Whoever owns a Chrysler/Dodge minivan knows there are tons of troubles on these vehicles. I am so curious why Chrysler let the same problem continue year after year, disappointed and turned away hundreds/tens of thousands of customers to Japanese made?
So many years into making similar type of vehicles like minivan--don't they learn how to do some basic things right? For example, the suspension, rack and pinion, sway bar link.....Those are not super new high tech stuffs and I believe a company specifically making the same thing for 20 years should at least know what to do and what to avoid. Radiator, battery, headlight, captain seats, airbag, heater seats, and transmission, none of the above is brand new idea or invention happened in the past 10 years.
I am not talking about jet stream windshield wiper, rear view camera ,hybrid motor or dynamic laser cruise control. If you screw up all of the above, I will still support you by the excuse helping domestic economy.
DC--you suck, you never learned and you will never get my business after I was fooled twice in ten years. Same compliment to Ford here.
And your ridiculous point is? You have stated commonalities that apply to every auto manufacturer of every product not just autos. Get a cup of coffee take a deep breath and enjoy it beats the alternative.
And your ridiculous point is? You have stated commonalities that apply to every auto manufacturer of every product not just autos. Get a cup of coffee take a deep breath and enjoy it beats the alternative.
I guess the Detroit big 3 are so good that they keep on losing market share everyday unless they make a wacky looking car like the 300 that happens to catch on.
There are tons of satisfied Chrysler minivan owners on the road. But I agree that Chrysler should improve bread and butter components like alternators, speed sensors and the like so they last as long as Toyota and Honda parts. Stupid failures ruin the reputation of otherwise good vehicles.
The original alternator on my 96 Grand Voyager had 178,000 miles on it when the van was totaled last week. How long do you think one should last to be considered good? I thought 10 years and 178K was pretty good.
You were lucky. My 300M was stuck in second gear at 45k miles because of a lousy sensor. Power windows have been fixed countless times. That kind of crap makes people look at imports.
But tons of troubles? I don't think so. Both my vans were bought used and with the exception of the transmission, any "troubles" they had were pretty clearly caused by the previous owners neglect. And the transmission in the late 80's early 90's vans that used the electronic 4 speed was a known common failure point and I knew that before buying either of them.
Your lumping the transmission in there and that's quite wrong, the transmission is ten times more complex than any radiator, battery, headlight, seat, heater, or airbag. And as for heated seats, that's a gimmick - wear a coat for God's sake. In any case heated seats are pointless unless you have a remote starter in the car and you start it 10 minutes before going out of the house to it.
And as for the other stuff, well here is the problem, and it's a problem that all the automakers have. Simply put, new car buyers are very price sensitive and the automakers are under a lot of pressure to keep their products cheap. That translates to pressure on the suppliers of these components.
So what happens is for year after year the suppliers don't get a cent more for whatever assembly they were making the year before, yet their raw materials costs go up, so they have to keep cost-cutting. And people are very inventive about finding ways of making something cheaper. Sometimes that works OK but other times it doesen't.
If the average new car purchaser wanted to buy a car that was made the same way as it was made 20 years ago, with the same parts, (except for updated versions of parts that had proved out to be bad) then it is likely that new vehicles could last 500K miles, barring accident. And it is also likely they would be even cheaper since the automakers could fire an entire useless 3/4 of the "automotive stylists" and marketing people that work for them, yet who don't contribute a single thing to the actual manufacture of the vehicle, everything they do is contributions to selling the vehicle.
There have been vehicles in the past (like the Volkswagen Beetle) where this has been the case and the later versions of those vehicles have developed phenominal reputations for durability.
But, the average new car purchaser today doesen't want this, they want a car that looks totally different than last year's model so they can drive over to impress their friends with it. The average new car purchaser views buying a car as making a personal statement about themselves, or some other emotional claptrap. That is what sells cars, and because of that, the automakers have to keep changing things around.
Youll be giving the same compliment to the imports once you have owned a couple of those for a number of years.
Actually GM/Delphi and Ford/Visteon force cost reductions on each supplied part - Ford takes an additional 5% of of the price they pay for the part - at least that's the way it was when I was in the biz 5 years ago.
...and health care costs, and the customer adds cover-their-butt no value added so-called quality reporting requirements to the supplier's line - people have to be hired to implement those, yet the price paid is reduced.
Yes - generally the only solution (other than going out of business) is to fake the quality checks (Firestone - Ford), move the production line to Mexico and not tell Ford (violates all kinds of rules), etc., etc, etc.
Usually not, but - hey - they're "saving money" - at least in the MBA's projections.
Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')
No, you were just unlucky. I've taken several Chryslers past 100K without the sort of trouble you mention. My 89 Acclaim to 143K without any transmission failures, with the original exhaust system, with the original alternator, etc. My current minivan has 61K with no such failures.
That 5% reduction was each and every year with no basis for the reduction - up to the supplier to find the "fat" in the process (or simply increase their loss on the part an additional 5%).
Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')
Yeah, I never had any trouble with mine either. I'm at that age where I know a lot of people who own them, and generally they give good service.
I just hauled one off to the crusher with 180,000 miles on it. It belonged to a neighbor. It was leaking oil, and he let it get low repeatedly, and one day it finally lost oil pressure long enough to throw a rod. It had that
1989 4-speed automatic in it, with 180,000 miles, and the thing had never been apart! I was impressed. I hated to junk it, but I sure wasn't going to bother fixing it, and I didn't think anybody else would either.
I and everyone else who had a second 98 or 99 LH car suffered with bad power windows. The motors, regulators and weatherstripping all were bad. Many failed multiple times. I always figure that that is why they went to tiny windows on the 300.
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