Why I Bought One Of The Worst Cars Ever Made

A lot of car people, when hearing the words “Maserati Biturbo,” immediately think of the iconic Top Gear scene where Jeremy Clarkson buys a Biturbo, drives it briefly, and then drops a dumpster onto it. As a way of both expressing an opinion and ruining a car’s future reputation, this segment was a slam dunk.

But why did Clarkson hate the Biturbo so much?

Like all things in life, there isn’t one simple answer to this question. From my admittedly limited research, the primary issue with the Biturbo was quality. The early carbureted models were known to run very lean, causing them to overheat and have other issues, and weren’t particularly well made, falling apart as soon as they drove off the factory line. Though most of us would expect this from a relatively small Italian brand, apparently the quality was bad even by those low standards, and sales suffered as a result.

By the time my Biturbo was made, most of these issues had seemingly been solved, mostly, as the injected Biturbos were vastly improved over their carbureted counterparts, but the reputation damage was already done.

Jason Torchinsky has written a redemption on this car, which was featured in The World’s Worst Cars, but even that redemption doesn’t ignore the car’s…questionable reliability, with Jason concluding:

Sure, it’s probably a money pit, but it does deliver on the character and drama and thrill and soul aspects of a car, which are incredibly important; these aren’t hot water heaters, after all, they’re irrational, emotional machines.

So why did I buy one?

Well, the answer to that is … complicated.

Let me start with my resume. I am an electrical engineer-turned-computer security engineer who picked up the wrenching hobby about 15 years ago. In my garage, I have at present a smattering of odd, unreliable cars such as a 1984 Saab 900 Turbo, 1987 Alfa Romeo Spider, 1989 Isuzu Piazza, 2001 Land Rover Discovery, 2013 Volvo C30, and a 2017 Alfa Romeo 4C. I’ve owned a fair few oddball cars as well, like a 2003 Jaguar S-Type R, a 1986 Honda Civic 4WD Wagon, a 1963 Volkswagen Dune Buggy, and a 1970 International Scout 800A.

So I have a lot of cars, I must be buying another because all of those are 100% sorted and I’m ready to move on to the next project, right? Well… no. Except for the 4C all the cars need something. The C30 needs a headliner, the Piazza a steering rack, the Discovery a transmission leak fixed, the Saab needs… a lot, and the Spider reeks of fuel. The real reason I bought yet another basket case is because I have a cheap car challenge road trip coming up and needed a… “cheap” car.

Let me explain.

Starting in 2015, my friends and I have been doing Top Gear style “cheap car challenges” where we buy cheap cars and then drive them on an epic road trip. For the first two, 2015 and 2017, we were properly nuts and flew to the starting point, bought cars in two days, then set off on a 2,000+ mile road trip. This was exceptionally fun, but also stressful, risky, and legally questionable.

For the 2019 trip we bought the cars in advance primarily due to legal restrictions and international border crossings. For the 2023 trip we bought the cars in advance because the car market was aggressively crap. That said, we still went to great lengths to keep the cars secret from each other and despite each having extra time with our cars in advance, we found driving around town and getting time to fix some faults in no way prepared us for the longer, more grueling pace of a full road trip and did little to diminish the experience.

While I’ve covered the first three trips on DriveTribe (RIP), I actually wrote up about 80% of the 2023 trip, where I resurrected a JDM Isuzu Piazza and drove the Oregon Trail, to share with the fine people of the Autopian, but got lost in the weeds of researching the history and historical significance of the places we’d visited and…. never finished the draft.

This is relevant, as before I bought my deeply neglected Piazza, I was looking at buying a neglected Maserati Biturbo instead. The same one I just bought.

How I Ended Up With This Maserati

In 2019 a mechanic friend of mine when to purchase a Porsche from an older gentleman in rural Oklahoma. While my friend didn’t buy the Porsche, he did buy several other cars including a 1989 Maserati 430i, aka a Biturbo, which had been sitting in a barn for some time but was fairly sound and reliable. The shop guys had some fun with it, going so far as to drive it to Radwood in Austin and a few other car shows, but, as they tend to, eventually lost interest and put the car in storage.

As I was discussing needing a car for the 2023 road trip, and knowing my penchant for quirky cars with unobtanium parts, the shop owner jumped on the opportunity to sell me his derelict Biturbo. While I was initially interested, the mechanical maladies were too many and the timeline too short, so we didn’t end up putting a deal together and I bought a broken JDM oddball instead:

I am who I am.

Sadly the Maserati never made it back to covered storage, instead languishing in the shop’s overflow lot exposed to the hot Oklahoma sun, cold winters, and frequent storms for two years, slowly degrading. As we prepared for our 2025 trip, I swung by the shop for some work on my Volvo and was asked, “Hey when are you going to buy my Maserati?”

