Well, you cross posting dirtbag, I get my chops busted for top posting....
You, however, cross post to several NGs - one of them a Ford NG and you post
some kind of cut and paste drivel that doesn't seem to mention the word Ford
not even once....


"Built_Well" <Built_Well_Toyota@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:819f3d8b-c814-4cd7-88a1-449b35037f73@m3g2000hsc.googlegroups.com...
>
> I was surprised to read that the 2 bottom trim levels of the
>
> new Passat do not come with automatic headlights. You have
>
> to spring for the third trim level (called Lux) to get the
> automatics. Kinda surprised me. All trims are turbo, though,
> even the bottom trim. The little 4-cylinder (just 2.0 liter)
> engine can put out 200 horsepower.
>
> The Jetta, assembled in Mexico, now comes with a 5th cylinder.
> It's an inline 5, and boasts 2.5 liters, more than my 2.4 liter
> Camry. But Consumer Reports says Volkswagen isn't known for
> its long-term reliability. A Consumer Reports survey of owners
> listed the '06 Passat as one of the least reliable family cars,
> but it drives really good, nice handling.
>
> The King of Reliability is Toyota, even besting Honda, which
> is the Queen, a close second to Toyota. Info coming from the
> April, 2007, issue.
>
> Nissan (and its luxury nameplate Infiniti) is all over the map
> in reliability, from good reliability for some models to
> downright poor reliablility for other Nissan and Infiniti
> models (info based on 2006 survey for 3 most recent
> model years' data).
>
> Subaru and Hyundai also did respectably well in the survey.
> All the other manufacturers, though, showed wide ranges in
> reliability from poor to bad--similar to Nissan's showing.
>
> Mercedes-Benz was at the bottom of the 36-nameplate heap,
> which really surprised me. Every time I get a hankering
> for a German car, I just gotta read Consumer Reports and
> I change my mind about wanting a German car (or even a U.S.
> car, I'm sad to say).
>
> I'm sure U.S. cars are improving dramatically, though.
> This was Consumer Reports '06 survey, 2 years old now, so
> it didn't include '07 and '08 models. Some Mercury models
> did really well in the survey, as did some Lincoln models, but
> some other Lincoln and Mercury models scored badly in the 3-year
> reliability survey. However, an outstanding Lincoln stand-out
> is the Lincoln Zephyr (or Lincoln MKZ which it was later known as).
>
> Going back to Mercedes for a second, in the survey, an
> 8-year-old Lexus scored better in reliablity than a new
> Mercedes-Benz ML500. (Yow.) Consumer Reports says the
> Lexus LS tops its survey, year in and year out. The
> 1998 Lexus LS400 "had fewer problems than the 2006
> Mercedes-Benz ML500"--remember this survey was done
> in 2006, two years ago, so they were comparing an 8-year-old car to a
> new car.
>
> The top 7 nameplates were:
>
> 1) Toyota
> 2) Honda
> 3) Scion (a Toyota brand)
> 4) Acura (Honda luxury brand)
> 5) Lexus (Toyota luxury brand)
> 6) Subaru
> 7) Hyundai (but Hyundai's subsidiary Kia didn't do so well)
>
> All other companies' nameplates had some models which turned
> in less-than-average 3-year reliability scores. As mentioned,
> some models for the companies really excelled, but other models
> from the same companies did poorly.
>
> BMW, another German car I've desired before reading
> Consumer Reports, didn't do so well either.
>
> The BMW 7-series was among the least reliable luxury cars, along
> with the Jaguar S-Type. BMW, as a whole, scored in the middle
> of the 36 name-plate bunch.
>
> Some of the least reliable small cars were the Chevrolet Cobalt,
> the 5-cylinder Volkswagen Jetta, and the Chevy Aveo.
>
> There were over 1.3 million cars reported on in the 2006 Consumer
> Reports Annual Car Reliablity Survey.
>
> Looking at more long-term data, the 1999 BMW 5 Series V8 had
> the worst engine cooling problem rate, with 34 percent. "In
> addition, 2000 to 2001 BMW 5 Series V8 and BMW 7-Series all
> had about 30 percent of their owners reporting engine-cooling
> woes."
>
> A quote from the article:
>
> "More than half of the 2004 Infiniti QX56, Nissan Armada, and
> Nissan Titan owners reported a brake problem. And almost half
> of 2005 Armada and Titan owners also reported brake problems."
>
> Now this Acura thing surprised me:
>
> "Nearly a quarter of owners of the 2001 Acura CL reported
> a bad tansmission problem, and nearly the same percentage of
> 1999 Volvo XC70s were reported to suffer from fuel-system problems."
>
> Damn, everytime I think of expanding my horizons beyond
> Toyota, cold, hard survey data and results bring me back,
> keeping me loyal to Toyota.