that'll never happen, what else will people on this forum have to point fingers at?

 

I showed my wife photos of the interiors of the 2006 Impala, the 2005 Dodge Charger, and the 2006 Toyota Avalon. She currenly drives a 1999 Olds Intrigue GL. Guess the order of her preference.

 

I think automobiles in general have come a long way in terms of reliability. The facts in the article, especially about who helps what economy and creates employment are pretty failsafe. I have read about this before several times.

But let's not kid ourselves. Reliability has become the big bugaboo with domestic cars whether real or imagined. Carrying the devastating torch on that front is Consumer Reports which continually deals heavy blows to the reputations of GM, Ford and Chrysler with the frequency of repair figures they publish based on owners repair experiences.

Consumer Reports has been around a very long time. So, when I look at the 2005 issue an see the five year averages for say, a Grand Am (and let's be clear, 5 years is where many of us think about getting a new car) and see black "X" marks after the third year, then I look at another car like a Toyota Corolla and see a sea of red check marks, what buying decision am I forced to make?

People here asked for facts. So here's one major fact. Just one: Brakes on the majority of GM vehicles are a disaster after the 3rd year according to CR(empirically based). I own three GM cars and I know this to be true from experience (anecdotal). The rotors are far too weak and they tend to warp. The CR figures go back an incredible 8 years, and still there doesn't seem to have been any change from GM. Why?

Brakes are not much of a problem for me. I fix them myself. But for the average Joe for whom car repair is a dark science, having to do brakes is freaking unnerving. So when Joe goes to get the shimmy in his brakes checked out and he's quoted $500 in repairs he gets scared. Especially since his unscrupulous mechanic has spent the whole time telling him horror stories about brakes that fail. He can't drive the thing without getting scared.

Joe ain't buying the same car again. Some guy hands him Consumer Reports, he looks at the FR figures and he's buying a Corolla (brakes that are good to like, SEVEN YEARS). That's it. That's what is wrong with the domestic industry. It's staring them right in the face but they refuse to see it.

To be fair, GM has a great car in the Buick Century. Excellent repair record. A few other models are extremely good too. BTW, my T/A is a great car, but it wasn't supposed to be. Time will tell.

 

Lets talk facts. CR has about the least sientific system of measure of reliability of any test system out there. They send out surveys to their readers, lets say 15,000. They get a response less than 5%. Of those whom do respond it is generally those have horrible experiences with products, studies have shown that people with bad exericences are more likely to tell over 5 people of said bad exerience than those who had a good experience.

If you want to talk facts you CANNOT use CR. JD Power uses MUCH more sientific systems to track repairs and vehicle quality than CR.

 

On the contrary, CU's reliability figures just for 2004 are based on a massive 810,000 responses to their subscriber survey. Those numbers are statistically significant - damn near bulletproof. And if those who respond generally have "horrible experiences with products" then why does Toyota always come up with such an excellent reliability record? Their figures aren't based on some guy who writes an angry letter. They are based on actual repairs, not opinions.

JD Power has been criticised because they take advertisements from manufacturers. That is a powerful incentive to skew statistics. However, their 3-year study does agree with most of what CR says. The problems generally start after 3 years with most cars. For example, on a Chevrolet Malibu you can expect to do the brakes after the second and third year. Same with Camaro. Same with the majority of GM cars.

Body integrity and hardware are other areas where GM has been sorely lacking. How many times have you heard complaints about cheap interiors on this site? None of the other domestics fare better either. Ford and Chrysler are worse overall than GM.

Then there's the Europeans. Their cars are plagued with electrical problems. The BMW 7 series is an absolute nighmare for electrical and power equipment. And here's where the larger media come into play however, consistently lauding BMW for their great handling ad nauseum while selling the public on cars that are really mediocre overall. You're better off with an Acura sport model. Or even a GM car for that matter. People still buy BMWs though. That won't last.

 

I've filled out a survey for JD Powers before... it's the same damn thing that consumer reports does. I have no idea how many surveys JD Powers does and had no idea how many CR did until the guy above posted they do 810,000, which seems pretty significant.

As also mentioned... I've been beating this horse for ages but nobody listens. 90 days initial defects is NOT a very solid measure of how the car is going to last in terms of durability. If it breaks within 90 days, it was a problem off teh assembly line. It it breaks in 90 months it was more likely something that was actually engineered poorly or purposely engineered that way to save money. Most people tend to care more about the latter.

And as biased as y'all say CR is... again you have to remember that they don't accept advertising money from anyone at all.

