Denon, Yamaha or Marantz Receiver

[Woochifer]

Look, until anyone can post me statistical provable facts that any of these is reliably superior to the others to such a degree it would make a notable difference that would interest me. Otherwise it doesn't mean a whole lot.

The reliability issues noted on this board in the past have typically been with specific production runs. The reviews are a good source for flagging potential problems with certain models. A handful of failed units should be expected, but if you start seeing reviews detailing out one failed unit after another, that points more to a pattern than just typical random bad luck. Some manufacturers have had more bad production runs than others. Sony and h/k have had several problematic runs with very high failure rates over the past decade. Sony's problems with their DE and DB series models got to the point that my friend in AV sales quit demoing the Sonys and steered his customers to the Denons and Yamahas as much as possible. Two years ago, Marantz's x200 models had early production problems with the power supplies. Onkyo also had at least a couple of models with reliability problems in the mid-90s.

But hey people buy American cars for some reason - it sure has nothing to do with reliability.

Yeah, and people buy European cars for some reason as well, even though their reliability now ranks at the bottom.

http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/...-reports_x.htm

[RGA]

The reliability issues noted on this board in the past have typically been with specific production runs. The reviews are a good source for flagging potential problems with certain models. A handful of failed units should be expected, but if you start seeing reviews detailing out one failed unit after another, that points more to a pattern than just typical random bad luck. Some manufacturers have had more bad production runs than others. Sony and h/k have had several problematic runs with very high failure rates over the past decade. Sony's problems with their DE and DB series models got to the point that my friend in AV sales quit demoing the Sonys and steered his customers to the Denons and Yamahas as much as possible. Two years ago, Marantz's x200 models had early production problems with the power supplies. Onkyo also had at least a couple of models with reliability problems in the mid-90s.


Yeah, and people buy European cars for some reason as well, even though their reliability now ranks at the bottom.

http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/...-reports_x.htm

Well I still only hear hearsay no facts about the audio equipment.

As for cars - I may be out of date with my info but "All Mercedes, Audi, Jaguar and Land Rover" did poorly.

Now I though American car companies owned all of these except Mercedes which owns Chrysler. So Chrysler doing better than Mercedes is odd since they're one and the same company.

Consumer reports...Yes I bought my 1994 Grand Am because Consumer Reports said it was more reliable than most every car in its class - I should have read the Lemon Aid as it was rubbished...Consumer Reports LATER had it as the lemon it was and still is.

The Focus has an awful record in Lemon Aid and good one in Consumer reports...ahh stats from polls...and did I read correctly that we're believing the manufacturers and what they claim is a break down? 20 to 18 even if that is correct is negligable and probably rooted out with a larger poll...like all the people who don't subscribe to consumer reports. Far less people own German cars so I would like to see the actual break down...Ie;the sample size for European cars would be FAR smaller than that of the American cars.

Buyers have figured it out over ten years since Toyota has finally surpassed GM. Though the Americans have figured it out with all the numerous co-productions. The Toyota Matrix and Pontiac Vibe(same car same plant - slightly alrtered body and interior) have gotten good reviews...perhaps mixing the Japanese know-how with the American styling I have said would be best for both entities.

Now if only Ford could somehow stop having their tires blow up because THEY can't design wheels and if they can stop their cars from blowing up on rear impact - Crown Victoria police cars - they might sit better with me. I mean they've been making them long enough and been sued enough time and they STILL have the exact same problems. Jaguar is owned by Ford...and the Jag is a POS. Blaming Europe? Now that I don't get...That's like Disney blaming Euro Disney for making no money...when it was stupid decsion by American owners not to investigate what their market was first.

I have heard various problems with Marantz here as well...one dealer dumped Marantz for repair and lousy customer service in the 1980s brought in Sony and Yammie and they sucked dumped them - then you see a decade later they bring them back and give em another try - Now they carry 3 or even 4 of those major players. Seems to me like it's a cycle - bad runs very possible. Denon marantz is funny because hey they don't care which you buy the moeny goes to the same pot. Sorta like the GM of receivers. I mean they brought out Saturn as a way to distance themselves from themselves - gee hopefully people won't think we're GM. Didn't work but it made a lot of sense.

[kexodusc]

Well I still only hear hearsay no facts about the audio equipment.

As for cars - I may be out of date with my info but "All Mercedes, Audi, Jaguar and Land Rover" did poorly.

Now I though American car companies owned all of these except Mercedes which owns Chrysler. So Chrysler doing better than Mercedes is odd since they're one and the same company.

Consumer reports...Yes I bought my 1994 Grand Am because Consumer Reports said it was more reliable than most every car in its class - I should have read the Lemon Aid as it was rubbished...Consumer Reports LATER had it as the lemon it was and still is.

The Focus has an awful record in Lemon Aid and good one in Consumer reports...ahh stats from polls...and did I read correctly that we're believing the manufacturers and what they claim is a break down? 20 to 18 even if that is correct is negligable and probably rooted out with a larger poll...like all the people who don't subscribe to consumer reports. Far less people own German cars so I would like to see the actual break down...Ie;the sample size for European cars would be FAR smaller than that of the American cars.

Buyers have figured it out over ten years since Toyota has finally surpassed GM. Though the Americans have figured it out with all the numerous co-productions. The Toyota Matrix and Pontiac Vibe(same car same plant - slightly alrtered body and interior) have gotten good reviews...perhaps mixing the Japanese know-how with the American styling I have said would be best for both entities.

Now if only Ford could somehow stop having their tires blow up because THEY can't design wheels and if they can stop their cars from blowing up on rear impact - Crown Victoria police cars - they might sit better with me. I mean they've been making them long enough and been sued enough time and they STILL have the exact same problems. Jaguar is owned by Ford...and the Jag is a POS. Blaming Europe? Now that I don't get...That's like Disney blaming Euro Disney for making no money...when it was stupid decsion by American owners not to investigate what their market was first.

I have heard various problems with Marantz here as well...one dealer dumped Marantz for repair and lousy customer service in the 1980s brought in Sony and Yammie and they sucked dumped them - then you see a decade later they bring them back and give em another try - Now they carry 3 or even 4 of those major players. Seems to me like it's a cycle - bad runs very possible. Denon marantz is funny because hey they don't care which you buy the moeny goes to the same pot. Sorta like the GM of receivers. I mean they brought out Saturn as a way to distance themselves from themselves - gee hopefully people won't think we're GM. Didn't work but it made a lot of sense.

What in the blue hell were you trying to say?
I've read it several times, most of it doesn't make any sense.

Incidentally, I work for Honda. If you think Japanese vehicles are built better, well, you don't realize that over 90% of our parts are found in our competitors vehicles as well. Cars aren't designed or built my the "manufacturers" anymore, they're assembled. By our own research, US manufactured vehicles hit the service department 2-3 times per 150 visits more than Japanese vehicles, hardly significant. Needless to say were concentrating on value, style, and performance now. Not sure how this made an audio forum, but whatever.
For what it's worth, I trust my Marantz and Yammie way more than a comparably priced Kenwood or Pioneer.

[RGA]

This is my point though at least there are SOME actual numbers for cars. the fact that they're not specific numbers is no help.

If I had a BMW I might bring it in for something totally anal where as with the Cavelier it may be that the transmission fell out --both count as a customer complaint both count as a service -- yet it is obvious which one is a bigger POS. Performance requires more work that is not oging to stop someone from owning a Bugatti...even if it's in the shop every 300km of driving.

I was pointing out that the so called European cars that supposedly suck worse than American cars are OWNED by American companies. BMW and Volkswagen were not mentioned in the article and Mercedes has had issues for over a decade --The Lemon Aid supports Consumer Reports on that count. However the first three years of the Ford Focus the lemon Aid thinks is if not the worst car on the road it's right down there. The American owned Consumer Reports does not seem to indicate that.

The problem is that Consumer Reports is polling subscribers. If they poll 700,000 people maybe 10,000 of them own a European car. The stats finding would have a much smaller sampling of Euro cars and the results far leass meaningfull. Any basic stats course covers this and naturally the American owned newspeaper with American interests lie by omission and readers are too ignorant to find out all of the numbers. And before Woochifer gets on my case by saying I pulled 10,000 out my ass surely even he knows that the big three outsell all of the Euro cars combined by a huge margin WITHIN the the US market. Either way if they don't provide a BREAKDOWN of the numbers it's meaningless.

The Lemon Aid guide typically breaks down the major problems of vehicls rated against the competitors not just from polls by people who buy their books.

There are some good American cars...generally the ones designed or co-produced with the Japanese. In 1996 used car guide there was exactly TWO GM vehicles that were recommended. One was the Chevy Sprint(built by Suzuki) and the Camaro because though it ell apart a lot offered a lot of performance for the money.

The 94 Grand Am I had had 4 or 6 pages JUST to help you fix the rattles. After it was in the shop 6 times in 18 months and talking to the GM repairman I got a few inside scoops on the pracitces of the company starting with a deliberate design to aid in alternator failures and some of the worst computer chips ever built by anyone. If a Beretta's chip fail you're looking at $1800.00Cdn...without the car doesn't run. Same chip in several cars but he referred to the Beretta.

And this V6 grand am could not do the Coquihalla nearly as well as the 4 banger Honda Civic could despite less horsepower and two fewer cylinders. This road is a large multi lane freeway heading to the British Columbia interior on a steep grade. Both were automatics. The Honda had some kind of grade logic allowing it to stay in a lower gear allowing it to make it up hills without losing power. The Grand Am far better off the line but on a grade would shift up at given speeds and on a grade would fall back.

I say better off the line but if you floor it it will steer left into on coming trafic and the whole front end seems to lift off the ground losing road grip. It is not recommended you run more than two power options on a grand am either or the alternator and or electrical system could blow - it did on mine.

You are correct parts are mixed and matched. For instance Genera Motors put out a terrific top grade battery (Delco) - it was rated in the top three I forget the other two. My 96 Civic and friends 94 civic had that Delco battery. The Grand Am however had some no name. Though I was impressed because when my Alternator blew after 3 months I was able to drive all the way home on the battery which was about 3 miles. So at least the batterry held out.

It may sound like I'm basing it all off my own experience but not so though mine has been horrible. I mean the Grand Am"
estimates
18,000KM Spark Plugs (Headlight burn out)
20,000KM brake pads replacement front
25,000KM Power windows (Headlight Burn out)
25,000KM Paint peeling on roof
27,000KM Power door locks
35,000KM Break Pads front replacement wheel bearings re-done - passener seat no longer locking on rollers - rear seat rattling failing to lock in place, rattle all windows, rattle air vents
37,000KM Alternator blown - tires need replacing
40,000KM Power windows fail, cruse control no longer works, air conditioner no longer cold - but kinda works so they won't repair it.
45,000KM - it is discovered that thje rear breaks have never engaged properly on the car because they were put on backward or some such drivel at the plant - this explains high break wear at least
47,000KM Power door locks fail(Can't get into the car...have to crawl through passenger window with tow truck guy helping, emergency break no longer works, rear window defroster fails
53,000KM front break pads gone yet again, anti-lock breaking engages with every break, muffler needs replacing -
Decide time to cut losses before I get into accident and tust that GM has properly designed the seatbelts and or Airbag....judjing by safety ratings it's a death trap so trade in get Honda Civic. GM 54,000km sold.

Honda Civic to 89,000KM

1000KM front light condensation built up - looked kinda ugly.

20,000km emergency break handle glue not sticking so - hard to push the button. Still worked just awkward. Fixed in 20 minutes.

89,000KM sold car 30% left on original break pads.

Buying exteneded warranty:
on GM $2000.00 for a one year 20,000km power train - didn't buy it.

On Honda 2 year bumper to bumper warranty $400.00Cdn to make it a 5 year bumper to bumper. $400.00 more for & year bumper t bumper...not offered on the GM at all.

I should have known then but we learn from our mistakes. The New GM still has that atrocious trunk and the same cheap seats and plastic interiopr with the same drive train...GARBAGE. And it's the high end Cavelier...uggh - Just like Bose ---advertise it to death and if you advertise it they will come.

[kexodusc]

Ah, thanks for clearing that up RGA. A few comments:
I definitely agree with you about the Lemon Aid and Consumer reports. Truth is, they're a very helpful form of free advertising for my company, though they exaggerate Honda's (and I dare say Toyota's) quality track records terribly.
I have no doubt that the Japanese manufacturers actually build a more durable vehicle. However, in my job I come across numerous studies, some internal some public which evaluat the "total cost of ownership" of our vehicles versus our competitors.
There's a few ways to do this, but basically it involves average sale price, and cost of repairs traditionally over a 6 year period (though sometimes you'll see a less meaningful 3 year period). There is a cost factor calculated for the customer's time and frustration that progressively rises as the initial vehicle cost goes up. In these studies, you'll find that GM in particular does quite well. I should give credit to Chrysler, too, they're quality initiative has been something else to watch since 1998 and if you've been following, they've been the manufacturer that's improved their warranties the most. I don't have anything nice to say about Ford, but I own a Mustang that's been cursed, so I'm biased.
Funny you should bring up Cavaliers. They are the leader in their class when referring to "total cost of ownership". I belive the newer Grand Am's finished quite high as well.
Part of the reason is many students and young people purchase them as cheap first cars, and can afford an extra hour or two a year for maintenance.
One final comment, our marketing research still shows that quality is lower on the priority list for most North Americans than other features. In the US, vehicle turnover is about 5 years for the typical family. Warranty's and powertrain coverage generally provide enough coverage. The North American public still feels that US made vehicles offer more performance, better design, and more features at a lower cost at the expense of quality. This may or may not be true as it is quite subjective, but it should help explain to you why people buy American. Honda in has been paying a lot of money to place their products in Hollywood movies and music videos to improve it's image (ahem...the Fast and the Furious). If Bose did this in the audio world they'd be chastised.

[Woochifer]

Well I still only hear hearsay no facts about the audio equipment.

As for cars - I may be out of date with my info but "All Mercedes, Audi, Jaguar and Land Rover" did poorly.

Now I though American car companies owned all of these except Mercedes which owns Chrysler. So Chrysler doing better than Mercedes is odd since they're one and the same company.

Mercedes' trouble began even before the Daimler-Chrysler merger. Their ranking on the JD Power initial quality survey had been on the decline for years after ranking in the top three consistently throughout the 80s and early-90s, and it's been within the past three or four years that it started showing up on Consumer Reports' reliability ratings as well.

Land Rover and other Rover Group models have had reliability problems as long as I can remember, and their past partners before Ford acquired the Land Rover brand in 2000 were BMW and Honda. The Rover Group was responsible for the Sterling, which was basically the British version of the Acura Legend, and even with a Honda platform and drivetrain, the Sterling was one of the most unreliable cars of the 80s.

Audi has a partnership with Volkwagen and has no ties to any American companies. And there have been several write-ups in business publications on the production and reliability problems that Volkwagen has had, and how it threatens to undermine the great sales rebound that the company has had the last few years. You want to go on a lemon hunt, look no further than VW, which has been in the bottom tier of the JD Power rankings for years and the CU data corroborates it.

Consumer reports...Yes I bought my 1994 Grand Am because Consumer Reports said it was more reliable than most every car in its class - I should have read the Lemon Aid as it was rubbished...Consumer Reports LATER had it as the lemon it was and still is.

The Focus has an awful record in Lemon Aid and good one in Consumer reports...ahh stats from polls...and did I read correctly that we're believing the manufacturers and what they claim is a break down? 20 to 18 even if that is correct is negligable and probably rooted out with a larger poll...like all the people who don't subscribe to consumer reports. Far less people own German cars so I would like to see the actual break down...Ie;the sample size for European cars would be FAR smaller than that of the American cars.

What data source does Lemon Aid use? My recollection from a prior thread is that they don't even track every model for every year. That would indicate that they are working from secondary data sources, which they would need to independently verify. It seems very simplistic.

Your comments on the Focus aren't factually correct either. CU has always rated the Focus highly based on its performance and subjective evaluations, but they did not recommend it during its first three years because of reliability problems. The last two model years, the reliability has improved enough for them to recommend the model.

And your comments on statistics don't really indicate a well grounded understanding of sampling procedures and survey research. First off, CU's car reliability ratings are based on a sample of 700,000 responses, which in any kind of survey research would constitute an exceptionally large sample. It doesn't matter one bit that the respondents are primarily Consumer Reports subscribers, provided that the pool of vehicles represented in the survey is a sufficiently random sample from different production facilities and production runs.

Any model that does not have a large enough sample to meet the confidence interval that they specify, they exclude from the reliability rankings. In a random survey, you only need a sample of about 25-30 responses to meet a confidence level of at least 90%. EVERY model that they report on meets their standard for statistical validity, and I believe that their stats rely on a fairly high degree of rigor before it gets reported. The CU survey methodology is valid because they maintain control over the survey distribution and data collection. This certain seems more comparable than whatever source Lemon Aid is using, since they seem to rely on industry generated data that may or may not have identical reporting formats and categorical protocols.

The only survey I'm aware of that has more extensive coverage than the CU survey is the JD Power survey, which bases its rankings on more than a million responses. (I got one when I bought my Acura, and my parents got the JD Power surveys for their Toyota and VW) In general, if you're looking for indications on things to come, the JD Power survey is a good source for spotting potential trends, like when Mercedes started dropping down the ranking and Cadillac moved up. The Consumer Reports reliability ratings typically confirm the JD Power trends a few years later.

Buyers have figured it out over ten years since Toyota has finally surpassed GM. Though the Americans have figured it out with all the numerous co-productions. The Toyota Matrix and Pontiac Vibe(same car same plant - slightly alrtered body and interior) have gotten good reviews...perhaps mixing the Japanese know-how with the American styling I have said would be best for both entities.

So, are you saying that the mass market always gravitates to the best products? If so, then the genius of Bose's mass market success must say something about their product quality as well.

Now if only Ford could somehow stop having their tires blow up because THEY can't design wheels and if they can stop their cars from blowing up on rear impact - Crown Victoria police cars - they might sit better with me. I mean they've been making them long enough and been sued enough time and they STILL have the exact same problems. Jaguar is owned by Ford...and the Jag is a POS. Blaming Europe? Now that I don't get...That's like Disney blaming Euro Disney for making no money...when it was stupid decsion by American owners not to investigate what their market was first.

Now, you're getting into the ridiculous exaggerations. First off, aside from the much publicized Ford Explorer fitted with Firestone tires, what other Ford models have had problems with tires blowing up? If it's the wheels that were at fault (and Ford buys their wheels from a lot of the same outsource suppliers as other car companies), then how come identical Explorer models with Goodyear tires had lower failure rates? And all that stuff about police cars blowing up, it's hard to do any kind of comparison considering that the Ford Crown Victoria is the ONLY police interceptor being marketed in North America right now. Do you know that these exploding police cars are doing so because of a design defect or because of how those police cars get driven? I got news for you ... ANY car can and will explode if it gets into a collision at high speeds.

