joe80

i should've mentioned 25 times. lol

i'm not gonna hide the fact that i love hyundai/kia. why should I? my dad was a Kia engineer for 10 years. I interned for hyundai technology center in Ann Arbor. I"m korean, and i used to hate hyundais. now, i love them. it's been my recent love ever since genesis arrived. bought 2 hyundais last year. love both my santa fe and my wife's elantra. elantra is bit boring, but it's basically camry minime. quiet, roomy, boring, and etc. i can't imagine elantra wining any comparison tests. it always finishes in the middle.

i firmly believe sonata is superior than camry in every possible way except the road noise and slightly smaller back seat. but sonata is superior in everything else. better price, better handling(camry is possibly the softest handler), better overall driving experience, better warranty, better fuel economy, more standard features, no unintended acceleration recalls, more HP, more torque, and finally a better interior and exterior design.

i'll refuse to believe that midsize has to sacrifice on performance and has to be a blandmobile because my 2003 accord(had it for 5 years) was a nice all arounder and it sold very well. camry will most likely always outsell sonata, fusion and etc, but that doesn't mean it's better. camry finished 5th in 2007 C/D testing. my aging last gen accord beat camry pretty easily. camry finished 7th in consumer reports. i really do think M/T is doing this to grab attention. many people are still talkin about it in many car forums. M/T has done a great job because people are still talkin about how camry finished 1st.

lex

I don't bother to read your posts anymore but I would NEVER buy that piece of crap Hyundai

Jetfire

iTrader: (3)

motortrend placing toyota as #1???

vietunit

iTrader: (5)

LOL @ Jetfire, interesting to see Camry as #1, I just read it and still can't believe it.

TRDFantasy

It's the class leader in having a simple, user-friendly interior. It's arguably the class leader in comfortable ride quality over rough roads. It's also the class leader in rear seat comfort and space.

Just because you don't like it in your opinion, does not change the objective facts about the Camry.

You are in the minority here, because for most buyers in the midsize sedan segment, comfortable ride, rear seat space and comfort, as well as a user-friendly interior all matter A LOT.

Sales figures don't lie. The Camry has been the #1 selling midsize sedan in the US for a reason, and no, it's not "just because it's a Toyota" like some people claim.

Threxx

User friendly interior? What does that mean? Give me an example. Personally I find the Fusion's interior to be by far the most user friendly... especially with Sync.

Does the Camry really have the best ride quality though? I think that's pretty subjective. Maybe it is the softest sprung but that doesn't automatically translate to best ride quality in my book.

Rear seat comfort is subjective too. Rear seat space, ok... but that's pretty low on most people's scales unless they're hauling around older kids or adults in the back quite often.

Actually everything you listed is subjective except rear seat room.

Actually a comfortable ride is important to me... as is a well controlled ride (not just soft springs). I like a 'user friendly' interior but could that possibly be any more vague of wording? Back seat space... no that really doesn't matter that much to me.

So you're positive that whatever car is #1 is #1 because it's currently the best choice on the market? Most marketing experts would disagree with you there. Success leads to success. A car being successful will cause it to continue to be successful for many years. The general public doesn't catch on to changes in product offerings very quickly. I absolutely assure you that if we reversed time and Toyota released this new Hyundai Sonata and called it the Camry, and Hyundai released the current Camry and called it a Sonata... that the one with the Toyota badge would outsell the one with the Hyundai badge by a wide margin. Possibly even a wider margin than there is today. Same story with the Fusion.

Just look at how long the old Ford Taurus continued to sell like crazy years after it had become no longer competitive in the market.

TRDFantasy

Read the part about the Camry in the comparison, and watch the accompanying video.

The way the ***** are laid out in such a simple fashion, and the way the center stack is designed is just very simple.

I mentioned "most comfortable ride over rough roads". The key to a comfortable ride over rough roads is for the car to be softly sprung.

It's not that subjective actually. It's suspension and damping dynamics. The Camry has a long range of damping motion and soft springs compared to much of the "sporty" competition, which is why most of the competition has a stiff ride on rough roads, and the Camry does not.

Objectively, competing vehicles like the Accord have a shorter range of motion in the dampers for example.

This is not subjective. On paper, the Camry has the best or 2nd best rear seat legroom. The Camry is the ONLY car in the class to offer optional reclining rear seats.

