Honda Car Forum

On 26 Dec, 15:14, Jeff <jeff....@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Dec 26, 2:43*am, "CharlesTheCurmudgeon" <n5...@comcast.net> wrote:
>
>
>
> > "A Plumbers Helper Named Joe" <AP...@a2e.net> wrote in messagenews:495479e8$0$1532$822641b3@news.adtechco mputers.com...
>
> > > "Derek Gee" <dgeeSPAMSU...@twmi.INVALID.rr.com> wrote in message
> > >news:49507d63$0$17050$9a6e19ea@unlimited.newshost ing.com...
> > >> <rantonr...@mail.com> wrote in message
> > >>news:37ae352e-9ab8-4f37-a60c-b9a0948620a2@r10g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
>
> > >>> CharlesTheCurmudgeon wrote:
>
> > >>>>"Rock Hardson" <RH...@yahooo.com> wrote in message
> > >>>>news:494d1c7a$1$1548$822641b3@news.adtechcompu ters.com...
> > >>>>>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...08/12/19/AR200...
>
> > >>>>>I suspect once the US auto industry gets on a level field the foriegn
> > >>>>>companies may be in for an ass kicking.
>
> > >>>>Sorry, you are WRONG. *US auto makers do not encourage the culture of
> > >>>>quality that the Japanese auto makers embraced about 50 years ago.
> > >>>>Until
> > >>>>the American automakers demonstrate they are truly commited to quality
> > >>>>and
> > >>>>not just dependent on whether the head of the company is commited to
> > >>>>quality
> > >>>>or not, *there's not only going to not be a level playing field, there's
> > >>>>not
> > >>>>gong to be any play.
>
> > >>> The Japanese may have embraced it 50 years ago, but they continued to
> > >>> have horrible quality
> > >>> (can you say 'Toyopet'?) for another 25 years. *It's also a myth that
> > >>> Japanese car makers universally have better quality because when
> > >>> Toyota, Honda, and Subaru are excluded, their quality falls to being
> > >>> only par with ours.
>
> > >> Where did you get the idea that Subaru's are some model of reliability?
> > >> In the 2008 JD Power Vehicle Dependability Study, they rank well below
> > >> the industry average. *(Just ahead of Chrysler and Dodge!) *Of the
> > >> Japanese makes, only Toyota, Honda, and Mitsubishi are above the industry
> > >> average. US makes scoring exceptionally well on the same survey are
> > >> Mercury, Cadillac, Buick, and Lincoln. *(Mercury and Cadillac are both
> > >> scoring higher than Toyota, Acura, and Honda!!!)
>
> > >>http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/new...ease.aspx?ID=2...
>
> > >> Derek
> > > You can talk all day long about the quality of American cars, but some US
> > > American citizens are hell bent on seeing this whole country go down the
> > > tubes beginning with the big industry and US auto manufactures. I can't
> > > figure out where this self sabotage mentality comes from but it can be
> > > very dangerous to our society.
>
> > Dear Derek,
>
> > Maybe you should pay attention to your stepsister Casey. American citizens
> > vote with their dollars, every time they purchase something. *They perceive
> > that the Detroit 3 do not really give a damn about them and have not for a
> > long time.
>
> Neither do the foreign owned companies. They are only concerned with
> their own bottom line.
>
> >*Even their commercials still tend to sell the sizzle instead of
> > the steak, although some Toyota commercials tend to be headed that way,too.
> > But Toyota has established a fairly good reputaion for quality as far back
> > as 1965 (not 1975 as you seem to think) and Americans are tired of carsthat
> > have to be in the shop as often as their 1930's counterparts for minor,non
> > scheduled repairs, and rust!
>
> Gee, I own a 1997 Contour. It rarely needed non-scheduled repairs. And
> those were expected wear and tear items. I haven't had any problems at
> all with my new 2008 Focus - only thing needed was an oil change in
> the first 6k. I haven't heard of rust problems on any cars for over 10
> years.
>
> > I owned a 1995 Chevy S-10 and I had points of
> > rust on it in the first year, which the dealer refused to do anything about!
>
> Why didn't you contact the factory representative?
>
> > I currently own a 1995 Toyota Corolla that still doesn't have any rust on
> > it.
>
> > Wake up and smell the coffee. *America LOSES when we do less than ourbest,
> > and we've been doing that since the 1960's. *When you're number one and you
> > think that you can do no wrong, the next step is DOWN. *Look at K-mart. *#1
> > Discount Retailer in 1980. *Who's number one now? *Yep, a southern-based
> > retailer that K-mart didn't see as any kind of threat, because K-mart
> > thought #1 was theirs by some sort of divine right. *Samething with GM, Ford
> > and Crapsler.
>
> Actually, Ford has done a lot to improve quality and their lineup of
> cars. I never knew there was a car called crapsler. Usually when one
> has to do name-calling to make a point, the point is not worth
> making.
>
> Jeff
>
> > Sir Charles the Curmudgeon

