When we go to a dealership and buy a car, we expect a lot of things from our purchase. We expect a comfortable ride, and something that is reliable, and perhaps the most important aspect of all, something that is safe enough for you and your loved ones to travel in.
Another thing we do expect from whatever car it is we may end up buying is that it has been built with the best possible quality and that it could, in theory, last a lifetime. Of course, all cars will reach the end of their travels at some point, but we want to have them as long as possible. Sometimes we are unlucky, however, and that is not quite the case.
Bad apples do creep in, probably more often than we would like. What we sometimes get are cars that are notorious for rusting away, and corroding much earlier in their life cycle than what would normally be deemed acceptable. To put that into context, some of the cars you are going to find in this list have been known to have major rust issues after just three or four years on the road. We're talking cars that have barely been used and are already turning brown.
Some of what you will read below may surprise you, on the other hand, some perhaps won't. But if anything, this list will remind you to always be sure you've found the best vehicle your money can buy. You don't want to have corrosion issues just a few years down the line.
22 GMC Canyon
GMC is one of this country's predominant vehicle manufacturers, and one of their biggest production commitments is the pickup truck range. They are the main competitors to Ford and Ram in this area. GMC launched the all-new Canyon in 2014, and were attempting to combat claims from the last two decades whereby a huge number of customers complained of rusting frames and corners of their trucks. The newer Canyon was somewhat better, but still riddled with problems and definitely not the drastic improvement over its predecessors that GMC was hoping for.
21 Jeep Wrangler
Launched in 2006 at the North American International Auto Show, the JK-generation Wrangler has been a common fixture in Jeep’s range ever since and has gone through various guises and changes in its twelve-year history.
However, it has been known for being notorious when it comes to rust levels, which takes away from the fact that the Wrangler is a great off-roader and a very good car.
Unfortunately, that cannot hide the fact you may come back from an off-road experience with a bit less exterior than when you set off. And that isn’t just down to off-road wear and tear either.
20 Saturn Relay
The Saturn Relay is a minivan introduced by Saturn in 2005, and it remained in production until 2007. You may be asking yourself, why did this car have such a short production span? Well, it was famous for being highly susceptible to corrosion, more so than a lot of domestically-produced vehicles. More often than not, the damage done to the cars' exterior was irreparable and thus Saturn’s reputation was damaged in the eyes of many consumers. Most did indeed turn their back on the brand for good, causing Saturn to duly ax the Relay after only a few years of production.
19 Saturn Vue
The Vue was similar to the Relay, in that it was very bad in terms of corrosion and rust. The car was in production from 2002-2007 and despite being a largely plastic-based vehicle, the subframe was the one area that rusted more than most on other cars.
If you were in areas where rain was a frequent occurrence, you were not going to have a happy time with the Vue.
It was perhaps unsurprising that Saturn received another wave of complaints, to go with those from 2005 onwards about its sister Saturn model, the Relay. Both contributed to Saturn's eventual demise.
18 Chevrolet Equinox
The Equinox is one of Chevrolet’s most marketed SUV-crossover models, and features in quite a number of its TV commercials, most notably the terrible "third times a charm" piece that makes us want to avoid the brand altogether. But despite this big marketing push, and indeed a fairly new car, the Equinox has also been plagued with rusting issues. One of the most notable areas that owners have found to develop rust is, in fact, the car's door frames. Quite a number of owners have gotten home, glanced down at the door bottoms inside the car and noticed a sizable amount of rust on that section.
17 Pontiac Torrent
The Pontiac Torrent is a mid-sized crossover produced by Pontiac from 2006 to 2009 as the successor to the much-maligned (yet modern cult classic) Aztek SUV. The Torrent was only in production for three years, and it was a car that was fairly susceptible to rust. Now there was nothing that was incredibly dramatic about how this car rusted, in fact, it would be classed probably as "above average" in that sense. But it was enough for it to be unable to endure a long production run at all, rusting quicker than owners would expect after not being in their garages for a long period of time.
16 Buick LeSabre
The 1992 Buick LeSabre was a reincarnation of a car that originally appeared back in 1959, though the remake was anything but a success as, pretty soon, problems started to emerge around the quality of the model's subframes.
The mounting bolts also were corroding badly according to some reports, which could have lead to the subframe dropping out of the car completely and causing a total lack of steering.
This is a warning to anyone that may have considered or be considering purchasing a LeSabre used: you’re gonna have to do a pretty thorough inspection to make sure all is right with the car.
15 Chevrolet Vega
The Vega is a car I’ve covered a couple of times already, but it was such a heap of junk. No, really, it was too bad not to put into this list. This is the car that reportedly dropped its front bumper the minute John DeLorean looked at it. Designed by a bunch of GM designers who didn’t really want anything to do with it, the Vega’s awful build quality meant it was a rust magnet, if indeed quite a pretty one. They are fairly collectible now, and with great care the rust can indeed be managed to a reasonable level, but a moment of neglect can result in a rust bucket sitting in the front yard in no time.
14 Chevy Citation
The Chevy Citation is another car, like the Vega, that was put together badly by those at Chevrolet and GM. Incredibly, it was voted Car of the Year in 1980 by Motor Trend Magazine, a move that surprised virtually everyone that had ever laid eyes on the car, much less had had the dubious pleasure of driving one. Build quality, as I mentioned with the Vega, was poor because it was done on the cheap. The car was rushed out without proper development, and thus its cheap building costs led to quickly pumped-up production numbers, this of course leading to a rapid growth of rust due to poor metal quality.