Your whole attempt to excuse European car makers and somehow blame American ownership for their slide into mediocrity is really grasping at straws. Jaguar was a very unreliable car when they were under British ownership. The most famous trait of vintage Jags was that the British designers could never figure out how to keep those things from leaking oil. At least under Ford ownership, the engine blocks don't leak anymore.

The problem with European cars is that they did not keep up with the rest of the industry. Mercedes is attempting to compete in a global market, yet they have not fundamentally changed how they design new models, which is akin to reinventing the wheel ever new model run. Because of their much higher R&D costs, they've decided to maintain their profit margins per car by basically cheapening and cutting corners on the materials used, which has been discussed at length on Mercedes message boards for about the last five years. Lexus passed Mercedes by designing their cars around a price target, and using shared components from previous Lexus models or other Toyotas if necessary.

BMW held steady, but their new 5 and 7 series models have had early production problems, especially in the electrical systems, which are basically introducing a lot of new and unproven technologies.

If you actually read that article that I posted, you'll note that 20 years ago, the American car makers had a defect rate that was more than double what the European car makers showed. Since then, the European car makers have lowered their defect from about 50/100 vehicles to 20/100 vehicles; however, American car makers have lowered their defect rate from over 100/100 vehicles to 18/100 vehicles. If anything, the American car makers had adapted to global competition, while European car makers have let their guard down.

I have heard various problems with Marantz here as well...one dealer dumped Marantz for repair and lousy customer service in the 1980s brought in Sony and Yammie and they sucked dumped them - then you see a decade later they bring them back and give em another try - Now they carry 3 or even 4 of those major players. Seems to me like it's a cycle - bad runs very possible. Denon marantz is funny because hey they don't care which you buy the moeny goes to the same pot. Sorta like the GM of receivers. I mean they brought out Saturn as a way to distance themselves from themselves - gee hopefully people won't think we're GM. Didn't work but it made a lot of sense.

First off, some history about Marantz (which you seem to be missing here). Marantz was an American company owned by Saul Marantz that primarily sold separates and tube components, until the mid-70s when the company was sold to Superscope, and that was when they shifted their R&D and manufacturing to Japan. It stayed there until Philips acquired the consumer unit in the 80s. Two years ago, Denon was acquired by a holding company, and a few months later, that holding company bought out most of Philips' share of Marantz.

You're basically spinning a load about the Denon/Marantz ownership, because both companies have maintained separate R&D facilities and use different outsource manufacturers. That might be changing since D&M Holdings is now setting up a separate manufacturing subsidiary, presumably to merge Denon and Marantz' manufacturing operations under one roof. And McIntosh is now owned by the same company, yet you don't see huge changes to their product line and their manufacturing continues to originate from the same U.S. facility as before.

You say that things go in cycles, but the thing is that some manufacturers have had more problematic production runs than others. Yamaha for example has never gone into a problematic cycle where they would just crank out one bad run after another. Denon has also been very good over the years at keeping away from big problems. Sometimes it is luck of the draw, but other times you have glaring patterns like some of Sony's DE series receivers, or the Marantz SR-7200 which had a design defect in the power supply that made its way into the early production models, or the reliability problems that h/k had in their receivers once they started outsourcing their manufacturing.

And to the contrary, the GM brand is not as universally reviled as your wishful thinking would indicate. So, you bought a lemon from them, get over it! That was 10 years ago. All of GM's advertising puts Saturn into the GM family, along with Saab and Hummer. Saturn has never ran from their GM ownership. Their brand loyalty stems from a whole other slew of factors related to the buying experience that are different from every other car company out there. Saturn's owner satisfaction ratings are up there with Lexus, and it's not entirely because the cars are the best, but rather because of the buying experience.

[Woochifer]

This is my point though at least there are SOME actual numbers for cars. the fact that they're not specific numbers is no help.

If I had a BMW I might bring it in for something totally anal where as with the Cavelier it may be that the transmission fell out --both count as a customer complaint both count as a service -- yet it is obvious which one is a bigger POS. Performance requires more work that is not oging to stop someone from owning a Bugatti...even if it's in the shop every 300km of driving.

You obviously have very limited understanding of statistical principles. The scenario that you point out is nothing but a hypothetical conjured more out of your imagination than reality. Your opinion over which one is a bigger POS is also just that, unsubstantiated opinion.

I was pointing out that the so called European cars that supposedly suck worse than American cars are OWNED by American companies. BMW and Volkswagen were not mentioned in the article and Mercedes has had issues for over a decade --The Lemon Aid supports Consumer Reports on that count. However the first three years of the Ford Focus the lemon Aid thinks is if not the worst car on the road it's right down there. The American owned Consumer Reports does not seem to indicate that.

Oh, don't let facts spoil a good conspiracy story. BMW WAS mentioned in the linked article (the problems with the 7 series have been reported elsewhere as well), and Volkswagen's reliability problems the past four or so years are well documented in the Consumer Reports auto issue and in the pages of various business magazines that have been predicting that VW's reliability problems might shortcircuit their comeback (and last year, their sales dropped by 12 percent, well above the industrywide decline). And contrary to what you might think, the Ford Focus was on Consumer Reports' list of cars to avoid for the first three years. But, with improved reliability on the newer models, last year they put the Focus on their recommended cars list, because other than the early reliability problems, the Focus was their top rated compact car. And what does Consumer Reports' American ownership have to do with anything? If they had some kind of bias, why would Japanese cars consistently rank highly on their lists?

The problem is that Consumer Reports is polling subscribers. If they poll 700,000 people maybe 10,000 of them own a European car. The stats finding would have a much smaller sampling of Euro cars and the results far leass meaningfull. Any basic stats course covers this and naturally the American owned newspeaper with American interests lie by omission and readers are too ignorant to find out all of the numbers. And before Woochifer gets on my case by saying I pulled 10,000 out my ass surely even he knows that the big three outsell all of the Euro cars combined by a huge margin WITHIN the the US market. Either way if they don't provide a BREAKDOWN of the numbers it's meaningless.

That's a load of horses**t and either you know it and are distorting facts to make an argument, or you truly are clueless about survey research and statistical sampling procedures. First off, you ARE pulling a number out of your ass, so why put it out there in the first place if you just conjured it up with zero factual basis? FYI, the actual market share of European nameplates is about seven percent, and it's not that hard to look that kind of stuff up. (translated that would equate to a sample of about 47,000)

And even if the actual sample figure was 10,000, how is that statistically insignificant? Just because it's lower than the sample for American cars does not mean that the conclusions are compromised. Check your statistics textbook sometime (that is if you've ever read one) and look up the sample size needed for 90, 95, and 98 percent confidence intervals -- it's not that big if your sample is sufficiently random. And just in case you never bothered to actually go through the reliability charts, you might be interested in finding that any model that truly does not have a large enough data sample does not get reported in Consumer Reports' reliability data (just look for where it says "Insufficient Data"). Not knowing the distribution of responses is a nonissue if CU is using a consistently high confidence interval in the sampling. For you to say that Consumer Reports is lying and their readers are ignorant is hypocritical because your post demonstrates far more untruth and ignorance than anything that Consumer Reports has said about auto reliability.

If the CU sample is so insufficient, name me another survey that has a sample size of more than 675,000 respondents if you're so fixated on a higher sampling rate. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics calculates the U.S. Consumer Price Index based on a survey of 7,500 households. Obviously, the statisticians at the BLS (who are among the best in the field) don't have a problem with that sample size, and the way that those numbers get parsed and cross-tabulated (by income group, by region, by household size, by race/ethnicity, etc.) is much more extensive than what CU does with the automobile reliability ratings.

Have you ever actually done survey research? I can tell you from experience with consumer surveys that the substantive differences drawn from a 1,000 household random sample versus a 10,000 household random sample are basically nonexistent; and even the difference between 100 and 1,000 responses is not that great.

And your little inneuendo about Consumer Reports subscribers and their evil American bias is pretty laughable. As I mentioned earlier, unless Consumer Reports subscribers are buying their cars from a different network of dealers or the cars are manufactured in different plants from the general population, then your objection means absolutely nothing. And a basic statistics class would be more than enough to get an introduction to error analysis and bias suppression. Oh, and BTW, the last time I checked, the cars being surveyed are the ones that are actually sold in America! Of course, that means that an American non-profit organization is the worst possible source to conduct such a study. Gosh, maybe we should call in an African or South American magazine to do an more unbiased or statistically significant survey.

The 94 Grand Am I had had 4 or 6 pages JUST to help you fix the rattles. After it was in the shop 6 times in 18 months and talking to the GM repairman I got a few inside scoops on the pracitces of the company starting with a deliberate design to aid in alternator failures and some of the worst computer chips ever built by anyone. If a Beretta's chip fail you're looking at $1800.00Cdn...without the car doesn't run. Same chip in several cars but he referred to the Beretta.

Hmmm, a survey sample of 675,000 is too small and questionable to draw conclusions from, yet your survey of ONE car IS conclusive! I'm sure your stats professor is proud of you.

[RGA]

Lemon Aid

"Out of 100 vehicles, we're apt to build 10 that are as good as any that Toyota has ever built, 80 that are okay and 10 that cause repeated problems for our customers." Robert Lutz, President Chrysler U.S. Chrysler Times, 17 July 1995

That's right Robert, and that's why Lemon Aid warns buyers to steer clear of that last ten percent and even reconsider that 80 percent you qualify as "okay." It's hard to believe I've been writing Lemon-Aid guides for almost 27 years. Imagine, when the first guides were written, Volkswagen had a monopoly on cold, slow, and unsold Beetles and minivans, Ford was selling biodegradable pickups (and denying it had a J-67 secret warranty to cover rust repairs), and a good, three-year-old used car could be found for less than $2,000.

The Lemon-Aid Used Car Guide is unlike any other auto book on the market. Its main objective, to inform and protect consumers in an industry known for its dishonesty and exaggerated claims, remains unchanged. However, this guide also focuses on secret warranties and confidential service bulletins that automakers swear don't exist. That's why you'll be interested in the "Index of Key Documents" section of the book. There you'll find the exact bulletin, memo, or news clipping reproduced from the original so neither the dealer nor automaker can weasel out of its obligations.

The Lemon-Aid guide's information is culled mostly from U. S. and Canadian sources and is gathered throughout the year from owner complaints, whistle blowers, lawsuits, and judgments, as well as from confidential manufacturer service bulletins.

Lemon-Aid does more than complain and explain. It targets abusive auto industry practices and lobbies automakers for changes. For example, two years ago Lemon-Aid blew the whistle on Chrysler's failure-prone automatic transmissions, brakes, and paint. Following Lemon-Aid's downgrading of Chrysler's products, company officials met with the author and set up a Warranty Review Committee to pay claims previously rejected.

Hit by a similar downgrading, Ford officials met with me on January 13th of this year and began giving refunds to Taurus, Sable, and Windstar owners with 3.8L V6 engine and automatic transmission claims even after their warranty had expired or they had been refused a refund in the past (see Part Two, "Invest in Protest").

This year's guide takes on GM's Saturn division for its factory-related powertrain and body deficiencies.

Lemon-Aid is really four books in one: a year-round SERVICE MANUAL showing diagnostic shortcuts and listing upgraded parts numbers, a GUIDE to over two decades of lemons and cherries, an ARCHIVE of internal service bulletins and memos granting free repairs and a LEGAL PRIMER to get your money back.

Safety defects get resolved through websites as well

Debra and Edward Goldgehn's 1985 Ford Ranger caught fire and burned completely. The couple's suspicions that it was a factory-related defect were later confirmed by a TV show that reported a series of similar Ford fires. The couple created their own web site called "Flaming Fords" and began amassing an incredible database containing reports of similar fires, class action lawsuits, expert witnesses, and actions taken in other countries. (For example, Ford had already recalled a number of its vehicles in order to fix the problem in Canada.) Shortly thereafter, Ford USA recalled 8.7 million cars and trucks, representing the largest recall ever announced by a single auto manufacturer. Ford says that the Internet pressure (the site has now been taken down) was coincidental and not a factor in its decision to recall the vehicles in the States.

Right, and Elvis is building Fords in Oakville.

Ratings may contradict Consumer Reports or auto club ratings due to the weight given owner complaints and internal service bulletins.

Why the Ford downgrade? Simple. Abysmally poor quality and Scrooke-like warranty assistance.

Focus, Taurus, Sable and Windstar owners may be angry that their vehicles have been downgraded to Not Recommended in this year's guides, while some of Chrysler's models, faced with similar on-going failures, are given an Average or better rating.

BAD BUYS

Cadillac: Allante, Catera, Cimarron, and all other front-drives (show-off cars for the nouveau riche and nouveau dumb)

Chrysler: Horizon, minivans (up to 1997), Neon, Omni (engine, brake, and automatic transmission failures; paint delamination)

Chrysler: Cirrus and Stratus (engine, automatic transmission, and AC failures)

Chrysler: Concorde, Intrepid, LHS, New Yorker, Vision (automatic transmission, brakes and AC failures; body leaks)

Daewoo: all models and years (coming out of bankruptcy; newly acquired by GM)

Ford: Focus, Taurus, Tempo, Topaz, Sable, Windstar (electrical glitches, engine, transmission, and brake failures)

GM Saturn: all models and years (engine failures, electrical glitches, and poor body fit and finish)

Hyundai: Excel, Pony, early Sonatas, Stellar (biodegradable bodies, serious engine, transmission, electrical, brake and fuel system failures)

Jaguar: all models and years (lots of cash for pseudo-cachet from Ford; mediocre quality and problematic servicing)

Kia: Sportage (a poorly performing sport-utility with an uncertain future)

Lincoln: Continental front-drive (engine, transmission, AC and brake failures)

Mazda: MPV (pre-2002 model was a gutless runt)

Saab: (electrical failures, problematic servicing, and quirky).

VW: Rabbit and EuroVan (mediocre quality control an Problems getting parts and service; Camper is ideal for waiting for a tow from Hans or Helmut)


GOOD BUYS

Audi: A4 and A6 (no more sudden acceleration unless you're talking about sales)

Chrysler: Colt, Summit, Stealth (three of the best cars Chrysler never built)

Ford: Escort, Mustang, Crown Victoria, Grand Marquis (a Mazda spinoff and rear drive reliability)

GM: Caprice, Camaro, Cavalier, Firebird, Roadmaster, Sunbird, Sunfire (dependable rear drives and well-equipped, inexpensive front-drive small cars)

Honda: Accord, Civic, Odyssey after '98 (reliable and slow to depreciate)

Hyundai: Elantra, Tiburon (fairly reliable and inexpensive)

Infiniti: all models and years, except for the G20 (a better-performing Maxima)

Lexus: all models and years (your father's Oldsmobile, if he were Japanese)

Lincoln: Rear-drive Continental and Town Car (best American luxury cars)

Mazda: 626, 929, Miata, Protege (reasonably-priced and almost as reliable as the Honda, Toyota competition)

Mercedes: 300 series (expensive, but you get your money back at trade-in time)

Nissan: Axxess, Maxima, Sentra (reliable and reasonably priced)

Subaru: Legacy and Forester (4X4 is what makes them special; reliability is in the Mazda, Nissan, class, almost as good as Toyota and Honda)

Toyota: Avalon, Camry, Solara, Sienna (Camry redux)

Recommended
Honda CR-V (2002)
Lexus LX 450, LX 470 (1998-2002)
Lexus RX 300 (2001-02)
Nissan Xterra (2001-02)
Subaru Forester (2001-02)
Toyota 4Runner (1996-2002)
Toyota Highlander (2001-02)
Toyota RAV4 (2001-02)
Toyota Sequoia (2001-02)


Not Recommended
DaimlerChrysler Jeep Cherokee, Grand Cherokee (1985-94)
DaimlerChrysler Jeep Liberty (2002)
Ford Explorer, Mountaineer (1991-2001)
General Motors Avalanche (2002)
General Motors TrailBlazer, Envoy, Bravada (2002)
General Motors Blazer, Envoy, Jimmy (1983-94)
General Motors Cadillac Escalade (1999-2002)
General Motors Suburban, Yukon XL (1985-94)
General Motors Tahoe, Yukon (1985-89)
Isuzu Axiom (2002)
Suzuki XL-7 (2002)
http://www.lemonaidcars.com/ford.htm http://www.lemonaidcars.com/chrysler.htm

Government Investigates Ford Focus
Posted 06/06/02 4:50 p.m. CDT

By Nedra Pickler
Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Safety officials have opened two new investigations into the Ford Focus , this time amid complaints the engine can suddenly stall and the front suspension can collapse.
The government has begun six investigations into the popular subcompact this year. Tim Hurd, a spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, said Thursday he cannot recall the government’s ever having as many investigations into one vehicle at the same time.

Seventy-two people told NHTSA that the Focus stalled while they were driving, including seven who crashed. Seven people reported the front suspension control arm fractured while they were driving, which led to six crashes.

The investigation into engine stall involves 574,700 cars from the 2000 and 2001 model years, the first two years of production. The suspension investigation also includes the 2002 model year.

The Focus is the country’s fifth-best-selling car, trailing only the Honda Accord , Toyota Camry, Ford Taurus and Honda Civic. But it has been plagued with safety problems, already having been recalled eight times for problems ranging from faulty seat latches and windshield wipers to a throttle that can stick open.

Two of NHTSA’s other open investigations involve possible airbag malfunctions, while the remaining were prompted by reports the rear wheel bearings could fail and the engine could catch fire.

NHTSA investigators said the alleged engine stall problem may be caused by debris accumulating in the gas tank, blocking fuel from being delivered to the engine.

NHTSA also is stepping up its investigation into nearly half a million General Motors vehicles after 28 crashes were blamed on a possible steering problem. More than 1,200 people have complained that the steering rack and pinion suddenly locked up while they were driving.

The investigation involves the 1998 Oldsmobile Intrigue and 1997 models of the Pontiac Grand Prix, Pontiac Tran Sport, Chevrolet Venture, Chevrolet Malibu, Oldsmobile Silhouette and Oldsmobile Cutlass.

The problem can cause the driver to lose steering control. GM reported six crashes in which eight people were hurt, but no injuries or deaths were reported in the other 22 crashes.

NHTSA opens any investigation with a preliminary inquiry, in which the agency and the manufacturer exchange paperwork. The Focus investigations are at this stage.

