Re: Cracked liftgate!

An interesting discourse anyway. I guess we all have our biases. Me, being,
what I would consider, environmentaly aware, choose to drive the smallest,
most efficient vehicle that meets my needs for 90% of my driving. For me,
that means a 4 cylinder, AWD with 5spd. I suppose if your a Navigator
driver, these points are moot anyway. I think the vast majority of people
drive WAY too much car for their needs. You stick with JD Powers and the V8,
I'll go with the grassroots Consumers Reports and the 4 banger. It's like
the difference between a labour party and a conservative party. Hey good
luck this summer finding fuel, eh.




"C. E. White" <cewhite3@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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"Grolch" <hjwilkeremovenospam@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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admittedly, CR's test methods leave a lot to be desired, BUT, at least
they
are not an industry controlled entity.

No they are not controlle dby anyone. The methodology for the collection
of
these opinion is so poor as to reder them compeletely useless.

When I see some of the JD Powers stuff it makes me laugh. Categories like
"best in initial quality", Huh?, I guess if
you put enough qualifying criteria defining a category even a Skoda would
qualify sometimes.

Well I quoted the results of the long term reliability study. This is
prestty straight forward. A random selection of owners of various models
are asked to report on the numer of problems they have experienced. Ford
and
Chevy clearly scored better than Subaru and were well above average.

Regarding the 2000 Focus, that was seven years ago, AND, that was the
ONLY
time Ford had that kind of rating from CR.

Actually Consumer Reports consistently ranks the Focus highly. In the May
2005 Small Car comparison test it was the highest rated vehicle.

The type of data that I make decisions on are "Owners satisfaction",
"would
you buy a car from this maker again",
"reliability", resale value. And most important, How consistently the
make
AND model rate highly. For instance, Hyundai has
received very high quality reviews in the past few years, BUT, I won't
consider them until they maintain that level for more than
ten years. I don't want my hard-earned cash going to a flash-in-the-pan
review, ala 2000 Focus.

The Focus has been highly rated for 7 years. Hardly a flash in the pan.

Subaru, Toyota, Honda have had consistently high ratings on virtually all
of
their models for decades! On the other hand, look at
Volvo, VW, LandRover, these supposedly "higher end" makes have had
abyssmal
quality ratings for decades.

Subaru has had consistenly poor ratings for a decade. Toyota has been
declining in quality (relative to almost everyone else) for at leat 6
years.
I wouldn't touch a VW product with a 20 foot pole - but that is just my
opinion (however, they get terrible JD Power ratings as well). Personally
I
don't think of VW as high end.

Ford, Chrysler, GM, have had spotty ratings for decades. Some models are
great, many are average, some are very poor. Some
years are great, some average, some poor.

Same is true for Toyota. They have built some real junk (still do).

This thread started out as a cracked liftgate comment. My initial reply
was
regarding materials engineering. I have a hard time
believing that corporations the size of Ford or GM don't know, or
couldn't
have predicted the failure of the lift-gate.

And Toyota should have been able to predict that the crappy plastic they
used in my last Toyta wouldn't last 4 years without turing white and
craking - or that mounting the alterantor next to the exhaust manifold
would
overheat the regulator and cause it to fail every damn August, or that the
starter solenid contact wouldn't last 3 years, or that the paint would
desinigrate in less than 2 years. The paint is literraly falling off my
Sisters Honda and the interior palstic is shedding - shouldn't those
geniuses at Honda have know that was going to happen? Or how about the
mega-geniuses at Toyota that redesigned engines so that they were prone to
sludging up? I like my new Nissan Frontier, but I swear it has plastic
that
literally bonds with dust. I've never had a vehicle get so dirty so fast.
And I'd love a chance to go one on one with the genius that located the
oil
filter or the one that designed the dip stick.

All manufacturer's make mistakes. Just be on the look out for 10 year old
Camry's (if you can find one still running). Chances are the bumpers will
be
discolored and the interior will look like crap. The two in my apartment
complex smoke badly in the morning and sound like rock crushers. The 11
year
old beat to hell Firebird my son just bought becasue it was cheap is in
much
better shape than my sisters 9 year old Honda.

Look around, it's no accident that the american manufacturers are
struggling
to maintain market share. Put me in the "they must
think we're stupid". I think the north american consumer is far from
stupid,
but this die-hard "I'm a Ford man" (or GM Man etc.) really challenges
that point of view. As I said earlier, the Exploder wouldn't sell
anywhere
but America and even then, it's mostly because they're cheap or have
so many dealer incentives attached that they end up comparing favourably.
But please, don't try and tell me that these explorers are fine,
well-engineered
cars.

The pre IRS Explorers sold all over the world (promentently in England,
Autralia, New Zealand). When they redesigned them to be larger in 2002,
they
desiced not to export them (and since they bought Land Rover, it made
little
sense to compete with Land Rover in many markets). In most other markets,
they sell home grown SUVs in preference to the larger Explorer which was
targeted to US buyers. I have not owned an Explorer in long time. I do
have
a 4 year old Expedition that I am very happy with (it repalced another
Expedition that was a very good vehicle).

Regards,

Ed White




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