Did you recently take on (or consider) a loan of 84 months or longer on a car purchase?
A reporter would like to speak with you about your experience; please reach out to PR@Edmunds.com by 7/22 for details.
A reporter would like to speak with you about your experience; please reach out to PR@Edmunds.com by 7/22 for details.
Options
Does America Even Need Its Own Automakers?
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
Extended warranties are great, if you don't drive a whole lot, and IF what breaks happens to be on the covered items list. So, for instance, I plan on keeping my primary driver for at least 200K miles.... I got it in May of '03 and right now it has around 147K on the clock. Ironically, if I were to be looking at cars right now, I'd look to find a "lightly used" example of the same car, and maybe also find something that is smaller, and cheaper to run, as a fun weekend thing - maybe a Mini or a Miata
When my kids are looking to buy their first new car, I'll certainly suggest they look seriously at those with longer warranties.
Just about all modern cars have reliable drivetrains. Things that commonly fail are electronic and electrical components these days. You're more likely to have a power window motor fail than a transmission.
Because my wife does more driving because of her job she uses what had been my Accord and I've been stuck with the van. Rather than drive something that's kind of dull and sucks gas I picked up a 99 Celica convertible. Fun, economical and SHOULD be dependable.
Ebay special.
I kind of liked driving junkers and miss some aspects now that I drive a new car regularly for the first time since 1986.
With a new car I feel bad every time there is some new little scratch or ding...I washed my car by hand once in the first few months and then decided not to do it again as I am bothered by every little flaw I see. Now I just hose it off and don't have to look too closely
With a new car I am always wondering should I take it in for this or that little thing while it is under warranty.
With a junker I can just go with little worry about the other guy...go ahead and hit me. :shades:
I took my new car out this morning and notice some small chips by the wheel well and I'm like "@%$@&!!! When the @^#*$& did that happen?" I'm also nervous as heck in traffic.
and, instead, when you drive the 1988, it is the other drivers that have to worry, cuz they know you probably don't care what happens to your car.
In Sept. of 2001 I was itching to pull the trigger on another new Kia. My wife loves the Sportage SUV, so even though I had my eye on a new 2002 Kia Spectra sedan, my wife made this comment.
"I don't want another one of those small cars. I love the Sportage."
Off to the group of Sportage's on our dealer's lot. I also loved the Sportage's design. The Pepper Red 5-speed Sportage 4X4 we were centering our focus on listed for $17,075. My wife loved it the moment she got inside it. We test drove and then went inside for haggling...I...I mean dealing. Or dickering. Striking a common ground between buyer and seller. They offered a really reasonable trade-in value on our '99 Kia Sephia. Good enough to get our signatures on the dotted line.
Our '01 Sportage 4X4 turned out to be another very nice vehicle from Kia for us. It did need a fuel-filler door kit replaced, and an alert mechanic noticed some staining on the radiator. It was decided that we needed a new radiator as the original one was leaking. So that was replaced under the Long-Haul Warranty. Now we had the Big Daddy of car Warranty's. Aside from a new gas cap to stave off the same "check engine light" deal we had with the '99 Sephia, that radiator and new fuel-filler door were the only things we needed fixed. Later a power window regulator needed replacing, also covered under Warranty.
As the years went by our '01 Sportage 4X4 proved to be a reliable rig and helped us get out of some slippery road conditions with it's 4WD system, too. I was stranded once in my Sportage 4X4.
While going to school in mid-Missouri, one morning I was driving to a clinical teaching hospital on the Lake of the Ozarks. I noticed, while still about 30 miles away from my destination, that my headlights were starting to dim. Humm...impending alternator failure? I'd been down this road before and knew the warning signs. Soon my AM/FM/cassette player went dead. I moved on, getting closer to the hospital. All of a sudden the small SUV puttered to a stop, my gas pedal went all the way to the floor with no resistance. My Sportage 4X4 was dying on the road. I locked the rig up and started walking back towards a small town I had just passed about 10 miles back. A teacher picked me up on the way, I only had walked about 100 yards when he stopped and gave me a lift. He told me of a mechanic that was good, back in town where he taught school. I normally don't hitch-hike any more, that was done in the 70's mostly, right?