It will be great for consumers of american cars in Europe now when us
taxpayers will be paying for american made cars.
Hopefully the cars will be both improved and cheaper.
That might even reflect on our own European made cars as well.
Please ask your kind president to give them a lot of money.

"CharlesTheCurmudgeon" <n5hsr@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:gj2cgm$te7$1@news.motzarella.org...
>
> "A Plumbers Helper Named Joe" <APHNJ@a2e.net> wrote in message
> news:495479e8$0$1532$822641b3@news.adtechcomputers .com...
>>
>> "Derek Gee" <dgeeSPAMSUCKS@twmi.INVALID.rr.com> wrote in message
>> news:49507d63$0$17050$9a6e19ea@unlimited.newshosti ng.com...
>>> <rantonrave@mail.com> wrote in message
>>> news:37ae352e-9ab8-4f37-a60c-b9a0948620a2@r10g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> CharlesTheCurmudgeon wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>"Rock Hardson" <RH232@yahooo.com> wrote in message
>>>>>news:494d1c7a$1$1548$822641b3@news.adtechcomp uters.com...
>>>>>>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I suspect once the US auto industry gets on a level field the foriegn
>>>>>>companies may be in for an ass kicking.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>Sorry, you are WRONG. US auto makers do not encourage the culture of
>>>>>quality that the Japanese auto makers embraced about 50 years ago.
>>>>>Until
>>>>>the American automakers demonstrate they are truly commited to quality
>>>>>and
>>>>>not just dependent on whether the head of the company is commited to
>>>>>quality
>>>>>or not, there's not only going to not be a level playing field,
>>>>>there's not
>>>>>gong to be any play.
>>>>>
>>>> The Japanese may have embraced it 50 years ago, but they continued to
>>>> have horrible quality
>>>> (can you say 'Toyopet'?) for another 25 years. It's also a myth that
>>>> Japanese car makers universally have better quality because when
>>>> Toyota, Honda, and Subaru are excluded, their quality falls to being
>>>> only par with ours.
>>>
>>> Where did you get the idea that Subaru's are some model of reliability?
>>> In the 2008 JD Power Vehicle Dependability Study, they rank well below
>>> the industry average. (Just ahead of Chrysler and Dodge!) Of the
>>> Japanese makes, only Toyota, Honda, and Mitsubishi are above the
>>> industry average. US makes scoring exceptionally well on the same survey
>>> are Mercury, Cadillac, Buick, and Lincoln. (Mercury and Cadillac are
>>> both scoring higher than Toyota, Acura, and Honda!!!)
>>>
>>> http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/new...spx?ID=2008115
>>>
>>> Derek
>> You can talk all day long about the quality of American cars, but some US
>> American citizens are hell bent on seeing this whole country go down the
>> tubes beginning with the big industry and US auto manufactures. I can't
>> figure out where this self sabotage mentality comes from but it can be
>> very dangerous to our society.
>>>
>>
>>
>
> Dear Derek,
>
> Maybe you should pay attention to your stepsister Casey. American citizens
> vote with their dollars, every time they purchase something. They
> perceive that the Detroit 3 do not really give a damn about them and have
> not for a long time. Even their commercials still tend to sell the sizzle
> instead of the steak, although some Toyota commercials tend to be headed
> that way, too. But Toyota has established a fairly good reputaion for
> quality as far back as 1965 (not 1975 as you seem to think) and Americans
> are tired of cars that have to be in the shop as often as their 1930's
> counterparts for minor, non scheduled repairs, and rust!