Also no, it's not low "on most people's scales". There is reason why midsize cars are called family sedans.

Like I said, you're in the minority of potential midsize buyers (assuming you're even *in* the market for a midsize).

Most of what doesn't matter to you matters to families that buy midsize sedans.

The qualities and factors that made the Camry successful have not changed very much, if at all.

People still buy the Camry in droves because it continues to mostly offer what made it successful in the first place.

The marketing helps a lot too, but Toyota has not done anything alienating with the Camry to drive buyers away. THAT is the key. The Camry continues to have extremely broad appeal, just like it did in the 1990s.

RX300-BV

#1 selling doesn't mean it appeals to the majority of buyers though. Using last months sales as an example:

Accord 22,456
Camry 16,552
Fusion 16,459
Altima 16,198
Mailbu 15,150
Sonata 7,506
Avenger 3,442
Sebring 3,160
Milan 2,675
Legacy 2,615
Optima 2,471
Mazda6 2,427
Passat 1,627

Last month's top seller, the Accord in all forms appealed to "more" buyers but it did not appeal to "most" buyers. As a percentage, the Accord only sold to 20% of those purchasing/leasing a new mid-sized sedan.

I think it would be easy to spin the data and say most buyers don't like a soft, comfortable ride, if you classify the Fusion, Altima, and Accord as not being a soft, comfortable ride. Now historically you could use the data and say "more" buyers like the Camry's comfortable ride, but more and most mean two very different things in this context.

LexBob2

Really now you could flip a coin and not go wrong with any of the cars in the comparo. They are all good family sedans and there really isn't THAT much difference between ANY of them.

Personal preference is the biggest deciding factor in the purchase of one.

GSteg

iTrader: (15)

I don't doubt that the Camry ride is more spongy than the Accord, but care you back up where you got the fact that the Accord has "shorter range of motion"? Shock travel means little since both cars are able to accomodate bumps on the road without bottoming out. Using words like "objectively" doesn't make the statement any more right.

GSteg

iTrader: (15)

Agreed. The top 2 or 3 cars are sold in thousands each month. There are no clear cut winner unless the competition is so far behind.

silversprucesc3

Gents, Im curious which one of you purchased a vehicle based solely on reviews from MT??? LMBO

Honestly, there are probably business and political influences guiding some of these reviews...
Lets face it, Toyota needs PR help... this is good for Toyota. Besides most of us have loved Toyota for years and can appreciate that as a family sedan, the Camry is a nice vehicle.

Personally I like the styling of the Sonata but frankly who gives a "c__p"..lol
At the end of the day the wife will tell me to get the Toyota anyway...~~

mmarshall

Yeah.....I'll bet.

TRDFantasy

#1 means it appeals to people more than any other model, that's pretty self-explanatory.

Speaking of spin, one month does not a trend make, especially February, which is the only month you posted . February was a pure exception for Toyota. Camry production was shut down for a week, and the Congressional hearings took place. It was a rare month for Toyota, and one of the worst months for Camry sales in a long time.

I can virtually guarantee Camry will be #1 by in March (likely by far), and that it will also regain #1 status for the year.

Do you want me to rip out the dampers from each car and measure the range of motion?

As for how I know, well it comes down to suspension design.

The Camry has MacPherson struts front and rear (rear being dual-link). The Accord has front double wishbone and rear multilink double wishbone. Compared to double wishbone, struts have lower unsprung weight, contributing to better ride comfort.

Struts also often have longer suspension/damper travel than double wishbone designs.

GSteg

iTrader: (15)

Travel means nothing when both cars have plenty of it. Have you ever heard of a shock dyno and do you know what it does? If you do, then you wouldn't be making these kinds of statement because damping has a lot more to do with valving than displacement. You can't tell how a suspension dampens by measing the length of the travel, or by physically looking at it.

If you're just guessing, then it's not objective.


Struts also often have longer suspension/damper travel than double wishbone designs.[/quote]

Unsprung weight is a very tiny part of the equation. The Camry has a softer ride, and it has little to do with suspension travel and what type of suspension it has. MacPherson and double wishbone designs are not the limiting factor of a travel.



Both Accord and Camry sell enough that either they're practically the number one choice for the mass consumer. At the rate they're selling at, claiming which one is better is splitting hairs.


Everyone is catching up at this point, so buying a midsize family sedan isn't quite as clear cut as before when you either had the Camry or Accord.