Oh. Oh no.

I am, at least when it comes to cars and dogs, a sentimental fool. The Biturbo is a handsome enough car, but I already had several ’80s basket cases and didn’t really need another. However, this one had at some point been a nice example and watching it decay away was breaking my heart. I had made some attempts to sell it on the owner’s behalf, but the ghost of Top Gear followed it everywhere and no one wanted to buy a non-running, seemingly abandoned Maserati that carries the title of “one of the worst cars ever made.” I went so far as to try to sell the car on Opposite-lock, the internet’s bastion of unloved cars, but even there it was met with skepticism, with one comment reading “Did we do something wrong? Are you trying to punish us?”

Unfortunately, this meant it was up to me to save this poor car and see what has earned this car such a ubiquitous reputation. After a few weeks of negotiations, a deal was struck. I bought the 430 for what the owner paid for it back in 2019, which means I was likely overpaying for such a forlorn example, but I was allowed to keep it inside the shop until the trip, including access to the lifts and tools. Additionally, if the ticking noise in the engine ended up being serious, the head mechanic would assist me with the required rebuild.

We shook on the deal, and I immediately regretted my decision.

How the heck was I going to get this poor neglected Maserati ready for a long road trip in just three months while also maintaining a full-time job and keeping all this secret from my other road trip companions?

Still. I pulled it out of the weeds, or … attempted to as it died and I tried to turn around … and pulled it into the shop to assess what I’d got myself into.

So what is actually wrong with the Maserati?

Despite a little bit of surface rust, the 430 is pretty solid, featuring only one small hole in each of the floor pans and no other appreciable rust. The interior is in great shape aside from a failed stitch on the driver’s seat. Some of the wood is peeling, and the gauge needles have curled in the Oklahoma heat, but these are pretty minor cosmetic issues.

The engine usually starts when asked, albeit grumpily, and drives fine. The mufflers have been bypassed because they were, allegedly, clogged, so while the Italian V6 singing without restraint sounds cool at first, it wears on you quickly and will need to be addressed.

Skipping to the worst, the engine had a loud tick from one of the cylinders. A compression check in 2023 showed adequate, consistent numbers, and a peep with the bore scope didn’t show anything terribly alarming. My best guess is we’re looking at an issue with either the valve adjustment, damaged cam, or broken spring. I would say it doesn’t sound like rod knock, but I’ve also never heard rod knock in person, so who am I to judge? None of these are the end of the world to fix, but I really won’t know until I get in there.

So what are the plans going forward?

Oddly, my first step is going to get the windows and doors working properly. I know straightening the curtains while the roof is leaking, or whatever your preferred metaphor is, seems insane, but to my mind, before I get the car running and driving well, getting it to where I can lock the doors and roll down the windows seems important. No sense in getting it running only to have it stolen (they’d bring it back, of that I have no doubt) or pass out from heat exhaustion while driving it. At present, the door locks kind of work, but the power locks start going into a continuous lock and unlock cycle if you try to use them, which isn’t ideal.

After that, I plan to tackle the engine and fuel system.

In 2023, I started to take off the valve cover but realized there were way too many fragile rubber bits between me and it, and since I technically didn’t own the car, I walked away. Since I now own it, I guess it is mine to break? I hope that once I lay eyes on the offending valve the problem will be apparent? Otherwise, I imagine the head will need to come off, which I suppose isn’t a huge deal as the timing belt is likely overdue for replacement anyway. Parts aren’t exactly readily available; RockAuto carries some basic filters, but not much else, but they aren’t terribly hard to find with a little bit of work.

I don’t know what I will find once I start digging into this thing, but I have until the end of August to get this wayward Maserati ready to go… well I guess we haven’t talked about that yet, have we?

The Trip Ahead

When planning these trips, we’ve discovered the easier a trip is to describe, the better. Our 2015 trip, for example, we did coast roads from San Diego to Seattle, for 2017 we did off-road and overland between Sacramento and Salt Lake City, for 2019 we did Seattle to Anchorage, and finally in 2023 we did the Oregon Trail. For this one, as much as I would have loved to do the Pan America Highway, we decided the Saint Lawrence Seaway would be a little less challenging.

So that is what we’re doing! We’re starting on the tip of Lake Erie and driving the coast of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, through Niagra, and then up the Saint Lawrence Seaway and River to the tip of New Brunswick, down through Nova Scotia, and then ending in Maine. In theory, I would sell the Biturbo there, but let’s face it, I won’t, so all-in I’m looking at needing to drive my neglected, broken, maligned Maserati 5,000 miles over the course of two weeks.

God (and in this case, I mean David) willing, I’ll keep you fine people updated on my progress getting this heap going.

Wish me luck!

Top graphic images: Evan Mackay