The agency can upgrade the case to an engineering analysis if it wants to examine the vehicle in detail for a possible safety defect. The GM investigation is in this stage.

NHTSA’s investigations can lead to a recall, but many are dropped.

Spokesmen for Ford and General Motors would not comment on the investigations except to say the companies are cooperating with the agency.

NHTSA also opened a preliminary investigation into about 75,000 Toyota T100 pickups from the 1993 – 1998 model years. Fourteen people have complained to the agency that the clutch pedal mounting bracket or the firewall where it attaches will fracture while driving.

The problem would stop the clutch from disengaging when the pedal is pressed and could cause the vehicle to move unintentionally, the engine to stall or stopping distances to increase.

Ford shares declined 20 cents to close Thursday at $16.75 on the New York Stock Exchange, while GM shares lost 89 cents to close at $58.20.



NHTSA Gambles With Focus Owners' Lives; No Recall Is Bad Law and Bad Safety

Ford Allowed to Replace Defective Fuel Pump After Dangerous Stalling


In an unprecedented decision that is both bad law and bad safety, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) closed a defect investigation into 573,585 2000-02 Ford Focus for stalling due to defective fuel delivery modules ("fuel pumps") by permitting Ford to replace the fuel pumps after they fail. During its investigation NHTSA found "the Focus will stall at all speeds without notice." (EA02-022 Opening Resume.) Even when NHTSA closed past investigations with "service campaigns," the campaigns involved the manufacturer replacing the defective part prior to failure.

Center for Auto Safety (CAS) Executive Director Clarence Ditlow criticized NHTSA for ignoring its own successful litigation record on stalling and over a hundred previous stalling recalls and being less able than private lawyers in standing up to Ford: Mr. Ditlow said:

NHTSA’s decision to gamble with Focus owners’ lives is bad law and bad safety. In the 1970's, NHTSA won two cases, United States v. General Motors Corp., 417 F.Supp 933 (D.D.C.), 565 F.2d 754 (1977) and United States v. Ford Motor Co., 453 F.Supp 1240 (D.D.C. 1978) where two US District Courts held vehicles stopped on the roadway or even on the roadside were safety defects. NHTSA has conducted over 100 safety recalls for stalling. By caving in to Ford, NHTSA admits that its lawyers are either less capable or more politically bound than class action attorneys who can win trials on stalling as a safety defect as in Howard v. Ford Motor Co., No. 763785-2, Alameda County, Calif. Super Ct.(Oct. 11, 2000). There Judge Ballachey held "stalling, under almost any circumstances, presents an unreasonable risk to automobile safety and to the safety of the occupants of any such vehicle. It would defy common sense and the weight of the evidence to find otherwise." (Id. At 12.)

In a letter today, the Center asked NHTSA to reopen the investigation and order a safety recall to prevent deadly stalls in the Ford Focus from happening by replacing the fuel pump before it fails rather than gambling with consumers’ lives by replacing the fuel pump after it fails.

Ford insists cars safe, but cops keep dying
Fatalities from rear-crash fires are higher than government toll
DETROIT FREE PRESS
December 8, 2003
By Jennifer Dixon
Free Press Staff Writer

First of two parts

Sheriff's Deputy Matthew Dominick barely had time to react last October when he saw a car hurtling toward his parked Crown Victoria on a roadside in Boone County, Iowa. He jumped to another lane, just as the Chevy Malibu slammed into the rear of his 2003 Crown Vic, ripping open its 19-gallon steel gas tank and igniting a fuel-fed fire that engulfed the patrol car in seconds. Ammunition and bags of confiscated fireworks began firing in the trunk, forcing emergency workersto take cover in a ditch. No one was hurt. But afterward, Sheriff Ron Fehr found himself asking a question that has dogged Ford Motor Co. for years: Does the most popular police car in America have a fatal flaw?

A Free Press investigation found that more people have died in fiery rear-impact crashes in the Crown Victoria and two similar sedans than federal regulators revealed when they cleared the vehicles and their rear-mounted gas tanks of any manufacturing defects last year.

The regulators, focusing mainly on police cases, counted 16 fatalities in rear-impact fires in cars built between 1992 and 2001. But the Free Press documented 30 deaths during that span and a total of 69 in the last two decades, including at least 18 officers. Ford insists the Crown Vic is safe and meets all federal standards, a view shared by regulators. Ford also says the car has a comparable record to other big sedans in fatal fires resulting from all types of crashes.

But the story of the Crown Vic Police Interceptor is about more than statistics. It is a story of how police agencies and their mechanics sought for three years to convince Ford to end the roadside infernos, while the toll of victims continued to grow. It is also an inside look at an automaker's struggle to persuade police that the cars were not inherently flawed -- and that no vehicle could withstand the kinds of crashes that were killing cops.

Throughout 2000 and 2001, as Ford was mired in a corporate crisis brought on by fatal rollover accidents involving its popular Explorer, the world's No. 2 automaker kept assuring police and their mechanics that they had nothing to fear with the Crown Vic. Ford met with police and political officials, offering up bar charts and brochures to allay their concerns.

But as the deaths increased, and as autopsy reports showed that many of the officers would have survived if not for the fires, Ford reversed course. The company agreed to begin outfitting the police cars with safety shields to protect the gas tanks. Mechanics at some police departments had begun doing the same thing on their own a year before.

When the new shields failed to quell lingering fears, the company took an extraordinary next step. It decided to offer fire suppression systems in the 2005 model of its police interceptors, the kinds of systems typically found in armored personnel carriers. The automaker says it was simply making a safe car safer.

Ford officials emphasize that no design can eliminate all risk in high-impact crashes. The company also says fatality figures are meaningless in isolation.

"I think the focus of saying, 'Here's a list of people who have died in a Crown Vic' takes away the view of, 'Are these frequent accidents? Are these rare accidents?' " said Sue Cischke, Ford vice president for environmental and safety engineering. "These are very rare accidents occurring under very high-speed, high-energy impacts. To use a word like death toll makes it sound like it's an epidemic, and I just think that's the wrong way of looking at it."

The reality is that rear-end crashes are rare. And police tend to be at greater risk than civilians of being in rear-impact crashes because they're often in harm's way while stopped at crash scenes and on roadsides.

Even so, some police and consumer advocates remain critical of Ford's response.

"Some people are being killed who didn't need to be," said Patricia Werhane, a professor of business ethics at the University of Virginia and DePaul University in Chicago, who has studied the Ford Pinto. The small car came under scrutiny in the 1970s for rear-end fires that killed at least 26 people. Werhane said the Crown Vic, with its gas tank behind the rear axle, should have been reengineered by now. It is built on a platform, or basic mechanical structure, launched in 1979.

Industry experts said most passenger cars built today have gas tanks forward of the rear suspension because it's considered a more protected location.

In the Iowa deputy's case, Dominick's car had been outfitted with Ford's new safety shields. But the Crown Vic still burst into flames, leaving him and his boss with doubts about whether the gas tank can ever be fixed. "It makes you wonder," the sheriff said. "It didn't help."

Lt. Greg Abbott of the Cobb County Police Department in suburban Atlanta, who narrowly escaped death in a Crown Vic hit from behind in 2002, is convinced something is wrong: "In a rear-impact accident, the Crown Vic is just a firebomb waiting to happen."

Police deaths in the car mount
It was 1998 when Lt. James Wells Jr. of the Florida Highway Patrol first suspected something was wrong. Two Florida highway patrol officers had been involved in similar rear-end crashes with fire. In 1997, Trooper Robert Smith was killed when a driver hit his Crown Vic from behind, setting his car ablaze. A year later, Trooper Marisa Sanders was severely injured when her Chevrolet Caprice patrol car was hit, leaking gas that caught fire as she stood outside the vehicle. Two late-night accidents. Two drunken drivers. Two different police cars. Too many coincidences for Wells.

Wells, who runs the patrol's equipment, compliance and testing office, began to investigate. He looked at all known deaths by fire in rear-ended police cars and determined that the Crown Vic and the Caprice were catching fire at about the same rate. But General Motors Corp.had stopped making the Caprice in 1996, leaving the market for police cars largely to Ford. So Wells decided to take a harder look at the Crown Vic and its gas tank, sandwiched between the rear axle and the forward trunk wall.

After investigating for more than seven months, Wells reported his findings to Col. Charles Hall, director of the Florida Highway Patrol, on July 26, 1999. That same Monday, as Hall met with his staff to discuss Wells' report, another Florida cop died.

Madison County Sheriff's Deputy Steven Agner was driving less than 5 miles an hour as part of a construction crew in north Florida when a Florida State University student, talking on her cell phone, came cruising along I-10. At about 70 m.p.h., her Chevrolet pickup plowed into Agner's 1999 Crown Vic patrol car. The Crown Vic caught fire immediately. Agner was trapped inside with a broken collarbone. The autopsy showed he burned to death.

The next day, Wells inspected the gas tank of Agner's car and found that it had been cut by the arm that holds the shock absorber on the right side of the rear axle. He added the details to his report. A week later, on Aug. 3, the Highway Patrol shipped Wells' report to Ford with a recommendation: Move the Crown Victoria's fuel tank from behind the rear axle to an area in front of it. If the tank couldn't be moved, Wells wrote, Ford should consider other options -- reinforcing the tank with shields to protect it from suspension components, lining the inside of the gas tank with a bladder to prevent leaks or installing a fire suppression system.

In a letter accompanying the report, Hall told Ford the Crown Victoria "does not adequately protect our officers in one of their principal job environments." Wells waited nine months for his first meeting with Ford to talk about his report. In the meantime, the fires and deaths continued, with police still the most visible victims.

On Feb. 18, 2000, Officer Skip Fink pulled over a motorist for a traffic violation on U.S. 60 in Tempe, Ariz. It was 5:40 a.m., not yet daylight. Before Fink could get out of his car, a Honda Prelude slammed into his 1999Crown Victoria. Gas gushed out of the punctured tank, and flames quickly consumed the car. Several motorists tried to help Fink. They heard the 264-pound man moaning and trying to speak as he tried to escape. Finally, rescuers pulled him from the wreckage. He was alive when paramedics arrived but showed no signs of life when he arrived at the Maricopa County Medical Center. An autopsy showed he died of burns and smoke inhalation. He had no other traumatic injuries.

There would have been nothing suspicious about Fink's death -- except that 14 months earlier, the same thing had happened to state Police Officer Juan Cruz. Parked on the inside westbound lane of I-10 outside Tucson, Cruz was finishing an accident report in his 1996 Crown Victoria when it was rear-ended by a woman who had been drinking while celebrating her 21st birthday. The patrol car burst into flames.Cruz died fromburns and smoke inhalation.

Two rear-ended Crown Victorias. Two fireballs. Two dead state troopers. Too many coincidences for Mike Lopker, manager of the City of Phoenix's police fleet. Lopker worried: Was something wrong with the Crown Vic? Would an officer on the Phoenix force die next?

From a mechanics' yard in south Phoenix, Lopker's assistants called Ford. Lopker said Ford assured them the car was safe.

He recalled a Ford official as saying, "We don't have anything to share. We don't know anything about this. You're the only one experiencing this."

Kristen Kinley, a Ford spokeswoman, said the company tried to be responsive to all of its police customers. "Safety at Ford has never taken a backseat to other issues," she said.

[Yeah never? the Pinto was known ahead of time and DELIBERATE to save a few bucks as well as the 1965 Mustangs which also were fireballs - Never...hahahahaha...only a total moronice numbnuts believes Ford]

Lopker, a mechanic, assumed he was a lone voice in Arizona, unaware that Wells, the Florida trooper, had warned Ford about the vehicle six months earlier. Nonetheless, he persisted in seeking answers. Lopker had mechanics put four Crown Vics up on lifts to look for any sharp edges or metal tabs that could puncture the gas tank. They didn't find anything remarkable.

"We're in the maintenance business," Lopker said. "We don't do crash investigations. We didn't understand what happens in a crash." Lopker's office called its Ford representative in the Phoenix area, asking whether he knew anything about the fires or car. "We were unsuccessful getting any information from Ford," Lopker said.

In the meantime, Wells, who wrote the Florida Highway Patrol report, met with Ford officials in Dearborn on May 4, 2000. They put cars on lifts, examined the vehicles and talked about Wells' concerns. He said Ford assured him themodel was safe.

In Arizona, Lopker and officials at the state Department of Public Safety remained worried. The department called Ford in January 2001. The next month, Ford dispatched a handful of representatives to Phoenix to meet with department officials. The Ford representatives pulled out charts and accident statistics and told the state troopers that the Crown Victoria was as safe as it could be and exceeded federal standards.

Just before midnight on March 26, 2001, Phoenix Police Officer Jason Schechterle was called to investigate a report of a dead body. Firefighters also were dispatched. on his way to the scene, at an intersection in Phoenix, a taxi with a passenger just out of jail rammed intoSchechterle's 1996 Crown Vic. A fire engulfed the vehicle. Firefighters, already at the scene, put it out. With black smoke and flames swirling around the car, Officer Kevin Chadwick saw what he thought was a silhouette in the front seat. Schechterle was trapped in the seat belt, unconscious. Chadwick cut the belt and freed Schechterle. The fire had burned away Schechterle's ears and most of his nose. It had mangled his hands. He remained in a coma for more than two months and, when he woke, discovered he was blind.

Concern continues to rise
Lopker's worst fears were now realized. But Ford still was telling him the Crown Vic was the "safest car you can buy," he said, and the automaker explained that it could not design a car to survive every crash or protect against all conditions.

The Crown Vic has rear-wheel drive and what is known as a live rear axle, features cops value. When the wheels move up and down, the whole axle moves up and down. The drive shaft, which runs the length of the car from the engine to the rear axle, also must be able to move with the axle. That kind of movement requires room in the car's underbody, leaving little space for a gas tank in front of the rear axle. Ford said the only option was to place the tank behind the rear axle.

Still not satisfiedwith what he was hearing from Ford, Lopker turned to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or NHTSA, which monitors auto safety. He wanted to know whether the Crown Vic was susceptible to rear-impact fires.

What troubled him was that he never had seen a problem on such a wide scale when his officers drove the Chevrolet Caprice, which also had a rear-mounted gas tank. But unlike the Crown Vic's steel tank, the Caprice's tank was plastic and mounted horizontally below the trunk floor. The Crown Vic's tank is mounted vertically, with greater exposure to suspension parts, NHTSA records show.

Lopker asked his staff to call NHTSA in Washington, D.C. At first, they called once a day. Then once a week. Then every two weeks. Then once a month. No answer. "They didn't want to talk to us -- ever," Lopker said. Responding in a recent interview, NHTSA spokesman Rae Tyson said: "I reject that we were nonresponsive. The agency was very responsive to the concerns that were raised by a number of law enforcement agencies."

Dennis Garrett, director of the Arizona Department of Public Safety, also was pressing NHTSA for answers. "There is an unusually high occurrence of fires associated with rear-end collisions of Crown Victoria vehicles," Garrett said in a letter to NHTSA dated April 3, 2001. "This is a trend which should be looked at to see if it is reflected at the national level. The design specifications and construction of the Crown Victoria should be examined by the experts at your disposal to determine if a design flaw exists or authoritatively state that the Crown Victoria, which has become the last full-sized police package sedan, is a safe vehicle for our nation's law enforcement officers."

NHTSA responded by sending a representative to Phoenix to meet with Garrett and other department officials. The representative told them the car was built to federal standards. But the pressure on NHTSA intensified. on June 5, 2001, a defect investigator from NHTSA and a division chief recommended that the agency investigate how often the Crown Vic was catching fire.

In late June, two Ford executives -- Brian Geraghty, director of design analysis, and Bill Koeppel, manager of production vehicle safety and compliance -- met with NHTSA officials to discuss the Crown Vic. During the two-hour meeting, Geraghty and Koeppel passed out the same booklet that Ford had been giving to worried police agencies, according to Geraghty's testimony in a lawsuit filed in the 1997 death of Florida Trooper Robert Smith.

Geraghty testified in a deposition that he and Koeppel met July 3 with Ford's Critical Concerns Review Group, which reviews safety issues, and explained to the group "that there wasn't a defect investigation being opened. We were not told of one being opened." Someone was keeping minutes and made this notation about the potential investigation: "got an agreement NHTSA will not open."

Geraghty, in an interview with the Free Press, described those minutes as inaccurate and said the note-taker was the "kind of a person in the corner who writes things down." "There was not an agreement," he said. "There never was an agreement."

Ford was mired in rollover battle
In any event, the last thing Ford needed at the time was another public relations nightmare, another federal investigation. The company already was reeling from a year of crises. The automaker was roiled by a bitter fight with Bridgestone/Firestone Inc. over who was to blame for fatal accidents caused when Firestone tires failed and Ford Explorers rolled over. Ford also was bleeding money. Sales were slipping. Its U.S. market share was eroding.

Doug Lampe, a Ford lawyer, said the tumult did not overshadow Ford's response to the Crown Vic fires. "The company has the staff, the resources, to handle multiple issues at one time," Lampe said. "That is not a challenge we are unable to meet."

The rollover controversy erupted in 2000, when Bridgestone/Firestone recalled 14.4 million tires, most of them on the Explorer, under pressure from Ford. Congressional hearings soon followed.
The wrangling between the companies flared up again on May 21, 2001, when Firestone said it was ending its 95-year relationship with Ford, creating a messy public divorce. The next day, Ford announced it would replace 13 million more Firestone tires not covered by the original recall.
Ford blamed Firestone, saying it had built defective tires for the Explorer. Bridgestone/Firestone blamed Ford, saying the design of the Explorer caused it to roll over when a tire failed. By then, nearly 150 people had died in crashes blamed on the tires, most of which were on Explorers.

NHTSA cleared the Explorer in October 2001, saying its design did not contribute to rollovers that occurred after tire tread separations. But the crisis took its toll, and there was unrest in the executive ranks.

The first hint of changes to come occurred when Bill Ford, company chairman, began taking more control of the business in July 2001. The board created the Office of Chairman and Chief Executive. Under the unorthodox arrangement, Ford and Chief Executive Jacques Nasser met every few weeks to review company operations. And it appeared Nasser and many top aides might be on the way out.

That August, as the company's red ink grew, Ford announced that it was cutting 4,000 to 5,000 white-collar jobs. on Oct. 30, Nasser was ousted, and Bill Ford stepped in as chief executive. By year's end, Ford would suffer staggering losses -- $5.45 billion. on Jan. 11, 2002, Ford announced a sweeping restructuring -- it was cutting 21,500 jobs in North America, a total of 35,000 worldwide. It was closing five plants and killing off four poor-selling vehicles.

Against this tumultuous backdrop, the problem of fires in police cars was a quiet, relatively small crisis. But it was catching up with Ford.