But this was different, I needed to get some help for my small SUV. In town he pointed right to the small gas station that offered mechanical help as well. Turns out it was my alternator that failed. The alternator and tow ended up costing me about $310. The owner walked out to me and told me that was one of the problems buying foreign rigs...their parts are harder to find and when you do, they cost more. Couldn't disagree with him after hearing that alternator part cost. Anyhow, while he said the part wouldn't come in until the next day, I needed to rent a car.
Enterprise Rent-A-Car, out of Lebanon, MO, came to my rescue. What car would I get to rent, I wondered. They drove out a 2004 Mitsubishi Lancer sedan, with an automatic tranny. Humm...I've always wonderd about Mitsubishi rigs and how they drive. I like the looks of the Lancer, I thought to myself.
The Lancer was a little buzz-noisy in the cabin but a decent little car. Decent enough to plant good memories for later in my mind about the Mitsubishi brand of automobile. I liked the looks of that '04 Lancer sedan and filed away the experience.
The next day the Sportage 4X4 was repaired and everything went well in picking it up and returning the Lancer to Enterprise from same repair shop. This repair occurred at about the 88,000 mile mark. The only other time the Sportage 4X4 cost me any out-of-pocket money was when a brake light switch went out. I took it to the Missouri Kia dealer we went to while living in Missouri, located in Brad PItt's hometown, Springfield, MO. That Kia dealer was as good as the one we started out at in Washington state, Jerry Smith Kia in Anacortes, WA. Later Jerry Smith Kia moved to our home town in Washington, Burlington, WA. Jerry Smith Kia was a great Kia dealer, in that, instead of arguing with you or making you feel like a dufus when you needed something, they were willing to fix your problem. Not only that, much of the time they looked to pay for the problem with the Long-Haul Warranty! I was pleased as punch to have found them!
After we moved to Missouri, this Kia dealer in Springfield was just as smart in customer dealings. Your dealer makes a big part of your experience with a particular car brand, oh yes it does.
The Springfield Kia dealer charged me about $95 to replace my '01 Sportage 4X4's brake light switch. I had no recent data to compare that cost with...a Ford dealer's price on that, or a Hyundai dealer's price, etc. But I came away from that service visit feeling good about things, I recall. So, in 5 1/2 years of '01 Kia Sportage 4X4 ownership, my wife and I had out-of-pocket reapir costs of about $400. Hard to argue with. Of course, it needed its L-O-F's, brakes replaced, tires, etc. All of the normal things a car needs to have done for maintenance. But I consider $400 in 5 1/2 years very, very reasonable.
I was waiting for Kia to build a 4-door sporty sedan that really had sporty, spartan looks. Mitsubishi beat them to the punch. When I got the first looks of the 2008 Mitsubishi Lancer GTS, I had to do a double take. Then a triple take. Then a quadruple take. Wow, had to look closer. The rest is history. I remembered my '04 Mitsubishi Lancer 4-door sedan car rental in the fall of 2004. Favorably, too. To be continued.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
My point of the large post above is to give someone's perspective on Kia Motors that is different from someone who has only bought domestic car products. I have bought mostly domestic products in the past, and those have mostly been Ford's. Of the newer Ford's I am mostly interested in the under-development Ford Verve. Great new look in subcompact sedans for that 2010 car.
But my posts here are intended to give you another pespective in cars for purchase for yourself or your family members. I don't know if my expenses would have been more if I had purchased Ford's in that time frame instead of Kia's. I do know that I respect the Kia and Mitsubishi brands and would recommend them to people that are interested in driving good cars that also look nice. A bonus for me is that I prefer the bodystyling of Mitsubishi and Kia to other brands and the Warranty's they offer buyer's are unbeatable. BTW, Finbarr O'Neill left Hyundai Motors as CEO and went to Mitsubishi several years back(he's since left them)and brought the 10 year and 100,000 mile Warranty with him to Mitsubishi.
