Edmunds.com | Inside Line | Auto Observer Your Account | Help | Directory
You are here:
![[F]](http://a332.g.akamai.net/f/332/936/12h/www.edmunds.com/media/townhall/webxicons/site.gif){kind=small}
Forums
Vans & Minivans 2008 Minivans 
1261 messages, Last post on Feb 27, 2008 at 7:47 AM
You are in the Vans & Minivans Forum. Your Host is Karens
|
Replying to: marine2 (Feb 25, 2008 7:01 am) Journal Sentinal Cars.com Consumer Reports AutoBlog AOL Videos YouTube And that's just the first page. The press loves covering a story like this. This is how it should work - the problem appears, people discuss it on-line, create a buzz. That puts pressure on the manufacturer to address the issue, and they do.
|
|
|
Replying to: ateixeira (Feb 25, 2008 7:36 am) A quick Google finds coverage from: Journal Sentinal Cars.com Consumer Reports AutoBlog AOL Videos YouTube And that's just the first page. The press loves covering a story like this. This is how it should work - the problem appears, people discuss it on-line, create a buzz. That puts pressure on the manufacturer to address the issue, and they do. Does it say what issue in Consummers Report has it in? Most of those you mentioned, most people would never see or read. Now if you had said NY Times, Arizona Republic, Edmonds, Motor Trend, LA. Times, CBS, NBC, I could understand it. They sure wouldn't have a problem with that kind of news on those sources if they were American. |
|
|
Replying to: marine2 (Feb 25, 2008 8:33 am) Click & Clack spoke about the issue on the air, too. It was pretty funny, as usual. Detroit Free Press covered it (naturally). Edmunds may have blogged it. I guess it was big news for those that wanted it to be big news. I dunno, it's just a spot weld. Doesn't seem like that big a deal, or that costly to repair, for that matter. Click & Clack had quite a bit of fun with it.
|
|
|
Replying to: dennisctc (Feb 24, 2008 3:15 am) 
|
|
|
Replying to: ateixeira (Feb 25, 2008 8:39 am) I dunno, it's just a spot weld. Doesn't seem like that big a deal, or that costly to repair, for that matter. I'm not talking about just a spot weld on the Toyota minivan. I'm talking about the massive recalls that Toyota is having on many of their models. Even as GM and Ford have accumulated award after award on vehicle quality, you’d almost never know about such quality gains made by American companies - or quality declines of foreign companies - by listening to the media. Did you hear about it when the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced that Toyota recalled more vehicles than it sold in the U.S. last year? Probably not. Did you hear about Toyota making an "elaborate apology" for their "worrisome series of recalls" that has "tarnished its reputation for quality?" Probably not. Did you hear about the Toyota senior manager quote that stated "We used to do quiet recalls called ‘service campaigns’ to deal with defects but we’re not going to hide anything anymore?" Such a statement suggests Toyota’s past recall numbers were probably much higher than we were led to believe, and they profited handsomely by having a perception of higher quality than they deserved. In Japan, prosecutors are looking into possible negligence on the part of Toyota for shirking recalls for the last eight years. How ironic. You probably didn’t hear about that one either because the American media doesn’t like to bash foreign auto companies - only American ones. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1753099/posts
|
|
|
Replying to: marine2 (Feb 25, 2008 8:53 am) The problems with the new 6 speed automatic are pretty well documented, in fact IIRC CR made that front page news. Same with the Tundra's glass camshafts. There is no doubt Toyota has had major growing pains. You can't do that kind of volume, especially with rapid growth, and maintain the level of quality control you had before, when you were smaller. I don't dispute that at all. In fact, an Edmunds member works for a supplier to SIA and surprised me when he said the quality inspectoins for Subaru and more stringent than the ones for the Camry at the same plant. Should we be surprised that Subaru passed Toyota in CR surveys? Toyota dropped from 1st to 5th place. In the context of the Sienna, though, it's still the most reliable van out there, whether you believe Consumer Reports or TrueDelta. They are using a proven engine and transmission, and one small defective spot weld doesn't change that a bit. Also, let's keep in mind Simmermaker is a Union member and runs www.howtobuyamerican.com, not exactly an unbiased reporter. |
|
|
Replying to: marine2 (Feb 25, 2008 8:53 am) But what has happened since gas prices have been on the decline in recent months? The Wall Street Journal reported a "slight" increase in truck sales by American companies, as Ford Expedition sales were up 41% and Lincoln Navigator sales were up 44%. The American media even tries to restrain its applause for home-based auto companies by referring to gains of over 40% as "slight!" And the foreign car lovers will probably also not tell you (or maybe they just don’t know or don’t want you to know) that GM and Ford pour more money into existing American facilities than foreign automakers spend on new plants, usually with little or no tax breaks. GM has already spent over $500 million upgrading two transmission plants this year, and has spent nearly a billion dollars over the last decade, for example, for facility upgrades in Texas. And what do GM and Ford get for making their existing plants more efficient? It isn’t tax breaks. Instead, they get accusations of not being "competitive" enough! Maybe here I should also mention that the average domestic parts content for Kia is 3%, while the average domestic parts content of Ford and GM is 78% and 74% respectively. This means that buying a U.S.-assembled (or even foreign-assembled, for that matter) GM or Ford supports more American jobs than a U.S.-assembled car or truck with a foreign nameplate. Fortunately for our benefit, the U.S. remains the overall global leader in research and development, and a big reason for that is that American automakers - according to the Level Field Institute - invest $16 billion in R&D (Research & Development) annually, which outpaces any other industry one could name. Admittedly, the Level Field Institute counts German-owned DaimlerChrysler as an American automaker, so Ford and GM’s combined R&D contribution to America is closer to around $12 billion. But who’s counting, right? Certainly not the American auto-bashing media. Japanese companies do employ 3,600 American workers in R&D, but that still leaves the foreign competition behind in the dust staring at American rear bumpers. 3,600 sounds like a big number until you realize that 65,000 Americans work in R&D facilities in the state of Michigan alone. In fact, two of the top four R&D spending companies in America as reported by the Wall Street Journal are - you guessed it - Ford and General Motors. The other two are also American companies: Pfizer and Microsoft http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1753099/posts |
|
|
Replying to: marine2 (Feb 25, 2008 9:02 am) WSJ said truck sales - that includes pickups, a much bigger percentage of the total pie. Simmermaker single out a couple of low volume luxury SUVs, a drop in the bucket when it comes to the big picture of pickup truck sales.
|
|
|
Replying to: ateixeira (Feb 25, 2008 8:39 am) It has cost Sienna owners $ 2,000 per front door to fix the problem with spot welds failing in the front doors of Siennas. Try this link for more information. I could not find the discussion in the Sienna Club about the BIG DEFECT in 2004-2007 Sienna front doors because I am not a member of the Sienna Club.
|
|
|
Replying to: marine2 (Feb 25, 2008 9:02 am) Lets discuss the benefits and short comings of these new minivans. But lets not cut our own throat by judging them today by the problems they had 8-10 years ago. All of them had some major problems. All of them are pretty good vans now.
|
|
You are here:
Forums
Vans & Minivans 2008 Minivans
New? Join Now!
Forum Tools
Search Forums
Browse by Vehicle
2011 Toyota Sienna
2011 Honda Odyssey
2010 Chrysler Town and Country
2007 Dodge Caravan
2008 Hyundai Entourage
2010 Mazda MAZDA5
2009 Kia Sedona
Browse by Board
Browse by Topic
Today's Chats