13 Buick Rendezvous
I always feel that the Rendezvous has a look on its face that says it knows it issn’t a great quality car. A crossover vehicle, the Rendezvous is listed as one of the least corrosion-resistant vehicles ever made, as the metals used to build it tending to rust quicker than a Ferrari can sprint from 0-60. Much like its Saturn equivalents, it was only in production for a short period of time, it’s run being little more than five years. And with only a 3-4 year warranty for corrosion damage, Buick clearly knew how badly put together the Rendezvous was from the get-go.
12 Chevrolet Cobalt
I’ve covered this car already in another piece, but it is certainly worth covering again due to its total lack of anything near reliability when it comes to build quality.
The Cobalt was a successor to the Chevrolet Cavalier, and was produced very much on the cheap to make it affordable to as many people as possible.
As well as mechanical issues like dodgy power steering, its cheap materials and poor metal quality meant rust would lick its lips at the prospect of forming along its frame, or wherever it could hope to find a piece of cheap, exposed metal, really.
11 Chevrolet Aveo
The Chevy Aveo is another horrific car I have unfortunately had the displeasure of talking about before, although in the past it was for even more intense reasons like the Aveo being terribly dangerous for anyone that got into it.
A huge number of people have been injured or worse in the Aveo, such was its terrible quality and appallingly low safety rating.
Incredibly, despite this and the penchant it displayed for its frames to rust through, it stayed in production for nine years, from 2002-2011. Exactly how a respected manufacturer like Chevrolet could allow that to happen is completely beyond comprehension.
10 Chevrolet Uplander
The Uplander is regarded as one of the worst cars to ever leave Chevrolet’s factory, if not that, then the worst car to ever leave a factory in the history of the automobile. It took the whole "built on the cheap" concept very literally and to such extreme lengths, and thanks to a terrible quality and strange dash design, as well as a tacky, plasticky feel to the whole product, it kept plenty of buyers away. But a lot of owners who actually had the sad displeasure of having owned an Uplander have complained about how badly the floor can rust, especially on the front passenger section of the car.
9 Buick Terraza
The Terraza is a "luxury" minivan produced by Buick for only two years, from 2005 to 2007. I say luxury in inverted commas as it suffered the same issues and fate that Buick's other product, the Rendezvous, had already suffered.
It is another vehicle that falls into the category of ones that are the least resistant to corrosion.
Corrosion was reported quite worryingly in the fuel tank area, which is incredibly dangerous if nothing else. There was basically nothing to get excited about on the Terraza except the daily need to check and see if you had avoided rust and corrosion for another few hours.
8 TJ Jeep Wrangler
The Jeep TJ is the second generation of Jeep Wrangler, which of course I have spoken about already in this piece. Now, the Wrangler, as I have said, was, and still is, a good off-roader, despite its extreme ability to shed itself to pieces. The TJ is unfortunately much the same story. Jeep has been able to improve the car and keep it as a good off-roading vehicle, yet the quality of the exterior is still lacking and thus corrosion can happen quite easily. Being off-road may accelerate that as mud and dirt accumulate, but even so, it’s a major issue that one would think Jeep surely would have figured out how to address by now.
7 GMC Sierra SLT (2014)
Being a relatively new machine, you’d imagine the Sierra SLT from 2014 would be pretty rust resistant and go a long time before any issues arose, especially with it being a pickup. Sadly, you couldn’t be more wrong.
Reportedly, the frames of these things have rusted over in as little as three years despite being totally covered with corrosion-resistant spray which is aimed at preventing such an event.
It makes you wonder if the spray they used in fact had the opposite effect to what they had intended for it to do, as the rust spread so quickly exactly where the spray was applied.
6 Pontiac Wave
If you’re in need of a fairly cheap ride to get around places, or perhaps this is going to be your first car for a short while, the Pontiac Wave is something you would look at and consider buying. But you certainly wouldn’t want it in the long run. For around $3,000 it may sound like a bargain, but it is notorious for starting to rust away incredibly quickly and would take an awful lot of attention to look after if you wanted it run a good period of time. Also, 106 bhp is not going to get you anywhere fast, and on highway onramps is almost dangerously slow.
5 Ford Explorer
The Ford Explorer has been with us since the start of the 1990s and has gone through various changes in that time period, but perhaps surprising—given that it’s a Ford—it does indeed tend to enjoy a good bit of rust during its lifetime.
The biggest issues with the Explorer are the exterior, and the paintwork is the biggest problem in that area.
Not anything anyone wants to deal with when looking after their car, seeing as it would cost a lot of money to have any problems with the paint touched up on top of already having to perform rust repairs on the exterior.
4 Pontiac G5
The Pontiac G5, whilst being very different to the Wave we looked at just a bit earlier, is not without its issues. I have seen several of these cars on sale, and some of the listings attract my attention. They do so because they proclaim in block capital letters that the car is RUST FREE. That probably tells you all you need to know about the G5. If you find one that has little to no rust then you are very lucky indeed because trying to find a pristine G5 is like trying to find a needle in a haystack.
3 GMC Terrain
The GMC Terrain is quite a popular SUV from the GMC line, but this is yet another car that cannot escape the rust factor and which is doing very little to boost GMC’s reputation as a company that does not sell rusty vehicles.
Recalls of the vehicle were made in 2015 to give customers "free rust prevention treatment."
However, having already paid good money for the car in the first place, you’d have expected it to have been built to a good enough standard in the first place so that it would not need remedial treatment later in its life.