I have had one Warranty event on my '08 Mitsubishi Lancer GTS. A rear door sash recall was done one day while my Lancer GTS was getting a L-O-F. It took them about an hour and a half and they installed latches in the rear doors that apparently are to "ensure that the rear doors stay closed under certain impact angles in the event of a crash." Our Lancer GTS has only had that one Warranty item and we're at about 20,500 miles. I do like that our Lancer GTS has a Warranty like it does but feel that both Mitsubishi and Kia vehicles are built well and are built to last. The Warranty is just another asset to have with the cars, but in my view not the ultimate draw in buying one of their cars.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
As to the war threat with N.Korea, I didn't think of that one when buying my '99 Sephia in May of 1999. Looking at the issue now, I feel that that issue will never have to be dealt with and that N.Korea would be foolish to pull that particular trigger. That is out of my knowledge zone and is still not a deterrent to me in buying a Kia.
Your other point, however, is one that I did think of back in 1999. And I felt that, even in 1999, there was so much sharing of designs, assemblies and technologies between carmakers, that my purchase of the Sephia was an insignificant drop-in-the-automotive bucket, overall. I know that these purchases can snowball and make an overall impact, truedat. A few points to ponder: Kia Motors built the Festiva for Ford back in 1988. Ford later assisted Kia in designing the ladder type frame for the Sportage. Carmakers share in building and designs and parts. I felt that by 1999 my purchase of a foreign car made less difference than a purchase of a Honda back in 1985 would have made to Ford instead of buying an Escort from them.
Kia's reputation at that point was not stellar, I'm sure you know that. But Americans were buying Honda's and Toyota's by that time in a large manner. I felt that frankly I wanted the most for my money and had read countless articles by that time(because of the advent of the internet)on this South Korean carmaker named Kia Motors. Even though it wasn't all positive I was drawn in by their enthusiasm and wanted a part of it. Ford's Escort had me interested and by 1999 I had owned a 1986 Mercury Lynx(the Escort's cousin)station wagon and had bought a new 1994 Ford Escort wagon that was a good car. One Warranty-covered fix required on that '94 Escort wagon, a new exhaust manifold. But it was a good car. I liked the new Ford Escort sedan in 1997 and bought a used one(18,000 miles on it)at a reasonable price. That purple '97 Escort sedan would be the last domestic product I would own. Everything went absolutely fine with that car, I just wanted a Kia Sephia. My buddy from Boeing in Everett, WA(widebody jet plant)had just bought a bright white '99 Kia Sephia.
"How do ya like your Sephia?" I asked him.
"It's fine," he replied.
"How's your gas mileage?", I asked.
"Good!", was his reply. "I just wanted something cheap for the commute." We both lived in Burlington, WA, about 45 miles north of Boeing's Everett plant, where we both worked.
"Reasonable price?" I asked.
"Very reasonable," was his reply.
By that time I was digging the look of the '99 Kia Sephia from the front. To me it was more than a foreign econobox. I was enthused by the entirety of it's body design, something about Kia designs that I always admired. Excellent flow of lines and curves and angles.
I ended getting my 1999 Kia Sephia for $7,995 in May of '99. No radio and no A/C. Didn't matter to me. It was what I wanted and it was what I got.
But, kernick, I do understand it when people feel like you do, that it's taking cash out of the U.S. in to foreign company's coffers. But wouldn't our President and/or Congress block imports to the U.S. if the matter was so negatory to the U.S.? Shouldn't they? Why is it OK to the President and to U.S. Senators and Congress then? We export shiploads to other nation's already.
