Home » What Car Was Most Mismatched With Its Engine?: Autopian Asks

What Car Was Most Mismatched With Its Engine?: Autopian Asks

Delorean Aa Ts
ADVERTISEMENT

Has there ever been a car you’ve been interested in, and as you dig into it you soon realize that the engine for the car just, you know, makes no sense? Like, sure, it works, in the sense that the lump of oily metal parts that smack around inside that crankcase get the car actually moving, but beyond that the engine just doesn’t seem to fit, technically or conceptually or performance-wise or whatever? Let’s talk about these cars.

There’s a lot of examples of these, when you really start thinking about them. For some cars, I think the choice of a wrong engine can be genuinely catastrophic, and, in one example I can think of, even destroyed that car and its whole company before any of the cars could even be sold.

Vidframe Min Top
Vidframe Min Bottom

I’m thinking of the Elio.

Remember the Elio? That little three-wheeled car that was supposed to be built in Shreveport, but the whole thing just turned into a huge mess, and maybe a scam? I think a lot of the issues with that company happened when they decided to re-engineer the old three-banger Geo Metro/Suzuki Swift engine. Why didn’t they just get a tiny three-cylinder from a supplier like Ford or GM or Mitsubishi? I have no idea. It was a terrible engine choice, and it was part of that whole disaster.

ADVERTISEMENT

But maybe that’s not really right for this – that was more of a disaster. We’re talking more just mismatched.

How about the iconic Citroën DS?

The DS was a wildly advanced car when it came out in 1955, a genuine Gallic land-spaceship with advanced aerodynamics and design, a hydropneumatic self-leveling and adjustable suspension system, power steering, a semi-automatic transmission and so much more. It was a marvel. And yet, all of this advanced hardware was powered by the same 1911cc inline-four from the old Traction Avant, a car that came out in 1934.

It was supposed to have an air-cooled flat-six, like a Porsche 911 or a Chevy Corvair, but that never happened, so it got the hand-me-down engine from the old Traction. It was fine, but very much out of character with the advanced jet-age character of the DS.

ADVERTISEMENT

There are plenty others: the DeLorean DMC-12 was similar to the DS in that it felt like a spaceship, but tucked in its rump wasn’t an engine that reflected the gull-winged, stainless steel character of the car, but a humble Peugeot-Renault-Volvo lump of a V6 that was dowdy and slow, more at home in rational Volvo sedans.

Our own S.W. Gossin suggests this mismatched pair:

Plymouth Prowler for mismatch. The V6 was the best they had at the time, and beat the V8 available, but didn’t really work in the marketplace with a percentage of the customer base. 

The Prowler really did feel like a V8 car. I get it. Let’s hear what Mark Tucker thinks, why not?

For mismatched engines: the Mazda Rotary Pickup. Let’s put a high-revving, no-torque rotary engine – in a truck.

Okay, fair enough, but those rotary trucks were just so damn cool.

But more importantly, we want to know what you think! What car feels the most mismatched with its engine! Tell us all and then argue and agree with everyone else, as you see fit, and with glee! That’s what we do here, after all!

ADVERTISEMENT

 

Relatedbar

What Is The Worst Possible Getaway Car? Autopian Asks

What New Car Would You Buy With $15,000 Cash In 1985? Autopian Asks

What Are The Most Annoying Things That Can Happen When Wrenching On An Old Car?

 

Share on facebook
Facebook
Share on whatsapp
WhatsApp
Share on twitter
Twitter
Share on linkedin
LinkedIn
Share on reddit
Reddit
Subscribe
Notify of
47 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Citrus
Citrus
14 minutes ago

What about mismatched but brilliant? Because the RAV4 V6. Toyota shoving a V6 in its bland little family SUV in the 2000s to make something that goes 0-60 in a little over 6 seconds? Makes no goddamn sense. Compels me though…

Otherwise, the VW lump in the Porsche 912, which made it sort of like a factory-built kit car – it looks like the real thing, but it’s just a bundle of old VW bits under there.

