For this reason, Consumer Reports has nearly single handily (with the unions, of course) ruined the American auto industry...

↓↑report

...When the domestics weren't shooting themselves in the foot with cars like the Pinto, Vega, current-gen Sebring, current-gen Avenger...

↓↑report

@Peter,

How has CR contributed to ruining the American auto industry? By providing comparative information on reliability? So if consumers just didn't know that American cars had been less reliable, we would have been buying them?

Um, no.

↓↑report

Sure shoots my nascent love affair for the STS-V.

Now off the "next car" list.

Too bad. But I have zero tolerance for poor reliability especially in this age of advanced engineering (too many Alfa/Jaguar/BMW headaches in my past).

↓↑report

Richard,
I had a stove recomended by CR that lasted only two years, a coffe maker recomended by CR that lasted only four months and caught fire, a printer recomended by CR that never worked right, and a digital camera they recomended that after a year took a crap.
On the other side of the coin, an 06 STS-V with 47K that's been flawless and my wifes 08 CTS, also flawless. Both not recomended by CR.
We keep a copy nearby in case we run out of Charmin.

↓↑report

Apparently they see them as "reliability too low to recommend" even though it's likely the only people that would respond to such a survey are the ones who had trouble. The rest are out having fun in their car.

I have trouble believing anything from consumer reports based upon the fact that those who have trouble are more likely to complain than those who like it are likely to praise it.

↓↑report

Yeah, what's the deal with the Z06 being rated as "Reliability too low to recommend?" Doesn't it have a SBC in it... one of the oldest, most reliable motors ever built?

↓↑report

Well..unless you're a Flintstone, there's more to a car than just the engine.

↓↑report

Yes, Noz. becuase the Z06 has nothing going for it outside of it's engine right? How ever will we cavemen ever understand that?

↓↑report

Doug A. wrote "I have trouble believing anything from consumer reports based upon the fact that those who have trouble are more likely to complain than those who like it are likely to praise it."

But doesn't that same standard apply to everyone, foreign-car drivers included? Owners with problematic Civics will complain to CR just as much as owners with problematic Focuses. So in that sense it's still a fair comparison.

↓↑report

Okay, Noz, I'll play. What else is wrong with the Z06? What would cause it to be considered "unreliable?"

↓↑report

Dustin:
"But doesn't that same standard apply to everyone, foreign-car drivers included? Owners with problematic Civics will complain to CR just as much as owners with problematic Focuses. So in that sense it's still a fair comparison."

Maybe not. See, they bought the Civic because CR said it was great. If anything goes wrong with it they don't get too upset over it. After all they were so smart for listening to CR in the first place, right?. There is a term for this in psycology, maybe someone else here knows it. But it has to do with self-enforcing something or other. On the other hand if you buy a car not recommended by CR and something goes wrong you might beat yourself (and the car) up and say "I should have listened to CR, now I own a piece of junk!", when all that went wrong was a sensor that was replaced under warranty. Unfortunately this is how many people think.

↓↑report

@Frank
Consumer Reports also shows excellent reliability for cars like the Ford Taurus. This whole ridiculous conspiracy theory about how Toyota/Honda owners won't complain on surveys is seriously ridiculous. Again I'll point out that Consumer Reports subscribers pay for the magazine so they can read accurate stats. If they themselves aren't filling out the surveys accurately then they're messing up the stats that they're paying for.

And anyways, the reliability ratings for Toyota sank a few years ago which triggered the removal of automatic recommendations...because people filled out surveys complaining of problems. So enough with the crazy conspiracy theories-they make no sense because there are domestic models that get great scores and imports that get lousy scores.

The only real issue with Consumer Reports is with comparisons where there are a lot of models on the market that they didn't include in a comparison. It makes their data less useful because they'll test like 20 televisions out of the 300 models on the market.

But their car surveys cover pretty much everything out there and are probably the most accurate you can get. It's not perfect but nothing in life is, and it sure as heck is a lot more objective than reading Motor Trend.

↓↑report

The primary list is dominated by them, yes.

↓↑report