Dear Curmudgeon,

'Tis you who needs to wake up! I'm not sure where you plucked the year 1965
from as a "quality" benchmark for Toyota, but I used to work on my
ex-girlfriend's 1981 Toyota Corolla, and I can assure you it was no better
and no worse than my 1981 Escort in the number of repairs needed. They were
just different repairs. The Toyota was a rust bucket of the highest order -
so much so that I had to make repairs out of sheet metal and bondo all over
that vehicle. When it needed repair, the imported parts were much more
expensive than the US sourced parts. It was finally replaced with an '89
Escort that was FAR better than the Toyota had been. It needed fewer
repairs, didn't rust, was less expensive to insure and operate, and repair
cost less.

>I owned a 1995 Chevy S-10 and I had points of rust on it in the first
>year, which the >dealer refused to do anything about!

So why didn't you go to another dealer (who still has to honor the factory
warranty), or contact the GM representative? Bad dealers are everywhere,
and they aren't just US brand dealers.

The Toyota dealer in my former hometown was CONVICTED of stealing
rustproofing from the Chrysler Corporation right about that time when it
needed the government loan. Nice guys, eh? When I was getting service for
the '81 Corolla mentioned above, that same local dealer was incredibly
arrogant about dealing with customers. Did Toyota revoke their dealership?
Nope, they still are in business today, even with a felony conviction and
bad service to customers.