Now, to GM, Ford and Chrysler, the effect is specifically felt by them, keeping it in the car industry, true. But here's the cincher and the clincher for me. Neither Ford, GM or Chrysler Motors put out a product in 1999 that competed with my Sephia for the price I paid. I love smaller rigs, indeed, the '08 Lancer GTS is about as large a car as I would be interested in buying! Actually, I liked the body design so much that is wasn't just price of product that spoke to me. It was the product offered for the price paid. It's my right to make those types of decisions in this country. Unless there's a chunk of information I'm missing from somewhere.
Like mentioned earlier, the 2010 Ford Verve 4-door has my interest and I would not discount the fact that I one day may return to buying domestic automotive products. That car holds promise and aside from a 1970 Chevy Suburban and a 1973 Plymouth Gold Duster(the Duster was a great rig BTW)the only products I've spent cash money on have been on Ford's, before these two new Kia's and this new Mitsubishi. So a return could ocurr in the future.
Throw all-EV's in to the thought pattern and Mitsubishi's i-MIEV all-electrically propelled city car and BYD's all-electric car called the e6 are front-runners in my mind to take a good look at. I don't wanna mess with hybrids, just give me straight-up all-electrically driven cars once I leave ICE cars. But that's another long post for another time, eh? Oh, there are company's that would take my '08 Lancer GTS and fit electrical-propulsion units in to them and swap out the ICE, too. That is another thing to think about as I motor along in my Rally Red Lancer GTS. :shades:
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
me: although the government has certainly intervened at times, that philosophy certainly does not fit with our national principles of free-trade and individual freedoms. If you and others wish to overdose on Swiss chocolate or Mars candy made in NJ, they allow you that freedom. The government should not tell you what you can purchase.
But being an intelligent person, well we should at least be as intelligent as others in the world, that we need to realize our standing in the world is no more certain, than the Romans had. If we are lazy and stupid, and expect the government to always print money and come to our rescue like parents, we are being stupid.
And yes it is important for the U.S. to have heavy industry, for it is these sort of factories that were converted in time of national crisis - WWII, that provided the machines and ships to win the war.
Out of 66 "best used cars to buy", 3 were domestic (Pontiac Vibe doesn't count).
Out of 42 "worst used cars to buy", 32 were domestic.
Read it here:
Best and Worst Used Cars
Note about Testing: CR says:
"The lists on these pages are compiled from overall reliability data covering 1998-2007 models with above-average or much-below-average reliability. CR Good Bets and Bad Bets include only the models for which we have sufficient data for at least three model years. Models that were brand-new in 2006 or 2007 do not appear. Problems with the engine major, engine cooling, transmission major, and drive system were weighted more heavily than other problems."
This simply documents something that many of us have known for a couple decades, namely that one of the downsides of the relatively lower cost of getting that Chevy rather than the Toyota was the dreaded 100K Mile marker - you kinda assumed that at 100K the thing was gonna start falling apart, and you were living on borrowed time. Quality is one of those hard to define things, and frankly, it often seemed like most domestics were built with the attitude "hey, whadya want, it's not gonna last forever!" Quality is in little details... like how smooth a switch operates, like whether the glove compartment opens smoothly, etc. And this stuff is not due to the alleged "incompetence" of the UAW worker, since many of these parts are designed and built overseas; I assume that some buyer at GM says which are the best for the price that they are willing to pay.
So I still feel that the complete question should be "Does the US need its own automakers, no matter how poor a product they deliver?" In other words, should we buy domestic at all costs?
Considering the fact that no new '06 and '07 cars were elegible, and that the American marques have introduced several new models in '07 and '08, only time will tell.
Considering the last several posts, no Korean cars made the good list, nor did any German cars (save the Porsche).
I agree that 06 and 07s shouldn't be on the list, because there might not be enough data. Also it's been my experience that some companies respond faster to defects than others, so a car that's "bad" its first year might turn out to be okay over a 6 year or so life span.
But taking that all into account, it's still depressing.
