But the Fench and Italian makers are the world leaders in electrics and electronics.
Cough.....
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"But the Fench and Italian makers are the world leaders in electrics and electronics."
And Fiat make very very unreliable badly put together cars.. and their styling!
And most Renaults' under bonnet wiring look like grandma's knitting after the cat has got into it...
Anyone want to buy an old Fiat Turbo Coupe 20V , Punto or other such classics? The good thing is they are cheap. The bad things are...
Now Citroen's XM is a masterpiece in modern electronics applied to cars:-)
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The new Laguna is an electronics masterpiece.
Has anyone actually made it more than 10 miles without those stupid tyre pressure things cocking up ?
There is also a rumour that Renault have made the decision to remove the bulb from the engine warning light.
The Dci model has now captured the record for most unreliable car of the year so far !
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Fair enough HJ,
but then why is the rest of the world lagging behind? Or more to the point, what is stopping them catching up?
Chad.R
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In a previous existence I looked into 'benchmarking' where companies compare the efficency of their processes and came across this anecdote.
In the 1980s (I think it was the 80s) Mercedes were making cars with a good reliability record. This reliability was achieved by good design and engineering but also a very strict quality control system. Each car was inspected thoroughly as it came off the production line and any faults fixed. Most cars had faults. Mercedes wanted to know how the Japanese managed to make cars of equal or greater reliability but in much less time and hence much cheaper. One of the Japanese manufacturers (can't remember which) let the men from Mercedes have a look at how they did it in Japan. Mercedes were horrified to find out that, on average, Mercedes spent more time inspecting and correcting one of their cars than the Japs did in building one of theirs, and yet the Jap stuff was at least equal if not better.
The moral was that quality isn't something you bolt on afterwards but something endemic to the philosophy of the company and its workforce. The manufacturing process was designed so that mistakes were less likely, management took feedback from the humblest worker in order to improve things and there was something in the psyche of the japanese worker that made them better at assembling things.
Touching on that last point, I have heard that japanese cars assembled here have a lesser reliability record than japan-assembled cars. Is this true?
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Touching on that last point, I have heard that japanese cars assembled here have a lesser reliability record than japan-assembled cars. Is this true?
Nick,
I too have heard this about Japanese cars built here, the 5 dr Corolla or the "Swindon" Accord seem to have worse records than there Japan built counterparts.
hence, in my original post "...cars made in Japan tend to be more reliable.."
Chad.R
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IMHO implementation of efficient and effective management processes across the organisation and investing in the long term is key. This rarely happens in EU / US - short termism and resistance to change (and knee jerk reaction to give shareholder value) being the order of the day.
Japan has a different culture though this may now be changing (globalisation) - also the Japanese worker is traditionally / culturally fully dedicated to the company which may or may not be worth the price.
CS
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Autocar magazine featured an article on this about a year ago.Japanese cars are more reliable for two reasons
1.The quality control standards of their suppliers (eg Hitachi)are much higher than European manufacturers using Bosch/Lucas etc. components.
2.Once the design of the car has been signed-off no modifications or upgrades are made even if the car goes on sale inferior to the competition in some respects.One example given in the article was the double glazing system fitted to the BMW 7 series and Mercedes S class, which required the side doors to be hastily re-engineered as the cars were due to enter production.This led to problems with door hinges,wind noise etc.
Not sure how this ties in with "Japanese" cars assembled in Europe using locally supplied components
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I also in a previous existence had a great deal of involvement with quality thinking and processes from a management as opposed to an engineering standpoint.
The essence to be taught and internalised was that quality is PART of the process, not an add-on at the end to see if things have been done right: rather the quality is designed in from the start. Unlike the often once prevalent Western style where it didn't matter too much if it ain't screwed on right, those guys down the line would pick it up and fix it. This is what the Japanese have always understood implicitly. It's why my 12 year old Toshiba VCR still works perfectly, my National aircons in the house never go wrong and the Hitachi fridge circa 1988 has never let me down.
We need to factor in Japanese (Indeed Korean as well increasingly) culture here. After WWII Japan lay in ruins. The herculean efforts to rebuild meant it had to produce things people would buy, in the face of formidable competition from Western manufacturers. Not just cars but airconditioners TV's, - Japan was miles ahead with things like cassette recorders and so on, fridges et al. That mean they had to be affordable and not go wrong, ergo quality. Somewhere in the middle of this fits Prof Deeming, an American who allegedly invented TQM (total Quality Management) and introduced it to the Japs.
During the 1960's Japan flooded SE Asia with cars and trucks, Toyota, Hino, Fuso, Mitsubishi etc. They were reliable in rugged conditions where servicing skils and resources were limited. In 1964 you could drive through Thailand, the Philippines or Cambodia and all you ever saw after ex-US Military Dodges and Reos, was vehicle after vehicle and motorcycle after motorcycle from Japan.
