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RSwordsman t1_jaewyr7 wrote

Reply to comment by Sparred4Life in Eli5- Why didn’t American Auto manufacturer dump all their R&D into reliability to rival the Japanese? by MattR9590

My FIL had a '98 Honda CR-V that had almost 200k miles until it racked up too much in repairs to keep. I told myself when I was in the market, I was definitely going for a Honda.

The time came and I got a used 2012 Civic with 35k miles. Now the car's 11 years old, around 160k miles and still going strong. Building to less than exceptional reliability seems like a terrible business decision unless you go strictly for the customers for whom money is no object, and/or the ones with more dollars than sense.

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Sparred4Life t1_jaexdfa wrote

You mean like the ones who will only buy Chevy because their daddy drove a Chevy, and his daddy drove a chevy...? :)

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RSwordsman t1_jaexlgd wrote

Either that or people who don't care about having constant car payments and just lease new ones all the time I guess hehe.

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Sparred4Life t1_jaey0s4 wrote

Yeah! If that's the approach a new American car will last that long for sure, that's a good point!

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