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      10-18-2012, 10:25 AM   #78
Bleep
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Quote:
Originally Posted by RMG View Post
...ignorant? I might be better informed than you as I spent a good chunk of my professional life working with statistics. I would suggest you go and check HOW these surveys are made and WHO's paying for them, ok? .... Familiarize yourself with this subject before jumping to conclusions.
JD Power and Consumer rep are relevant for people who are interested in PERCEPTIONS. The real world unbiased reliability studies based on real data are rare because these are extremely expensive and difficult to achieve (car manufacturers do not supply reliability data to anyone) and for this reason there are only a few. ADAC in Germany has one...in this study too some Japanese brands are shown to be more reliable than the rest but the percentage that separates BMW from the winners is quite small. Going through a study like this shows that EACH CAR, W/O EXCEPTIONS HAS HIS OWN ISSUES, and in general the more complex the car is the chances to have something going wrong are higher.

The BMW 335 "reliability issue" in NA is complex and has to do with a multitude of factors. I would start by mentioning the BMW service quality (...that I agree, in NA is horrible) and a very specific customer type that many times is an "enthusiast" that tweaks and destroys the car integrity and passes his problems to others shortly after, with the gas quality to mention just a few. I also suspect that a lot of frustrated individuals blaming BMW on this forum bought a BMW and cannot afford one. They have been able to acquire the car of their dreams but the total cost is outside their financial comfort zone and this creates stress....some of them would like their car they worked so hard for to last forever... They’ve replaced their simple Toyota’s or Honda's with a much complex car that cost twice as much and for this reason alone they DEMAND the car to be bullet proof reliable. When something goes wrong with their beloved car they jump to their computer looking for answers....feeding each other's frustrations that have nothing to do with BMW ... and contaminating others that have no problems with their cars...this is how this paranoia works. The fact they cling to this forums posting thousands of negative comments harassing anyone who has a different experience (instead of trading in their "awful", "unreliable" cars and ending their "nightmare") confirms this. You also witness hilarious situations where BMW is blamed for the quality of their turbos or AC that are 100% Japanese...
Toyota’s and Honda's have their own reliability problems, some quite severe. Still, their customers are happier because they have more realistic expectations as their buying decision was more rational, they've removed the dream factor from it together with the fun factor... Check with someone who works in the Service departments for Toyota and Co. ... (some of them have made their voices heard on this forum...), they went through issues more serious than the HPFP for example but the perception that their cars are somehow indestructible - remains. Even the Lexus flagship model had serious flaws and big problems with their V8 (had a worldwide recall)..Still, if you read what JD Power says the PERCEPTION among Lexus customers is that these problems do not exist…? I don't have time to deconstruct all the rationale behind this for you... it is a losing battle… people like you generally have a tendency to favor information that confirms their preconceptions and maintain their beliefs.....again, you need to...READ, think...if you can.
End of story.
That's a lot of words but not much proof of anything. A bunch of handwaving about how BMW owners are more prone to whining about their issues. Enthusiasts are the minority for any major car manufacturer, BMW or not. I also doubt many owners here have consumer reports subscriptions where they can overstate their issues. You could say the same bs about how meticulous BMW owners are about their cars, but then they shouldn't break down as often should they?
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