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Comments
-juice
Flippy1: Just a word of advice. You don't have to take your vehicle back to the dealer of purchase. You can take it elsewhere and try your luck there, if the lemon law isn't applicable; 12 incidents in 6 months would have me pretty ticked as well. Maybe an attorney can be of assistance. Good luck.
Sorry to hear about your Jeep Liberty problems. I agree however every automaker makes its share of lemons. There are plenty of folks out on the net that have had no problems with their Liberties and would have purchased nothing else. I would fight to have Jeep buy your vehicle back under your state lemon law.
It's more of a driving test than a test drive.
Recently I was all hot on the Ford Escape after 2 test drives then I rented it for a weekend. Loud car with unconfortable seats. Uh uh.
Well worth the $70.
I did, and I'm happy with it.
scape2, did you see this one?
jafo2001: "Recently I was all hot on the Ford Escape after 2 test drives then I rented it for a weekend. Loud car with unconfortable seats. Uh uh."
My point: Your mileage may vary.
What say you hosts? Change the title to read "Mini-SUV Comparisions"? Oh wait, that won't work cause the vehicle names aren't in the title, making it hard for TH participants to find the topic with Edmund's current limited search function. :-(
-Frank P.
The good news is that (fnially!) we will be getting a real search function. I can't give you a specific date yet but it's COMING! Patience!
tidester
Host
SUVs
-Frank P.
what other problems should i be aware of??
What else should I consider buying??
thanks
I would have been embarassed to sign my name to a "customer service" letter like this. PLEASE keep this in mind when you are looking at cars and considering the Liberty
-juice
BTW, I've got 18k miles on my Trib and no problems in 15 months I've had it at home!
scape2... the data came from real consumers posting to the "Ford Escape/Mazda Tribute problems" board (which now has over 1200 posts, by the way, and problems keep cropping up). The NHTSA site has 15 distinct posted Consumer Complaints for the 2002 Trib and even more for the 2002 Escape. NONE for the CRV... ONE for the Santa Fe.... Four or five for the Outback.... Yes the Tribscape sells greater volumes, but the problem counts represent a higher proportion of the Tribscape compared to the other vehicles, illustrating that buying a Tribscape incurs a higher risk of getting a poor quality vehicle. I know you have had no problems with yours, but your constant defense of this vehicle in light of what has been posted the NHTSA and to this web site (and others.. check out the Yahoo boards on Mazda, for example), seems unusual... unless your a dealer! ;-)
Yes, a good chance of having a positive experience.
But as good a chance as the competition offers?
That's gotta be some kind of record!
But, sure, as you say, any vehicle can fail.
For example, If avg reliability means 10% of the model owners will experience problems, 50% worse than avg still only means 15% of the model owners will experience problems. Or looked at it another way, 85% of the model owners won't have any problems with their vehicle.
I had a Jeep Cherokee for 8 years and it never had a single problem. However, I recognize that I was fortunate because Jeeps in general don't have a very good reputation for reliability.
-Frank P.
Anyone else have any luck with this?
scape2: it's easy to find happy Escape owners, they sell 120k per month or so. But it's also easy to find unhappy owners. Chat rooms like these are not a scientific sample, so I rely on CR for the poor reliability forecast.
It's not everything, the X5 has had 14 recalls and even worse reliability forecasts and people line up to buy those. The M class is also worse. But it does mean something, at least to me it does.
-juice
You had better watch what you say. If your little Forester gets stuck in some deep NM sand, you may very well need one of those "unreliable" American vehicles to tow you out. Not many foreign models out there can do it. You never know who's reading... CR, and any other magazine for that matter, are not fact books. The only real authority on what you should buy is your own brain. If you need a vehicle that will last for years to come, then by all means use the mags as a guide. You may get lucky, and then again, you may not. There are no guarantees. My family has had nothing but great experiences with Ford vehicles, and I am going to continue to buy them no matter what CR says because I really like the way they look, and drive. I still test drive everything else, but the Escape won my wife and I over by a large margin. She's a Honda lover, and I thought for sure I'd be driving a CR-V. I'm curious. What's the reliability rating on the BMW X5, and the Mercedes M class? The X5 has had about 12 recalls in the past three years, and the M class, along with the C class (USA Today last week), have been rated as two of the most problematic vehicles you can buy. If CR gives them high, or even mediocre, reliability marks, something is amiss. If not, maybe they actually are on to something.
