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posted by martyb on Tuesday October 25 2016, @08:21PM   Printer-friendly
from the would-you-recommend-this-car-to-a-friend? dept.

Lexus, Toyota and Buick are the most reliable brands in Consumer Reports' latest survey, a reward for their conservative approach to new technology.

It's the fourth straight year that Lexus came in first and Toyota came in second. Two of their hybrids—the Toyota Prius and the Lexus CT 200H—were named the most reliable vehicles. But Buick—General Motors Co.'s near-luxury marque—is the first domestic brand to crack the top three since the magazine began tracking vehicle reliability in the early 1980s.

Audi and Kia rounded out the top five brands.

Dodge, Chrysler, Fiat and Ram—all owned by Fiat Chrysler Automobiles—were the worst performers. Electric car maker Tesla Motors also fared poorly.

The magazine released its annual reliability survey Monday. It's closely watched by the industry, since many buyers look to the magazine for recommendations.

http://phys.org/news/2016-10-lexus-toyota-buick-auto-reliability.html

Top Vehicles in Consumer Reports' Reliability Survey

[Details]: Consumer Reports News


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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:50PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:50PM (#418736)

    You clearly have no idea how CR's auto reliability reports works.
    They solicit all of their subscribers, there is no restriction on what vehicles are reported on.
    Frankly I am just plain fucking tired of idiots like you alleging conspiracy and manipulation simply because you know jackshit about a topic. Your ignorance is not proof of conspiracy, its proof of your idiocy. The internet has made it too easy for idiots to pontificate as if they were experts. Next time you don't actually know what the fuck you are talking about, do us all favor and shut the fuck up.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:59PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:59PM (#418743)
  • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Tuesday October 25 2016, @11:50PM

    by RamiK (1813) on Tuesday October 25 2016, @11:50PM (#418769)

    The fact they're soliciting all of their subscribers is the problem: There simply shouldn't be enough reliable data to determine Lexus and Buick topping in reliability. Even counting road accident is biased considering how little a luxury motor rides yearly compared to work and commute vehicles.

    Toyota I can believe. At least in the sense that it's known enough to be reliable that every guy looking for that number 4 or 5 after putting down his favorite will throw in Toyota just because he heard good things.

    As for everything from the third sentence onward, it's a real shame how quick people are to forget about emissionsgate. I don't feel any obligation to trust the so-called experts about anything after they've been fooled, or made a fool of us for the last 20 years about exhausts and efficiency.

    Now, go take a puff of that cigarette and calm your nerves. 9/10 doctors recommend Camel Lite.

    --
    compiling...
    • (Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 26 2016, @12:16AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 26 2016, @12:16AM (#418777)

      > There simply shouldn't be enough reliable data to determine Lexus and Buick topping in reliability.

      More fucktard pontifications based on knowing absolutely nothing.
      Just shut the fuck up already.

      > As for everything from the third sentence onward, it's a real shame how quick people are to forget about emissionsgate

      Do not even try to compare your self-agtgrandizing ignorance with the expertise of the guys who actually went out and tested the VWs in the field. You don't know shit about what you are talking about, they actually did know exactly what they were talking about because they had were experts in the field.

    • (Score: 2) by Bogsnoticus on Wednesday October 26 2016, @05:46AM

      by Bogsnoticus (3982) on Wednesday October 26 2016, @05:46AM (#418874)

      0 years about exhausts and efficiency.
      Now, go take a puff of that cigarette and calm your nerves. 9/10 doctors recommend Camel Lite.

      And 9 out of 10 men who have tried camels, prefer women.

      --
      Genius by birth. Evil by choice.
    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday October 26 2016, @01:31PM

      by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 26 2016, @01:31PM (#418963)

      The fact they're soliciting all of their subscribers is the problem

      I'd take a different tack that their subscribers are ... unusual people. To put it nicely.

      My parents subscribed for a year and discontinued for three reasons:

      1) Most of the stuff they needed to buy was settled by whats actually available where we live today not some leisurely ordering from a specialty shop in Boston or WTF and we can't find the issue with the thing we need to buy. So its not actually useful unless you plan far ahead for next time the toilet tank lever chain snaps or the kitchen exhaust fan breaks and when that happens you pick a convenient retailer and buy the one thing they offer. Because you can't find the issue covering kitchen exhaust fans and when you do its five years out of date and lists stuff you can only buy from stores that are 1000 miles away anyway.

