Topic: articToyota Crashes In Reliability Rankings

[Mitlov]

My Jetta rocks.  Just for the record.  I'm not sure what CR rated the 2004 Jetta 1.8T as, but I'm sure it wasn't very good.

[Mitlov]

What other manufacturers has CR been doing this type of behaviour with as well?

Ten bucks says Honda and Subaru.

[Snowman]

My Jetta rocks.  Just for the record.  I'm not sure what CR rated the 2004 Jetta 1.8T as, but I'm sure it wasn't very good.

[jcon]

What other manufacturers has CR been doing this type of behaviour with as well?

Ten bucks says Honda and Subaru.

From what I hear, you can buy a Honda or Subaru in the US for 10 bucks (they cost thousands more here)... 10 bucks Canadian, not that worthless Greenback!

[AVToller]

Folks, it is called PREDICTED reliability not guaranteed reliability. If you HAD to bet on who is going to win the next PGA major tournament and Tiger Woods had the lead going into the final round, how would you place your money? He MIGHT lose, but based upon previous results, the chances are vanishingly small.

For many years ALL Toyotas were above average in reliability even in their first year. Would it not seem like a very safe bet that their next new model would ALSO make the grade? Now that a long standing pattern has been broken, they are no longer going to bet the same way as it is no longer a "sure thing". Big deal, big surprise. Bias - sure. Don't you have a bias that the next time you take a step you won't fall through the floor into the center of the earth? 

[airbalancer]

Folks, it is called PREDICTED reliability not guaranteed reliability. If you HAD to bet on who is going to win the next PGA major tournament and Tiger Woods had the lead going into the final round, how would you place your money? He MIGHT lose, but based upon previous results, the chances are vanishingly small.

For many years ALL Toyotas were above average in reliability even in their first year. Would it not seem like a very safe bet that their next new model would ALSO make the grade? Now that a long standing pattern has been broken, they are no longer going to bet the same way as it is no longer a "sure thing". Big deal, big surprise. Bias - sure. Don't you have a bias that the next time you take a step you won't fall through the floor into the center of the earth? 

Is that because you live on a fault line

[mmret]

The bottom of his Yaris must have rusted through as a result of this CR "downgrade" on ToMoCo.

[carcrazy]

More bad news for Toyota name?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071017/bs_afp/japanautocompanyrecalltoyota_071017095017;_ylt=AiJIiStrGCETUjGkzIRUzAzlyREB

[Julie]

Barrie...look at this chart....WAAAAAAYYYYY down at the bottom.  That's where Chevy and GMC are right now for quality..........So who's failing what exactly??

Ouch.

Barrie, just because 2 vehicles from Toyota has gone down the drain for reliability this year, doesn't mean the whole brand is suddenly crap. 

Also, "Toyota builds bad V8's...". Easy there, just because of some camshaft issues, 1st year of production of the 5.7, makes all Toyota V8's bad?  The 4.7 L has been solid.

Doesn't matter. For Barrie, Japanese cars are , and everyone is wrong unless they say GM is the best and will be forever. It's not going to change his mind......

[barrie1]

How right you are and I will continue for the rest of my days to drive the GM products and also know for sure they are the best built vehicles out there. Rating lists like that are made by Humans and they do make mistakes which they are trying to rectify now. They have been caught promoting a bad product as they just thought it was OK and wasen't. At least they have admitted their serious mistake again and are attempting to rectify it with a new method of reporting the actual truth. Why is GM still the largest car company out there? Because they build the best vehicles is why.  Millions of world buyers every year just can't be wrong but some of you can.   

[jcon]

How right you are and I will continue for the rest of my days to drive the GM products and also know for sure they are the best built vehicles out there. Rating lists like that are made by Humans and they do make mistakes which they are trying to rectify now. They have been caught promoting a bad product as they just thought it was OK and wasen't. At least they have admitted their serious mistake again and are attempting to rectify it with a new method of reporting the actual truth. Why is GM still the largest car company out there? Because they build the best vehicles is why.  Millions of world buyers every year just can't be wrong but some of you can.   

More people buy non-GM vehicles than buy GM vehicles. If GM built the best vehicles out there they would not have lost so much market share.

