Hello Jim,
Never blew an engine but one car's engine electronics quit working right in our driveway, another developed a brake cylinder problem, then I recently had one where the seats fells apart and other stuff was just about to. All US made cars. IMHO the quality really began to tank some time in the late 70's.
Now I usually make sure I have a Mitsubishi. Never had the slightest issues with JPN cars and I drove a lot of them as rentals. Plus here at home.
My wife just had her 10+ year old Toyota smog-checked. Passed with flying colors and huge margins, like usual. A friend's Ford was already at the dismantler at that age. They were told it would take a new engine to make it pass, and that it wouldn't likely be for long. Unless they could get a used Mazda engine from Japan in there but that would have cost a lot more for mods.
Don't do this in CA. Costs a lot more. A whole lot more.
Regards, Joerg