It’s Friday the 13th, widely regarded as the most unlucky day of the year. But why do people choose this day in particular as one to fear for their lives?
Actually, it’s thought to be traceable back to the Middle Ages, with some medieval historians claiming that it was the day on which Eve bit the apple from the Tree of Knowledge. If you own any of these cars, though, every day will feel like Friday the 13th.
Yeah, they’ve got licence plates, just like your Corsa. They’ve got brakes and tyres, and a steering wheel too, just like your Corsa. But they are not your Corsa, because if you don’t treat them right, you’ll end up in a ditch.
Lancia Stratos Stradale
Wild and theatrical, the Lancia Stratos Stradale was developed alongside the Stratos rally cars designed to beat the Renault Alpine and Ford GT70 in the mid-70s, and quickly developed a reputation for being a challenging drive.
The original Stradale versions demanded far-above-average driving skills and lightning quick reactions to control, with the car’s tendency to spin out in corners posing a major problem.
As well as that, the windscreen was curved at such an angle that the view out of the front was distorted, while the placement of the fuel tank meant that a rear impact could easily result in a pretty nasty fire.
Yet despite the fact that so many owners ended up in accidents, the reputation for requiring a deft hand only added to the Stradale’s mystery and desirability.
Porsche 930
Early Porsche 911s had a bit of a reputation for wayward handling characteristics, thanks to the car’s signature rear-engine placement. Instead of having the engine sit on top of the back axle, it hung out behind it, acting like a giant six-cylinder pendulum that could throw you off-course with one ill-timed blip of the throttle.
In 1975, Porsche decided to throw a primitive turbocharger into the mix and in doing so created the 930 911 Turbo, one of the most legendary and deadly sports cars of all time.
It’s one thing to enjoy the scenery going past, another entirely to end up a part of it. For anybody who owned a 930, that was the risk that they constantly ran.
The problem with the early 911 Turbo was turbo lag, where all of the power would suddenly come on after a considerable delay. This sudden boost created a tendency for the already-unpredictable 911 to swap ends in the corners, and its nickname – the Widowmaker – was well earned.
Still, if you took your time to learn the car and manage the boost , you had one of the fastest cars in the world at the time, as well as one of the most enduring and desirable.
Ford Model T
It might be the second most-popular car of all time, outselling everything except the Volkswagen Beetle, but the Ford Model T was a real pain in the keister to drive.
Designed long before driver controls were standardised, the Model T featured odd positioning for the multiple throttle, brake and gear levers. This meant that driving one was like loading a musket while trying to juggle wet soap… blindfolded.
The right pedal isn’t the accelerator, it’s the brake. The centre pedal engages reverse, while the left shifts gear ratio; the throttle is a lever mounted on the right side of the steering column, and another lever on the left controls spark timing. Phew.
It’s funny that for the car that put the world on wheels, the Ford Model T isn’t exactly something that anybody can get in and drive these days. Oddly, when it first arrived, the Model T was praised for its ease of operation, but jump into one today and you’ll probably find yourself in a hedge pretty quickly.
Reliant Robin
If you’re an avid Top Gear fan, you’ll know all about just how difficult the Reliant Robin could be on a tight corner, given its odd three-wheeled layout and propensity to flip on a moment’s notice.
That’s not to say that its lack of a fourth wheel was necessarily why it was so difficult to drive. After all, the Morgan 3 Wheeler has three wheels and handles fine, but it was the Robin’s unique two-at-the-back, one-at-the-front layout that was the root of its problems.
Due to the fact that the front wheel behaved much like a motorcycle wheel, the biggest problem for drivers was avoiding slippery surfaces. Even a wet road marking or manhole cover was able to send you tumbling down the slip road on a motorway.
Notoriously unstable in cross winds, the smallest gust was enough to lift the Robin onto two wheels, while any reasonably heavy cargo in the back would often cause the front to lift when accelerating. The good news? Well, if you crashed, at least you’d be crashing at a slow speed.
Ford Mustang Fox body
Like most muscle cars, the Ford Mustang never really held a reputation for exception handling, thanks largely to the solid live axle at the rear which endured for 50 years, right until the present-day model replaced it with an independent suspension setup.
In particular, the third-generation ‘Fox body’ Mustang, which was built from the late 70s to the early 90s on Ford’s Fox architecture underpinnings, has a bit of a reputation for being something of a pig.
The obvious complaint is the straight axle, which was poorly located and also had a significant amount of wiggle room in either direction, making the limit of grip much more of a grey area than most performance cars would allow.
Likewise, step on the accelerator too hard and the axle would have a tendency to get pulled up into the body, causing wheel-hop, while the front geometry and lack of camber sent you on a one-way trip to understeer city.
Finally, the Fox platform, which was used on everything from the Mustang to the Mercury Cougar family estate, was never the sort of chassis that should have been used for a muscle car. Super flexy, it made handling even less predictable, bunching up the front and causing the rear end to come around uncontrollably.