.
-A tightened up second gen 74 Trans AM. Really go thru the structure.
-and I really, really want an RCR Superlite as my budget Ferrari.
I'm willing to eat all my broccoli and clean up my room.
I think I would go with some flavor of a 911. You can drive iit all year round, putter around town and then do a track day or back road bombing.
I have to agree that it's "unanswerable". It is a good mental exercise though.
Of all the cars Ive owned over the years, I have to say my02 Elantra DD/autox/vacation-mobile has been "the best" of the bunch. It's never been the fastest. It's not the most luxurious. It isn't GREAT at anything. But it handles anything I throw at it with ease and keeps on trucking. I've been impressed at every turn by it's durability, it's ease of maintenance, it'scost, it's cost of parts, how fast it consumes the normal stuff liketune-ups/brakes etc. It handles well enough to not be boring. It's comfortableenough to make a 14 hour blast to Gainesville and not wear you out. It gets mid-30's gas mileage. It has enough power to entertain and run with traffic and enough brakes to get you out of trouble.
Would I tell the world that this is the perfect car for them? No. But for what it's been tasked with, I think it fits the bill. 10 years and truckin'...
Every time I see threads like this, I miss my old 2002 WRX wagon. When I saw that Aspen White wagon at the Factory Five event, I wanted to steal it!
I liked that car a lot and miss it every day. But was it the best car ever? That's hard to tell, but it's up there. Here's what I liked about the car:
-VERY easy and cheap to tune the ECU, and very rewarding. For the cost of a Tactrix cable and about 10 minutes of your time, you would be able to change maps on the car and tweak settings and feel instant differences. Data logging was also very easy.
-Working on it made sense and was easy, even with the boxer engine. I preferred wrenching on the WRX than my Trans Am.
-Go-fast parts are cheap and plentiful, and there's always good deals on them, especially on the forums
-It was a good size and had plenty of interior space, I used it to haul all sorts of stuff
-A total beast in all weather, it was unstoppable!
-Went pretty fast and handled great (with mods)
-Seemed to be pretty durable, I ran Stage 2 on the car for 60,000+ miles with no real issues.
-Interesting looks. Although my wife called it a "chick car".
And here's what I didn't like:
-2002-03 models make annoying rear differential harmonic noises on the highway, mine did it right at 62mph. Only way to fix it was to swap out for a later diff or drill holes in the housing and install little harmonic cushiony damper danglers.
-The whole pre-cat thing was annoying. Subaru decided to put a pre-cat in the up-pipe BEFORE the turbo that tended to break apart on the early WRX's. Swapping it out for a catless up-pipe was no picnic, and I had access to a lift.
-Gas mileage wasn't so great. I bought mine back in 2005 when gas wasn't as expensive as it is now. I usually got 21-22mpg out of mine. And factor in that it takes premium, and it's not so easy on the wallet if you drive a lot.
-Insurance was very expensive, even for the wagon, due to all the young kids cracking them up. This car and the 2009 I had after it were the only cars I've ever had where the insurance would go UP year to year.
-I found that the mod bug had bit early on, and I ended up spending a lot of money on that car rather than my projects. Now if you buy it as a project, this isn't really a problem.
-The 2.0L was sensitive to brands of motor oil. I noticed huge differences in oil consumption depending on what brand oil was used. Mobil 1 was the worst. Lots of stories out there from people spinning bearings while running Mobil 1. Weird. I ran Shell Rotella 5w40 full synthetic in mine and it loved it.
-I broke the driver's seat on mine! All those hard launches made the track snap.
-Cold weather made the fuel lines leak under the hood. It took years for Subaru to admit they did messed that up. I fixed mine on my own before they recalled them, but it was a very time consuming PITA.
-ABS is super sensitive. That got very annoying. Going over the slightest bump would cause the brake pedal and the whole car to spazz out. Subaru also issued a recall for this.
-I never had issues with my transmission like many others had, but it would have been nice if they gave the thing a 6th gear like the STI's had.
-It had horrible paint, and dented way too easily.
Out of all the cars I've had, I miss it the most. I will own another someday, but only as a weekend toy.
One all-around monster that I'm surprised I haven't seen mentioned yet:
The Mazdaspeed6.
Big four-door spaceship that likes to cover 850 miles in 13 hours without breaking a sweat, then goes and rips up a back road like a grown-up WRX.
Double wishbones all around, a Mazda MZR under the hood, all-wheel-drive for snow days.
I think something along the lines of: "reliable, practical and engaging driving experience, best of" would work well. I had 2 1.6 miatas at some point in my life. One was a heavily built turbo monster that had one-off parts and could eat anything with fenders on smaller to medium tracks. The other was a JDM, right hand drive, stocker. The turbo was fun to drive like a rockstar cocaine binge, but as a daily and even for hooning the stocker was much more fun (also a lot less scary). It was easy to toss, easier to shift and provided a fun and engaging driving experience.
We all want an F40 (at least I think we do), but let's face it, its neither practical or reliable. So, based on my experience with most of these cars (usually in an autox loaner/codrive setting)
Ze best of ze champions:
E36 M3 is a heavy contender. 335i, E30 318 (no straight six but much more nimble). I would say that an e46 m3, while glorious does not quite make the reliability.
ITR, S2000 (pushing practicality, but no more than a miata), 8th Gen Si (Probably the last good civic we will get) and any of the older ef/eg Si's. I would love to say NSX, but I have never driven one.
NA/NB Miata, Hell no to an NC however. To the doubters, you would be surprised how much people can move with this little car.
1st gen USDM WRX, 2.5RS; Hated the STi
Any reliable 911. Any aircooled turbo if price is not a criteria (as they are all reliable, fact)
Rx8; supposedly questionable reliability, but I have heard a lot of good stuff as well. Probably one of the best stock damping I have felt on a car. Just a joy to drive.
Lastly, after the redesign of the Mustang (2004 on?) I had the chance to drive a GT (300hp) and a V6 (200hp) on an autocross. Surprisingly, as a drivers cars I preferred the V6. It still had enough power to get the rear out (albeit barely) but it also turned in much better and was better suited to working with the driver. Whereas the GT was just, plow plow plow, power, correct, power, plow plow plow ?Why wont you turn?. Have not driven the new ones but I can imagine they would be even better.
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