But the law of averages is what counts. CR polls a large number (I personally don't know their sample size) of auto owners and gets feedback on problems for the different makes and models. The result of these averages makes up their data and recommendations. If you don't trust their information because you think there is some conspiracy and foreign manufacturers are paying them off or whatever, fine. But really, what else are you going to do? Drive 400 different Toyota Camrys yourself, log the problems, and then move on to your next choice for a family sedan?
I too have had nothing but great reliability/quality and value with Ford products throughout the years. If you visit other web sites/chat rooms around the net you will find plenty of unhappy Toyota/Honda owners out here. People who were swayed into buying and then finding out every Toyota/Honda built is not perfect as we are led to believe from the Press.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2002-03-12-crcars.htm CR doesn't always get a large sample for every vehicle. I don't agree that everyone knows any manufacturer can produce a lemon. If you read around these boards, you'll see people that think some manufacturers can do no wrong. I never said there was a conspiracy at CR, I just can't believe that people heavily rely on their opinions when deciding what to drive. I guess I just care more about the driving aspect of owning a vehicle, rather than the value. Besides, we're just going with the flow here. I really don't care what you drive. I'm just here to offer some advice that stems from my experiences, whether anyone likes it or not, that's up to them.
Sample variance doesn't make their data wrong. They publish an average, so of course your mileage may vary. Honda makes some lemons, but most are reliable and on average you'll tend to do better than you would at Ford.
More about Honda - they have a buy-back program, so I read that after arbitration they often take those cars out of circulation. With a new car, the owners likely has better results, and this makes their numbers look better. I saw lemon law vehicles for one state, and Honda didn't have a single one - because they were bought back. They were the only manufacturer to have zero lemons in that state that year. It may bias the numbers, but if you're an owner, who cars, you don't end up with the lemon.
baggs32: I've driven my Forester on sand, and it was excellent. It's very light and performs admirably in the sand. Driver is the biggest factor, of course.
X5 has actually had 14 recalls, and the reliability scores are equally awful. M class also gets awful scores. So they seem to be spot-on.
-juice
Yes, BMW messed up the X5 launch, too, but I guess owners like them a lot so they're more forgiving?
-juice
-juice
-juice
http://detnews.com/2002/autosinsider/0204/06/autos-458536.htm
Interesting that they note that Hyundai has only one-sixth or one-seventh as many dealers as Ford, but sold HALF as many Santa Fe's as Ford sold Escapes.
Still, Hyundai is doing well.
-juice
Everybody knows that Yon Lu makes $5 an hour not $2
Escape and Focus launches were botched, Ford employees and dealers readily admit that. I think they have good basic products, but just need to dot a few more "i"s and cross a few more "t"s.
-juice
Sorry, I have to disagree a bit about the "i" and "t"s on the Tribscape.... I still read the Escape/Tribute problems board. Every other day there is someone NEW out there. And every time I read it, it reinforces my SantaFe decision. Is the Tribscape a good vehicle? Yes, well-designed and it was my choice up until I picked over BOTH the SF and Trib parked next to one another in the parking lot and test drove both (yes, all in broad daylight too!). And, I picked the SF only at the very end of that process when I discovered the interior quality was better, the tolerances were better, the doors closed more "solidly" and everything from the engine compartment to the retractable cargo cover were more thoughtfully designed and had better materials! I thought that if Hyundai could build a car like this, that it was worth taking the Hyundai plunge. Time will tell. Anyway... I think failing engines/transmissions and the incredibly nagging stalling problems are MORE than dotted i's and crossed t's. Ask any Tribscape owner who has been through those problems. (Sorry for venting, scape2 got me going with the "Yon Lu" post, revealing a number of issues there, not the least of which is being blind to the failures of the American automobile industry in the past 20 years).