An increasing number of vehicles are available with a third row of seats. Some reviewers, myself included, often evaluate these vehicles based on the suitability of their third row seating for adults. And mahy car buyers will make the same evaluation. Should you? When I take a step back to think about this question, it becomes clear that the answer is… More →
Month: May 2007
Why TrueDelta excludes inconsistent respondents from the analysis
TrueDelta only recently started collecting data on the 2007 Acura MDX. So far, the 32 owners who have responded have reported only one trip to the shop that included a successful repair. This repair trip would be included in the analysis, except for one thing: the repair was reported for January, and the owner in question did not respond for… More →
Another feature I’d like to see in more cars: head-up display (HUD)
Back in 1990 General Motors started offering a head-up display (HUD) in the Pontiac Grand Prix, and within a few years the feature was available in a number of its products. Though other automakers including BMW have started offering the feature in recent years, for the most part the world has yet to take notice. I’d personally like to see HUDs… More →
Issue tracking added to the Vehicle Reliability Survey
Another quarter, another set of tweaks to the Vehicle Reliability Survey. This time around, I’ve sought to address two common problems with responses. First off, people often report multiple issues at the same time. The form has been revised to make it clearer that the top half of the form should be filled out separately for each repair trip, while… More →
The demographics of the panel
The current special survey on dealership sales experience surveys asks panel members about their gender and age for the first time. And the results have been surprising. Many people come to the panel from Epinions, which has a heavily female membership. And women tend to be more concerned about reliability than men are. I also get many emails from women… More →
Time to clean the data!
Well, except for a few stragglers data collection is done for the quarter. There’s more of it than ever before. Which also means there’s more of it to clean than ever before. First, a bit on growth. Last month 5,064 cars were surveyed. Of these, a survey was completed for 2,183 of them. Which works out to a 43 percent… More →