#quality

A lawsuit against Mazda is moving to the United States Supreme Court, reports Bloomberg, challenging whether automakers should have been required to install shoulder belts in all of its seats prior to current regulations requiring the improved belting systems took effect in 2007. The case centers on a 2002 accident in which Than Williams was killed when a Jeep Wrangler hit her family’s 1993 Mazda MPV. The Williams MPV had only lap belts because shoulder belts weren’t required by federal law until 2007. A California court has already barred the lawsuit from coming forward, arguing that federal regulations supersede any local rulings, and that then-legal seatbelts should protect manufacturers from personal injury liability. However a recent case casts some doubt on the precedents in the Mazda case…

Last week Jack Baruth reviewed the press release that attended Consumer Reports’ latest auto reliability survey results. But don’t run out and buy a Porsche for the sake of reliability just yet. And it might even be safe to buy a Chrysler.

Jack was surprised that Porsche ranked second among makes. On top of this, the Boxster was reported to be the most reliable car. What CR didn’t include in the press release about its coverage of Porsche models:

Number of 2009s with enough responses: 1

(a solid black blob for the 911)

Number of 2010s with enough responses: zero

Consumer Reports’ response to virtually any critique has long been the large size of their sample. Yet their coverage of recent Porsches is almost nonexistent. CR’s predictions are based on however many of the three most recent model years they have sufficient data for. The prediction for the 2011 Boxster is entirely based on the 2008, because that’s the only year they have enough data for. Yet the 2009 included significant revisions. They have no reliability ratings for the Panamera or the all-new Cayenne. So they have little basis for ranking the entire Porsche’s 2011 line. Even so, they rank Porsche second from the top.

Data limitations don’t end with Porsche. CR also did not receive enough responses for…

• Most 2009 and 2010 Audis. For the A8 they can rate only the 2004. For the S4, only the 2005.
• Many 2009 and 2010 BMWs, including the 135i and 535i singled out as unreliable in the press release. Consequently, BMW’s brand score is heavily based on the 2008 model year.
• Most 2010 Cadillacs.
• Six 2010 Chevrolets.
• Many 2010 Hyundais, Kias, and Mazdas.
• Any 2009 or 2010 Land Rover, including the new LR4.
• Five of the last eight model years of the Merecedes S-Class.
• The 2009 or the 2010 Mercedes GL-Class. Based on the 2008 alone they predict that the 2011 will be the least reliable SUV.
• Any 2010 Mitsubishi. And among the 2008s and 2009s, they can rate only the Outlander.
• Any 2009 or 2010 Saab.
• The 2010 Scion tC and xD—even with Toyota products their coverage isn’t complete.
• The 2010 Subaru WRX. They still single the WRX out as the one Subaru to avoid. From TrueDelta’s survey and forums I’ve learned that the engines in early 2009 WRXs have been prone to failure. But this problem was fixed during the 2009 model year, and should not affect the 2010s, much less the 2011s. Unfortunately, CR’s predictions don’t factor in known common problems that have been fixed.
• Any 2010 Suzuki, including the new Kizashi.
• Any 2010 Volvo aside from the XC60. And most 2009 Volvos. But the press release still mentions Volvo as one of the two consistently reliable European brands.

In general, coverage of recent model years is much less complete than for 2008 and earlier. The severe downturn in car sales two years ago appears to have severely impacted Consumer Reports’ ability to gather enough data on the 2009 and 2010 model years. As a result, they make predictions for many 2011s based entirely on the 2008 model year, but do not clearly note this. In these cases any improvements (or declines) over the last two years have no impact. And yet they still conclude that some manufacturers have improved over the past year, while others have not.

Chrysler allegedly falls in the latter camp, with the press release reporting that it “remains the lowest-ranked manufacturer.” Chrysler has responded that, based on warranty claims,the quality of its products has greatly improved over the past two model years. Who’s correct? According to CR’s own results, quite possibly Chrysler. By CR’s count, Chrysler offers 28 models.