No More Crossovers
No More Crossovers
7 minutes ago
Reply to  Citrus

A friend of mine was considering a 2009 (?) AMG clk 63 and that’s another one along the line of “This engine should not have been in this car but thank god someone did it”

Temporarily embarrassed millionaire
Temporarily embarrassed millionaire
15 minutes ago

The 1.3L 4-cylinder in the 2nd generation Geo Metro is clearly an engine that doesn’t match its car. When paired with a 3 speed automatic transmission, the combined fuel mileage was a measly 28 MPG.

What did the Geo Metro have going for it other than its outstanding mileage? How did GM so badly misunderstand their own product? The tiny 1.0L 3-cylinder engine of the base model gave the car a combined mileage of 40 MPG. Driven frugally, it was easily capable of hitting the mid-50s while also having enough space in its hatchback body style to transport an entire symphony orchestra.

Instead of embracing what made the Metro unique, GM tried to convince buyers to buy the bigger engine which made the car, essentially, a more expensive, decontented Suzuki Swift.

NebraskaStig
NebraskaStig
31 minutes ago

6th Gen Celica – the base 1.8 was shared with the Corolla. And the GT trim upgrade? The 2.2 engine from a Camry with 135hp. (USDM) It just couldn’t compete with the Integra or Prelude with that low of power.

CR-Z not splitting between a fuel-efficient HF and sporty Si models and instead trying to be both and ending up being neither. The new Prelude is highly likely going to make the same mistake which is a damn shame as I love the design, but why get it over an Accord hybrid? Make a hybrid and ICE-only version you cowards!

Dogisbadob
Dogisbadob
6 minutes ago
Reply to  NebraskaStig

The 7A-FE and 5S-FE Celicas should’ve been sold with the 4A-GE and 3S-GE instead. And of course, the 3S-GTE should’ve been an option.

Nsane In The MembraNe
Nsane In The MembraNe
38 minutes ago

The DeLorean is a good answer. They look like spaceships but are basically economy cars when it comes to their powertrain. If I recall correctly most if not all were automatics as well. There are some cultured people out there that have pulled off LS swaps in them and they’re doing the lord’s work. God’s own V8 sure brings them up to snuff.

I’ll also add the current C63 AMG. A goddamn turbo 4 cylinder and 1,000 pounds worth of hybrid gadgetry in a nearly six figure performance sedan that’s always had a V8 is hysterically bad. Mercedes also had the absolute audacity to make that stupid 4 cylinder the base engine in the GODDAMN AMG GT.

Imagine paying LC500 or 911 money for a turbo 4 popper…and I say this as someone who dailies a turbo 4 popper. It’s great in a $35,000 hot hatch. It has no place in flagship sports car.

Urban Runabout
Urban Runabout
27 minutes ago

“…It has no place in flagship sports car.”

Lotus Esprit and BMW i8 have entered the chat.

Nsane In The MembraNe
Nsane In The MembraNe
18 minutes ago
Reply to  Urban Runabout

The i8 is actually a three cylinder….and for some reason that’s weird enough for me to forgive it, especially considering it was designed to be a PHEV and outright performance was never the goal.

Adrian Clarke
Adrian Clarke
15 minutes ago

I’m not sure what the split is, but at one point as a potential DeLorean purchaser there are plenty of manuals out there.

Slow Joe Crow
Slow Joe Crow
1 hour ago

The Mazda Parkway bus. A 24 passenger bus powered by a rotary engine, for an even more extreme mismatch than the REPU. To nobody’s surprise Mazda sold very few rotary powered busses and the majority of the ones sold had piston engines.

Adrian Clarke
Adrian Clarke
14 minutes ago
Reply to  Slow Joe Crow

A very efficient was to turn gas into noise. Torch ignored my suggestion of the Mazda Roadpacer.