Derek

"Derek Gee" <dgeeSPAMSUCKS@twmi.INVALID.rr.com> wrote in message
news:495568fc$0$17045$9a6e19ea@unlimited.newshosti ng.com...
> "CharlesTheCurmudgeon" <n5hsr@comcast.net> wrote in message
> news:gj2cgm$te7$1@news.motzarella.org...
>>
>> "A Plumbers Helper Named Joe" <APHNJ@a2e.net> wrote in message
>> news:495479e8$0$1532$822641b3@news.adtechcomputers .com...
>>>
>>> "Derek Gee" <dgeeSPAMSUCKS@twmi.INVALID.rr.com> wrote in message
>>> news:49507d63$0$17050$9a6e19ea@unlimited.newshosti ng.com...
>>>> <rantonrave@mail.com> wrote in message
>>>> news:37ae352e-9ab8-4f37-a60c-b9a0948620a2@r10g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> CharlesTheCurmudgeon wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>"Rock Hardson" <RH232@yahooo.com> wrote in message
>>>>>>news:494d1c7a$1$1548$822641b3@news.adtechcom puters.com...
>>>>>>>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>I suspect once the US auto industry gets on a level field the foriegn
>>>>>>>companies may be in for an ass kicking.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Sorry, you are WRONG. US auto makers do not encourage the culture of
>>>>>>quality that the Japanese auto makers embraced about 50 years ago.
>>>>>>Until
>>>>>>the American automakers demonstrate they are truly commited to quality
>>>>>>and
>>>>>>not just dependent on whether the head of the company is commited to
>>>>>>quality
>>>>>>or not, there's not only going to not be a level playing field,
>>>>>>there's not
>>>>>>gong to be any play.
>>>>>>
>>>>> The Japanese may have embraced it 50 years ago, but they continued to
>>>>> have horrible quality
>>>>> (can you say 'Toyopet'?) for another 25 years. It's also a myth that
>>>>> Japanese car makers universally have better quality because when
>>>>> Toyota, Honda, and Subaru are excluded, their quality falls to being
>>>>> only par with ours.
>>>>
>>>> Where did you get the idea that Subaru's are some model of reliability?
>>>> In the 2008 JD Power Vehicle Dependability Study, they rank well below
>>>> the industry average. (Just ahead of Chrysler and Dodge!) Of the
>>>> Japanese makes, only Toyota, Honda, and Mitsubishi are above the
>>>> industry average. US makes scoring exceptionally well on the same
>>>> survey are Mercury, Cadillac, Buick, and Lincoln. (Mercury and
>>>> Cadillac are both scoring higher than Toyota, Acura, and Honda!!!)
>>>>
>>>> http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/new...spx?ID=2008115
>>>>
>>>> Derek
>>> You can talk all day long about the quality of American cars, but some
>>> US American citizens are hell bent on seeing this whole country go down
>>> the tubes beginning with the big industry and US auto manufactures. I
>>> can't figure out where this self sabotage mentality comes from but it
>>> can be very dangerous to our society.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Dear Derek,
>>
>> Maybe you should pay attention to your stepsister Casey. American
>> citizens vote with their dollars, every time they purchase something.
>> They perceive that the Detroit 3 do not really give a damn about them and
>> have not for a long time. Even their commercials still tend to sell the
>> sizzle instead of the steak, although some Toyota commercials tend to be
>> headed that way, too. But Toyota has established a fairly good reputaion
>> for quality as far back as 1965 (not 1975 as you seem to think) and
>> Americans are tired of cars that have to be in the shop as often as their
>> 1930's counterparts for minor, non scheduled repairs, and rust!
>
> Dear Curmudgeon,
>
> 'Tis you who needs to wake up! I'm not sure where you plucked the year
> 1965 from as a "quality" benchmark for Toyota, but I used to work on my
> ex-girlfriend's 1981 Toyota Corolla, and I can assure you it was no better
> and no worse than my 1981 Escort in the number of repairs needed. They
> were just different repairs. The Toyota was a rust bucket of the highest
> order - so much so that I had to make repairs out of sheet metal and bondo
> all over that vehicle. When it needed repair, the imported parts were
> much more expensive than the US sourced parts. It was finally replaced
> with an '89 Escort that was FAR better than the Toyota had been. It
> needed fewer repairs, didn't rust, was less expensive to insure and
> operate, and repair cost less.
>
>>I owned a 1995 Chevy S-10 and I had points of rust on it in the first
>>year, which the >dealer refused to do anything about!
>
> So why didn't you go to another dealer (who still has to honor the factory
> warranty), or contact the GM representative? Bad dealers are everywhere,
> and they aren't just US brand dealers.
>
> The Toyota dealer in my former hometown was CONVICTED of stealing
> rustproofing from the Chrysler Corporation right about that time when it
> needed the government loan. Nice guys, eh? When I was getting service
> for the '81 Corolla mentioned above, that same local dealer was incredibly
> arrogant about dealing with customers. Did Toyota revoke their
> dealership? Nope, they still are in business today, even with a felony
> conviction and bad service to customers.
>
> Derek
>
>

I picked 1965 because I had a teacher that had a '65 Crown, that by the time
I saw it, was already 10 years old and had well over 100,000 miles on it.
60's American cars wouldn't do over 100,000, at least not any of the ones we
owned.

Between the various members of our family, we had a 77, a 79, two 80's, an
81 and an 82 Corolla. The only problem we had was the 81 had been abused by
the previous owner (run really low on oil) and we had to get a rebuilt 3 TC
engine for it. That is one weakness of Toyotas. Keep the oil between low
and full and change it regularly, and you'll get a lot of miles out of it.

Most dealers have NBH (Not Bought Here) syndrome. I had a 79 that I
purchased at one dealership. I got moved a couple hundred miles, and took
it to the local dealership for regular maintenance. They wanted me to drive
it back to the OTHER dealership for maintenance. I moved again before the
next regular maintenance. That dealer, too, thought I ought to drive it all
the way back to the dealer I bought it from, by that time some 300 miles
distant.

As for the Chevy, the next nearest dealer was owned by the same people in
the next town. The next dealer after that was 40 miles away.

I like Toyotas, but I've learned not to trust dealers.