Number of 2009s with enough responses: 14

Number of 2010s with enough responses: 7

The problem, once again: CR’s coverage is far less complete than their overall sample size (1.3 million) suggests it should be. Chrysler’s rating is heavily based on the 2008 model year. And their products were mostly unreliable that year.

In two cases for which CR has enough data, the minivans and the Dodge Journey, the ratings improve from “much worse than average” for the 2009s to “about average” for the 2010s. This said, if other models have similarly improved, and if CR had had enough data on them, it still wouldn’t have been enough. The predicted reliability formula (which is confidential) appears to equally weight the model years, even though the most recent year is most likely to predict the current year. So a bad 2008 and 2009 can easily outweigh a much better 2010, and do for the minivans and the Journey. Even when CR does have enough data for all model years it often takes three years before an improvement is fully reflected in their predictions. When they don’t have enough data on the most recent years, it can take forever.

With such sparse data on the 2009s and 2010s, and some indication that the reliability of Chrysler’s products has improved while at least one Porsche has gone in the other direction, Consumer Reports probably should have reported that Chrysler’s and Porsche’s relative positions are currently unclear. Instead, they applied a formula that doesn’t take trends into account and that ignores substantial holes in their data. Porsche benefits. Chrysler does not.

Coming in Part II: Should you EcoBoost?

We’ve known that the Cadillac Escalade was America’s most-stolen vehicle, but we never asked why. The answer: GM didn’t put steering locks on a number of Escalade and other GMT9000 Ute model years, and shifters on these models are easily pushed out of “Park.” These weaknesses (and their ineffective fixes) allow thieves to push Tahoes, Denalis and Escalades to a safe spot where parts stripping can be done in a matter of minutes. And as the report details, Onstar is rarely effective at stopping quick snatch-and-strip-style thefts, because the damage is typically already done by the time vehicles are reported stolen. Hats off to WXYZ TV for looking past the statistics and finding the truth behind the Escaladae’s stealability. GM is reportedly working on a new steering column replacement for these vehicles.

Reaction to recently-released images of the updated Dodge Journey interior has been varied, but if there’s a consensus, it’s that improvement is undeniable, but that Dodge will need to update more than the interior in order to make the Journey truly competitive. And that’s the diplomatic way of putting it. One reader even wrote in (in the spirit of International Caps Lock Day) to say

I OWN A 2009 DODGE JOURNEY AND IT IS THE BIGGEST PIECE OF CRAP I HAVE EVER OWNED DODGE SHOULD BE ASHAMED TO SELL THIS KIND OF CRAP TO HARD WORKING AMERICANS I WISH I COULD DRIVE IT RIGHT THOUGH THE SHOW ROOM.

Point taken: the Journey needs to be improved. So why is Dodge selling the (as yet unimproved) crossover as “World’s Best Vehicle(?)” Sure, they’re trying to be cleverly ironic, but doesn’t it just highlight the fact that you’d need to be cross-shopping a bare metal armored car in order to think highly of the Journey? On the other hand, we’re not exactly sure how we’d sell the benighted Journey ourselves. Hit the jump for more questionable (or not?) cross-shopping, courtesy of Dodge’s too-cool-for-reality Mad Men.

From conflict-torn Afghanistan [via Newsweek] comes this strange tale of Taliban tribute to the “the vehicular equivalent of the AK-47”: the Toyota Hilux (more famous among Western car nuts for its infamous Top Gear adventures).

As the war in Afghanistan escalated several years ago, counterinsurgency expert David Kilcullen, a member of the team that designed the Iraq surge for Gen. David Petraeus, began to notice a new tattoo on some insurgent Afghan fighters. It wasn’t a Taliban tattoo. It wasn’t even Afghan. It was a Canadian maple leaf.