      2) My EE/CS dad and future EE/CS me would read reviews about electronics and think "this is the dumbest GD way I've ever heard of to evaluate an audio amplifier" or whatever. Total journalist run organization. I mean they just don't (didn't) understand the people reading and the products being reviewed, at least not at the same time. For an example of what I'm talking about watch a free OTA TV PBS show called "This Old House" thats been around since the 70s. The "problem" is they are new england coastie boston people and they have a ... unique aesthetic taste out there which would look badly out of place anywhere but Boston. There are interesting aspects and they kinda get some of it, but their taste is way off from most of the world and then at least CR makes most of their reviews based on taste and style all of which do not match the rest of the country. Then the realization you get from all journalist majors the whole "well sure these guys are idiots about EE and CS stuff but I'm sure their top tier plumbers" and the red pill is when you realize every plumber in the country is reading the same damn thing but saying "well sure these guys are idiots about plumbing but I'm sure they're top tier EE and top tier CS people" Basically its a pile of LARP in a slightly different culture and tastes and styles such that not only is everything made up, but everything is made up to entertain people who ain't even us.

      3) The last straw was their readers and/or editors are too ignorant to generate useful survey content. So a XYZ model Plymouth IS, repeat, IS, an ABC model Mazda come off the same group project assembly line and the last step is slapping different nameplates and VIN on them, but they're identical cars marketed very differently, naturally the ethnic group CR focuses on hated american cars and loved japanese cars as a political statement, so naturally the CR report claimed the same car is a lemon if it gets an american nameplate and gods gift to drivers if it gets a japanese nameplate. The problem with discovering reality by surveying idiots is idiots are really dumb. Its like pretending you're doing scientific discovery by running a survey of slave labor in 100 BC asking if the earth is flat or round and patting yourself on the back for your amazing scientific skills at determining the earth is flat.

      I can't use a SN car analogy because of #3 above, so I'll use a programming analogy that code reviews mean something when the reviewers are skilled fellow programmers ... or crucially, when you mistakenly think they're skilled fellow coders ... but when you can't find/schedule them when you actually need them, and they're a bunch of journalists or otherwise ignorant and crucially are not even programmers at all, and if they're not even from the same culture so their views are irrelevant compared to yours (imagine a team of OO experts trying to review functional paradigm/style code...)

      I'll throw out a theory making CR even more irrelevant today in 2016... Because of the internet and internet scam/review sites eating CR's lunch, I'm gonna bet the average reader / surveyed contributor is over 70, because under 50 probably exclusively uses yelp or amazon reviews or web forums or anything but a legacy printed magazine to make decisions. That explains the Buick thing because I'm pretty sure based on observation that the AARP hands out coupons for 10% off your next Buick with your annual renewal. If you're not 70, would you take car advice from someone who's 70? Maybe, maybe not. Kinda like most of my MiLs elderly friends had caddies or oldsmobiles maybe a decade or two ago, but now they seem to skew Buick.

      I bet legacy TV news viewers like Buick, newspaper subscribers like Buick... It has to do with demographics of dying industries not, well, reality.

      • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Thursday October 27 2016, @04:20AM

        by RamiK (1813) on Thursday October 27 2016, @04:20AM (#419279)

        The ignorance of the consumers is a given. Even an auto-mechanics has significant observation bias after all. So, you can go around expecting people who maybe owned 5 automobiles from 2-4 makes to rate a market filled with different price tiers, part prices, service costs, models, engine sizes and etc...

        Saying that, the format can still produce good data. Say, by following something like this format:

        Rate the 5 most recent cars you've owned in descending order by date of purchase:
        1. Reliability: |1| |2| |3| |4| |5| Make:______ Model:______ Year:_____
        2. Reliability: |1| |2| |3| |4| |5| Make:______ Model:______ Year:_____
        3. Reliability: |1| |2| |3| |4| |5| Make:______ Model:______ Year:_____
        4. Reliability: |1| |2| |3| |4| |5| Make:______ Model:______ Year:_____
        5. Reliability: |1| |2| |3| |4| |5| Make:______ Model:______ Year:_____

        Ideally, you'd use a web form and drop-down boxes so the numbers would crunch automatically.

        Following this format, you'd eliminate multiple biases and have a good built-in criteria to evaluate the quality of the feedback (diversity of past ownership and years of ownership). You'd be able to say things like "People who owned a GM Truck for 3-7 years rate their reliability this or that". Or, "Toyota is often rate most reliable by people owning models past X year and that owned the car for Y years.".

        Of course, making a determination of what's "Most reliable" will be a bit tricky. But still, I'd rather debate the interpretation of the data then the method of it's collection and it's very quality.

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        compiling...
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 26 2016, @02:09AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 26 2016, @02:09AM (#418814)

    Editor's Note Ratings for models with an asterisk (*) are based on one year of reliability data.

    Because reliable means your brand new car doesn't break down in the first year. Progress.