We had a dealer in this town in the South that got his franchise pulled.
I'd taken my car in there to have the valves adjusted (one of the last of
the mechanical lifter 3K-C engines) He told me I needed a ring job at
48,000 miles. He submitted no proof, no compression test, nothing. The
reason I was using oil is that I'd been to 3 dealers in the previous 2
years, and NONE of them would adjust the valves or even check them, despite
the fact the recommended maintenance interval was 15,000 miles. I told him
to adjust the valves and if he did anything else without my approval, he
could pay for it out of his own pocket. I wasn't the only person he'd
pulled this sort of stuff on. But he started out as a GM stealer and added
Toyota later. That's how a lot of them started in this part of the country,
and they carry over the old GM attitudes in a lot of cases.

The only Ford I'd ever want to own is a Model T or a Model A. Nothing
newer. I'd never own a FartEscort. My dad's old 77 Corolla, by the time we
got rid of it in 1999, still looked better than most of the 10 year old
FartEscorts I've seen. And by then it was 22 years old. And it could still
get up and go. And it had been charged by a deer, literally about a decade
before that, and we'd had it repaired and it still ran.

I still swear most of the Detroit 3 test for winter in Southern California
and for summer in Gander Bay, Newfoundland.

My sister-in-law used to drive a FartEscort. I've seen the car and driven
it once. She now drives Toyotas. And with all the trouble she had with it,
she dumped it, like I dumped my S-10.

Sir Charles the Curmudgeon

"CharlesTheCurmudgeon" <n5hsr@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:gj2cgm$te7$1@news.motzarella.org...
>
> "A Plumbers Helper Named Joe" <APHNJ@a2e.net> wrote in message
> news:495479e8$0$1532$822641b3@news.adtechcomputers .com...
>>
>> "Derek Gee" <dgeeSPAMSUCKS@twmi.INVALID.rr.com> wrote in message
>> news:49507d63$0$17050$9a6e19ea@unlimited.newshosti ng.com...
>>> <rantonrave@mail.com> wrote in message
>>> news:37ae352e-9ab8-4f37-a60c-b9a0948620a2@r10g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> CharlesTheCurmudgeon wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>"Rock Hardson" <RH232@yahooo.com> wrote in message
>>>>>news:494d1c7a$1$1548$822641b3@news.adtechcomp uters.com...
>>>>>>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I suspect once the US auto industry gets on a level field the foriegn
>>>>>>companies may be in for an ass kicking.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>Sorry, you are WRONG. US auto makers do not encourage the culture of
>>>>>quality that the Japanese auto makers embraced about 50 years ago.
>>>>>Until
>>>>>the American automakers demonstrate they are truly commited to quality
>>>>>and
>>>>>not just dependent on whether the head of the company is commited to
>>>>>quality
>>>>>or not, there's not only going to not be a level playing field,
>>>>>there's not
>>>>>gong to be any play.
>>>>>
>>>> The Japanese may have embraced it 50 years ago, but they continued to
>>>> have horrible quality
>>>> (can you say 'Toyopet'?) for another 25 years. It's also a myth that
>>>> Japanese car makers universally have better quality because when
>>>> Toyota, Honda, and Subaru are excluded, their quality falls to being
>>>> only par with ours.
>>>
>>> Where did you get the idea that Subaru's are some model of reliability?
>>> In the 2008 JD Power Vehicle Dependability Study, they rank well below
>>> the industry average. (Just ahead of Chrysler and Dodge!) Of the
>>> Japanese makes, only Toyota, Honda, and Mitsubishi are above the
>>> industry average. US makes scoring exceptionally well on the same survey
>>> are Mercury, Cadillac, Buick, and Lincoln. (Mercury and Cadillac are
>>> both scoring higher than Toyota, Acura, and Honda!!!)
>>>
>>> http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/new...spx?ID=2008115
>>>
>>> Derek
>> You can talk all day long about the quality of American cars, but some US
>> American citizens are hell bent on seeing this whole country go down the
>> tubes beginning with the big industry and US auto manufactures. I can't
>> figure out where this self sabotage mentality comes from but it can be
>> very dangerous to our society.
>>>
>>
>>
>
> Dear Derek,
>
> Maybe you should pay attention to your stepsister Casey. American citizens
> vote with their dollars, every time they purchase something. They
> perceive that the Detroit 3 do not really give a damn about them and have
> not for a long time. Even their commercials still tend to sell the sizzle
> instead of the steak, although some Toyota commercials tend to be headed
> that way, too. But Toyota has established a fairly good reputaion for
> quality as far back as 1965 (not 1975 as you seem to think) and Americans
> are tired of cars that have to be in the shop as often as their 1930's
> counterparts for minor, non scheduled repairs, and rust! I owned a 1995
> Chevy S-10 and I had points of rust on it in the first year, which the
> dealer refused to do anything about! I currently own a 1995 Toyota Corolla
> that still doesn't have any rust on it.
>
> Wake up and smell the coffee. America LOSES when we do less than our
> best, and we've been doing that since the 1960's. When you're number one
> and you think that you can do no wrong, the next step is DOWN. Look at
> K-mart. #1 Discount Retailer in 1980. Who's number one now? Yep, a
> southern-based retailer that K-mart didn't see as any kind of threat,
> because K-mart thought #1 was theirs by some sort of divine right.
> Samething with GM, Ford and Crapsler.
>
> Sir Charles the Curmudgeon
>
So if I say the same thing about a crappy Toyota and Mazda that family
members owned that didnt hold what exactly does that tell you especially
when I have an American car that runs and looks great going on 146k miles,
or a 82 Dodge I had that I put 180k miles on with regular maintenance? It
lasted a lot longer than the 83 Toyota Camery.