Ford Device Fails Crash Tests
It could worsen police car fuel leaks, officials say

July 16, 2003

BY JOCELYN PARKER
FREE PRESS BUSINESS WRITER

A device Ford Motor Co. hoped would protect Crown Victoria police cars from fuel tank leaks could actually worsen the problem, according to crash tests ordered by the City of Dallas.

Dallas officials said Tuesday that Ford's Trunk Packs, which are supposed to safeguard the fuel tank from sharp equipment during rear-end crashes, may increase the amount of fuel leakage during accidents.

City officials reported significant fuel leaks in two 75 m.p.h. crash tests.

A test conducted last week on a Crown Victoria equipped with a plastic trunk pack resulted in a 7.6-gallon fuel leakage, far more than the 0.3 gallons of leakage that resulted from a test Ford conducted last year without the Trunk Pack, according to Dallas City Attorney Madeleine Johnson.

"While a full analysis of test results is still under way, we felt we could not sit on the results about the Trunk Packs since Ford has recently started shipping them to departments who ordered them," Johnson said in a statement.

She added that Ford is making the Trunk Packs, which hold sharp items such as axes and crowbars, available to dealers for $250. They're touted as safety devices.

The news is the latest blow for the police car, which has been involved in several fuel-tank fires following high-speed, rear collisions. The vehicle, which has been the subject of several lawsuits and a federal investigation, has been the overwhelming choice of police officers and state troopers in the United States. About 85 percent of all police departments and state troopers use the vehicles.

Fuel tank fires following high-speed rear-end collisions have killed at least 12 officers.

Johnson told the Free Press that the City of Dallas began the tests recently because there was no evidence that Ford has tested the Trunk Packs before releasing them. Johnson said Dallas invited Ford to participate in the testing, but the company declined.

"You just don't want to put out a device unless you've adequately tested it," Johnson said.

Johnson added thatone of the tests consisted of filling the Trunk Pack with 200 pounds of sand to represent the weight of the police equipment and then crash-testing it in the vehicle at 75 m.p.h. She said the force of the Trunk Pack hitting the fuel tank caused it to split "like a melon."

Ford meanwhile, says it has conducted tests for the Trunk Pack and those tests have determined that the device protects the tank from puncture.

"We've done our own testing and we believe it does what it's intended" to do, said Ford spokeswoman Kristen Kinley.

Kinley said it's difficult for Ford to make any determination about the tests ordered by the city because the company hasn't had an opportunity to examine the vehicle.

"It would be ideal for us to test the vehicle to better understand their test," Kinley added.

Consumer advocate Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen, said the news will just put Ford under more pressure to redesign the vehicle.

Latest Crown Victoria Fire Claims Family of NASCAR Crew Chief http://www.autosafety.org/article.php?scid=96&did=839
Ford Shields: In closing its investigation without a recall, NHTSA relied on the plastic shields which Ford is providing to police department as a fix for the rear crash fires in its CVPI’s. It’s not adequate and the police of this country deserve better. The shields developed by Ford were tested in a rear impact by a Taurus at 75 mph into a CVPI. Although Ford proclaimed the test a success, Dallas City officials discovered it failed despite having favorable test conditions that officers with their lives at risk won’t have on the highway. The lower portion of the trunk had sand bags in it – a device that every highway engineer knows is used to reduce the hazards of impacts into road abutments and would reduce the likelihood of the Taurus impact going into the fuel tank in the crash. The Taurus itself has a soft, lower front than the SUV that struck Trooper Ambrose’s CVPI. The Taurus weighs less than many vehicles that have struck CVPI’s. The shields also don’t protect all the areas which have been shown to have been punctured in crashes. Police officers deserve protection in all survivable fire crashes, not some, not most, but all.

Better Alternative: Better and more protective technology exists than developed by Ford to protect occupants of Crown Victoria’s. Firetrace International has developed a combination of tank bladders and flame retardants for Crown Victoria’s. It had a crash test conducted by Goodrich Aerospace at its Hurricane Mesa Test Track, a military testing center in Hurricane, Utah. Using a pusher/rocket sled, engineers crashed a 1970 Ford F-100 pick-up truck weighing more than 4,000 pounds into the rear of a 1999 CVPI equipped with both a Fuel Safe bladder and a Fire Retardant Panel (FIRE Panel). The pick-up impacted the rear of the Crown Victoria at 81.9 mph. Even though the CVPI contained real gasoline instead of non-flammable Stoddard fluid, there was no fire. Neither technology is radical or new. The bladder has been used in Ford's own race cars while the fire retardant has been used for years in military planes and has been tested by the Bureau of Standards in passenger motor vehicles. The Motor Vehicle Fire Research Institute has tested similar technology on GM side saddle pickups with success at impact speeds far in excess of the present or proposed safety standards.

From the Pinto to the Crown Victoria, Ford has used lawyers and lobbyists to engineer loopholes into safety regulations and oppose recalls rather than using engineers to build crash fire safety into motor vehicles. The police and the public have paid with their lives and burned bodies for the resulting unsafe fuel system. If the Federal government won’t stand up against Ford, then it’s up to states like New York and cities like Dallas and trial lawyers to do so. We owe it to the police who protect us to protect them.


Over the past 10 years, there have been nearly 40 regional recalls, with two announced in the past year. Manufacturers conduct regional recalls when a particular defect is more likely to manifest itself when exposed to regional weather conditions, like snow or heat.

For example, in 1999, Ford recalled Windstar minivans to correct a fuel tank defect that caused cracks in hot weather. These cracks could leak fuel and vapor, creating a serious fire hazard. With NHTSA’s blessing, Ford conducted a recall in 11 states, the 10 southernmost counties in California, and Clark County in Nevada. This left consumers in some of the hottest parts of the country – including California’s Death Valley, Tennessee, and New Mexico – without a guaranteed free repair.

Similarly, numerous recalls arising from defects attributed to corrosion caused by road salt have included Washington, D.C., and Maryland, but not Virginia, so commuters who drive from Virginia to Washington, D.C., every day for work are not guaranteed the same notice and free repair that their neighbors will get.

"Regional recalls make no sense, particularly in a mobile society where people often drive from one region to the next," said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook. "If a vehicle has a defect that makes it unsafe, the defect needs to be fixed on all similar vehicles."

Added Clarence Ditlow, director of the Center for Auto Safety, "NHTSA’s actions suggest that it doesn’t snow in Buffalo and it’s not hot in Death Valley. For years, NHTSA required manufacturers to conduct nationwide recalls. But the agency eventually gave in to automakers. Geographic recalls reduce auto company recall costs at the expense of public safety."



{I'm glad I take public transit...the buses here are from england so chances are it the elctrical system might fail - but I might make it out alive.}

I'm glad I don't rely on Consumer reports who don't report much of what counts it would seem.

Interestingly is 1000 samples is as good as 10,000 as Woochifer claimes...then why do 10,000? Ahh that's right. Just like in audio...there is validity and reliability. 50 trillion samples reliably saying the wrong thing is worse than one sample saying the right thing.

[RGA]

Continued from last post - I love cars where the wheels fall off - wrap me up a focus....have a I driven a Ford lately? Thank heaven - if I want to risk my life I'd rather jump from planes.


Ford's Trouble Prone Focus Hit With Safety Recalls & Investigations

With 9 safety recalls to date and 6 defect investigations, the Ford Focus is proving to be an embarrassment to Ford Motor Company and its new President William Clay Ford, who are trying to stress quality in the wake of the Ford Explorer/Firestone ATX, Wilderness AT tire debacle.

Not since General Motors introduced its ill-fated X-car in 1980 (Buick Skylark, Chevrolet Citation, Oldsmobile Omega and Pontiac Phoenix) which had 13 recalls in its first two years has a manufacturer had so many recalls. Among the Focus recalls are 351,000 2000 models whose roof pillars can cause head injuries in crashes and 203,700 2000 models whose left rear wheel falls off.

The Focus' sinking reputation was further hammered hard by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's announcement of 6 major investigations from February to May 2002. Evening up the wheel problem, NHTSA launched a new investigation into wheels falling off the 2000 models, only this time it was both right and left rear wheels. Airbags that deployed inadvertently and that burned drivers were the subjects of two investigation in 2000-01 models. The 2000 model was hit with a investigation into engine compartment fires, which has now been upgraded to cover 2001-02 models as well. 2000-01 models are being investigated for engine stalling. 2000-2002 models are under investigation for collapse of the front suspension.

In November 1999, CAS wrote then Chairman William Clay Ford and warned him about Ford overall reputation for poor quality and covering up defects to avoid recalls. The Focus fiasco shows Mr. Ford has a long row to hoe before he can restore some of the luster to his great grandfather's company."

[wasch_24]

Hey, RGA.

Maybe you should sign up for a membership on carreview.com.

Just scroll down and click on the link.

[Hivihead]

I owned a '89 Honda Accord till Mar '03. 243,000 miles in 14 years. Still original engine and transmission. No need for rebuilt yet when I sold it. I had the head gasket changed at around 190,000 miles. I think the '80s japanese cars are more reliable as Q/C back then has something to do with it. And it was made in Japan. Not in Ohio like today's Accords and Civics(though not 100% are). Now I have a Mercedes CLK. It is running fine as well. So far so good...
Same to audio. My Denon 2802 is doing its job, thank you. I have AML last year and now sitting at home, recovering from the transplant. I turn the Denon on and watch movies, playing SOCOM II online, XBOX Live...you name it. I have it on all day. And it runs around the clock for months. Through my B&W 6.1 speakers, they sound fantastic. The mids are B&W's strong point. I do like Marantz if you listen to music a lot. In one box, the SR series is the one you have to auditon. I know the SR-12S1 is out of your range, but you'll be amazed how good it sounds, comparing to the Yamaha's DSP-ZS9.

[Woochifer]

Continued from last post - I love cars where the wheels fall off - wrap me up a focus....have a I driven a Ford lately? Thank heaven - if I want to risk my life I'd rather jump from planes.

Oh what a piece of work you go through just to avoid admitting that you don't know squat about statistics and how survey research is conducted! All of your quotes are covering the Focus models that Consumer Reports did not recommend, so I have no idea what you're trying to prove, other than avoid my questions about how CU's 675,000 response pool cannot generate statistically significant findings on European car reliability. (Hey, you were the one who brought up what gets taught in basics stats courses, so I figured that you'd actually taken one and would know what it takes to create a statistically significant sample) Spinning the subject and avoiding my questions does not make your original points any less untruthful and/or atrociously illogical than they are.

I mean, you complain about CU's conclusions that are based on a viable and reliable survey form that's consistent from year to year, and based on one of the largest consumer survey samples anywhere. The data being reported is consistent, the minimum confidence levels are consistent, and the reporting methodology is consistent.

Instead, you rely on the Lemon Aid guide that was culled together through inconsistent data sources ("confidential" sources, complaints, etc.) that may or may not be comparable from model to model, and might be no better than hearsay. Plus, their survey of models is incomplete. Maybe they are a good source, maybe they aren't. But, judging from what I've seen so far, their methodology is too subjective and leaves too many data gaps to be consistent. It makes for nice anecdotal conversation, but for anything approaching statistical rigor, it looks pretty thin.

Do you REALLY think it's safer to jump out of airplanes than to drive a Ford Focus? I guess you've never sought a job as an actuary. That would make for rather amusing conversation if you ever got interviewed for such a position.

[RGA]

You say I don't provide proof about the Fire issue - I did - you're wrong too bad too sad. Focus is a POS Consumer reports recommended them when they came out...provide the first issue please that says otherwise. The Focus when it came out was well reviewed by almost everyone - car of the year in Europe to boot.

Polling customers is meaningless without all of the pertinant information. If you knew thing one about statistics which it appears you don't simply taking polls is not enough unless you provide a breakdown of what EXACTLY went wrong...polling the companies is completely useless as they're as untrustworthy an entity as it gets.

Statistically relevance is ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS better especially in a poll methodology with MORE trials...which is why you didn't answer my question If 1000 is as good as 10,000 then why did CR bother to do 675,000. Because more is best. if 650,000 were done on American cars versus 25,000.00 for the rest it makes a difference period. There is nothing wrong with wanting to know the details of a poll now is there - according to you I insult the integrity of CR if I dare ask for a statistical breakdown - like what kind of problems 20 versus 18 is barely anything...and if it is truly atrocious to have this kind of difference - then 18(american) to 12(Japanese) is absolutely horrendous which would then prove that it's FAR better to go Japanese. I am not defending Euro Cars because they are not particularly well reviewed in the Lemon Aid. Most Mercededs are not recommended, nor Land Rover, nor Jaguar. BMW fairs better(On certain cars) because they offer performance - and with performance comes repair work.

What I want to know is how many are serious problems versus the non serious kind - a break down of the age of drivers for cars because it is shown that Younger people are more reckless statistically than are middle aged and increases again with older people.

All of those isues impact the car's breakdown rates. You drive it into the ground then it's going to have problems no matter what it is. The Civic hatchback and Ford Mustang in Canada is extremely popular with 16 year old first time drivers - I'd like to see comparative stats on cars owned by 16-21 year olds. We know the Civic overall is an outstanding car in this regard but not too many in this age bracket buy Toyota Tercels. These two a while ago were Tercel in first place Civic in second for repair histories in this class...but the swing for the Tercel may have been because of not being a popular car AT ALL amongst first time teens. and very popular with starter families. Without knowing the statistical breakdowns you may as well be watching the graphs on tv as to why you should buy this dish detergent. The graph is 9 feet high compared t the other graph but the percentage on the side(if you can read it) says 1000 dishes cleaned while the other cleans 1001 dishes...but the graph makes it LOOK like detergent X cleans 900 times the amount.

I never defended the Euro cars I simply mentioned that I believed that Americans owned some of those companies...Which Ford does - Jaguar. Jag has an atrocious record. Then YOU cover for Ford by saying Jaguar was a lousy car before Ford took them over as if to say that I thought they were good. No, they have always sucked...my point is now then that they sucked no matter who owned them(Ford sure didn't fix the problem now have they)...SO lets's look to see why - anal customers who send 20 complaints in over something that another car owner would not complain about at all. ---WHAT is the complaint? Lemon Aid does take customer complaint polls but they don't stack their stats solely on those numbers. What are the problems? I send my ar in for the sticky E-brake handle glue - that's one service - my friend who brings is Sunfire in for a Transmission replacement is one service complaint. What is the 20 versus 18. I'll take 20 minor problems over 18 major ones. Those numbers may be the opposite too...but I would like to know otherwise the number doesn't mean anything. I wouldn't mind a stat on percentage of recalls either. That requires no half assed polling. Polls also have bias issues on the way questions are asked...I'm sure you knew that when you took the psych courses but it's a skewable issue and a weakness of polls.

Ford 2001 Focus car of the year and recommended doesn't help all the engine fires and numerous other recalls. Initial quality tests don't help because unless the engine catches fire in the review then hey all things are a go for a good review (0-90 days whoah that helps). Why should anyone believe that Ford has fixed their Focus? Convince me that the 2004 model is better than the 2000-2003 models and won't have the same problems in the same numbers(Initial quality revies can't). There is a reason Consumer Reports had Good to EXCELLENT all across the line for my Pontac Grand Am in 1994 then 3 years later the thing reads like a solid black inkblock of the crap that it was.

I went by Consumer Reports who gave it glowing reviews and "Much better build quality than the previous models" blah blah blah. Ooops no sorry they ain't. Should have read the Lemon Aid which I did a few months later which warned of the crap at the outset. Ford has had all these fire problems for so many years and with so many models that they begin to become a laughing stock...even if they finally build a good car so do other companies ... why take the risk that because CR says the 2004 model is good because they drove it around and a wheel didn't fall off like the old ones that hay problem's fixed buy this car. It isn't even good when it works...the review by JD Power gave the comfort and power etc ratings 2 and 3 out of five...adding to the less than good mecahnical ratings and the fire history of the vehicles you'd have to be a total moron - provided you know all of this information ahed of time - to actually buy one of those piles of kaka. Especially when the lots here have Honda Civics for LESS money????? WTF Even he Neon another mess is going for 1-2K MORE. No wonder the Civic is the best selling car in Canada.

I have a friend who works at Ford and I saw their internal customer satisfaction polls (versus ALL the other dealers in British Columbia) versus Honda. Honda's dealers ran from 95%-100% and involved any servicing number of servicing quality of servicing initial purchase stisfaction. Ford had posters giving award to a delaer that could get to 60%. Most were in the 30-50% range. If anything Ford is better than GM overall and Chrysler - well judjing by their CEO's comment in my last thread he basically admits his cars are junk...which of course they are.

[Woochifer]

You say I don't provide proof about the Fire issue - I did - you're wrong too bad too sad. Focus is a POS Consumer reports recommended them when they came out...provide the first issue please that says otherwise. The Focus when it came out was well reviewed by almost everyone - car of the year in Europe to boot.

Try CU's auto issues that came out after the first reliability reports rolled in. Whenever they make any kind of recommendation on a new vehicle, they ALWAYS preface that by saying that the reliability data has not come in yet, and if the reliability comes up negative, they pull the recommendation. The VW New Beetle and Mercedes M-class come to mind as other models where they've done this.

Polling customers is meaningless without all of the pertinant information. If you knew thing one about statistics which it appears you don't simply taking polls is not enough unless you provide a breakdown of what EXACTLY went wrong...polling the companies is completely useless as they're as untrustworthy an entity as it gets.

Give me f**kin break! Your holy bible Lemon Aid does not have ANY statistical validation for the defects that they list. Nor is there any consistency in how data is collected from vehicle to vehicle. And now you're giving a lecture on how to conduct survey research? At least Consumer Reports will tell the reader when there is insufficient data to make a conclusion about a specific model.

Consumer Reports is NOT an academic journal, they are a consumer magazine, and I doubt you'll find any other statistical tables in ANY consumer oriented magazine that contains a full accounting of how the statistical analysis was done. Your demand for some kind of full accounting of the results presumes that consumers want to thumb through hundreds of pages worth of error analysis and meaningless anecdotal accounts.

Statistically relevance is ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS better especially in a poll methodology with MORE trials...which is why you didn't answer my question If 1000 is as good as 10,000 then why did CR bother to do 675,000. Because more is best. if 650,000 were done on American cars versus 25,000.00 for the rest it makes a difference period. There is nothing wrong with wanting to know the details of a poll now is there - according to you I insult the integrity of CR if I dare ask for a statistical breakdown - like what kind of problems 20 versus 18 is barely anything...and if it is truly atrocious to have this kind of difference - then 18(american) to 12(Japanese) is absolutely horrendous which would then prove that it's FAR better to go Japanese. I am not defending Euro Cars because they are not particularly well reviewed in the Lemon Aid. Most Mercededs are not recommended, nor Land Rover, nor Jaguar. BMW fairs better(On certain cars) because they offer performance - and with performance comes repair work.

