1988 Chevrolet Beretta review from North America

Engine control computers, five or six before 60,000 miles. Once or twice after that. Eventually we got a good one.

Fuel pump, 80,000 and 170,000.

Timing chain, 160,000.

Ignition coils periodically failed, making car impossible to start.

Massive oil leak, 90,000 due to faulty distributor block-off plate (engine has distributorless ignition, but block is cast to have a distributor hole).

Transmission, slipped from 195,000 until failure @ 201K.

Paint, Defective clearcoat, first noticeable after car was 1 year old. GM were absolutely evasive about this, even after it became widely known they had repainted others' cars for free.

Water pumps went out roughly every 40K miles.

Front seat frames were very flimsy. Driver's seat back started to bend and then eventually collapsed into back seat. Main driver was a 140 pound woman.

Inner door panels were a constant headache. Cheap materials, cheap fasteners, long and somewhat heavy doors were a lethal combination.

CV joints failed. One became noisy at 80,000 miles. The other blew apart at 140,000.

Struts, 70,000 and again, 150,000.

Front brake calipers need to be replaced with pads as they tend to seize and cause pads to fail prematurely.

V6 engine had ample power and was relatively good with gas (high 20s on highway). Nobody I know who had a 4-cyl was happy with performance, and their gas mileage wasn't much better.

Unless you can get it for next to nothing, so you can easily dispose of it when something goes wrong, I would avoid this model. They have a way of nickel and diming you to death.