saw most of congress hearing today w/mr toyoda. this guy has a mba from a boston college but couldn't understand english???!!! but that's not my point or the fact they didn't read their own book or follow it's advise.
here's my gripe & it came out in today's hearing: they don't share any electrical/computer/black box info w/anyone outside of the company. this & many other things they do hits us hard in the pocketbook: simple door key $25 bucks 'cause it takes a lazer @ a locksmith to cut it. crummy ml audio system that only the dealer can fix. sewell lexus-dallas gettin' $750 for a battery(that can't be rite)!!?? gps upgrade $200+, on line it's $125 but not available for toyota/lexus, etc/etc & i know you can add to this list.
sure the dealer is great but the attitude is also there: "hey it's a lexus you get more, sooooooooooo we charge more"!!! lf ps my dream-machine is still the best i'v ever owned. just check my garage, lonfrank

 

All luxury cars are very expensive, LExus is just the most realiable, period.
Take a look at BMW or at MErcedes, how much does it cost to fix any little thing on one of those cars? THey have lots of technology going into their vehicles as well and they are far from being as reliable as Lexus, they are a frigging nightmare. Been down that route, ran back to Lexus.

So I guess what Im trying to say if you dont want fancy, then Toyota or Honda is best recommendation and everything is cheap and/or easy to work on/fix yourself. If you want fancy, then we gota deal with this stuff. Getting ripped off for everything.

 

^^^1, only Lexus in my garage ! I may get ripped off at the Lexus dealership, but MB and BMW make me a resident at their service bay

 

First the legal. If a manufacturer issues a recall, that in itself does not make them liable for accidents that would have been prevented by the recall. Specifically, a recall is not evidence of admission of defect. You still have to prove the defect was the cause of the accident. We do that because we do not want manufacturers to avoid recalls for liablility sake. Providing all data would be an issue of liablility. If Toyota published a 1 in 100,000 probablility rate of failure, lawyers would use that to demonstrate knowledge of a defect. In short, they would have to stop making cars. Every new technology has unintended failures, and it is the job of the NTSB to assure these technologies are safe. The NTSB does not have the funds to do that. So when you marvel at the new Prius MPG, you have to know it is new technology, that is not fully tested. You are taking on some risk. When I bought my 03 SC in 09, much less risk. If you look at Toyotas internal documents they post an intangible called goodwill. That is how much more will people pay for our product because it is a Toyota. They have lost goodwill, this year and will have to adjust for the cost related to these recalls.


Stealerships

The spring broke on my then new 1988 Mustang GT ashtray. Had to buy half the interrior to get that part, $500 (in 1988).

My 1992 Subaru SVX had a flaw in tranny design, they last 100K miles, replacement is $6000, more than the car was worth

Our LS430 rear shade cover broke, a 2" peice of plastic, needed a total replacement $1200


My SC GPS went belly up, had to replace the whole ML system to fix it $5100, 30% of what I paid for the car, and it is still not as good as my 49$ refurb Tom Tom

All cars companies are this way. With Lexus you have less problems, and very few mechanical problems that will leave you on the road dead. Most maintaince work can be performed at local tire shops, for the same price as working on a civic.

If it is something out of pocket, you can always find a deal. If you owned anything from Italy, or an expensive German car, you feel like you are constantly bleeding. I have been driving Lexus and Acura for years, and visit the shop for repairs, less than once a year. I do not know anyone with a 2003 model BMW, Ferrari, Porsche, or Mercedes that can use it as a daily driver.

I buy the warranty, which does pay for itself, but the types of things that have broken, I would not fix if it were not for the warranty. I could do without a $1200 sunshade, and a $1000 aftermarket stereo / GPS would be fine. Truth is our cars are not expensive to own. Don't be to hard on Mr. Toyoda. He builds you daily drivers that last for years. Nice of him to do that.

 

Toyota chief blasted by lawmakers despite apology
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Toyota...74761.html?x=0

Now for the real story without the political rhetoric....

The Toyota recall story you haven't heard

http://www.thedailycrux.com/content/4168/Autos/mpsa

Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Text Size:

By Dr. David Eifrig in Retirement Millionaire:

In case you haven't heard, Toyota is in trouble with the Feds. But not because of anything it did or didn't do.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is demanding the president of the company sit under its klieg lights and explain himself. Committee leaders are going to bully him with the threat of legal action until he shows up.

Politicians know they can get a lot of free press by stoking the popular perception that Toyota somehow knew the gas pedals were "dangerous," but installed them anyway, violating U.S. laws and regulations.

This is utter nonsense, though you can be sure the U.S. automakers are doing everything to encourage this hysteria.

When I heard the news about the gas pedals getting stuck and causing fatal crashes, I had to think about the probability these accidents resulted from the use of an ill-designed component.

Consider the numbers: 34 people died in accidents blamed on the pedals. That's a pretty small number, but maybe enough to raise some concerns... until you realize that's the total number of fatalities since 2000.

Toyota has recalled more than 8.5 million vehicles in the U.S. Assume the owners drive those vehicles 10,000 miles a year (12,000 is probably more accurate, but 10,000 is a conservative estimate... and a factor of 10 makes the math simpler). That means Toyotas are logging more than 85 billion miles a year in the U.S. - 850 billion miles during the last 10 years.

So divide 34 deaths into 850 billion miles, and the odds of a Toyota owner having one of these accidents is one in 2.5 million... That's a random event.

If Toyota were using faulty equipment, we would have seen thousands more accidents and deaths.

You're more likely to get killed by lightning: 60 people died from lightning in the U.S. just last year. Heck, I'm more likely to get a hole-in-one on the golf course. The odds of that are only 5,000 to 1.

But statistics aside, just apply a little common sense to the question. The allegedly defective accelerator part is made in Canada by Indiana-based CTS Corp. Many makes and models use this same part. For example, the Pontiac Vibe uses it. Ford sells a van in China with the component.

Why aren't we hearing about those cars? None of the drivers with American cars that use identical parts ever experienced a stuck accelerator? It just makes no sense.

But never mind... The demagogues know a vote-getter when they see one. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told people to stop driving Toyotas... and then retracted it saying it was "obviously a misstatement."

I'm confident those parts are safe. Still, if you drive a recalled Toyota, you should take it in to get the pedal replaced. Ignoring the recall could void your warranty.

And look for Toyota stock to be one of the great buys of the decade, too.

 

Yep, saw it too yesterday. A lot of grand standing and questions being as over and over again when much of them were already answered earlier. Either some of these folks don't understand engineering and the process of Quality assurance and the steps to investigate issues coming from the fields or just plain STUPID. Yeah, Toyota was a little slacking in with the recall, but this thing seems like a witch hunt to me.