Subarus in EU

What? Toyotas and Subarus are built in the same plants? Do they have the same parent company?

No, but Toyota owns a stake in Subaru's parent company, Fuji Heavy Indistries.

I think it was fairly recently that production of the Camry stopped at Subaru's plant, it was in late 2016 to make way for the new Imprezza.

Cooperation, even between competitors, is not totally unknown. IIRC, GM and Toyota shared a production facility in Fremont, California for a while.

This was back in the early '80's. I was in a tow lot once and owner pointed out that there were no Japanese cars. He pointed out an American car less than a year old that had broken down twice.

At the time US manufacturers quality was to warrant for 3 years and do repairs free. Japanese gave 3 year warranty and did not expect you to need repairs during the period.

Thread reminds me of buying a Chevy back in the sixties and salesman telling me to make a list of problems and come back next week for us to fix them. I just had service on my one year old Forester only time I went back to the dealer was to get Bluetooth set for a new phone.

No, they do not have the same parent company but there has been some history of working together (more in the KEI field) -the FR-S Scion/Toyota 86/BRZ is the latest high profile colaboration.

And GM/Suzuki at Ingersoll Ontario.

They didn't implement the toyota system, per-se, but they sure learned from it. Perhaps the highest quality US branded cars on the market today. (and perhaps for the last 20 or more years)

That was the NUMMI factory where the Geo Prizm and Toyota Corolla were produced (along with Tacomas, Vibes, and some others). It is now the Tesla factory.

To a large degree, it was an American, William Deming, who taught the Japanese about quality control.

Indeed, yet it's ironic that we had to learn it from the Japanese.

Not a well-known fact by the public.

I don't know which Japanese car company he was talking about but he said buying their brand was like buying a Kenmore appliance from Sears.

Also knew a Ford engineer whose assignment was to adapt a Ford model to use a Japanese engine.

When I worked in the chemical industry it was common to buy and sell your competitors product to supplement your flat out production or downed facilities.

As the Japanese are well known for, they take an idea or product and make it better and cheaper (product) or better /more efficient (idea).

Japanese automobile companies by and large sell their own products - bur Toyota is selling a Mazda 2 as the 2016/2017 Yaris, as well as the Subaru BRZ as the '86 (FR-S). There is a lot of colaboration between Toyota and mazda and Subaru.

Nissan is owned by Renault - which also has a large chunk of Mitsubishi.

Mitsu and Chrysler worked together for many years, as did Mazda and Ford. Not to mention, Ford used to own Jaguar and Land Rover and Chrysler once owned Masarati.

American companies used to have "captive imports" before they figured out (some to a larger degree than others) how to actually BUILD a good small car.

It's quite a shock to see a VW engine in a Chrysler car. I don't think VW and Chrysler had a partnership. My guess they just needed an engine to make their Omni/Horizons move. My guess is that Chrysler just hated doing that and VW thought it was funny as hell. :)

Hi,

all cars are made in Gunma (JF1). There are a few US made Legacys over here but officially Indiana is USDM only.

As per models, we have the WRX STI but not the WRX. Levorg only in 1.6 (and a couple of RHD 2.0 imported via Switzerland). BRZ and GT86, with the GT imported at 20 to 1. Outbacks in Diesel and 2.5. Legacy in Diesel, 2 and

Some eastern Europe importers can lay their hands on other models (the WRX comes to my mind), but for LHD Western europe this is about it.

Thanks for that info.