"CharlesTheCurmudgeon" <n5hsr@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:gj3r0s$qs1$1@news.motzarella.org...
>
> "Derek Gee" <dgeeSPAMSUCKS@twmi.INVALID.rr.com> wrote in message
> news:495568fc$0$17045$9a6e19ea@unlimited.newshosti ng.com...
>> "CharlesTheCurmudgeon" <n5hsr@comcast.net> wrote in message
>> news:gj2cgm$te7$1@news.motzarella.org...
>>>
>>> "A Plumbers Helper Named Joe" <APHNJ@a2e.net> wrote in message
>>> news:495479e8$0$1532$822641b3@news.adtechcomputers .com...
>>>>
>>>> "Derek Gee" <dgeeSPAMSUCKS@twmi.INVALID.rr.com> wrote in message
>>>> news:49507d63$0$17050$9a6e19ea@unlimited.newshosti ng.com...
>>>>> <rantonrave@mail.com> wrote in message
>>>>> news:37ae352e-9ab8-4f37-a60c-b9a0948620a2@r10g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> CharlesTheCurmudgeon wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>"Rock Hardson" <RH232@yahooo.com> wrote in message
>>>>>>>news:494d1c7a$1$1548$822641b3@news.adtechco mputers.com...
>>>>>>>>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>I suspect once the US auto industry gets on a level field the
>>>>>>>>foriegn
>>>>>>>>companies may be in for an ass kicking.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Sorry, you are WRONG. US auto makers do not encourage the culture of
>>>>>>>quality that the Japanese auto makers embraced about 50 years ago.
>>>>>>>Until
>>>>>>>the American automakers demonstrate they are truly commited to
>>>>>>>quality and
>>>>>>>not just dependent on whether the head of the company is commited to
>>>>>>>quality
>>>>>>>or not, there's not only going to not be a level playing field,
>>>>>>>there's not
>>>>>>>gong to be any play.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>> The Japanese may have embraced it 50 years ago, but they continued to
>>>>>> have horrible quality
>>>>>> (can you say 'Toyopet'?) for another 25 years. It's also a myth that
>>>>>> Japanese car makers universally have better quality because when
>>>>>> Toyota, Honda, and Subaru are excluded, their quality falls to being
>>>>>> only par with ours.
>>>>>
>>>>> Where did you get the idea that Subaru's are some model of
>>>>> reliability? In the 2008 JD Power Vehicle Dependability Study, they
>>>>> rank well below the industry average. (Just ahead of Chrysler and
>>>>> Dodge!) Of the Japanese makes, only Toyota, Honda, and Mitsubishi are
>>>>> above the industry average. US makes scoring exceptionally well on the
>>>>> same survey are Mercury, Cadillac, Buick, and Lincoln. (Mercury and
>>>>> Cadillac are both scoring higher than Toyota, Acura, and Honda!!!)
>>>>>
>>>>> http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/new...spx?ID=2008115
>>>>>
>>>>> Derek
>>>> You can talk all day long about the quality of American cars, but some
>>>> US American citizens are hell bent on seeing this whole country go down
>>>> the tubes beginning with the big industry and US auto manufactures. I
>>>> can't figure out where this self sabotage mentality comes from but it
>>>> can be very dangerous to our society.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> Dear Derek,
>>>
>>> Maybe you should pay attention to your stepsister Casey. American
>>> citizens vote with their dollars, every time they purchase something.
>>> They perceive that the Detroit 3 do not really give a damn about them
>>> and have not for a long time. Even their commercials still tend to sell
>>> the sizzle instead of the steak, although some Toyota commercials tend
>>> to be headed that way, too. But Toyota has established a fairly good
>>> reputaion for quality as far back as 1965 (not 1975 as you seem to
>>> think) and Americans are tired of cars that have to be in the shop as
>>> often as their 1930's counterparts for minor, non scheduled repairs, and
>>> rust!
>>
>> Dear Curmudgeon,
>>
>> 'Tis you who needs to wake up! I'm not sure where you plucked the year
>> 1965 from as a "quality" benchmark for Toyota, but I used to work on my
>> ex-girlfriend's 1981 Toyota Corolla, and I can assure you it was no
>> better and no worse than my 1981 Escort in the number of repairs needed.
>> They were just different repairs. The Toyota was a rust bucket of the
