At last year's NY Auto Show we saw a new (or a revisited) movement in practical family haulers: the hatchback. There didn't seem to be anything like that at the 2005 NY Auto Show, though. Rather, this year we saw refinement. Some manufacturers took existing models and fine tuned them: sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. But most manufacturers didn't kill off a model just to replace it with another.
"Don't most auto makers do that?" you ask. Sometimes, yes, they do but often wait years and years to make necessary changes and then find themselves leap-frogged in terms of quality and features. We consider it not just a smart move to continue to improve these vehicles, it's required -- even if the car has proven to be a sales leader. Why? Competition. A good analogy would be Apple's incredibly successful iPod. There are not only four models (Shuffle, Mini, regular and Photo) there have also been four generations, in just over four years! Apple has taken a great product and made it insanely great by going over and over and over the existing design and tweaked it to near-perfection. Think Ford did that with the Taurus? Ha! As soon as the Taurus became a "fleet" car, all refinement stopped. And it died. The Taurus is being replaced next year by the Fusion and we can only hope it doesn't suffer the excruciating life the Taurus led. Our own internal car fleet (a 1998 Saab 900s) is identical to the model we had in 1994. But, you say, that was only four years what can you expect? We expect rattles that existed in a model in 1994 version not to be present in the 1998 model. Alas, same rattles.
The idea of taking a good car and refining it to perfection sounds... well, it sounds like you are a Japanese company (Apple being a great exception). The Mercedes-Benz S-class is certainly a fancy, luxurious car. But it feels like your old grandfather's car. It might have just rolled off the assembly line but if feels far older than it is. Lexus used to use the slogan, "The Relentless Pursuit of Perfection" and they claimed they were aiming at the Mercedes S-class in terms of quality. Well, according to the latest stats from Consumer Reports, Lexus has done it. How did they do it? By constantly reviewing what they've made and analyzing how to improve it. There's a bonus way: waiting patiently for the other guy to let his product waste away from neglect. Forbes has a great list of the best current sedans and in the article they also offer up this tidbit:
Consumer Reports gives both Mercedes' flagship S-Class and high-volume E-Class sedans ratings of "poor," the lowest on its scale, for predicted reliability. The entry-level Mercedes C-Class sedan ranks only one step higher, with "fair" predicted reliability. To compare those ratings to some Japanese sedans, all of the sedans in the slide show from Toyota and its upscale Lexus subsidiary achieved reliability ratings of "excellent" or "very good."You think the high-end Lexus is ever going to by rated "poor"? Thought not.
Refinement is often referred to as attention to detail. Detroit would be lying if they put that on their resume, though. In fact, lack of attention to detail is the defining reason Detroit is fishtailing out of control. We urge Detroit (oh, hell, all carmakers) to study and imitate Honda and Toyota's methodology of analyzing a car and refining it to near-perfection. We're not sure why Detroit has been distracted but it's obvious now that they've wandered into the breakdown lane and the only way out is self-reliance.
Apart from all of the above, which is fine,
nobody seems to comprehend how the LS430 is
built.
Not a single Western manufacturer has the depth and breadth of experience with
construction by robots.
The Lexus LS430 is built entirely by Robots, the most advanced robots on the planet. To build the 14 Lexus models takes a total of 66 humans!!! - NO guest workers!!
Posted by: johnmclean | Thursday, October 20, 2005 at 07:22 AM
The German luxo-cruisers are trying to answer questions nobody is asking. Who needs iDrive from BMW? Makes their cars undriveable and dangerous. Who needs Mercedes' COMAND system? Has caused electronics gremlins to take COMMAND. The Lexus LS430 is easy to use and easy to live with. No wonder the Japanese luxury entries have been plastering the Germans. The new Infiniti M and Lexus GS are great cars (prefer the M myself).
Vehicle Voice (http://www.vehiclevoice.com) tracks interest in these advanced features. Everything from iPod integration to satellite radio interest to navigation systems are meaured. To cast your ballot for the features you would consider in the future, check out http://www.vehiclevoice.com.
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Posted by: karxprt | Sunday, April 10, 2005 at 07:44 PM