Consumer Reports: Prius, Corvette 'Most Satisfying

That is why I own both a prius and a vette

 

Prius - the most reliable vehicle of 2005

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5241767

 

Uh oh, they reference CR, someone we know will soon be knocking that...

 

How can that be? How many folks on here have had their Prius stall on them? The most dependable car had a recall for stalling and I am in trouble for questining the methods of CR? <_< This was not a recall to adjust the headlights, it was a recall to take care of a stalling problem. I have no trouble believing the most satisfying car but the most dependable? c'mon.

 

which one do yoy find the most satisfying and do you fill out CR surveys?

 

A good question if you are honestly asking it but somehow I get the sense that you are posing it rhetorically.
By this question are you implying that using a percentage of the number of people who have voiced having the stalling problem on PriusChat would be a better gauge of overall vehicle dependability than CR's survey methods?
Do you have any idea what percentage of the overall 12,000+ PC'ers have/had the problem? How significant a number is that when put into a percentage of ALL Prius owners nationally or worldwide? Please don't give me an answer like, "Well, I don't have any numbers on that but I'm just sure by my gut feeling it must be a lot."
Do you know what the numbers are for people who haven't posted anything about a stalling problem because they haven't had to?
After finding out the answers to those questions then you have to ask how does that compare to all of the other industry makes to know whether the statement/result is inaccurate.
I'm not about to say I have the answers to these questions cause I don't know the numbers--which is why I can't understand how you can discount a widely accepted survey resource like CR without having ANYTHING other than your own personal (completely unbiased, of course )perception. If MR (Malorn Reports) surveys can give me substantial trustworthy data to review, please do.

By the way, you'll be happy to hear I have not had a single reliability problem in close to 20,000 miles of my Prius ownership.

 

hey, same here. A bit more than 20k miles, no problems at all!

 

h34r: Same things I just can't resist God will get me for this... :lol:

Um, maybe if GM dealers had hot spots in their service waiting rooms. Every week when the GM owners are in having their vehicles repaired, they could describe their problem-du-jour while they are waiting on the mechanic. :lol: :lol:

h34r:

 

I like that MR....Malorn Reports.

 

I had my Prius engine not come back on last summer, but to call that a stall is misleading. The car still drove on electric power - plenty enough to get to a safe place. Then I just turned the power off and on, and it was fine again. (It was such a minor inconvenience that I never even took it to the dealer until they sent out the SSC card half a year later.)

Maybe that's why the Prius is so satisfying.... even when it "stalls" (or runs out of gas), you can still drive it !

 

My Prius was in the recall range, and has yet to have any reliability problems of any form.

 

ditto

 

Same here, nearing 16K, 0 repairs, 0 mfg defects. 2 recalls - the inaccurate NAV DVD replacement and the potential stall. I think a total of 65 cars were reported or .04%. Even allowing for under reporting, it wasn't a major problem. However, the last thing Toyota needs is inaccurate bad press, better to 'fix' it for all cars than have people ramping up the "The Prius is unreliable, dangerous and Toyota isn't doing anything about it" noise.
Notice the difference between Toyota and Ford/Firestone. One said "we'll take care of it even though very few people have been affected", the other pair spent any 'capital' they had pointing fingers at each other. Firestone hit the bottom of my list with their handling of the 500 (for those of you old enough to remember, it was around 1978. The tires would blow if they got too hot) and you can bet that if I had any little thought of giving them any of my money in the future, it is gone forever now.

 

The potential stall problem was a recall because it concerned safety, whereas the MFD problem, which I actually had, deserved just a replacement under warranty (my garage's explanation).

 

and given how common it is for people to run out of gas pushing a 500 mile tank... how many of those stall reports do you think were due to not having any gas for the engine to run on?

just popped over 13k on my prius. had one rear alignment issue (toe was a little too far out- something like .02 degrees off or so), fixed under warranty by my DH. no other manufacturing issues. have paid maybe $40 for synthetic oil and oil filters so far.

 

30K miles.

$$: Petrol + oil changes
Repairs/Dealer visits/Mechanic visits: 0

Ongoing Issues: Lifetime mpg *still* less than 60.

Anticipated maintenence: Makeover to plug-in by 2010

 

65 cars? For GM, I think it would take 65 spontaneously exploding GM [pick your model] cars to register as anything more than statistical background noise.

65 Prii stall and we get a service recall. 65 GMs stall and you would probably have GM engineers high-fiving each other for outstanding quality improvement.

 

I heard that "Day to Day" segment. Madeline Brand interviewed David Champion, the senior director of CR's auto test center. After discussing CR's top ten picks, she asked him which vehicle had the best overall value, the best reliability for the money.

He said for the 2005 model year, that would be the Prius, where only 4% of owners reported any problems. He then compared that to the worst, the Infinity QX56, where 40% of owners reported at least one problem. Again, 2005 model year.

I believe the stalling problem affected mostly 2004 owners, but that early 2005's were also recalled for a software upgrade, just in case. Is my memory correct? I'm not sure how many 2005's actually stalled, though. I do know that later model 2005's were not affected.