TrueDelta

Recently, whenever Toyota has a quality issue Automotive News likes to suggest that this might severely damage their reputation.

The latest case: Toyota is recalling 3.6 million cars because the floormats might slide forward and snag the accelerator. Cases of “unintended acceleration” have caused some accidents and even a few deaths, so they can be very serious.

If the recall fixes the problem, it won’t have a lingering impact. If it doesn’t…ask Audi.

At any rate, this is a safety problem, not a quality problem. Toyota’s quality reputation won’t be significantly harmed by stories in the press all by themselves. Instead, reputations for reliability (or lack thereof) begin with the experiences of people and their close friends and family. As long as many car owners aren’t having bad experiences with Toyota’s cars, their reputation for building reliable cars is safe.

It would help if Toyota went out of its way to take care of those people who do have problems with its cars. Unfortunately, what I’m hearing from Toyota owners suggests that their customer care is, if anything, worse than average.

On a positive note, Toyota has announced that it will soon offer extended warranties up to eight years or 125,000 miles, whichever comes first. Manufacturers’ extended warranties usually go up to 7/100. A willingness to go up to 8/125 with an extended warranty suggests that the cars are now being engineered to go this long without a major problem. Only Honda, which offers an 8/120 extended warranty, offers a warranty nearly this long.

Toyota’s move is consistent with car buyers’ expectations. Another thing I’ve learned from talking with hundreds of car owners: people increasingly expect a car to last at least 120,000 miles without major problems. Getting to 100,000 is no longer sufficient.

For the 2007 model year General Motors (GM) increased the powertrain warranty on its cars to five years or 100,000 miles (5/100), whichever comes first. They felt this warranty was better than Hyundai’s 10/100 powertrain warranty because it transfers to subsequent owners of the car.

Today GM sent a memo to dealers to announce changes to the items covered by the 5/100 powertrain warranty for 2010 model year cars.

Items that are no longer covered include:

1. Fuel system, including fuel pump and fuel injectors

2. Powertrain control modules

3. Throttle body assembly

4. Clutch and pressure plate for manual transmissions

5. Wheel bearings

Items added:

1. Oil lines and oil cooler

2. Crankshaft pulley

3. Clutch master cylinder

First thought: they’re reducing coverage, which isn’t good. The fuel system and wheel bearings are among the powertrain items most likely to fail in the first five years.

Second thought: do competitors’ standard powertrain warranties include these items?

To find out, I called a few dealers and had them check coverage on these items for me. (Note: I did not ask about the crankshaft pulley.)

First off, the powertrain control modules tend to be covered under the 8/80 emissions warranty, and this remains the case with GM.

Beyond this, it turns out that the items covered under the standard powertrain warranty vary quite a bit from manufacturer to manufacturer.

Toyota covers everything in the list except the throttle body assembly.

Honda covers the fuel pump and drive wheel bearings, but nothing else on the list.

Subaru covers the transmission control unit and the wheel bearings.

Hyundai covers only the drive wheel bearings with its non-transferable 10/100 powertrain warranty.

Nissan covers nothing on the list.

Still waiting to hear on Ford.

In other words, it appears that GM’s coverage used to be among the best, perhaps even the best, and will now be among the worst–but that it has plenty of company there.

So, GM is going to allow car buyers to return a car in the second month of ownership for a refund.

Or, buyers can opt for an extra $500 rebate instead.

So, how many people are going to forego $500 for the right to return the car?

The fine print, as I understand it:

1. Dealer processing and titling fees are not refundable. Sales tax is.

2. The car must have less than 4,000 miles on it.

3. The car must have at most $200 in wear and tear or damage.

4. Only one return per household.

My wife is still upset that I returned a partially eaten loaf of bread to CostCo. (My argument then: no one liked how it tasted. What’s a satisfaction guarantee for?)

So I’m guessing she won’t let me buy a Corvette Z06 unless I intend to keep it. And if I intended to keep it, I’d opt for the $500 rebate.

Or maybe GM really does believe in its products. A friend of mine once bought a big screen TV right before hosting a Super Bowl party, planning to return it the following week. But, after having that TV in his living room, he couldn’t bring himself to return it.

Maybe GM figures that anyone who bought a GM car planning to return it would find that they couldn’t live without the car?

We’ve updated the Car Reliability Survey results to include owner experiences through June 2009. With this update, our results are about 14 months ahead of the traditional source of such information.

Prompt quarterly updates enable TrueDelta to provide initial reliability stats on new models quickly. The August results included the first 2010 model, the Kia Soul. (A big thanks to Kia Soul Forums for helping to get the word out.) Launching an all-new model can be tricky, but so far it appears that Kia has done well with this one. Through the end of June only one of the 38 participating owners had had a repair, to the satellite radio. This works out to 15 successful repair trips per 100 cars per year.

When the stat is updated again in November, it will probably be a bit higher. For July some owners reported repairs to the optional lights on the speakers that beat in time with the music. Kia is aware of this problem, and has issued a TSB for it, so it should only affect early cars.

The November update will include additional 2010s such as the redesigned Mazda3 and Toyota Prius.

Though fuel prices have moderated, as long as the economy remains soft car buyers will be focusing on fuel economy, not horsepower. In response, manufacturers are rushing to offer at least the alternative of a less powerful, more efficient engine.

The Mazda CX-7, a compact SUV, is a case in point. When the CX-7 was introduced three years ago, only one engine was offered: a 244-horsepower turbocharged 2.3-liter four. A good fit for Mazda’s driver-oriented image, but fuel economy has been a weak spot.

For 2010 Mazda has refreshed the CX-7, and the turbo has been joined by a 161-horsepower non-turbo 2.5-liter four. The new engine is good for EPA ratings of 20 city and 28 highway, compared to 17 and 23 for the 2009 turbo. (For 2010 the turbo improves to 18/25.) The new base model weighs 300 pounds less, so acceleration should be similar to that of the non-turbo fours in the Honda CR-V (20/27) and Toyota RAV4 (22/28).