Hoonicus
Hoonicus
1 hour ago

Early C1 Corvettes stymied more by the two speed power glide auto than the blue flame I6. You’re seriously trying to compete with Jaguar and the like with a 2 speed auto?

Dogisbadob
Dogisbadob
4 minutes ago
Reply to  Hoonicus

Did Jaugar even offer an automatic at the time?

Micah Cameron
Micah Cameron
1 hour ago

Listen, the DeLorean and DS may have had slow engines that were a little underwhelming compared to the rest of the car, but they were fine.

As far as a real mismatch goes, I submit literally every American V8 muscle car built before the Malise era. Shit brakes, downright dangerous suspension, interiors made of paper mache, bodies made of the thinnest, crappiest “steel” on the planet, and bonkers powerful engines. They were garbage right off the showroom floor, but *dangerous* garbage.

Urban Runabout
Urban Runabout
1 hour ago

2nd Gen Cadillac Seville and the standard diesel engine.
What was supposed to be an elegant, smooth luxury car came with a smoking, clattering, underpowered diesel.

While we’re at it – the optional BMW diesel in the Lincoln Mark VII.

The detuned Eta engines in BMW 3 and 5 series of that same timeframe.

And also, the severely underpowered 3.8L in the Mercedes-Benz S Class and SL from 1981-1985

OverlandingSprinter
OverlandingSprinter
1 hour ago

AMC’s I6 in the Pacer. The designers banked on sourcing a Wankel rotary, which never came to pass, then had to shoe-horn a six into it at the last minute.

Same for the Vega — a promised rotary and we know the rest of the Vega’s engine story. What isn’t talked about is the early Pinto engines were no bargain either.

Aron9000
Aron9000
1 hour ago

Cadillac and the HT4100 V8. But especially in the big RWD Sedan and Coupe Deville. What a turd of an engine, even if it was reliable you have 130hp propelling a 4300lb sled.

GM management had an edict that “we will not sell a car with a gas guzzler tax” Really screwed over Cadillac at that time, the customer base would have gladly paid it to keep driving their big block V8 cars. Its a night/day difference between the 77-79 cars with the 425 V8 and the HT4100 ones in terms of power.

Also around that same time as Cadillac introduced the HT4100 Mercedes reintroduced their V8 to the US market after selling only diesels for a couple years. You paid the gas guzzler tax with the Benz but they were rocket ships for that era with 80 more hp than the Cadillac

Zecrid
Zecrid
1 hour ago

In defense of the Prowler, the V8 made no sense for the project. The whole point of the Prowler was that It was an experiment in aluminum. All that hard work to make an aluminum chassis just to put a pig iron V8 in? No, the all aluminum V6 was a far better choice.

As far as my choice for most mismatched engine car combo. My vote is the 86 Taurus. Ford comes out with a brand new space age sedan and what’s powering it? An equally brand new stone age archaic V6. I could forgive an American company for still sticking with pushrods in the early ’80s, what I can’t forgive is the complete lack of aluminum heads and a half decent transmission. I understand the Vulcan is a tough as nails engine, but they are extremely underwhelming in every other aspect until you give it to Yamaha to make DOHC.

RM
RM
1 hour ago

Can I complain in general about the rash of 1.5l turbos in full size cars? It’s one thing for GM to do it, but was recently in Germany and our euro spec decked out luxury passat wagon (with integrated seat massage!) had a 1.5T as well. It performed decently enough.. but 3cyl engines just don’t belong in a full size car!

Last edited 1 hour ago by RM
Fuzzyweis
Fuzzyweis
1 hour ago

Bmw i8 and Cadillac ELR, kind of responses to the Model S, but came just a little short.

Mr E
Mr E
1 hour ago

The massive battery in the new Hummer. Kinda heavy for what’s designed for offroading.

Last edited 1 hour ago by Mr E
Pappa P
Pappa P
2 hours ago

The second gen Taurus SHO.
No one would expect that there’s a Yamaha V8 in there driving the front wheels.

