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Motor Trend names anybody who spends the cash advertising and whatnot "the best"! lol "The best" is what professional mechanics and actual owners with nothing to gain say is the best!
You might be making the same point as the critics. They're arguing that a current Toyota wouldn't hold up as well for 25 years / 200k.
Only time will tell, won't it. Those who are griping now are VERY premature in their judgment, I'd say. A family member has a 2008 Camry and it's been wonderful. I'm still a Toyota fan.
Fifteen years from now when my Toyota wears out, I think that I will look at other makes and models.
My point exactly, and if I do decide to sell in 5 or 10 years, that's right, resale value. Yea, I know the 60's hot rods worth a fortune, I'm talking real world DD's with 50 to 100k and 5 to 10 years on them, most of these domestics aren't worth squat. The Toyota's hold enough resale to give you a chance at a trade in that will let you easily get back in a new car without being upside down.
Well, I thought my water pump going out was VERY premature........
Definitely premature, but a sample size of one.
Some people seem to expect Toyotas to have zero problems. This has never been realistic. They have problems, just (still) less often than other makes. (Based on the car reliability survey I conduct.)
The gap isn't as large as it used to be, but this is because the others have gotten better, not because Toyota has gotten worse.
I'd say it was good timing, seeing as to how you were still in warranty, it'd be my luck the thang would go out of warranty before it broke, but I'll still take my chances with a Toyota, if I decide to dump it a least I'll get somethan out of it, try that with many other makes and yall see what I mean. Dont get me wrong the 10year/100,000 mile warranty others offer is tempting.
The UA circus has hurt Toyota resale values. Many people are now unsure about buying a Toyota. I personally think this isn't justified, but just the way it is.
The big question is whether the current dip is temporary or permanent.
I've seen quite a few of these posts from Toyota owners, so I thought I might give a little background as what you are experiencing is a result of recent changes Toyota has made to their manufacturing process in the pursuit of earning the number 1 auto manufacturer spot.
Toyota's success was built upon the quality and reliability of their cars. They developed a manufacturing and quality control system known as the "Toyota Way". It shares similar concepts to those of Six Sigma, but is an in house philosophy built around auto manufacturing.
In addition to constant quality checks and improvements, Toyota took a very unique path to parts sourcing. They specified a single source for each component and worked hand in hand with the plants to produce the parts. Toyota provided engineers, quality assurance personel, technology, etc. as well as paying for improvements to the plants manufacturing systems if needed. This created a very tight knit manufacturing process and ensured consistent quality.
As Toyota began to grow and expand, they realized they had the opportunity to eclipse Ford and perhaps even GM. The companies focus started to drift towards volume. About 7 years ago there was an incident at a brake pad manufacturing plant that shut down all of Toyota's production for two weeks. They realized that if they were going to shoot for the top spot, they would need to diversify their supplier network to ensure these types of shut downs wouldn't happen.
They went out and quickly added a secondary supplier for all components. The issue was that they did not put the same effort into these manufacturers in terms of QC and standards that they did with the others. Instead of Toyota engineers working directly with the plant and Toyota working with the owners or paying for upgrading the systems at the plant, Toyota simply sent schematics and said, build this part. This quickly led to subtle differences in parts across the same model line of cars based on where it was built and the source of the components. If you remember back to the accelerator pedal issue, there were two seperate versions of the pedal depending on where your car was built and one of them was deemed deficient, while the other was not.
So, when people say that recent Toyota products are not the same as older Toyota products, they are very correct. In pursuit of volume and achieving the number 1 spot, Toyota sacrificed quality in the parts sourcing which has led to a significant uptick in issues among Toyota vehicles. In light of all the issues Toyota has gone hard back to the "Toyota Way" and is instituting major reforms in their parts sourcing process from the secondary suppliers. Consider it growing pains.
Brilliant post.
Additionally, a lot of the quality surveys hold all cars to the measure of how many "problems" they have. It's not as hard to have few problems with a car that has manual windows, no sun roof, no heated seats etc etc etc.
Toyota in particular has offered a lot more in terms of features in moving from the role of inexpensive reliable transportation to mid range on up where they are today. New models, more options, more features and even keeping quality static you are going to have more problems.
They still make many fine vehicles but the old blanket statement that they are "better" than various domestic models is no longer true....and personally I'm not willing to pay a premium for "higher quality" when it's based upon older vehicles.
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"The best" is what professional mechanics and actual owners with nothing to gain say is the best!
happy, happy, happy...