>> highest order - so much so that I had to make repairs out of sheet metal
>> and bondo all over that vehicle. When it needed repair, the imported
>> parts were much more expensive than the US sourced parts. It was finally
>> replaced with an '89 Escort that was FAR better than the Toyota had been.
>> It needed fewer repairs, didn't rust, was less expensive to insure and
>> operate, and repair cost less.
>>
>>>I owned a 1995 Chevy S-10 and I had points of rust on it in the first
>>>year, which the >dealer refused to do anything about!
>>
>> So why didn't you go to another dealer (who still has to honor the
>> factory warranty), or contact the GM representative? Bad dealers are
>> everywhere, and they aren't just US brand dealers.
>>
>> The Toyota dealer in my former hometown was CONVICTED of stealing
>> rustproofing from the Chrysler Corporation right about that time when it
>> needed the government loan. Nice guys, eh? When I was getting service
>> for the '81 Corolla mentioned above, that same local dealer was
>> incredibly arrogant about dealing with customers. Did Toyota revoke
>> their dealership? Nope, they still are in business today, even with a
>> felony conviction and bad service to customers.
>>
>> Derek
>>
>>
>
> I picked 1965 because I had a teacher that had a '65 Crown, that by the
> time I saw it, was already 10 years old and had well over 100,000 miles on
> it. 60's American cars wouldn't do over 100,000, at least not any of the
> ones we owned.
>
> Between the various members of our family, we had a 77, a 79, two 80's, an
> 81 and an 82 Corolla. The only problem we had was the 81 had been abused
> by the previous owner (run really low on oil) and we had to get a rebuilt
> 3 TC engine for it. That is one weakness of Toyotas. Keep the oil
> between low and full and change it regularly, and you'll get a lot of
> miles out of it.
>
> Most dealers have NBH (Not Bought Here) syndrome. I had a 79 that I
> purchased at one dealership. I got moved a couple hundred miles, and took
> it to the local dealership for regular maintenance. They wanted me to
> drive it back to the OTHER dealership for maintenance. I moved again
> before the next regular maintenance. That dealer, too, thought I ought to
> drive it all the way back to the dealer I bought it from, by that time
> some 300 miles distant.
>
> As for the Chevy, the next nearest dealer was owned by the same people in
> the next town. The next dealer after that was 40 miles away.
>
> I like Toyotas, but I've learned not to trust dealers.
>
> We had a dealer in this town in the South that got his franchise pulled.
> I'd taken my car in there to have the valves adjusted (one of the last of
> the mechanical lifter 3K-C engines) He told me I needed a ring job at
> 48,000 miles. He submitted no proof, no compression test, nothing. The
> reason I was using oil is that I'd been to 3 dealers in the previous 2
> years, and NONE of them would adjust the valves or even check them,
> despite the fact the recommended maintenance interval was 15,000 miles. I
> told him to adjust the valves and if he did anything else without my
> approval, he could pay for it out of his own pocket. I wasn't the only
> person he'd pulled this sort of stuff on. But he started out as a GM
> stealer and added Toyota later. That's how a lot of them started in this
> part of the country, and they carry over the old GM attitudes in a lot of
> cases.
>
> The only Ford I'd ever want to own is a Model T or a Model A. Nothing
> newer. I'd never own a FartEscort. My dad's old 77 Corolla, by the time
> we got rid of it in 1999, still looked better than most of the 10 year old
> FartEscorts I've seen. And by then it was 22 years old. And it could
> still get up and go. And it had been charged by a deer, literally about a
> decade before that, and we'd had it repaired and it still ran.
>
> I still swear most of the Detroit 3 test for winter in Southern California
> and for summer in Gander Bay, Newfoundland.
>
> My sister-in-law used to drive a FartEscort. I've seen the car and driven
> it once. She now drives Toyotas. And with all the trouble she had with
> it, she dumped it, like I dumped my S-10.
>
> Sir Charles the Curmudgeon
>