In Europe they were virtually unheard of and when Honda made its first foray into the UK in 1962 with m/cycles they were sneered at as "built of monkey-metal" and "made on a bowl of rice a day". Prejudice was rife from people who had themselves been or had relatives imprisoned in Asia by the Japanese (Burma Railroad) and so on. At that time I was working with one of UK's first Honda m/cycle dealership and recall the amazement of our mechanics at the quality of engineering and assembly when they took them down, compared with the positively agricultural AJS's and BSA's in the shop.
When the first shovel front Coronas appeared in London in 1966, we all laughed at the weird shape and said Pride and Clarke won't sell many of them. But when we looked, not only were they very well built (remember we were comparing with Cortinas, Cambridges and so on) but they had EVERYTHING -- heater, radio, all that stuff you had to pay extra for when you bought a British brand at a price that was attractive. But you still had to face the neighbours peering from behind their curtains of course if you bought one of those weird little cars.
The first Western market forays were really made in Australasia, where in the mid-60's you had Mazda's, Princes (forerunner to Datsun,later Nissan, and the redoubtable jeep-looking Toyota Landcruiser. The Aussies soon overcame their prejudices when they realised these were reliable value for money vehicles that would cover Australian distances and temperatures and road surfaces without fuss. Holden, Valiant and Ford, the big 3 started to feel the heat. In the North West where I spent 1969 the Landcruiser swept the board for reliability and ruggedness, pushing Landrover way out, and make no mistake, your vehicle reliability in some of those places could genuinely mean life or death to you.
What distinguished the early Nips were their unsophistication (not much to go wrong, easy to fix) willingness of the dealers to bend over backwards and make it right if there was a fault. Their early styling was abysmal: check the Datsun 16OJ, Mazda 929, Isuzu Bellett, Toyota Crown circa 1966-78, but by and by they caught up.
Japanese "face" was restored -- another fundamental linchpin of their culture and reason for getting things right, and Europe in the days of crappy merchandise and endless strikes by undisciplined workforces at Ford and BL producing unreliable cars vs. Japanese order and precision with respect for authority meant Europe presented open season for Honda, Toyota and friends and they couldn't lose (except maybe the dreaded deal HOnda did with BL for the early Prelude :-(. We used to laugh at those clips of Nissan workers all doing their callisthenics when they started up in Sunderland (I think it was) and singing company songs before work but ultimately the laugh was on us.
Quality never goes out of fashion. In Japan it's something which is in the heritage and is linked to deep social and cultural norms. It has been said quality discipline is easier to instil in that framework than in the more libertarian individualistic West. Hramony and consensus is also terribly important and I notice during my spells in Japan (In another industry) that nothing change-wise was implemented without the full commitment of all concerned. This seemed to mean that many potential problems were ironed out right at the outset because everyone went to the job with a clear of view of exactly what was required. But it did take longer, and you just compare a Japanese manager's workweek in terms of hours with a European's!
Quite simply they work a damn sight harder.
Whoops I must be over time here. Don't want to be Bogush'ed.
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Got it exactly right, Growler. As one who has been involved with half-*rsed attempts to introduce a Quality ethos in the UK I couldn't agree more.
Get it right from the start and the "cost of quality" is a benefit to all.
Terry
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Growler
Wasn't there also an issue in the 60's and 70's where it was difficult to export to Japan and so their industry had a monopoly home market to build up a manufacturing base?
Also I believe that our motor industry was hamstrung for decades by the VED system which dictated long stroke, small bore to get in a low tax class. When that went out our manufacturers had too much invested in that type of design to change overnight.
I agree with your comments about hard work and quality, although developing countries will always have an initial edge in low labour costs.
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In a nation of more than 120m people there's going to be a whole host of factors, and I agree with many of the above.
I don't believe the monopoly argument though. A cursory glance around France will tell you their car manufacturers have a virtual monopoly there, yet are at the other end of the reliability spectrum.
See also Trabants in Eastern Europe.
One that hasn't specifically been mentioned yet is the cultural effect of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. In recent Japanese history, the God-like power of science is there for all to see.
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"A cursory glance around France will tell you their car manufacturers have a virtual monopoly there"
IMHO that is because the French are just about the most xenophobic race on Earth and support French industry and interests at any cost.
(Sorry if that is not politically correct, Mr Moderator, but it's the truth)
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Brian,
The absolute answer to the question is stated by HJ in a one word answer above to the initial question...no further comment required, except a long term thought....
Why did Kamikaze pilots wear crash helmets?
Regards,
Matt35
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H.J. is absolutely right, - I had a friend who worked for a British machine tool company, who wanted to break into the Jap market and sent over some metal drill bits as samples for evaluation. They were duly returned with a hole drilled clean through the centre. I think this sums up the whole ethos of Japanese engineering!!
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