Once again, your inability to comprehend basic statistical theory and all too apparent desire to exaggerate and sensationalize is showing. You know why CU goes with a sample of 675,000? Because that annual survey goes out to ALL of their subscribers! And that large a sample allows them to do comparisons between different model years and create statistically significant samples for most of the car models on the road.

That 675,000 response pool is divided among over 100 different car models and tracked over a five-year trend. That large pool ensures that you can parse the data down to model and year, and still achieve statistically significant results for the majority of models on the road. Anything that CAN meet their minimum statistical significance threshold gets reported, and anything that CANNOT is reported as insufficient data. What part of that don't you understand? If we were talking about ONE car model from ONE model year, then the statistical difference between a 1,000 car random sample versus a 10,000 car random sample would not matter.

You're basically hurling every bit of crap that you can at CU for actually saying that American car makers have caught up with European car makers. Why all the hatred? This is no shocking news story if you've seen how the trends have played out the past few years -- it was only a matter of time.

What I want to know is how many are serious problems versus the non serious kind - a break down of the age of drivers for cars because it is shown that Younger people are more reckless statistically than are middle aged and increases again with older people.

All of those isues impact the car's breakdown rates. You drive it into the ground then it's going to have problems no matter what it is. The Civic hatchback and Ford Mustang in Canada is extremely popular with 16 year old first time drivers - I'd like to see comparative stats on cars owned by 16-21 year olds. We know the Civic overall is an outstanding car in this regard but not too many in this age bracket buy Toyota Tercels. These two a while ago were Tercel in first place Civic in second for repair histories in this class...but the swing for the Tercel may have been because of not being a popular car AT ALL amongst first time teens. and very popular with starter families. Without knowing the statistical breakdowns you may as well be watching the graphs on tv as to why you should buy this dish detergent. The graph is 9 feet high compared t the other graph but the percentage on the side(if you can read it) says 1000 dishes cleaned while the other cleans 1001 dishes...but the graph makes it LOOK like detergent X cleans 900 times the amount.

Good luck trying to generate any kind of statistically significant sampling with all that parsing and cross-tabulating that you're looking for. And better luck trying to get those types of survey results into any kind of readable form that makes sense to anybody. Bringing all these irrelevant externalities into the discussion just exposes the lack of first hand experience that you have with any kind of survey research.

Trying to equate CU's data reporting with dishwashing commercials is patently ridiculous exaggeration, and just another untruth among the many that you've spread into this thread.

I never defended the Euro cars I simply mentioned that I believed that Americans owned some of those companies...Which Ford does - Jaguar. Jag has an atrocious record. Then YOU cover for Ford by saying Jaguar was a lousy car before Ford took them over as if to say that I thought they were good. No, they have always sucked...my point is now then that they sucked no matter who owned them(Ford sure didn't fix the problem now have they)...SO lets's look to see why - anal customers who send 20 complaints in over something that another car owner would not complain about at all. ---WHAT is the complaint? Lemon Aid does take customer complaint polls but they don't stack their stats solely on those numbers. What are the problems? I send my ar in for the sticky E-brake handle glue - that's one service - my friend who brings is Sunfire in for a Transmission replacement is one service complaint. What is the 20 versus 18. I'll take 20 minor problems over 18 major ones. Those numbers may be the opposite too...but I would like to know otherwise the number doesn't mean anything. I wouldn't mind a stat on percentage of recalls either. That requires no half assed polling. Polls also have bias issues on the way questions are asked...I'm sure you knew that when you took the psych courses but it's a skewable issue and a weakness of polls.

Oh, the mark of desperation. 20 minor ones versus 18 major ones? Please. Where's your proof that this scenario is at all anything other than your own sensationalist imagination at work? Again, it's all assumption, conjecture, unsupportable exaggeration, etc. Times change, and long held stereotypes need to step aside as reality and facts creep into the picture -- deal with it.

Your point about recalls is weak because it's the discretion of the auto maker as to whether or not they issue a general recall, or just quietly alert service managers about a potential problem. My Acura has never been recalled, but I can tell you that there have been service alerts that needed extended checkups or part replacement when I brought the vehicle in for servicing, including a distributor problem that left me stranded 200 miles from home a few years ago on the 4th of July (the alert on that problem came up a few months later, too late to help me though).

Bias is a valid objection (as I'm sure you'll agree about the validity of sighted audio listenings), but from having taken part in the CU auto reliability survey in the past, I can tell you that it is one of the better done consumer surveys that I've seen. The language is neutral in tone, and the problem categories are discretely laid out with very clear descriptions of what types of problems belong in which blanks. If you've never seen the CU survey form before, then you have zero basis for mouthing off about bias or skewedness or "half-assed polling."

Ford 2001 Focus car of the year and recommended doesn't help all the engine fires and numerous other recalls. Initial quality tests don't help because unless the engine catches fire in the review then hey all things are a go for a good review (0-90 days whoah that helps). Why should anyone believe that Ford has fixed their Focus? Convince me that the 2004 model is better than the 2000-2003 models and won't have the same problems in the same numbers(Initial quality revies can't). There is a reason Consumer Reports had Good to EXCELLENT all across the line for my Pontac Grand Am in 1994 then 3 years later the thing reads like a solid black inkblock of the crap that it was.

I went by Consumer Reports who gave it glowing reviews and "Much better build quality than the previous models" blah blah blah. Ooops no sorry they ain't. Should have read the Lemon Aid which I did a few months later which warned of the crap at the outset. Ford has had all these fire problems for so many years and with so many models that they begin to become a laughing stock...even if they finally build a good car so do other companies ... why take the risk that because CR says the 2004 model is good because they drove it around and a wheel didn't fall off like the old ones that hay problem's fixed buy this car. It isn't even good when it works...the review by JD Power gave the comfort and power etc ratings 2 and 3 out of five...adding to the less than good mecahnical ratings and the fire history of the vehicles you'd have to be a total moron - provided you know all of this information ahed of time - to actually buy one of those piles of kaka. Especially when the lots here have Honda Civics for LESS money????? WTF Even he Neon another mess is going for 1-2K MORE. No wonder the Civic is the best selling car in Canada.

I have a friend who works at Ford and I saw their internal customer satisfaction polls (versus ALL the other dealers in British Columbia) versus Honda. Honda's dealers ran from 95%-100% and involved any servicing number of servicing quality of servicing initial purchase stisfaction. Ford had posters giving award to a delaer that could get to 60%. Most were in the 30-50% range. If anything Ford is better than GM overall and Chrysler - well judjing by their CEO's comment in my last thread he basically admits his cars are junk...which of course they are.

So you bought a lemon! Big friggin' deal! So your personal experience was lousy, but does that mean that EVERYBODY who's ever bought an American car shares your viewpoint? And does it mean that because Pontiac built a lousy model in 1994, that they and EVERY OTHER American car maker would build nothing but lousy cars from then into eternity? Check the pretzel logic and personal bias at the door if you want to argue statistics, you might actually learn something.

[RGA]

Typical of your continual bias and straw mans. RE: 20 versus 18...instead of inventing my position try reading and thinking too tough for you it would seem.

Sneak into any Ford dealer's results of customer satisfaction - I was there I saw it - that was three years ago seriously doubtmuch has changed.

Car recalls can be federally demanded or demanded by state on safety issues...not determined by the manufacturer...you would hope the manufacturer would do it themselves but that would take corporate responsibility and they - Ford mainly - has proven a disinterest in lives over profit...with the exact same fir issues spanning many models over now 3 decades my conclusion is simple they are clueless...why you would support proven beyond any doubt their heinous practices is ridiculous. The fact their sales rank for an ex big three is number five in the largest market car seller outside trucks and SUV's is proving customers despite CR are not stupid.

BTW it would take a one page summary of the breakdown of their statistical analysis. Engine/transmission/ body are arguably the most high ticket brakdowns on a car. Rear tailight, e-break handle glue, interior cloth issues are minor in comparison. CR does break down each componant to their credit -as does Lemon Aid.

As usual to support your CR blathering you state that Lemon doesn't have "any consistency in how data is collected from vehicle to vehicle. And now you're giving a lecture on how to conduct survey research?"

Man you like to dream stuff up - they provide FAR more information than CR about the cars. You won't see the recall and horrendously CRAPPY Ford safety in CR despite the fact that they've been crappy for 30 years in this regard.

Lemon Aid:
Ratings are based upon over 700,000 owners reports, government-recorded safety complaints, and confidential automaker service bulletins. It's the only publication that lists hundreds of secret warranties and service tips now in effect for 1987-2002 cars and minivans. Lemon-Aid will tell you exactly what may go wrong today or tomorrow with your present vehicle or the one you may purchase. And, if repairs are needed, you will have the needed service bulletins to shop around for the cheapest repairs possible. Lemon-Aid also gives you:

A fresh, iconoclastic, "in your face" attitude formed from over thirty-one years of consumer advocacy in the trenches.
An expose of safety features that kill (airbags and anti-lock brakes)
Crashworthiness data going back a decade
Secret warranty summaries with reprinted bulletins as proof
Summarized service bulletins to get right to the problem
Specific prices for more models and years
A section dealing with the best and worst used vehicles over three decades
Legal information to help you gain an out of-court settlement and sample complaint letters/faxes A list of great Internet gripe sites Almost 500 pages in a pocket-book format Background

Their main objective, to inform and protect consumers in an industry known for its dishonesty and exaggerated claims, remains unchanged. However, these guides also focus on warranties and confidential service bulletins that automakers swear don't exist. That's why you'll be interested in finding the exact bulletin, memo, or news clipping reproduced from the original so neither the dealer nor automaker can weasel out of its obligations.

The Lemon-Aid guide's information is gathered throughout the year from owner complaints, whistle blowers, lawsuits, and judgments, as well as from confidential manufacturer service bulletins.

Each year, we target generic vehicle defects and abusive auto industry practices. After warning readers, we then demand that automakers extend their warranties to pay for factory mistakes. For example, last year we highlighted Chrysler's engine headgaket, automatic transmission, paint, and brake problems, and Ford and GM engine intake manifold, automatic transmission, paint delamination and peeling problems. Additionally we downrated Honda and Toyota after noting a decline in their quality control.

Following Lemon-Aid's urging, all three Detroit automakers paid off thousands of powertrain and paint claims on six year or older vehicles extended their warranties (secretly) and lost some important small claims cases, as well.

Even Toyota and Honda, unhappy with Lemon-Aid's lowered rating, decided last year to extend their powertrain warranties up to 8 years for engine and automatic transmission failures on 1997-2002 vehicles.

The latest 2003-04 Lemon-Aid guides make a critical comparison of 1990-2003 cars, trucks, SUVs, and minivans and safer, cheaper, and more reliable alternatives are given for each vehicle (see the sample Ford Taurus and Sable and Chrysler minivan ratings taken from the early guides).

Points are also given for crash test results and for the availability of essential safety features. Performance comparison tests and a list of essential accessories are only a sampling of the wealth of material you have at your fingertips. Lemon-Aid combines test results with owner complaints, Internet postings, and surveys to determine its ratings.

Phil Edmonston
January 2003

Bonus is even more surveys than CR. Also, where did I ever say thet Europe was a bastian of quality. The article you presented blasts Eupoean cars with 20 defects versus 18 American ... hardly a huge difference to start with. Lumping all cars together as European versus American is not help either genius. At the very least I would like to know which performed better or worse...maybe BMW is 15 and Volkswagen is 27? The USA today of course isn't bright enough to provide the reader any sort of facts but rather purport broad generalizations. The exact same broad generalizations that you accuse me of - but at least I'm not writing for a newspaper where objectivity is supposedly a requirment over ramblings on forums. Hell Jaguar, Mercedes and Land Rover could be pulling the entire European number into the gutter for all we know. And we simply don't know do we?

American cars have a number of good models in Lemon Aid - but over the entire range they are certainly crap compared to the Japanese - presumably you didn't buy Acura for no reason...they cost more are not very big vehicles you'll find more power in a NA car for cheaper? The fact the American counterpart would proably be in the shop twice as often or nearly so must have come into the equation somewhere - or happened to be a nice coincidence.

You keep saying my one bad experience with a 94 grand am...HARDLY - you look at the CR of that Car...I'm not the only one...MOST people have the exact same story to tell. ****ty paint jobs lousy transmission, horrible steering engines, electrical systems, and abysmal safety is not relegated to one car it's the ENTIRE run. if you don't have a tirade of numerous problems with it you're in the minority and fluked out - even CR supports that. The words of the idiot running Chrysler basically admits that 90% of his cars are junk compared to the Japanese and 10% are as good...THINK this is the f***ing guy who runs the f***ing company and he even KNOWS his cars were a POS that are mostly O.K. And hell their cars seem to come under less blasting than Ford or GM even in CR. What must their CEO's say?

[Woochifer]

Typical of your continual bias and straw mans. RE: 20 versus 18...instead of inventing my position try reading and thinking too tough for you it would seem.

Hey, you were the one that was throwing all those hypotheticals against the wall and see which one would stick. All I'm doing is pointing out what a statistically validated base of data says. If that's too difficult a concept for your to comprehend, then don't blame me.

Sneak into any Ford dealer's results of customer satisfaction - I was there I saw it - that was three years ago seriously doubtmuch has changed.

Ooooh, the clandestine secret files that you and nobody else has access to. Sorry, but sneaking into a Ford dealer and thumbing through their customer surveys is not exactly how I enjoy spending my evenings. (And are those customer surveys dealing with the cars themselves, or the dealer's customer service? Two VERY different things) If breaking into Ford dealers and reading customer survey forms is your joy in life, then by all means keep it up. So congratulations, but what does this have to do with European cars now having a higher defect rate than American cars?

Car recalls can be federally demanded or demanded by state on safety issues...not determined by the manufacturer...you would hope the manufacturer would do it themselves but that would take corporate responsibility and they - Ford mainly - has proven a disinterest in lives over profit...with the exact same fir issues spanning many models over now 3 decades my conclusion is simple they are clueless...why you would support proven beyond any doubt their heinous practices is ridiculous. The fact their sales rank for an ex big three is number five in the largest market car seller outside trucks and SUV's is proving customers despite CR are not stupid.

Am I supporting these practices? No. And where do I say that? Nowhere. All I'm pointing out is that you cannot use recall rate as a statistically valid way of doing comparisons because the thresholds for issuing general recalls versus service alerts is up to the discretion of the manufacturer. It constitutes a variable and therefore a bias.

BTW it would take a one page summary of the breakdown of their statistical analysis. Engine/transmission/ body are arguably the most high ticket brakdowns on a car. Rear tailight, e-break handle glue, interior cloth issues are minor in comparison. CR does break down each componant to their credit -as does Lemon Aid.

As usual to support your CR blathering you state that Lemon doesn't have "any consistency in how data is collected from vehicle to vehicle. And now you're giving a lecture on how to conduct survey research?"

So where is the consistency in how Lemon Aid collects and reports their data? They provide the detail that you like so much because they don't have a statistical significance threshold for reporting data like CU does. Collect enough anecdotal evidence, and it's easy to draw any conclusion about any vehicle, but not one that can meet any kind of statistically significant standard.

Man you like to dream stuff up - they provide FAR more information than CR about the cars. You won't see the recall and horrendously CRAPPY Ford safety in CR despite the fact that they've been crappy for 30 years in this regard.

But, again you cannot generalize this for EVERY single Ford model, and for EVERY model year, and for EVERY single unit.

Bonus is even more surveys than CR. Also, where did I ever say thet Europe was a bastian of quality. The article you presented blasts Eupoean cars with 20 defects versus 18 American ... hardly a huge difference to start with. Lumping all cars together as European versus American is not help either genius. At the very least I would like to know which performed better or worse...maybe BMW is 15 and Volkswagen is 27? The USA today of course isn't bright enough to provide the reader any sort of facts but rather purport broad generalizations. The exact same broad generalizations that you accuse me of - but at least I'm not writing for a newspaper where objectivity is supposedly a requirment over ramblings on forums. Hell Jaguar, Mercedes and Land Rover could be pulling the entire European number into the gutter for all we know. And we simply don't know do we?

Good gawd, there you go again! Just making up numbers and spinning the subject to try and avoid having to say ANYTHING positive about American cars.

But, again with Lemon Aid where is the CONSISTENCY in the reporting? They're talking about owner reports, but do they do the statistical validation themselves, or is it just pulling anecdotes out of a database and reporting it as fact? With the CU reliability data, the survey is widely circulated, they maintain full control over the data entry and reporting, and you know that it is a consistent set of questions from year to year. Comparisons between models and model years are valid because the questions, the sample validation procedures, and the minimum confidence levels are identical. Lemon Aid claims to be pulling all of these different sources together to make their conclusion, which is fine for anecdotal reporting, but the more subjective and open ended data that you pull into a dataset without devoting major resources into postcoding, the less reliable it is.

No, the broad generalizations that I've seen you make on this thread are in the rhelm of untruths and sensationalist exaggerations. Nowhere in that USA Today article is there anything that can be factually disputed. You're more than welcome to reinterpret things or take a different angle, but nowhere is there anything in the article that even approach the sensationalism that you inserted.

American cars have a number of good models in Lemon Aid - but over the entire range they are certainly crap compared to the Japanese - presumably you didn't buy Acura for no reason...they cost more are not very big vehicles you'll find more power in a NA car for cheaper? The fact the American counterpart would proably be in the shop twice as often or nearly so must have come into the equation somewhere - or happened to be a nice coincidence.

FYI, I bought the Acura BECAUSE of its small outer dimensions. Have you ever tried parallel parking in San Francisco? For pure driving experience within my budget, I would have opted for a Ford Probe (which incidentally had an above average reliability record), but its limited outer view and bulkier body nixed it from consideration. My car has stranded me three times with various electrical system problems since I bought it, so while I feel it's a good car, it's certainly not bulletproof and perfect. Even my parents' Camry has been recalled twice, and even after the fixes, the brakes on that car still suck and Toyota jerks my parents around every time they inquire about the brakes.

You keep saying my one bad experience with a 94 grand am...HARDLY - you look at the CR of that Car...I'm not the only one...MOST people have the exact same story to tell. ****ty paint jobs lousy transmission, horrible steering engines, electrical systems, and abysmal safety is not relegated to one car it's the ENTIRE run. if you don't have a tirade of numerous problems with it you're in the minority and fluked out - even CR supports that. The words of the idiot running Chrysler basically admits that 90% of his cars are junk compared to the Japanese and 10% are as good...THINK this is the f***ing guy who runs the f***ing company and he even KNOWS his cars were a POS that are mostly O.K. And hell their cars seem to come under less blasting than Ford or GM even in CR. What must their CEO's say?

