What research is that exactly?
I don't have them handy...although if I run across the studies again I'll gladly post links. The studies looked at cars that were built in multiple plants/countries and compared their quality from one plant/country to the other. The findings were that a very high percentage (I believe it was around 85-90%) of the quality of an auto was determined in the design phase, not at the point of assembly.
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Foreign car or domestic? Reputation isn't the only factor
By Aviya Kushner • Bankrate.com
Mechanics, consumers and car analysts all tick off the same names when asked for the most reliable cars: Honda and Toyota.
But, they add, not all imports are so impressive.
Some models from luxury brands such as Mercedes and Audi are turning in below-average reliability numbers, according to new data from J.D. Power and Associates, the independent research firm. And complaints are popping up in car magazines from luxury buyers who feel disappointed.
Meanwhile, some budget imports continue to turn in beautiful performances year after year.
"The Japanese Big Three have been at the top of the dependability charts since 1990," says Joe Ivers, partner and executive director of quality and customer satisfaction at J.D. Power and Associates in Detroit.
"Toyota, Honda and Nissan tend to do very well, and there's very little difference from one to the next," Ivers says. "In the luxury category, Lexus is the best with 163 repair incidents per 100 cars, and Infiniti is next with 174 per 100."
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Note that the Japanese Big Three are at the top of the quality ratings (although admittedly this is IQS, which I already stated is not my favorite measure of quality), yet some of their cars are assembled in the US, and some are assembled in Japan.
It's interesting that no matter where Toyota and Honda assemble their cars, they still come out as the most reliable/durable according to JD Powers, Consumer Reports, and also unscientific (and somewhat aged) anecdotal data from my 8 years of being an auto mechanic and working on over a thousand cars each of those 8 years.
There are many different measures of quality, and the data may be slightly different depending on which measure you look at. I don't trust the IQS (Initial Quality Survey) as much as I do the reliability and durability numbers. The IQS will 'ding' a car for having body panels that don't line up exactly right. While I agree this is a defect, it's not the most important measure of quality IMO...I care about a car that starts every time, works as advertised, and lasts a long time with minimal repairs.
I'm still am an enthusiast and work on cars. I also designed and built engines for my company for 8 years. We had lots of data showing that if you find a problem in the design phase of a product, it would cost you $X to fix it. However, if it was not found during design, but rather slipped through to production, and then found, it would cost $20X to fix. The implication is that it's smarter to design the quality in rather than do quality inspections on the back end of the production line.
As a result of this concept, which has been known for a number of years in the manufacturing industry, companies spend more time on up-front design hoping to save money on the back end...and it works. As a result, the overall quality of ALL products has improved over the decades (although some would argue this in terms of things not being made "like they used to be). Just look at our cars today...100,000 miles without a tuneup, tires that last 40,000 miles, much rarer breakdowns (although a breakdown is probably more expensive now) and so on...a vast improvement from 30-40 years ago.
Dave
until I met an wrinkled, wise older Mexican woman in the park. She sympathized with me and gave me a hug, and at some point later in the conversation she mentioned that when she was young, she had had to wash her babies' diapers in the river, pounding them with rocks until they were clean.
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