What the list seems to say is that we aren't even as good as the Koreans anymore
Not true, the article says:
The Best of the best and Worst of the worst are based on our larger lists of Reliable used cars and Used cars to avoid...
Being even average these days is pretty good...I would not call average "mediocre".
Note that the only Ford product on the worst list is Lincoln Aviator. Chrysler has only a couple version of AWD minivan and Jeep Grand Cherokee. GM seems to be the one with the continuing big problems.
How is that possible?? MOST of the models on the bad list were sister models to one another. Considering there are only a few models on the bad list (by virtue of that fact) and there are only a few Korean brands, we are at LEAST as good as they are.
C'mon folks.... are we really reduced to trying to split hairs about EXACTLY how poor the quality perception is, and, by Consumer Reports' criteria, how poor the quality realities are?
I'm more concerned about the PR than what "worst" or "best" actually means.
Yeah, average is mediocre. How else can you define it? I suppose you can raise self-esteem with "exceptionally average"? :P
Would you fly on "Average Airlines"?
That would be an exceptional airline today, compared to the airlines of the 1970s and 1980s. Having flown every 3 weeks for 25+ years I watched the airline industry go down hill. I hate flying anymore. Even 1st class on the domestic carriers is substandard.
I look at the auto industry the same way. My 1988 GM PU was better than my 2005 GM PU and I liked them better than anything from the other makers.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Toyota and Scion vehicle inventories have risen to record levels because the company misjudged just how much the U.S. market would decline this year. The number of units in dealership stock and en route have swelled to about 376,000. That's about 100,000 units more than were on the ground last summer, and up from about 348,000 a year ago. The main problem: Toyota produced lots of pickups and SUVs, a gamble that has not paid off.
The Best of the best and Worst of the worst are based on our larger lists of Reliable used cars and Used cars to avoid...
The larger list of reliable used cars referred to does not include cars with "average" reliability ratings, instead it lists models rated better or much-better-than-average. Similarly the larger list of vehicles to avoid lists vehicles with worse or much worse than average reliability survey ratings.
What is surprising is that Lincoln has the town car in the best of the best class, while the Mercury Grand Marquis, basically the same car, is not.
Otherwise the whole terminology is worthless IMO.
Okay let's try a compromise to understand these ratings. How about:
"Domestic vehicles rarely excel"
But, I'll try to explain my point one more time:
The list of reliable cars you linked to is called "the Best of the best" by CR. In the magazine is a longer list of reliable used cars. This longer list is referred to in the text at your link. That longer list in the magazine includes only models rated better or much-better-than-average. Better than average is not average, nor is it mediocre.
Therefore, your statement, with regard to the lists at your link that If they didn't make either list, that means they are mediocre at best is not correct.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080427/BUSINESS01/804270572/10- 14/BUSINESS01
Among other highlights are these:
"It's an uphill battle for Chrysler, which has seen its U.S. sales decline nearly 16% so far this year compared with last year. Chrysler lost $2.9 billion on operations and restructuring costs last year, internal numbers seem to indicate."
and
"Chrysler has 3,521 dealerships -- down 64 from the end of 2007. According to the automaker, about 57% of the dealerships sell all three brands."
Looks like the new owners and management are really turning the screws to get low-volume dealerships to close and to get higher-volume dealerships to invest in making over their stores, as well as going combo. They are shooting for every store to average more than 1000 annual sales, on a level comparable to Toyota/Honda (and Nissan too? I'm not sure).
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
"These are models that have performed well in CR road tests over the years, and have proved to have several or more years of better-than-average reliability. Listed alphabetically."
Soooooo----if this list is the better than average, then what's left?
Do they have a category of "Kinda Reliable" over at CR?
BUT----
But the whole point of the article is that domestics didn't make the Dream Team, right?
I would put my money on CR as their statistical analysis is usually pretty confused and off too.