 

I will explain one more thing about what has been said here and that is that people who experience a problem with a percieved quality product will generally think it is a fluke, ie tranny failure on a Toyota Matrix. Those who experience the same with a percieved lower quality product, ie Pontaic Vibe, will see it as the rule.

Also if someone is so vehiminately for Consumer Reports I can say NOTHING to change his mind. If you cannot accept that something may possibly have a flaw in it then YOU are not going to change your mind. If you show me documented actual repair numbers for EVERY single car of a series then I will take that as a true statement. If you show me the responses of people who subscribe to a magazine, as the only possible respondents, and you show me the total percentage of those who responded, and you show that compared with the same respondant rate for each model product tested then I can belive the results. If you cannot ever guarantee the exact same sent rate and respondant rate with multiple products then your data is flawed.

What was the actual number of survey's sent out? Who were they sent to? What is the crossection of the total population?

Without the above questions answered the number of respondants is USELESS!

 

I believe the one major flaw with CR is that foreign car owners with problems don't respond and American car owners with NO problems don't respond.

How can they be ABSOLUTEY SURE they're getting a fair cross section?

 

It's amazing that you guys think that the entire population of America, including the 98% of the people out there who almost don't even know what car they drive, much less care enough to be part of some sort of collective subconscious conspiracy to scew surveys in favor of any japanese brand.

What's even more ridiculous about this assumption is the fact that SOME American cars DO get great reliability ratings from CR, and some Japanese cars get TERRIBLE ratings... especially some mitsubishis and such. So do you think this giant US citizen conspiracy is really so deeply ingrained that people know they're only supposed to say good things about certain brands and models of japanese vehicles, but not others?

Give me a break.

 

Problem here is your fishing for excuses to get out of this. You've just been presented with the facts. You know they're true but you have chosen not to believe them. If you have questions about the accuracy I'm sure contacting Consumers Reports will get you the answers.

Like it or not CR is the industry standard in reliability figures. Car buyers read it widely and apparently their "anecdotal" experiences tend to match up with what they read.

The time here would be better spent discussing the problems presented in CR rather than simply attacking the magazine as some grand conspiracy to wipe out the domestic car industry. That hypothesis is pathetic.

If I were an automaker I would be looking at CR, then going back to my suppliers to work out a solution to

(a) the brake issues
(b) the electrical issues
(c) the body hardware issues

There really isn't much to it. That's all the Japs appear to do. If you don't do it you can count on losing more market share and fading into history.

 

I have no problem with facts but if you only have a portion of the facts then you do not have all the information. I looked on CRs website and couldn't find any contact info. Maybe you have to be a member to contact them. Please contact them and ask if what was the total surveys sent out for 2004 new car purchases and the total responses. Give me that information and then you have a little more data.

 

Like I said before, how can CR (or you, or anyone) be ABSOLUTELY SURE about the data CR receives?

And how can YOU (or a consumer) be ABSOLUTELY SURE about what CR reports. Do you know their methodology? And not what they SAY they do but what they ACTUALLY do? How do you know that they're not throwing away certain data and keeping other data?

You and many others blindly trust them. Why would you blindly trust anyone or anything in this world? Wouldn't it be better to come to a conclusion based on YOUR real world experiences?

 

Didn't CR get sued by Suziki after rigging tests to get the Sidekick up on two wheels and running the story? Not sure it was them but that is what my gut says.

 

If you want to be a conspiracy theorist, then be my guest. Are you ABSOLUTELY SURE that your biological mother is who she is? Are you ABSOLUTELY SURE that the government isn't using mind control on you? Are you ABSOLUTELY SURE that radiation causes cancer?

Unless you personally can prove all of the above to yourself in 100% undoubtable fashion, then you have to trust the research of others and be willing to accept data that is not 100% proven, but still has odds that point undeniably in one direction or the other.

Point is that you specifically said that the consumers are not reporting their good domestic cars and are not reporting their bad japanese cars. I asked you if that was the case then why are their poorly-rated japanese models and entire brands that are poorly rated, and then domestic vehicles that are highly rated, as well, by CR?

Your previous theory makes no sense, so you have chosen to try and shift the focus to some legalise.

"Yeah OJ had bloody gloves and was seen by witnesses, DNA evidence, and fled the scene of the crime, but are you SURE it wasn't all a setup!?!?"

 

I read all about that.. Suziki was pissed that CR reported their vehicle as something that would tip over during routine handling manuevers. They persued proving them wrong and suing them for slander, but ended up realizing that by the testing methods CR used, their vehicle did tip while others didn't, and they dropped the case.