Abdominal Snoman
Abdominal Snoman
2 hours ago

Here with what I’m sure will be an unpopular opinion… the Skyactiv engine in the modern Miata. No complaints about performance, reliability, or anything that actually matters, but it just has such an annoying raspy buzzy mechanical sound at high rpm’s compared to their older 1.6 and 1.8’s.

Clark B
Clark B
2 hours ago

Definitely not the worst out there, but the Karmann Ghia fits the bill, I think. It’s a nice looking little car, but it’s got VWs ubiquitous air-cooled engine in it, making at most ~50hp.

TimoFett
TimoFett
2 hours ago

The Pontiac Fiero was definitely severely let down by its choice of engine.

Dogisbadob
Dogisbadob
10 minutes ago
Reply to  TimoFett

The Iron Dukee is a bad choice no matter what it’s installed in.

The Fiero should’ve gotten the 122 or the Family II, with the Quad 4 being optional once it came out.

JP15
JP15
2 hours ago

There are plenty others: the DeLorean DMC-12 was similar to the DS in that it felt like a spaceship, but tucked in its rump wasn’t an engine that reflected the gull-winged, stainless steel character of the car, but a humble Peugeot-Renault-Volvo lump of a V6 that was dowdy and slow, more at home in rational Volvo sedans.

I disagree on this one. Yes, the engine was strangled for US emissions with 1970s-era catalytic converters and tuning that strangled the engine, but don’t forget a turbo 2.5L version of the same engine powered the much-lauded Alpine GTA turbo, and LeMans-spec versions made well over 400hp.

The Delorean was a really European car that was horribly federalized. The chassis was designed by Lotus, having a lot in common with the Esprit. However, they found the headlights sat too low to meet US specifications (what is it with the US and dumb headlight regulations?). It was far too late to restyle the whole body, so instead they jacked up the car on taller springs, wiping out much of the Lotus benefit.

They had all kinds of crazy aspirations for the engine with a Wankel being one of the bigger ones, but the Euro-spec PRV engine isn’t terrible, it’s just awful with US federalization.

I plan to own a Delorean someday, and I’d resto-mod it back to much of the original design intent. It will never be a supercar, but it does untapped potential.

Hugh Crawford
Hugh Crawford
2 hours ago

You know,the PRV engine in the Delorian was used in a lot of pretty neat cars and was raced at LeMans.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V6_PRV_engine

Jack Trade
Jack Trade
2 hours ago
Reply to  Hugh Crawford

Every now and again, while waiting to cross a main thoroughfare to get to work, I’m there in time to catch a guy who drives his DeLorean to work (I’ve seen him a couple of times).

It’s always striking how low and wide it is compared with everything around it, but my favorite part is the incongruous engine note coming out of it.

Clark B
Clark B
2 hours ago
Reply to  Jack Trade

When I lived in Lexington there was someone who drove theirs on a regular basis and it really is striking in person.

Once I saw two Deloreans there in the same day, but in different places, so it wasn’t the same car.

Jonee Eisen
Jonee Eisen
1 hour ago
Reply to  Hugh Crawford

Yeah, that engine could be made to be pretty good, actually.

Dogisbadob
Dogisbadob
2 hours ago

The Pacifica PHEV V6 should’ve been a 4-cylinder, for example. Instead, the V6 PHEV gets worse mpg than a Sienna, which isn’t even a plugin.

Early midsize-to-large cars and crossover hybrids used a V6 when they should’ve used an I4, though that was eventually corrected later. The electric motor provides the instant torque, and the I4 has better mpg than a V6.

Outside of hybrids, a good example is the shitty 54-degree V6 in the Catera and other GM cars. The Catera should’ve gotten the 3800 (which was already offered in Australia, in both NA and supercharged forms)

The 90s and newer Panthers had a lazy V8 with V6 power. The standard engine should’ve been a V6 (they had a 3.0L with 220 hp at the time), and the V8 should’ve been the same version as the Mustang GT of the time (260 hp instead of 224). The Marauder engine should’ve been standard on the Town Car.