These lists guide you to the most reliable vehicles for 10 model
years, 1997 through 2006, and alert you to those that have been
problematic. Reliable vehicles and Vehicles to avoid include all
models that showed above- or below-average overall reliability
(Used Car Verdicts) in our 2006 Annual Car Reliability Survey,
which drew responses on about 1.3 million vehicles.
Pay particular attention to CR Good Bets and CR Bad Bets,
which we compiled from the longer lists.They cover the models
for which we have sufficient survey data for at least three years,
and have either performed notably well or have been especially
troublesome.
Here is short excerpt from the longer list:
$8,000 - $10,000
Acura Integra ’00; RL ’98; TL ’99-00
Buick Century ’02-03; Regal ‘01
Chevrolet Tracker ‘02
Ford Crown Victoria ’02; F-150
‘99-00; F-250 ’99; Mustang (V6)
’99; Ranger (2WD) ’01; Taurus ‘03
Honda Accord ’00; Civic ’01;
CR-V ’00; Prelude ‘98
.
.
.
(note that this longer list does not include performance in road tests as a crterion, it is strictly based on reliability)
Meanwhile, the short list indicates, in the introduction, that the listed vehicles have performed well in road tests and have had several years of better-than-average reliability and is presented like this:
Acura Integra
Acura MDX
Acura RL
Acura RSX
(except ‘06)
Acura TL
Acura TSX
.
.
.
The short list does not specify model years for the most part, so appearing on that list implies that all or most of the past 10 model years have been above average in reliability (or whatever years the model was produced in). For instance Honda Accord is above average in all model years (and did well in road tests), so it makes the short list.
Maybe there is a Buick model that is reliable in all model years, but it did not do well in the road tests, so it would not make the short list. All the model years of this car would be dispersed under the appropriate price range headings of the long list.
Maybe there is a Ford model that did well on road test, but is reliable only for model years 2002-05 and not any other years, so it does not make the short list. But the 4 model years that are reliable can be found dispersed under appropriate price ranges in the long list.
Whew!...I hope that is enough explaining of this.
Kind of a patch job seems like.
It is just too bad that they continue to get big salaries and bonuses while their companies are losing money and their workers are being laid off.
It appears that you are interested in seeing a performance based pay structure to auto executive salaries. I wouldn't object to that but, only the corporate boards and stockholders have any real say in executive pay and stock options. If you feel company A pays too much to executives, there are two things you can go about it. (1) Don't invest in that company (2) become an investor in company A and change the corportate culture to limit saleries and stock options.
I wouldn't say these automotive executives are braindead, their problems didn't happen overnight and they aren't going to be fixed overnight either. I guess cwzyx377 doesn't realize that life isn't like a situation comedy where a resolution to a problem is at hand, implemented and resolved in 30 minutes time. These problems happened over decades of time. The corporate cultures of these companies could and I feel should take much of the blame for their current problems. I blame much of Detroits ills to Douglas Frasier former head of the UAW. In the 70 's and early 80's he was very tough at strong arming the big three in getting them to accept pay and benefit proposals that I'm sure everyone including the big 3 auto executives and Doug Frasier himself realized were not good to the long term viability of these companies. Nor were these contracts beneficial to the auto workers who later were laid off because of the car companies' lack of money. Even if the UAW workers weren't making more money with every contract being negotiated, they were making headway in healthcare benefits as well as the opportunity to keep often times old outdated and grossly inefficient plants open.
Another problem the big three faced was UAW workers and their factory bosses who weren't interested in making the absolute best product. They were looking out for their wallets; and not looking at the big picture of making great products that would lure buyers into the showrooms.
Admittedly, the big three were looking at maximumizing profit through badge engineering. They were more interested in making their cars nearly identicle to each of their brands and saving money through an economy of scale. It is a good principle and it works provided there is enough differentiation between brands, for an example of how it works well thing of Toyta and Lexus, Lexus in many cases are rebadged Toyotas with fancier engines and electronic toys inside the cars but they are nearly identicle to Toyotas in every other way. Back in the 70's and 80's Detroit's version of badge engineering at this time was really bad. The only real difference between many of Detroits vehicles at this time was the hood ornament and the hubcaps.