Yeah, and you blame CU for enticing you to buy that Grand Am. They can only go on the basis of the data in front of them. Your quote about MOST people having a similar tale to tell about the Grand Am is something you have no proof of, and is just more unfounded assumption, exaggeration, and sensationalism. (On the CU reliability table, it only takes a failure rate of 7.5% to earn a black mark, so there's plenty of room between going over 7.5% versus going over 50%+1, which would define "most"; even using CU's old scale based on standard deviations above and below the mean, it would still be a very high hurdle to achieve 50%+1 on all those purported defects that you named) The previous model years might have been reliable, but unfortunately you drew the short straw and got a lemon. Life is unfair, move on.

And BTW, that quote that you cited is NINE years old and Robert Lutz isn't even at Chrysler anymore. The American brands started moving up on the European nameplates on the JD Power survey about five years ago, and the trend on the CU reliability reports has similarly trended upwards the past three or so years. Like I said, it's hardly shocking news if you've been following things the past few years.

[RGA]

First of all you have no idea how the Lemon Aid gathers its evidence uyou are simply trying to make them look incompetant. Again you skirt the issue - you say there is nothing untruthful about the article but a lie of omission is still a lie. There is nothing beneficial in that article...tell me exactly what I or anyone else on this planet can get that would help them make a car purchase of a specific BMW. I said several times and you keep ignoring it that the numbers are telling us NOTHING. 20 versus 18 great what about it. Serious problems all problems which car companies. Nice of you to ASSUME that 20 for all Eurpean Cars is IDENTICAL all across every model and European companies. Are you so stupid that you cannot see why knowing more of the breakdown here is impoertant. Christ we're talking about totally generalized stats that could mean any god damn thing and you're holding thta it has relevance? I said at the outset that my numbers were hypothetical----THEY HAVE TO BE since we get no relevant numbers from the article. I'm presenting a WHAT IF statement. I'm not saying these ARE the numbers. My point is a valid one...how do you KNOW for sure that BMW rates 15 complaints and Merceded is 30 - the AVERAGE is what they are providing. Certainly some are better than others and that was my point. The same applies to American Cars.

I would also like to see the breakdown of the American cars - it's not a one sided thing. I would be interested in several layers of the stats because general averages are positively useless. ---- Especially when both are very close. How do the Japanes/American car co-sponsorships do for example. If the Japanese cars rank as a 12...then it is presumably relevant to suggest that PERHAPS the American/Japanese co-productions fair better than the American only models. See why it's important to KNOW the brakdown? Again if we KNOW the Japanese are 30-50% better then does it NOT STAND TO REASON that the co-productions are responsible for lowering that HIGH 18 figure. For all we know and I ssay again this is hypothetical the American ONLY versions are are well above 18. Judging by the two averages this hypothetical is very likely to be the case comparing the two numbers.

Looking at Consumer Reports USED CARS and the Lemon Aid guide both are pretty close to each other. I bet that some of the best cars out of America are the co-produced ones and the ones that are dreadful Piles of crap will most certainly NOT be the ones that are co-produced. In fact I've looked and it is seemingly the case. The sprint the three Chryslers that got good reviews were all either co-productions or entirely built by the likes of Suzuki. Yes there are exceptions.

As for the Grand Am 7.5% failure rate is the minuimum? Then how do you know what the ACTUAL rate is? What is that rate over every year? Only 7.5 cars out of every 100 fails over the warranty period? 7.5% of every 100 cars fails every month, year, off the line, what the Fuc* does the stat mean? Are 80 cars completely trouble free while the other 20 are total disasters like mine. I had it in roughly 7 times in a year and half. That's only 4.67% if over yearly periods. And more to the point WHAT is failing?

First rule of stats is know EXACTLY and specifically what the stats are telling you. All we have is a bunch of averages and numbers which are not specific in any way.

Yeah Lutz is gone but that hasn't helped Chrysler with sever not recommendeds in all of their family cars. But at least they don't have wheels falling off like the Focus and many of the others which only catch fire possibly horribly burning you to death. No car is perfect I'm not saying that the Japanese are perfect either - I've seen reports of lemons which are pitiably hilarious - I know a person who had a Tercel and had the engine cylinder fire right through the block or some such thing at a mere 70,000km. And Tercel WAS rated high by every publication. But if we're playing the odds the Japanese ON AVERAGE is considerably superior to American Cars - not counting co-productions is the numbers I really want to see.

[Woochifer]

First of all you have no idea how the Lemon Aid gathers its evidence uyou are simply trying to make them look incompetant. Again you skirt the issue - you say there is nothing untruthful about the article but a lie of omission is still a lie. There is nothing beneficial in that article...tell me exactly what I or anyone else on this planet can get that would help them make a car purchase of a specific BMW. I said several times and you keep ignoring it that the numbers are telling us NOTHING. 20 versus 18 great what about it. Serious problems all problems which car companies. Nice of you to ASSUME that 20 for all Eurpean Cars is IDENTICAL all across every model and European companies. Are you so stupid that you cannot see why knowing more of the breakdown here is impoertant. Christ we're talking about totally generalized stats that could mean any god damn thing and you're holding thta it has relevance? I said at the outset that my numbers were hypothetical----THEY HAVE TO BE since we get no relevant numbers from the article. I'm presenting a WHAT IF statement. I'm not saying these ARE the numbers. My point is a valid one...how do you KNOW for sure that BMW rates 15 complaints and Merceded is 30 - the AVERAGE is what they are providing. Certainly some are better than others and that was my point. The same applies to American Cars.

Spinning these hypothetical mantras over and over don't help your argument any. I'm going on what I see on Lemon Aid's website (which provides no documentation of their statistics), and the claims that they make. I'm not saying that they're incompetent, I'm saying that their findings have no consistent standard for statistical significance.

The CU survey has a consistent standard for statistical significance that they use every year. What they cannot report because it fails to meet the statistical threshold, they let you know. Your continued spinning demand for some kind of statistical breakdown ignores this simple fact, and ignores basic statistical sampling procedures.

Calling this a lie of omission is ridiculously far fetched because there's no deceit on the part of CU or the USA Today article. What's so untruthful about reporting the same stats the same way for the past 24 years? The only reason it made news this year, is because the conclusion changed. Was it a lie when CU put out press releases the past 23 years saying that American cars were less reliable than their European and Japanese counterparts? You're only getting your panties into a bunch because the conclusion no longer supports your biases.

I would also like to see the breakdown of the American cars - it's not a one sided thing. I would be interested in several layers of the stats because general averages are positively useless. ---- Especially when both are very close. How do the Japanes/American car co-sponsorships do for example. If the Japanese cars rank as a 12...then it is presumably relevant to suggest that PERHAPS the American/Japanese co-productions fair better than the American only models. See why it's important to KNOW the brakdown? Again if we KNOW the Japanese are 30-50% better then does it NOT STAND TO REASON that the co-productions are responsible for lowering that HIGH 18 figure. For all we know and I ssay again this is hypothetical the American ONLY versions are are well above 18. Judging by the two averages this hypothetical is very likely to be the case comparing the two numbers.

If CU has been recording their reliability data the same way the past two decades, then these trends ARE valid. (The only change they made in the detailed reporting was four years ago when they changed from a scale that varied based on standard deviation to a straight scale. The reason? The reliability differences between cars had narrowed to the point that standard deviations no longer had as much meaning as before. Plus, they wanted to more accurately report on the reliability of older vehicles) Going down from 108 defects per 100 cars to 18 defects per 100 cars is nothing to sneeze at, and while European carmakers going from 53 defects per 100 cars down to 20 is an improvement, it did not represent nearly as big an improvement as what American car makers have done. The trends have been going in that direction for years, so this is nothing earthshaking.

The more detail that gets reported, the less reliable the findings are because then you're getting into consistency problems associated with postcoding open ended responses. Plus, with a survey sample as large as CU's, it makes no sense to process open ended responses or make the survey so long and complicated that you cannot get statistically significant responses for most problem categories. (Not to mention that if you make any kind of question list too long and/or open ended, you decrease the response rate and potentially leave the questions open to subjective interpretation, which can render the data meaningless since the question means something different to different respondents) It's already a feat that CU can get as much statistically valid data split into the categories that they do use.

As for the Grand Am 7.5% failure rate is the minuimum? Then how do you know what the ACTUAL rate is? What is that rate over every year? Only 7.5 cars out of every 100 fails over the warranty period? 7.5% of every 100 cars fails every month, year, off the line, what the Fuc* does the stat mean? Are 80 cars completely trouble free while the other 20 are total disasters like mine. I had it in roughly 7 times in a year and half. That's only 4.67% if over yearly periods. And more to the point WHAT is failing?

It's irrelevant because a 7.5% failure rate in a SPECIFIC CATEGORY for a vehicle less than one-year old is already very high (anything over 10% I believe gets CU's worst mark). I know you're just desperate to make that Grand Am out to be the worst failure in automotive history, but you'll just have to settle for CU pulling their recommendation once the reliability data came out. The importance of the reliability tables is seeing how different car models compare to one another, not whether the failure rate is 10% or 12% or 50%. If most other new cars have a failure rate under 5% in any given category (which is true for the most part), then seeing something over 10% is a red flag regardless of the actual rate. If you take the time to actually read the CU data tables, you'll see that the scale represents the percentage of cars that have had repair work done in a specific category over the life of the vehicle up to five-years old. (They changed to a fixed scale four years ago to indicate how the percentage of repairs increases as the car ages) You don't need to have taken Stats 101 to interpret CU's data tables, they're very easy to decipher.

First rule of stats is know EXACTLY and specifically what the stats are telling you. All we have is a bunch of averages and numbers which are not specific in any way.

And like I said, if you want endless cross-tabulations into specifics and details, then you lose the statistical validity of the database. That just how it is with ANY database. Qualitative research is fine for getting at details and expository information, but it's no good if you're looking for a finding that's consistently replicable and reliable from trial to trial. It spins a good story and makes for good copy, but it's also easily contradicted and discredited.

And it's not like CU's reporting is hiding stuff. Just look at their glossary to get the type of repair work that goes into each category and look at how they arrive at their findings. If you want to believe that defects in European cars don't mean the same thing as American cars, then go ahead and keep believing that, but there's no reliable evidence that will back up that contention.

Yeah Lutz is gone but that hasn't helped Chrysler with sever not recommendeds in all of their family cars. But at least they don't have wheels falling off like the Focus and many of the others which only catch fire possibly horribly burning you to death. No car is perfect I'm not saying that the Japanese are perfect either - I've seen reports of lemons which are pitiably hilarious - I know a person who had a Tercel and had the engine cylinder fire right through the block or some such thing at a mere 70,000km. And Tercel WAS rated high by every publication. But if we're playing the odds the Japanese ON AVERAGE is considerably superior to American Cars - not counting co-productions is the numbers I really want to see.

Again, you're looking at anecdotes and trying to generalize them. Spins a good story and I guess has entertainment value, but it ultimately has little relevance to anyone other than the unfortunate consumer who bought a lemon. Good survey research design is designed to take the subjectivity out of the equation and put every subject being analyzed on an equal footing, by establishing minimum confidence levels and statistical validity for the data. If you're trying to accuse CU of lying because they're not parsing the data in a way that supports your anecdotal evidence, then you've totally missed the point.

[RGA]

actually I worked in accounting for a decade and understand stats and it is you who is trying to weasal out of the truth.

You are banking on the following premise 20 Europpean cars fail versus 18 fails of Eurpean cars...therefore European cars are now worse than American cars. Answer yes oer no to this because that is ALL the stats presented by USA indicate. Improvements began when co-productions started. A co-production is not an American vehicle the same way a non co-produced American car is. I give the American car manufacturers credit for finally realizing the don't how to design nor build a good vehicle and to get help from those who are competant and know how to run a business that puts out quality over profit margins...seemingly they could not do that either judging by Toyota and Honda for that matter.

Reliability is meaningless woithout validity - you studied that right? There are studies with over 250,000 people in longitudinal nutrition studies over a 30 year period which is now kaka because the tested the wrong thing.

your trial notion is idiotic. In audio they use a 16 trial test - invented by??? some engineer no doubt. The statistical significance of a trial of 10 would be 9 correct in a DBT. OR 59/100(achieved as 6/10 ten times in a row with one 5). You run your 10 trial test and score 6 your test is chucked out and you can't tell the difference between componant a and b. But with more trials achiviing the the 59/100 is the EXACT same statistically significant outcome at the .05 level. Naturally you don't see this little notion dawn on anyone or the reaosn WHY more trials would be used. More trials = more confidence in the result.

All I said was at the very beginning the USA today article compared European cars with American cars. Well Jaguar is a Ford - it's owned by an Amrican then it is American...and if it doesn't count as an American Car then how the hell does the Japanese co=produced cars count as Amercian. Oh I see only if it serves the American car manufacture best. If Jag scores terrible then it's European but if the Toyota Matrix(ahem Pontiac Vibe) gets great reviews it's a GM?

Sorry it doesn't take a person with a Stats 101 course to know that without knowing specifics then you have nothing. I don't mean a 50 page report. This is not hard...the next time CR comes out with a full listing of cars I can set up a spread sheet with Co-produced cars and results on one side and non co-produced cars on the other - and separate the American Cars and European Cars.

TO be fair and i should have said this last post...I said BMW may have better scores than than the 20...well for all we know Chrysler may be 14 and GM is pulling the number badly.

Generalizing American cars witha far higher reliable statistics base (in terms of confidence level) versus that of European cars is ridiculous. I don't blame CR for the stat because i understand what it is they're REALLY saying in that article that the Big three have come a LONG way to curtail their problems - 108 to 18 is terrific...naturally they're going to say wow look how much we improved compared to the Europeans. But then they had SO MUCH farther to come. What you expected the Europeans to improve to 1?

For this to be worth thing one to a BUYER who is looking at manufacturers you NEED to know the numbers for GM, Chrysler, Ford, BMW, Mercedes. What are the percentage for each company. Surely if they have the numbers to make a broad and useless generalizaion they have the percentage for each car manufacturer - and then for each car. I mean it would make sense for Ford to know that hey the Focus and or Explorer are bringing the entire company into the mud maybe it's time to dump the sh!t and move on to something else. Or at the very least phone Toyota and ask them to re-design the car for them so wheels don't fall off and engines don't catch fire. This method saves both companies money - build them in the same plant.

You don't seem to want to look at individual cars - or the co-production issue because I suspect you've read CR like I have and know yourself which ones get recommended and which ones are dung heeps.

None of this has anything to do with Yammie, Marantz and Denon. There was no stat on these that I can find...except for anecdotal stories of my friend the dealer or my friend the repairman who saw more of this in than that.

[Woochifer]

actually I worked in accounting for a decade and understand stats and it is you who is trying to weasal out of the truth.

Just because you can work your way around a ledger sheet does not mean that you know anything about survey research design, validation procedures, or how to report statistics using that methodology. And if I'm weaseling out of the truth, then what is YOUR definition of the truth? That CU is lying? That their statistical procedures are biased? That European cars are more reliable than Americanones just because you say so? Sorry, but molding universal truth out of your own biased version of reality doesn't stand up to any kind of objective scrutiny.

You are banking on the following premise 20 Europpean cars fail versus 18 fails of Eurpean cars...therefore European cars are now worse than American cars. Answer yes oer no to this because that is ALL the stats presented by USA indicate. Improvements began when co-productions started. A co-production is not an American vehicle the same way a non co-produced American car is. I give the American car manufacturers credit for finally realizing the don't how to design nor build a good vehicle and to get help from those who are competant and know how to run a business that puts out quality over profit margins...seemingly they could not do that either judging by Toyota and Honda for that matter.

You're just putting words into my mouth for argument's sake. Just because you have a love for exaggerating, does not mean that others share your obsession. Nowhere did I say that European cars are now WORSE than American cars. Whenever I say that one car is WORSE than another, I go by a lot more criteria than just the reliability record. If you go back to my original point, I was simply pointing out that based on the CU survey, American cars now have a lower defect rate than European cars, where's the untruth in that? And why this sets off such an illogically visceral reaction on your part is anyone's guess. If you want to parse that general point to death and try and find exceptions, asterisks, etc. and try and find some hypothetical rearrangement of the data that better fits your biases, go ahead. But, then it certainly would not have more validity than what CU reported.

Reliability is meaningless woithout validity - you studied that right? There are studies with over 250,000 people in longitudinal nutrition studies over a 30 year period which is now kaka because the tested the wrong thing.

So, tell me the invalid part of the CU data collection procedures, sampling, and/or survey form. Just because you can point out one example of bad research design doesn't mean that all research is therefore invalid.

your trial notion is idiotic. In audio they use a 16 trial test - invented by??? some engineer no doubt. The statistical significance of a trial of 10 would be 9 correct in a DBT. OR 59/100(achieved as 6/10 ten times in a row with one 5). You run your 10 trial test and score 6 your test is chucked out and you can't tell the difference between componant a and b. But with more trials achiviing the the 59/100 is the EXACT same statistically significant outcome at the .05 level. Naturally you don't see this little notion dawn on anyone or the reaosn WHY more trials would be used. More trials = more confidence in the result.

What trial notion did I bring up? The DBT research design that you're bringing up is completely off topic because a consumer survey is not about doing repeated trials of a behavioral input and comparing stimulus variables. If you survey a consumer about their vehicle's repair history 100 times, guess what, they will give you the same response 100 times. Now you're REALLY getting desperate by bringing these kinds of irrelevancies into the discussion.

All I said was at the very beginning the USA today article compared European cars with American cars. Well Jaguar is a Ford - it's owned by an Amrican then it is American...and if it doesn't count as an American Car then how the hell does the Japanese co=produced cars count as Amercian. Oh I see only if it serves the American car manufacture best. If Jag scores terrible then it's European but if the Toyota Matrix(ahem Pontiac Vibe) gets great reviews it's a GM?

First off, the main conclusion of the USA Today article is that this year's batch of cars represents the first time that European nameplates have a higher defect rate than American cars in 24 years of tracking the data. You were trying to berate American cars for their reliability, and this is obviously some valid data to the contrary. Volvo's also now owned by Ford, but the cars are still designed and built in Sweden. Jaguar's owned by Ford, but they are still designed and built in Britain. The one strongsuit of the CU survey is that they have been consistent during that time period in tracking and reporting the data.