I had a 69 Plymouth RoadRunner, at 130k miles I could still leave a patch of
rubber 15feet long.

"Rock Hardson" <RH232@yahooo.com> wrote in message
news:4959910a$0$26496$822641b3@news.adtechcomputer s.com...
> So if I say the same thing about a crappy Toyota and Mazda that family
> members owned that didnt hold what exactly does that tell you especially
> when I have an American car that runs and looks great going on 146k miles,
> or a 82 Dodge I had that I put 180k miles on with regular maintenance? It
> lasted a lot longer than the 83 Toyota Camery.

Since you cannot even spell Camry, I doubt you owned one. But if you like
Toyota's, that fine, don't buy one. Just don't tread on those who don't
agree with you.

"Rock Hardson" <RH232@yahooo.com> wrote in message
news:49599212$0$26494$822641b3@news.adtechcomputer s.com...
> I had a 69 Plymouth RoadRunner, at 130k miles I could still leave a patch
> of rubber 15feet long.

How much gas do you use for that stunt? How much petroleum (used to make
tires) do you just waste?

If the Big3 go out of business, you will get exactly what you deserve.

"Mark A" <someone@someone.com> wrote in message
news:bmg6l.161$rF5.71@bignews6.bellsouth.net...
> Since you cannot even spell Camry, I doubt you owned one. But if you like
> Toyota's, that fine, don't buy one. Just don't tread on those who don't
> agree with you.

Correction,

But if you don't like Toyota's, that fine, don't buy one.

On Dec 29, 10:20*pm, "Mark A" <some...@someone.com> wrote:
> "Mark A" <some...@someone.com> wrote in message

>
> But if you don't like Toyota's, that fine, don't buy one.

Toyota's what?

On Mon, 29 Dec 2008 22:18:41 -0500, Mark A cast forth these pearls of
wisdom...:

> "Rock Hardson" <RH232@yahooo.com> wrote in message
> news:49599212$0$26494$822641b3@news.adtechcomputer s.com...
>> I had a 69 Plymouth RoadRunner, at 130k miles I could still leave a patch
>> of rubber 15feet long.
>
> How much gas do you use for that stunt? How much petroleum (used to make
> tires) do you just waste?

78 gallons through the carburator, and thirty two barrels off the tires.
But it sure was fun in those days...

>
> If the Big3 go out of business, you will get exactly what you deserve.

Yeah - all of us guys that were around back then, burning rubber off our
tires and guzzeling up gas for the fun of feeling real power and
acceleration - we now must face the realization that we are the fundamental
downfall of the US auto industry.

--

-Mike-
mmarlowREMOVE@alltel.net