When a perplexed Kilcullen began to investigate, he says, he discovered that the incongruous flags were linked to what he says is one of the most important, and unnoticed, weapons of guerrilla war in Afghanistan and across the world: the lightweight, virtually indestructible Toyota Hilux truck.

What do you do when a company you own (through your trusty Treasury Department) won’t help you out over the phone? Out of luck with his dealer and pissed off at the “condescending” attitude of GM’s phone support staff, one former Marine and “lifelong GM customer” drove from Virginia to Detroit in order to get The General to take responsibility for chronic power steering pump failures in his wife’s Chevy HHR. His initial reward: more condescension, and the privilege of getting escorted from the premises of GM’s Headquarters. But Marines don’t quit that easily…

Since TTAC is already “ noted for dissing its mainstream competitors for cosseting carmakers,” we might as well not try to resist temptation on this one… because Car And Driver may have just outdone themselves. It starts with the one of the best headlines in ages:

10Best Surprise: Plastics Make the Chevy Volt’s Interior Possible

Surprise? Where? But in spite of the painfully unambitious headline, what follows is a symphony of strange. The ultimate point of which appears to be that C&D is absolutely thrilled about GM’s decision to make the Volt’s interior out of plastic. Yes, really.

This is the interior of the forthcoming Fiat 500 Sport, built in Mexico for the US market [UPDATE: Fiat’s PR team insists that this is not the US-market version… we will revisit the story when real photos come out]. After the jump, you can find a photo of the Italian market Fiat 500’s interior. Spot the differences (there’s one big one we’re thinking of) and win the respect of TTAC’s Best & Brightest. Help us understand why these changes were made, and you’ll be well on your way to becoming the next TTAC comments section superstar.

When the high Yen drove Nissan out of Japan to Thailand, and to importing their Nissan March (elsewhere known as the Micra) from the Land of Smiles back to the Land of the Rising Sun, many thought this a daring, maybe even suicidal experiment. Will the notoriously nitpicky Nipponese buyer buy it? Or will “the first move by a Japanese carmaker to export a mainstay model to the home market,” as The Nikkei [sub] called it, be a resounding dud? Either the Japanese are changing, or Nissan pulled-off the impossible.

Earlier today, I noted that

Revitalizing a once-dominant domestic brand is a lot harder than telling the quality-improvement story of a once-reviled Korean value brand

and I think this video helps prove the point. For a brand like Hyundai, highlighting product details helped change perceptions… but then, Hyundai has never asked Americans to think of their cars in especially emotional, patriotic, or culturally significant ways. They’re just high value cars that have become better and better over time. For GM and Chevrolet’s new top marketing execs (freshly poached from Hyundai), the plan seems to be to follow the Hyundai “quality story” gameplan, with a little awkwardly hip flair. For a brand that’s been “the heartbeat of America,” “like a rock” and more, this latest video seems stuck in “excellence for everyone” (i.e. generic and directionless) territory.

Besides, when the word “solid” is used in marketing materials to describe a “ 3,100-3,300 lb” compact car, it sounds a little like a Mom calling her kid “big-boned.”

I am looking under every rock and asking the question: Is there anything wrong or unusual about our pedals? We are continuing to look to see if there is something that we could do differently.

Toyota’s Steve St. Angelo tells the WSJ [sub] that Toyota is reviewing its pedal designs in search of a cause for its recent Unintended Acceleration scandal. Thus far, Toyota’s UA issues have been traced only to sticky pedals and floormat interference. Attempts to trace UA to malfunctioning throttle units have thus far been abortive, with a government research panel finding that brake misapplication occurred in many of the Toyota UA incidents.

Thanks in part to help from TTAC readers, TrueDelta received a record number of responses to last month’s Car Reliability Survey—nearly 18,000. Updated car reliability stats have been posted to the site for 458 cars, up from 404 three month ago. There are partial results for another 351.

These stats cover through the end of June. Other sources of car reliability information will not cover the most recent months until the summer or even fall of next year.