Sorry it doesn't take a person with a Stats 101 course to know that without knowing specifics then you have nothing. I don't mean a 50 page report. This is not hard...the next time CR comes out with a full listing of cars I can set up a spread sheet with Co-produced cars and results on one side and non co-produced cars on the other - and separate the American Cars and European Cars.

What specifics are you trying to get at? They're tracking the data the exact same way that they did the past 24 years, which makes these kinds of comparisons relevant. The other tracking trends have been pointing in that direction for years (i.e. VW and Mercedes' reliability declines, BMW's recent problems with the 5 and 7 series, Land Rover's perennial reliability issues, etc.).

Coproduced cars represent a relatively small segment of the overall market, certainly not big enough to drive a 675,000 response survey, and you can check the sales charts from R.H. Polk and other sources if you want to look for that. If you want to go on the basis of where they are produced, then that's another story altogether given that many foreign car companies now make cars here, and a lot of domestic cars are made in Mexico, Canada, and elsewhere. But, the country of origin is something that CU does not track from year-to-year, and the occasions (with the first U.S. made Honda Accords I remember) where they did compare U.S. and Japanese made versions of identical models, they found no significant differences in the reliability.

Generalizing American cars witha far higher reliable statistics base (in terms of confidence level) versus that of European cars is ridiculous. I don't blame CR for the stat because i understand what it is they're REALLY saying in that article that the Big three have come a LONG way to curtail their problems - 108 to 18 is terrific...naturally they're going to say wow look how much we improved compared to the Europeans. But then they had SO MUCH farther to come. What you expected the Europeans to improve to 1?

Considering how far ahead European nameplates were, you would expect that they would be able to maintain at least a slight edge. But, like I said, Mercedes made the mistake of not changing the fundamental way that they design cars. They still do a bumper-to-bumper redesign with every new model cycle, and their desire to maintain profit margins in the face of rising R&D costs led them to economize on the parts used in the vehicles themselves. BMW's recent 5 and 7 series models introduced some new untested electronics, some of which have proven unreliable. Volkswagen let their QC guard down as their sales picked up, and now their reputation's taking a beating, which is too bad because I generally like their cars otherwise and my wife has been saving up for a New Beetle. European car makers at one point had a better than 2-to-1 edge in their defect rate. How they let that huge edge whither away should be the burning question rather than trivialities about how the survey sample was divied up. And as I've pointed out repeatedly, this is not some one-year outlier result (and with survey samples this large, outliers are not going to drive findings), it's part of a general trend that's been going on for the past few years.

For this to be worth thing one to a BUYER who is looking at manufacturers you NEED to know the numbers for GM, Chrysler, Ford, BMW, Mercedes. What are the percentage for each company. Surely if they have the numbers to make a broad and useless generalizaion they have the percentage for each car manufacturer - and then for each car. I mean it would make sense for Ford to know that hey the Focus and or Explorer are bringing the entire company into the mud maybe it's time to dump the sh!t and move on to something else. Or at the very least phone Toyota and ask them to re-design the car for them so wheels don't fall off and engines don't catch fire. This method saves both companies money - build them in the same plant.

No, what matters to the buyer is how reliable the model that they are test driving has been. They don't care that the VW Passat has had an average reliability record for the most part if the VW Jetta that they are interested in buying has had high defect rates in most categories. If CU is reporting the data, then it meets their minimum confidence level, if the data's insufficient, then the buyer's on their own. All that other background about which car maker or model has a higher proportion of the sample, or how the company does in aggregate, makes for good bulletin board fodder and fanboy discussions, but pretty much irrelevant otherwise.

You don't seem to want to look at individual cars - or the co-production issue because I suspect you've read CR like I have and know yourself which ones get recommended and which ones are dung heeps.

Quite the contrary, that overall defect rate is very indicative of a general trend that I've seen among individual European models over the past five or six years. For example, before 1998, Mercedes were mostly above average or much better than average in their reliability records, but around the introduction of the M-class, successive model introductions have shown more problems than before. VW has had a similar slide in the reliability of most of its models as well. BMW was strong for the most part, but CU's now reporting on problems with the 7 series, and I've been reading other stuff about the 5 series as well. Frankly, I'm surprised that it took until this year for the CU findings to confirm what's been showing up on the JD Power rankings and CU's own reliability information on individual models the past few years.

Coproduction's not an issue because examples like the Pontiac Vibe/Toyota Matrix or the Nissan Quest/Mercury Villager or Chevy Prizm/Toyota Corolla make up such a minimal portion of the overall auto sales (at least on the American side of the sales ledger) that they would hardly make a dent in an aggregated summation like the one reported in the USA Today article, and it's not like coproduced cars have grown so much the past five years that they would completely explain the improvements in American car reliability (in fact, both the Villager and Prizm were discontinued for 2004, so the coproduction cross-badging strategy's obviously not a major part of American car makers' plans). If you're talking about shared platforms or drivetrains, then there might be an argument there. However, even in those cases, you're talking about significantly different vehicles with potentially very different reliability records. I mean, the Sterling shared the platform, drivetrain, and a lot of the same body parts as the Acura Legend, yet the reliability records of those two models were about as contrasting as you can get.

[RGA]

Just because you can work your way around a ledger sheet does not mean that you know anything about survey research design, validation procedures, or how to report statistics using that methodology. And if I'm weaseling out of the truth, then what is YOUR definition of the truth? That CU is lying? That their statistical procedures are biased? That European cars are more reliable than Americanones just because you say so? Sorry, but molding universal truth out of your own biased version of reality doesn't stand up to any kind of objective scrutiny.

I have conducted psychological testing with statistcal methodology...no I'm not a statistician...but on this it's not that tough. Again you build a straw man and down right LIE. I never said CR was lying...What I did say is that the information they provided...or was misused by USA is no help. DO you deny that based off that information you can say that Chrysler has fer defects than BMW solely based off that article. YES or no to this question? If I'm a buyer looking at the flagship from these two guys and my PRIMARY concern is breakdown rates does that article help me in ANY way? If you missed my point all this time well here it is and it should be an obvious one...though we'll see if you GET IT.

You're just putting words into my mouth for argument's sake. Just because you have a love for exaggerating, does not mean that others share your obsession. Nowhere did I say that European cars are now WORSE than American cars. Whenever I say that one car is WORSE than another, I go by a lot more criteria than just the reliability record. If you go back to my original point, I was simply pointing out that based on the CU survey, American cars now have a lower defect rate than European cars, where's the untruth in that? And why this sets off such an illogically visceral reaction on your part is anyone's guess. If you want to parse that general point to death and try and find exceptions, asterisks, etc. and try and find some hypothetical rearrangement of the data that better fits your biases, go ahead. But, then it certainly would not have more validity than what CU reported.

Oh there's a lot of untruth in it. It's sad that you can't see it. I am not arguing the number they produced - I questioned the validity of calling an American owned car company a European car...if we're going by WHERE it's built then Honda is American or Canadian but they count as Japanese. Jaguar is a Ford - an American car. If you can't see the misuse of creating statistical data here I pity you. GM buys Suzuki Swifts and re-badges them into Sprints and do they now count as American? Do you not understand this very basic concept. Without knowing what the hell they are considering European and what counts as All American or Japanese the numbers are meaningless. No CR didn't lie because perhaps they did produce something useful but typical of newspapers don't tell you the whole story. After all Newspaper writers generally aren't the brightest bulbs in the droor and rather than actually understand the issue they paraphrase the hell out of things to make a point that looks good. i mean thanks to newspapers people actually thought for 20+ years the human beings use 10% of our brains - look at the potential. D'ohh.

What trial notion did I bring up? The DBT research design that you're bringing up is completely off topic because a consumer survey is not about doing repeated trials of a behavioral input and comparing stimulus variables. If you survey a consumer about their vehicle's repair history 100 times, guess what, they will give you the same response 100 times. Now you're REALLY getting desperate by bringing these kinds of irrelevancies into the discussion.

Actually that is untrue and with your expertise in stat and psychology - you are an expert right as you seem to imply it. I brought up DBT's to illustrate the misuse of statistics and why high cofidence is important. Many surveys in psychology - the ones with a lot of questions often ask the same questions in slightly re-worded form. Low and behold the rating scale is often DIFFERENT just from the re-wording of the same question. This is not an issue in the car surveys because presumably all car owners get the exact same form so everything is equal. More trials offers higher confidence in the results however. Statistical significance determination is not a set in stone figure.

First off, the main conclusion of the USA Today article is that this year's batch of cars represents the first time that European nameplates have a higher defect rate than American cars in 24 years of tracking the data. You were trying to berate American cars for their reliability, and this is obviously some valid data to the contrary. Volvo's also now owned by Ford, but the cars are still designed and built in Sweden. Jaguar's owned by Ford, but they are still designed and built in Britain. The one strongsuit of the CU survey is that they have been consistent during that time period in tracking and reporting the data.

Have no problem with this...I wasn't defending European Cars.

What specifics are you trying to get at? They're tracking the data the exact same way that they did the past 24 years, which makes these kinds of comparisons relevant. The other tracking trends have been pointing in that direction for years (i.e. VW and Mercedes' reliability declines, BMW's recent problems with the 5 and 7 series, Land Rover's perennial reliability issues, etc.).

Okay do they keep track of the vast increases in American-Japanese co-produced vehicles in the last 24 years. My point is more to do with Japanese cars than European. I have no interest in European cars. I would simply like a number that helps THE BUYER rather than the typical American flag waving retard in the street. Buying Japanese cars and rebadging them and buying Japanese to design and properly run plants is all well and good but it says nothing to me that Americans are actually any better at bukilding cars. I'm not defending ANY of the Eurpean cars never have been. But us versus them articles - Christ it's no wonder there is so much Anti Americanism with all of the sweeping generalizations.

Coproduced cars represent a relatively small segment of the overall market, certainly not big enough to drive a 675,000 response survey, and you can check the sales charts from R.H. Polk and other sources if you want to look for that. If you want to go on the basis of where they are produced, then that's another story altogether given that many foreign car companies now make cars here, and a lot of domestic cars are made in Mexico, Canada, and elsewhere. But, the country of origin is something that CU does not track from year-to-year, and the occasions (with the first U.S. made Honda Accords I remember) where they did compare U.S. and Japanese made versions of identical models, they found no significant differences in the reliability.

Well that's weak. Firstly, I would expect no to very slight differences between the co-produced cars. I don't care where they are produced though a comparison of plants making the same cars would be of iterest to the manufacturers no doubt to see who is producing better products. What I am talking about is cars that are the same model even built in the same plant with a different label. A Nissan truck several years ago had Ford stamped right in the door - Mazda and Ford have had some sort of sister company thing going on for at least a decade. Toyota and GM with several models - Suzuki, Nissan are in there as well. Honda seems to be by themeselves.

European car makers would be advised to do the same...They improved all on their own but a cuple of Lexus designers would do Mercedes some good.

Considering how far ahead European nameplates were, you would expect that they would be able to maintain at least a slight edge. But, like I said, Mercedes made the mistake of not changing the fundamental way that they design cars. They still do a bumper-to-bumper redesign with every new model cycle, and their desire to maintain profit margins in the face of rising R&D costs led them to economize on the parts used in the vehicles themselves. BMW's recent 5 and 7 series models introduced some new untested electronics, some of which have proven unreliable. Volkswagen let their QC guard down as their sales picked up, and now their reputation's taking a beating, which is too bad because I generally like their cars otherwise and my wife has been saving up for a New Beetle. European car makers at one point had a better than 2-to-1 edge in their defect rate. How they let that huge edge whither away should be the burning question rather than trivialities about how the survey sample was divied up. And as I've pointed out repeatedly, this is not some one-year outlier result (and with survey samples this large, outliers are not going to drive findings), it's part of a general trend that's been going on for the past few years.

Well the Japanese stomp them both still. But does that mean I won't take the James Bond BMW over a top of the line Cadilac? well unless we know the SPECIFIC results of those two cars after 3 years...we won't know. 20-18 over one year...let's see it next year as well...to be sure it isn't a trough.

No, what matters to the buyer is how reliable the model that they are test driving has been. They don't care that the VW Passat has had an average reliability record for the most part if the VW Jetta that they are interested in buying has had high defect rates in most categories. If CU is reporting the data, then it meets their minimum confidence level, if the data's insufficient, then the buyer's on their own. All that other background about which car maker or model has a higher proportion of the sample, or how the company does in aggregate, makes for good bulletin board fodder and fanboy discussions, but pretty much irrelevant otherwise.

Umm that's what I've been saying - specific companies specific cars. It's a giant umbrella.
Level one: American VS European = value to individual buyer to know this stat ZERO.
Level Two: Ford VS Honda = Value to customer ---moderate because people like to feel secure with the company they are buying from.
Level three: Ford Focus VS Honda Civic = Value to know this stat - most relevant --will car catch fir and burn my wife and kids to death or will it likely not. Then you read the reports and then see number 2 and look for history of the company...which one has the roasty toasty past?

Quite the contrary, that overall defect rate is very indicative of a general trend that I've seen among individual European models over the past five or six years. For example, before 1998, Mercedes were mostly above average or much better than average in their reliability records, but around the introduction of the M-class, successive model introductions have shown more problems than before. VW has had a similar slide in the reliability of most of its models as well. BMW was strong for the most part, but CU's now reporting on problems with the 7 series, and I've been reading other stuff about the 5 series as well. Frankly, I'm surprised that it took until this year for the CU findings to confirm what's been showing up on the JD Power rankings and CU's own reliability information on individual models the past few years.

You'll have to prove those stats sorry. Mercedes has scored very poorly for at least 15 years in the Lemon Aid guide. Average is a high point for Mercedes - for that money Average doesn't cut it. Inflated prices don't help either. I may be wrong but Lemon Aid compares cars within given classes. So sports car versus sports car. So the Camero gets a high rating in the lemon aid because of performance versus surveys versus repairs versus re-sale and all that stuff and it gets ranked highly. Because they owner expects high maintenaance and versus other sports cars it does well. That to me is a reasonably fair method of evaluation...They still provide the negative numbers for repairs but it's a good indicator of the cars value. The Bugatti at 1million US is probably a POS reliability wise but not many cars go 0-300KPH in 14 seconds and hit a top speed of over 250MPH. Maintenance versus repair versus driving habits versus age of driver versus WHERE you drive all impact cars...the old joke of being better off having your car built Tuesday to Thursday would be interesting to see the stats there as well.

Coproduction's not an issue because examples like the Pontiac Vibe/Toyota Matrix or the Nissan Quest/Mercury Villager or Chevy Prizm/Toyota Corolla make up such a minimal portion of the overall auto sales (at least on the American side of the sales ledger) that they would hardly make a dent in an aggregated summation like the one reported in the USA Today article, and it's not like coproduced cars have grown so much the past five years that they would completely explain the improvements in American car reliability (in fact, both the Villager and Prizm were discontinued for 2004, so the coproduction cross-badging strategy's obviously not a major part of American car makers' plans). If you're talking about shared platforms or drivetrains, then there might be an argument there. However, even in those cases, you're talking about significantly different vehicles with potentially very different reliability records. I mean, the Sterling shared the platform, drivetrain, and a lot of the same body parts as the Acura Legend, yet the reliability records of those two models were about as contrasting as you can get.

But that could have been a design issue from the get-go. Small numbers or not we don't know...why are they not listed? Co-production is not limited to JUST both companies making the same car. But this is a minutae arguement anyway. Amercian cars across the board fall apart 50% more often than Japanese cars - if we're going to use the same CR statistic which still isn't very good as generalized statistics go. Sounds like Lutz the incompetant boob is over at GM...ahh that explains it.

Certainly they're(American makers) are getting better as a group and seem to be on the right track according to the following article. Of course I'd expect them to get better...they could not possibly have gotten much worse than they were... http://www.businessweek.com/magazine...4/b3867085.htm

[topspeed]

Discussing cars with someone that doesn't even own one is like discussing audio with a deaf person.

I have been trying, lord knows I've been fighting it, to get involved because both of you have a history of going at it. It's like watching Mtry and hifitommy or Lex and SirTT, although I admit it's entertaining as hell in a slow-down-for-a-car-wreck kind of way.

However, RGA your facts, accusations, and sweeping generalizations are so far off base, I don't even know where to start...

The Grand Marquis a rebadged Mazda? What idiot told you this? It's a rebadged Crown Vic on a body-on-frame chassis that has been around since time imemorial.

Jaguar is ranked in the Top 5 of reliability, due in very large part to Fords parts and manufacturing expertise. They are not a Ford btw, they design, engineer, and manufacture their own cars. Is there Ford content? Of course and thank God for that. There's also GM (tranny), but at least the Lucas content has been vastly reduced, if not eliminated completely in the new XJ.

Ford doens't hire Japanese to run their plants, they've had their plants examined by the Japanese because they are the most efficient in the world.

GM doesn't "buy" Suzuki's and rebadge them because they OWN 25% of Suzuki. They also own a big chunk of or all of: Saab, Hummer, Fuji Heavy Industries (Subaru), Opel, Vauxhall, Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Lancia, Daewoo and their domestic brands.

That wasn't a Nissan truck, that was a Mazda and yes, Mazda is owned (not partnered) by Ford. Ford also owns Jaguar, Land Rover, Volvo, and Aston Martin along with their domestic brands.

Nissan/Infiniti is owned by Renault.

The VW Group owns Audi, Lamborghini, Bugatti, Bentley, Seat, Skoda, and is related to Porsche (although they share platforms and technology, Porsche AG is still family owned)

BMW owns Rolls Royce and Mini.

DC owns a big chunk of Mitsubishi (around 35%) along with Smart, Maybach, and their domestic brands.

Honda/Acura and Toyota/Lexus are independent.

As far as reliability issues let's be clear, it's a lot more even out there than you think. BMW recalled the current M3 because of catastrophic engine failures (siezing) and the 3,5,and 7 series because of (drum roll please) FIRES caused by faulty design in the wiring harness. Mighty Toyota even recalled some cars (can't remember which model) due to electrical probs. Mercedes was ranked 30th out of 32 brands in reliability by a GERMAN auto mag. Audi & VW's well document quality woes have resulted in a 11% drop in sales (the third year in a row for declining sales). So you can see, it doesn't matter where it's made, they all have their share of problems.

RGA, I like you but you have a tendency to lock onto one source and proclaim it as gospel. Whether it's Lemon Aid or Peter Qvortup(sp?), you immediately discount anything that is contradictory as heresy. This is extremely short sighted and you're smarter than that. FWIW, I prefer to get my quality info not from CR, Lemon Aid, or JD Power but have found the best info comes from the long term tests conducted by C/D, R&T, Automobile, Autoweek, et.al. These guys drive the wheels off their cars in all kinds of conditions for at least 1 year or 50,000 miles. Bare in mind, auto scribes aren't terribly kind to cars and usually drive them much harder than Joe Public.