[barrie1]

Yes they have lost Market share with every year going by and more competition from the other builders they will lose share as not all of us want the same vehicle that the guy next door has. We all have our wants and wishs on the vehicle we would like to drive and most of us will get it later in our lives. The kids will be raised and so will your income level so you will be able to finally afford the vehicle of your dreams. It all depends on your lifestyle and need for the toy you want as to when you actually do get it. Your Pocket does have the major say it having it and when it happens. No-matter what the GM lineup is still the largest vehicle company in the world and Toyota isen't going to beat them this year by the news thats coming out. I am sure they are loseing many sales by the bad publicity they are receiving whether its fair or not. Its the way the market works and has for all of the other builders so far so its finally their turn to face the music. The Big Old 3 had to face it and they have improved their quality a lot but some of you just can't figure that out at all it seems as you are hung up blaming them for all the mistakes that they all have made. You should driving a Horses with Blinders as you seem to wear them every day on here.  Julie is 100% correct in that I will never change as I do know a good product when i see it as I have spent over 50 years under the hoods of thousands of vehicles doing repairs and most of them were from somewhere else other then being a domestic vehicle as we know it persay.

[dr_spock]

As long as it gets you from A to B and you derive pleasure from it, who cares what CR says. Don't let the bastards spoil your perceived consumer gratification of your wheels.

ps. I so LOVE my Passat !!!!!!! Not a single problem.

Don't you mean not a single problem yet?      

[MKII]

This statement has to impress the consumers of the new Camry whom experienced the funky tranny, and who were told "you have to learn how to drive this car".  Anyone remember how Toyota was telling the Camry consumers that they just had to learn to drive with this new transmission.

Toyots Admits To Camry Flaw, Flaw known from the very beginning...yet Toyota continued selling
Thats because there are only 160 Camrys affected, Right ArticSteve

Jim Lentz, executive vice president of Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A said he was not surprised that the Camry V6 was on the list as it had a transmission flaw that Toyota was aware of.
“We knew in the very beginning we had a transmission issue with that vehicle,” he said. The problem caused the transmission to get stuck in second gear or pass through second gear roughly.

Lentz had no explanation for the other two vehicles making the "not recommended" list


Toyota's top brass was concerned that three of its vehicles were moved to the "not recommended" category — the Camry V6, Tundra V8 and Lexus GS AWD. “The bad news from our perspective is we never want to see vehicles on the ‘not recommend’ list,” Jim Lentz, executive vice president of Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. told Automotive News.

For those who have followed Toyota's transmission nightmare, these problems go back to at least 2002 models. Toyota's "fixes" have simply changed the characteristics of the problem.

Hesitating Lexus unsettling for owners http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04343/423383.stm

David Champion, director of automobile testing for Consumer Reports said "Your reader's experience does sound a lot worse than what we experienced, but that might be just the difference between cars."

"We've driven quite a few new cars that have drive-by-wire, and they don't have that problem,'' he said.

A Lexus spokesman said "The transmissions on the cars have a sophisticated system that learns driver habits and adjusts itself to fit their driving pattern. This can vary depending upon the learned driving pattern."


Hesitation issue goes beyond Toyota's luxury line  http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04345/424551.stm
Owner, Beth Caldwell, said her 2004 Toyota Highlander V-6 with the five-speed automatic transmission had the same hesitation problem and that when she took it to the dealer's service department, she was told "that's how the new transmissions are."

Scott McAliley said he got a similar response when he approached his dealer about his 2004 Lexus ES330. He said the dealer told him that, "a.), They couldn't find anything out of the ordinary and b.), The problem would diminish over time as the computer learned our habits."

Software Glitch Slows Some 2007 Camrys http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2006/10/toyota_accelerate.html
Toyota says it doesn't know how many consumers driving the 2007 version of the best-selling car in America are riding around with the old software.  (Yeah right)

On this link... http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060426/BIZ/604260377/1001 "Toyota Motor Sales USA said the problem affects about 160 cars." 

Thread at Edmunds where a Toyo fire extinguisher is posting on the supposed "snap ring" fix. It is always fun to see how these well trained seals can give very professional empty answers and the best are when he/she does not answer at all.
http://townhall-talk.edmunds.com/direct/view/.f0c20c4/0

[duck]

The Japanese should open their markets to GM cars. So far they haven't.   

[Juke1]

My test drive of 2 07 Camrys SE/LE was my biggest turn off ever behind the wheel of a Toyota, especially just after finishing test driving an 07 Altima with a CVT, so smoooth!!  I forgot how to drive maybe?