One of the biggest problems that started to be an issue with the US car buying public was that Detroit was perceived to have a quality gap between US/European and Japanese car offerings. There is still a perception gap to this day. Although the American brands have made serious strides in fixing the quality perception problem, it still remains one of the biggest hurdles Detroit still is fighting hard to fix.
I feel there has been an area where Detroit was ahead of the curb, where the foreign makes are trying to catch up to Detroit to this day. This area is big SUV's and trucks. GM and Ford especially were selling SUV's and trucks in huge amounts. They were doing this often times with profits in excess of $10,000 or more profit per vehicle. Where Detroit dropped the ball was when they didn't focus on the small car market during this time of economic prosperity coupled with low gas prices. Detroit didn't focus on the small car market because there was and still is very little profits in small cars. The only way to make small cars and do it profitable was/is to do it in huge economies of scale.
There were a couple attempts by legislators to increase the CAFE standards at this time but they failed primarily due to the efforts of the automotive lobby in Washington DC. Without the motivation to improve the gas mileage standards by government and with gas in good supply, nearly all car companies both foreign and domestic continued to make cars that got slightly worse gas mileage year after year during the 80's and 90's.
As far as Detroit not doing stuff now to increase gas mileage? I think with one automaker what cwzyx377 says has some merit. Ford with its Focus, Fusion, Milan and Escape and the Escape Hybrid are good answers to higher gas prices. Ford is working with diesel engines and with turbos. therefore you could in thery get a 4 cyclinder turbo with the power of a typical V8 engine but still retain the mileage of that 4 cyclinder engine. GM also has some viable answers to higher gas prices. They have mild hybrids, they have cars and trucks with cyclinder deactivation as well as cars an trucks with 6 speed automatic transmissions. These cars with cyclinder deactivation and those with 6 speed transmissions with only grow in number over the next few years. GM is also working on transmissions with more than 6 speeds to them for even greater fuel savings. They are working on the Volt which is to be available for the public in 2010. The Volt will run exclusively for 40 miles on electric power than once you go past the 40 mile range a small gas engine kicks in and works solely to recharge the electric motor that propells the car forward. Initial tests have been very promising. Over a 600 mile range per gas tank is expected, it will have plug in ability so its easy to recharge, in tests so far it drove in upstate NY to Terrytown, NY ( right outside NYC) on slightly less than 1/2 a tank, it travelled 300 miles during that one test alone at highway speeds.
The Japanese companies imparticular were more on the ball with regard to changing the body styles of their cars making them fresh and more importantly keeping them fresh and ever so desireable in the eyes of the the car buying public. Detroit were in a mode of changing designs every 5 or more years and in some cases much longer periods of time than that. Coupled with that a lagging quality perception and an image of being more thirsty on gas once gas prices had started to inch upward has put Detroit in a serious bind.
Clearly though the two huge problems Detroit is faced with is today is perception of poor quality although its getting better they have a long long road to go to fix the perception, they also have to deal with paying for the healthcare costs of retirees for many more years to come thanks to the efforts of Douglas Frasier and his ilk. If Detroit can shutdown poor performing factories here in the US, with minimal costs to the UAW workers and either build new ones here in the US, or relocate them to Mexico and other places, and make
Plus I'm sure brake pads, clutches, sensors and such cost 2X for an Acura as it does for a Chevy or Ford. So maybe they're not such a great deal?
I agree that the "reliable" cars are not necessarily worth the extra cost. Forget Acura, even a used Accord can cost 2 times what a used Taurus does. Or maybe a 3 year old used Ford would cost what a 7 year old Toyota or Honda would...since reliablity declines with age for all cars the Ford might be just as reliable and in better condition.