Jack Trade
Jack Trade
2 hours ago
Reply to  Dogisbadob

I was always a little surprised that Ford put a detuned 4.6 in the Crown Vic. If it had offered the Mustang version, then they really would be rear gear swap away from being the muscle-car-in-plus-size-clothes that some people now mistakenly think they are.

Jatkat
Jatkat
1 hour ago
Reply to  Jack Trade

I think the CVPI guys sort of perpetuated that myth. It’s enough power for the vehicle, but should never be mistaken for a sports car. My 97 GM even has the “Handling and Performance Package”, which really helps tighten it up a bit while maintaining excellent and comfortable road manners.

Jatkat
Jatkat
1 hour ago
Reply to  Dogisbadob

Incorrect opinion on the panthers. That lazy bastard is happy to chug along for 80 billion miles. Torque is plenty to move it’s fat ass out of its own way, and it makes a nice quiet v8 noise which is essential for that class of vehicle. Would I take a more raucous version in my grand marquis? Of course! But I think it was the right choice to make.

Jatkat
Jatkat
1 hour ago
Reply to  Dogisbadob

Fully agree the 4 cam should have at least been optional on the GM, TC and Crown Vikkie

Jack Trade
Jack Trade
2 hours ago

I’ll go the other way – the ’90s Dodge Spirit, in R/T guise that provided the 2.2 turbo engine.

A forgettable, dowdy-looking sedan with an absolute screamer of a motor. Amusement park ride quality torque steer just added to the unexpected drama of how fast they were.

Uninformed Fucknugget
Uninformed Fucknugget
1 hour ago
Reply to  Jack Trade

I was going to bring this to the table. I believe they also made a Plymouth version (Sundance?) that looked like something my grandma would have drove.

Maymar
Maymar
50 minutes ago
Reply to  Jack Trade

Yes! Mismatched can be a good thing sometimes too. Similarly, the Trailblazer SS and Grand Cherokee SRT-8 are pretty traditional SUVs closing in on 5000lbs, very cynical mid-2000s domestic products, but completely improved by a snout fulla lusty V8.

MrLM002
MrLM002
2 hours ago

Third Gen Camaro with the Iron Duke, Pontiac Fiero with the Iron Duke. Mazda REPU with the 13b Rotary.

I love them all though.

Pappa P
Pappa P
2 hours ago
Reply to  MrLM002

I would add the fox Mustang with the 2.3 lima

Dogisbadob
Dogisbadob
16 minutes ago
Reply to  MrLM002

That Camaro should’ve used the 122 instead. GM should not have even bothered making the Iron Dukee in the first place.

So I’d say anything with the Iron Duke is a mismatch.

StillNotATony
StillNotATony
2 hours ago

I had a friend in high school who had a short bed, square body Chevy pickup. It had a 454 in it, and if you breathed heavy on the throttle, the tires lit up and it started to slip sideways.

Because there was basically no weight in the back, you had to drive it ve-e-e-e-e-e-ry carefully, especially if the road was anything but absolutely clear and dry.

It could be a real giggle box, but it would also turn on you like a 930 Turbo.

Roland Steed
Roland Steed
2 hours ago
Reply to  StillNotATony

My brother had a ’77 like that he ordered new. tons of illicit fun.

He eventually sold it when his insurance payments exceeded his loan payments.

LTDScott
LTDScott
2 hours ago

Mazda Roadpacer AP. Because nearly nothing could be worse than a 2-rotor Wankel to propel 3400+ lbs of Aussie metal down the wangan-sen.

The Bishop
The Bishop
2 hours ago
Reply to  LTDScott

worse than that- there was a bus they made with that motor.

Adrian Clarke
Adrian Clarke
11 minutes ago
Reply to  LTDScott

The cover star of my “how the fuck does that move?” file.

47
0
Would love your thoughts, please comment.x
()
x