almost anything will last if "properly maintained". my dad has had some trucks that he beat the crap out of. never changed the oil or filter. chained the engine down instead of getting new motor mounts and and the truck made it over 500,000km and would still be around if it was not lent to someone that has killed many vehicles by running them out of oil.

 

I thought those old detroit 2-strokes liked to suck up their own oil and runaway until they blew up?

This reminds me of the guy with the million mile dodge van. He was on motor number 3, and transmission number 5, and rear end number 4, but it was a million mile van, darnit!

 

I will go with the Cadillac HT4100 V8 as the worst I ever personally owned ('85 Eldorado). What a POS.

I hate to say this, because I like the car, but the 1ZZ-FE 1.8 4-banger in my current DD ('02 Corolla) is quite a bad engine. It is reliable, but the mileage is sub-par at just under 30 MPG, the power is all made high in the band making it accelerate about as fast as the Hindenberg in a headwind, and it burns a quart of oil about every two weeks like clockwork. It is a Torqueless Wonder with a drinking problem, although, as I said, its absolute never-give-it-a-thought reliability makes up for a lot.

For my best engine, I give the nod to the L28E straight six in my 1980 280ZX, followed closely by the 232 straight six in my '68 AMC Rebel. Both were smooth, reliable, powerful enough for their intended use, and easy to work on.

 

Since you mentioned the 232 six, I vote we start a Best engines thread. I will start it.

 

Im going to add the 3.2 DOHC Isuzu engines. Mostly in the 97-03 range. They had a severe oil supply problem caused by too small of oiling holes for the pistons to stay lubed. MANY met their maker at 60k miles due to a sudden, rapid increase in oil usage and being run dry in between oil changes. Ask me how I know...
In thier defense, the 3.2 in the preceeding years was a wonderful powerplant that lasted easily into the 250k mile range. So, possibly this should be listed as a simple, but catastrophic design flaw on an otherwise great engine?

 

I know a guy with over a million hours on his Detroit 2 stroke. It all depends on proper tuning and maintenance. If the Detroit isn't properly tuned it will suck oil bad. Also 2 cycles are notorious for sticking valves, but that is easily fixed by using appropriate fuel and crankcase additives.

 

2 strokes don't have valves.

Or did I miss something?