[kexodusc]

Thank you so much, Topspeed. Someone had to say it.

C'mon gents, break it up, shake hands...every week you guys square off in debate after debate using big words most of us common folk don't understand. You want to fight each other? I ENCOURAGE it...go ahead....but just think...e-mail would be more private and allow you to say what was really on your minds.

It's somewhat discouraging to see 2 of the most helpful posters on the forum constantly engaged in a battle of good vs. evil, right vs. wrong, Paradigm vs.metal tweeters suck...you get my point.

I would like to know...was there ever a time when you two got along? Which post started the big rift?

Cheers guys!

[Woochifer]

I have conducted psychological testing with statistcal methodology...no I'm not a statistician...but on this it's not that tough. Again you build a straw man and down right LIE. I never said CR was lying...What I did say is that the information they provided...or was misused by USA is no help. DO you deny that based off that information you can say that Chrysler has fer defects than BMW solely based off that article. YES or no to this question? If I'm a buyer looking at the flagship from these two guys and my PRIMARY concern is breakdown rates does that article help me in ANY way? If you missed my point all this time well here it is and it should be an obvious one...though we'll see if you GET IT.

Okay, so now I'M a liar too. Before you get your delicate sensibilities wound up even tighter, I was asking you a question whether you thought CU was lying (you already said that USA Today lied by omission, what did they omit? If you want them to reprint the entire CU auto issue, you'd be better served just buying it yourself). Now you've answered, so move on.

And on your little attempt at a yes or no pin-me-down line of questioning makes for nice drama, but again veers off-target into the rhelm of irrelevancy. But, for argument's sake I'll entertain your question. The simple answer is no, of course not.

And the long answer is that the CU press release and the USA Today article were never intended to answer that type of question. I mean, that question of whether a Chrysler is more reliable than a BMW is just as irrelevant to the content of the article as whether a Chrysler PT Cruiser is more reliable than a BMW 3-series, or whether a 2003 PT Cruiser with a turbo engine is more reliable than a 2003 BMW M3, or whether a 2003 PT Cruiser with turbo engine has more front suspension failures than a 2003 BMW M3's front suspension. You're basically creating exceptions and asterisks to suit your biases. Of course, you'll find specific European cars that are more reliable than certain American models. But, then again, in the previous 23 years when European cars as a whole routinely had lower defect rates than American ones, I could've just as easily found specific American car models that were more reliable than specific European cars.

Oh there's a lot of untruth in it. It's sad that you can't see it. I am not arguing the number they produced - I questioned the validity of calling an American owned car company a European car...if we're going by WHERE it's built then Honda is American or Canadian but they count as Japanese. Jaguar is a Ford - an American car. If you can't see the misuse of creating statistical data here I pity you. GM buys Suzuki Swifts and re-badges them into Sprints and do they now count as American? Do you not understand this very basic concept. Without knowing what the hell they are considering European and what counts as All American or Japanese the numbers are meaningless. No CR didn't lie because perhaps they did produce something useful but typical of newspapers don't tell you the whole story. After all Newspaper writers generally aren't the brightest bulbs in the droor and rather than actually understand the issue they paraphrase the hell out of things to make a point that looks good. i mean thanks to newspapers people actually thought for 20+ years the human beings use 10% of our brains - look at the potential. D'ohh.

So, we should now call Saab an American car, even though the entire design team and manufacturing facility are in Sweden? Or that all along we should have called Mazda an American car as well because Ford has held a stake in the company since the 70s? Or maybe we should now call Chryslers German cars, even though not a single Chrysler model is actually designed and manufactured in Germany? Or start calling Nissan/Infiniti a French car just because Renault holds a majority stake, even though most of the design and manufacturing operations are in either Japan or the U.S.? Your search for straws to grasp onto just to maintain this pathological need to bash American cars is getting absurd.

And before you now veer off onto yet another wild mental adventure bashing the whole journalism profession, keep in mind that USA Today was not the only newspaper that wrote an article about CU's findings. CU puts out a summary press release like that every year, and newspapers write about it every year. The previous 23 years detailed out how American cars were less reliable than the European and Asian brands, and newspapers wrote about that.

Actually that is untrue and with your expertise in stat and psychology - you are an expert right as you seem to imply it. I brought up DBT's to illustrate the misuse of statistics and why high cofidence is important. Many surveys in psychology - the ones with a lot of questions often ask the same questions in slightly re-worded form. Low and behold the rating scale is often DIFFERENT just from the re-wording of the same question. This is not an issue in the car surveys because presumably all car owners get the exact same form so everything is equal. More trials offers higher confidence in the results however. Statistical significance determination is not a set in stone figure.

I have no background in psych, aside from three college courses and participating in a couple of experiments. The survey research that I do is related to socioeconomic and market research. Even though the quantitative methods are similar, the research design can be entirely different. With a consumer survey, the variation on the measures is less than with documenting human behavior, but you still need to validate the survey with a test sample. Sure, you get higher confidence levels with higher samples, but the question is how much you're willing to invest in order to get that high sample. With any large group, you'll never get a 100% response. Does the jump from a 95% confidence level to a 99% confidence level mean that much more to the survey objective? The Census Bureau invests billions of dollar to try and achieve a 100% population count, but even with all those resources and tens of thousands of survey takers, they still only achieve about a 90% count and have to use sampling techniques to fill in the remainder. And with the more detailed socioeconomic characteristics, the entire demographic profile of the U.S., every state, every city, and every tract and block group is based on a 10% sample.

Okay do they keep track of the vast increases in American-Japanese co-produced vehicles in the last 24 years. My point is more to do with Japanese cars than European. I have no interest in European cars. I would simply like a number that helps THE BUYER rather than the typical American flag waving retard in the street. Buying Japanese cars and rebadging them and buying Japanese to design and properly run plants is all well and good but it says nothing to me that Americans are actually any better at bukilding cars. I'm not defending ANY of the Eurpean cars never have been. But us versus them articles - Christ it's no wonder there is so much Anti Americanism with all of the sweeping generalizations.

Flag waving retard? Us versus them articles? Anti-Americanism? Where the hell did this come from? Like I keep saying, look at all of the coproduced cars out there. Do any of them rank among the top selling vehicles for the big three nameplates? The only reason why Detroit car makers went to coproduction was so that they would not have to do their own ground-up compact car designs. It fills in a market gap, but it's not their primary focus. If you think that the coproduced cars constitute a large enough group to have singlehandedly driven the improvement in American car quality, you really need to pay attention to sales figures. The Chevy Silverado alone outsells the Pontiac Vibe by about 10-1. If there's such a jingoistic flag-waving slant to the American media, then how come the various problems that the American car manufacturers have had over the past couple of decades were so widely documented in the press? If you're not defending European cars, then why fly off the deep end and launch into a cut-and-paste tirade when I post something on how American cars now have a lower defect rate overall?

Well that's weak. Firstly, I would expect no to very slight differences between the co-produced cars. I don't care where they are produced though a comparison of plants making the same cars would be of iterest to the manufacturers no doubt to see who is producing better products. What I am talking about is cars that are the same model even built in the same plant with a different label. A Nissan truck several years ago had Ford stamped right in the door - Mazda and Ford have had some sort of sister company thing going on for at least a decade. Toyota and GM with several models - Suzuki, Nissan are in there as well. Honda seems to be by themeselves.

Like I said, check the sales charts. Those types of coproductions make up a miniscule share of the overall sales, and would do little if anything to drive the defect rate one way or another. Oh, and BTW, Isuzu made SUVs for Honda for a number of years.

Well the Japanese stomp them both still. But does that mean I won't take the James Bond BMW over a top of the line Cadilac? well unless we know the SPECIFIC results of those two cars after 3 years...we won't know. 20-18 over one year...let's see it next year as well...to be sure it isn't a trough.

And that's been the case for years, so tell me something I don't know. If you want the SPECIFIC results, then go to the CU auto issue. Their press release was about aggregate results, if you want the specifics, they're available. It's not like anyone's hiding anything.

Umm that's what I've been saying - specific companies specific cars. It's a giant umbrella.
Level one: American VS European = value to individual buyer to know this stat ZERO.
Level Two: Ford VS Honda = Value to customer ---moderate because people like to feel secure with the company they are buying from.
Level three: Ford Focus VS Honda Civic = Value to know this stat - most relevant --will car catch fir and burn my wife and kids to death or will it likely not. Then you read the reports and then see number 2 and look for history of the company...which one has the roasty toasty past?

If you're so obsessive about cars catching fire, no wonder you don't drive. First off, how often do cars, especially newer ones, just spontaneously catch fire? Even among the cases of the Ford Explorers with the exploding tires, we're looking at a total of about 80 documented cases. Out of the half million or so Explorers that are sold every year, that hardly makes for something that I would lose sleep over. An electrical system problem that can potentially strand me in the middle of nowhere is a more immediate concern (and something that Acura discovered AFTER I had already shelled out $400 and ruined a 4th of July holiday).

Like I keep saying, if you want specifics, they're out there for you to look up. But, that still doesn't change the aggregate defect rate. You want to believe that American cars are unreliable, I'm sure you'll keep finding examples that support your case, but that certainly doesn't support the blanket condemnation that you keep throwing around.

You'll have to prove those stats sorry. Mercedes has scored very poorly for at least 15 years in the Lemon Aid guide. Average is a high point for Mercedes - for that money Average doesn't cut it. Inflated prices don't help either. I may be wrong but Lemon Aid compares cars within given classes. So sports car versus sports car. So the Camero gets a high rating in the lemon aid because of performance versus surveys versus repairs versus re-sale and all that stuff and it gets ranked highly. Because they owner expects high maintenaance and versus other sports cars it does well. That to me is a reasonably fair method of evaluation...They still provide the negative numbers for repairs but it's a good indicator of the cars value. The Bugatti at 1million US is probably a POS reliability wise but not many cars go 0-300KPH in 14 seconds and hit a top speed of over 250MPH. Maintenance versus repair versus driving habits versus age of driver versus WHERE you drive all impact cars...the old joke of being better off having your car built Tuesday to Thursday would be interesting to see the stats there as well.

I have to prove stats? They're out there for the taking if you want to look them up! All of these hypothetical scenarios that you're spinning are the ones that would be difficult to reliably prove in any form.

But that could have been a design issue from the get-go. Small numbers or not we don't know...why are they not listed? Co-production is not limited to JUST both companies making the same car. But this is a minutae arguement anyway. Amercian cars across the board fall apart 50% more often than Japanese cars - if we're going to use the same CR statistic which still isn't very good as generalized statistics go. Sounds like Lutz the incompetant boob is over at GM...ahh that explains it.

Certainly they're(American makers) are getting better as a group and seem to be on the right track according to the following article. Of course I'd expect them to get better...they could not possibly have gotten much worse than they were... http://www.businessweek.com/magazine...4/b3867085.htm

CU DOES post the coproduced car models separately if you want to look them up. And since you started this post on the subject of lies, how does a higher defect rate mean that "American cars across the board fall apart 50% more often than Japanese cars"? I don't know about you, but here in California I don't see too many cars that just fall apart. Maybe you've been breathing too much of that road salt to tell the difference between something that needs repair versus something that is on the ground in pieces.

[RGA]

Discussing cars with someone that doesn't even own one is like discussing audio with a deaf person.

Umm had to sell it to get a student loan...I've owned three before the age of 27. I am not a car guy...as such I care more about reliability than 0-60 ratings.

However, RGA your facts, accusations, and sweeping generalizations are so far off base, I don't even know where to start...

No I complained about the generalization of lumping car companies together. I said at the outset that the 20-18 stat serves what to YOU if YOU were going out to buy a car. It still doesn't help you if you're going to buy a Focus vs a VW Golf. You need to know the sepecific cars. I have not EVER defended European Cars except to say that we don't know from those stats WHICH car companies are lousy and which are not. I used BMW as an example not a set in stone fact that they were better. But if the AVERAGE is 20 defects than anyone with a basic understanding of averages KNOWS that some cars are going to be lower fewer than 20 and some higher than 20. Same goes for the American Cars for that matter some are higher than 18 and lower than 18. That's not a generalization it's a fact.

The Grand Marquis a rebadged Mazda? What idiot told you this? It's a rebadged Crown Vic on a body-on-frame chassis that has been around since time imemorial.

Are you in league...Never mentioned the Marquis?

Jaguar is ranked in the Top 5 of reliability, due in very large part to Fords parts and manufacturing expertise. They are not a Ford btw, they design, engineer, and manufacture their own cars. Is there Ford content? Of course and thank God for that. There's also GM (tranny), but at least the Lucas content has been vastly reduced, if not eliminated completely in the new XJ.

You have evidence of Jaguar in the top 5 in the world? Not judging by CR or the Lemon Aid reports - and even if - Hypothetically, it were true then that would illustrate my point above that some European cars fair better than the 20 figure now doesn't it?

Ford doens't hire Japanese to run their plants, they've had their plants examined by the Japanese because they are the most efficient in the world.

Yes - I never said Japanese run their plants...Japanese have had over the last 20 years more mobile plants better QC better design...American are copying or trying to their model...good - never argued the point i even provided a link which says the same thing.

GM doesn't "buy" Suzuki's and rebadge them because they OWN 25% of Suzuki. They also own a big chunk of or all of: Saab, Hummer, Fuji Heavy Industries (Subaru), Opel, Vauxhall, Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Lancia, Daewoo and their domestic brands.

25% does not mean they own Suzuki...that requires 50.1% And when the Sprint was made what roughly a decade ago. This practice is not new. Swift was out and people were buying them up GM wants a piece of that and comes out witht he Sprint...same exact car but with a GM body...it's a Japanese car designed by Suzuki.

You do however bring up an intersting point though that so many companies are now bought and sold merged that lines today are very blurred. Hell one article was complaining about some Japanese cars that advertised "Made in America" but every single componant in the car was not made in the US but Mexico Canada china or elsewhere...so they were upset with the wording. There was a Hitachi Laserdisc player that was a clone of the my Pioneer LCD 1091 with Hitachi's silver box instead of blakc and Hitachi's logo instead of pioneer...looking inside some of these various players you'll see Sanyo chips in them. So that is my point. What is a Sprint? Japanese or American...how did CR decide? Lemon Aid mentioned 3 RECOMMENDED Chryslers with a snide remark "The three best cars Chrysler never built." They didn't but because it's owned by Chrysler did CR count them as American.

This was my only complaint with the entire article was what are they talking about when they say American/European/Japanese or Korean Mexican for that matter. Is it company ownership? Is it who designed it? Is it where the parts came from? Is it where it was physically BUILT? If the latter than Honda Civic is an American Car...Jag is European...if it's ownership the Honda is Japanese and Jag is American. You can't have it both ways and if you want it both ways you better tell the reader...in either case it was not done in that article. It's like me saying that Audio Note is 50% better than YBA. Great...how so? Which products? Statistics ALWAYS need contexts that are useful.

As far as reliability issues let's be clear, it's a lot more even out there than you think. BMW recalled the current M3 because of catastrophic engine failures (siezing) and the 3,5,and 7 series because of (drum roll please) FIRES caused by faulty design in the wiring harness. Mighty Toyota even recalled some cars (can't remember which model) due to electrical probs. Mercedes was ranked 30th out of 32 brands in reliability by a GERMAN auto mag. Audi & VW's well document quality woes have resulted in a 11% drop in sales (the third year in a row for declining sales). So you can see, it doesn't matter where it's made, they all have their share of problems.

Again I'm not saying EVER that European cars don't have recalls or even Japanese cars. I remember a few years a go a huge recall on seatbelts...Toyota, Ford and a few others all used the same seatbelts so all cars using the seatbelts had the same problems...just like if that Sanyo chip was defective you would see Sony and maybe 12 other companies have the same problem. Arcam and Audio Note use a Sony Transport in some of their cd players whereas Sony doesn't even use their own transports in their own models. My point about the Delco battery earlier which was in a Honda and not their own GM car.

RGA, I like you but you have a tendency to lock onto one source and proclaim it as gospel. Whether it's Lemon Aid or Peter Qvortup(sp?), you immediately discount anything that is contradictory as heresy. This is extremely short sighted and you're smarter than that. FWIW, I prefer to get my quality info not from CR, Lemon Aid, or JD Power but have found the best info comes from the long term tests conducted by C/D, R&T, Automobile, Autoweek, et.al. These guys drive the wheels off their cars in all kinds of conditions for at least 1 year or 50,000 miles. Bare in mind, auto scribes aren't terribly kind to cars and usually drive them much harder than Joe Public.

I had a problem with car and driver because they reviewed a Honda Civic and saying a plus was their relibaility was superior to American counterparts and they listed Cavelier. THEN, flipping over to Cavelier review they say it's caught up to the Japanese -recommended - Which the F! is it? Whichever pays the most advertising? Must have been a tie that issue. CR and Lemon Aid are information tools for reliability...that's ALL I would use them for. Certainly not as road test evaluators. Then I would go to car guys like yourself or C/D for opinions which is the best 70k sports car.

Everyone makes a lemon never said otherwise...specific stats helps you play your odds. In the Civic class nothing is going to blow your mind performance wise - gas mileage, nimbleness, features, comfort and naturally RELIABLY getting you from A to B. CR and Lemon-Aid show you the odds. Both actually are very close in opinions on most cars - probably 85%+ but L-A provides more details about other aspects unknown to CR readers. I suggest it would behoove people to cross-reference BOTH before making a used/New car buy. Same way I like t read several reviews of audio componants not JUST one source like you claim I do. It's interesting that class C recommended componants get rubbished in the Brit press and great stuff from Britain doesn't even get a review in Stereophile.

OT
The Sugden A21a I use as an example of why you SHOULD NOT JUST read Stereophile and base your purchase solely on what they say. I spoke to the reviewer who finally did a review of the A21a and he said it was the class leader of integrated amps. that amp had been number one for a decade in Britain and that amp was sold in North America as well. But Stereophile readers would have bought Arcam MF Creek Rotel Bryston integrateds off the reviews. Then in 2003 14 years after the A21a update in 1989 Stereohile says ohh yes this was the best amp in it's class. How the hell can they MISS the longest running amplifier in history - the best one it's class to boot - and then when they FINALLY review it they don't even give it a full review...no I had to ask the editor himself to get the answer. And sopmething tells me you won't see it in their recommended componants listing either.

As for Peter...I give him the benefit of the doubt because based off the sound his process is the correct one - to my ear ... whether the techies like it or not that's fine let them keep upgrading every six months for all I care.