[CSH]

I have annoyances with my 07 Camry:

1) When driving at 115kmph on the 401 when i try to accelerate to say 125 it will take forever to accelerate. The speed will not increase even if you press the accelrator for like 5-6 seconds. Only after that i see some speed increase. The rate of speed increase is unacceptable. It tries to maintain 5th even when i press hard on the accelerator and there is just not enough power to increase speed within acceptable amount of time in 5th.

2) When cruise control is set to 100-110 and we drive over a bridge or overpass on the 401 the car shifts to 4th (not noticable), then engine revs a little more and this is fine. However when cruise is set to 120-130 the car will shift to 3rd and rev to 4000rpm and there will noticable  shifts and engine noise. This is unacceptable. The gearing has to be changed

Toyota USA has a TSB for this. I got a copy of it and took it to the dealer. He said this is a US TSB and does not apply to Canadian cars. He then proceeded to give me BS about the drive by wire system saying that drive the car hard and it will learn and you will not have the above issues. Well my wife drives the car almost 50% of the time and being a new driver she does not/cannot drive the car hard. Will the car unlearn what it learnt from me..

There are also build issues with the car interior. However that is best explained with pictures. I will probably get an oppurtuinity to take then on Sunday, so will post then.

I am relatively new to the country and although i test drove atleast 5 cars (for minimum 45 mins) and i did not have the eye or the knowledge to see annoyances i am experiencing now with the car. Or maybe i am expecting too much as the others cars would have also been the same, i dont know.

[johngenx]

Toyota, overall, makes very reliable cars.  But, like every maker, they goof.  What they need to do is stop blaming the consumer.  They tried it with engine sludge and ended up having to be sued.  Now they're doing it with adapting tranmissions and DBW systems.  My MB has both, and the car is buttery smooth.  In fact, the sweet thing about adpating trans programming, is that if you spend the day putzing about the city the trans just eases from gear to gear and you never notice it.  Hammer down some twisty road and it holds the gear when you get off the throttle and it waits until redline to go up.  While not as fun as a manny, it's way better than the old days of AT's.

As for DBW it makes for some nice cruise-control features, but otherwise I don't get it.  They added resitance to the pot to make it "feel" like the old spring loaded cables.  Why not just use the cables?  They didn't cost $1800...

[UmroAyyar]

I have annoyances with my 07 Camry:

1) When driving at 115kmph on the 401 when i try to accelerate to say 125 it will take forever to accelerate. The speed will not increase even if you press the accelrator for like 5-6 seconds. Only after that i see some speed increase. The rate of speed increase is unacceptable. It tries to maintain 5th even when i press hard on the accelerator and there is just not enough power to increase speed within acceptable amount of time in 5th.

2) When cruise control is set to 100-110 and we drive over a bridge or overpass on the 401 the car shifts to 4th (not noticable), then engine revs a little more and this is fine. However when cruise is set to 120-130 the car will shift to 3rd and rev to 4000rpm and there will noticable  shifts and engine noise. This is unacceptable. The gearing has to be changed

Toyota USA has a TSB for this. I got a copy of it and took it to the dealer. He said this is a US TSB and does not apply to Canadian cars. He then proceeded to give me BS about the drive by wire system saying that drive the car hard and it will learn and you will not have the above issues. Well my wife drives the car almost 50% of the time and being a new driver she does not/cannot drive the car hard. Will the car unlearn what i learnt..

There are also build issues with the car interior. However that is best explained with pictures. I will probably get an oppurtuinity to take then on Sunday, so will post then.

I am very new to the country and although i test drove atleast 5 cars (for minimum 45 mins) and i did not have the eye or the knowledge to see annoyances i am experiencing now with the car. Or maybe i am expecting too much as the others cars would have also been the same, i dont know.

Which TSB did you find? I had one applied to my car after getting the same BS by the service advisor. I wrote to the dealer principal, service manager and got the salesperson involved as well. Service advisor don't usually accept anything from you.

Here's a list of 2007 Camry TSBs in PDF format.
http://www.toyotanation.com/forum/showthread.php?t=180105

I had this one applied to my, has transformed my car's behaviour entirely.
EG056-06 --- ECM CALIBRATION: ENHANCEMENT TO SHIFTING PERFORMANCE & SMOOTHNESS (2AZ-FE)

[drederick]

Toyots Admits To Camry Flaw, Flaw known from the very beginning...yet Toyota continued selling
Thats because there are only 160 Camrys affected, Right ArticSteve

WOW.... its like I am reading one of my posts! and a super well written post it is!