Toyota sales off more than GM or Ford

[Diamondpilot]

........Looks like it's back to the 12 yr old stuff.

Yep, I am a big KID! I like playing with tractors, trucks, boats, airplanes, ect.

Chris

 

[Redneck in training]

I in general I buy whatever good value car I can find. Never bought new car in my life. Here is how I select a car. I research it on Internet and try to find a car with good reliability report that isn't popular and has warranty expired recently (value plummets). Then I drive the car till it blows up. Over past twenty years I bought different cars for myself, kids and wife. We pay cash and never buy full coverage insurance. So far it worked for us. Another reason I like used cars is that if somebody dents my door on a parking lot I don't even look at it. Saves my nerves. If it happens to new insured car you have to deal with it. Believe it or not my best pics were Buick Regal 3.8L V6. Cheap to buy, cheap to fix and had least number of problems. Other cars we had were:
Honda Accord:
It rusted, the engine would die out of blue and won't restart. Half our later it would start and run for a month or so and do it again. Took it to a dealer paid a couple hundred bucks for parts and troubleshooting but it kept doing it. Heating never defrosted side windows. The wire harness for pop up light failed due to hardened insulation that fell off of the wires. Forgot the price for replacement but it was high. More that the car was worth I suppose. Fixed it by myself. Junked the car before 180000 miles.
Nissan Sentra:
Manual trany was noisy from about 90000. It failed at about 150000. Replaced it with JY trany. A/C never worked well. The car didn't make it over 180K either.
Currently we have Subaru Legacy Outback. 200K on it but spent good money for several expensive sensors, steering pump some brake parts etc. Trany shifts jerky etc. It also has very bad mileage.
Buick Regal 1991:
Bought it in 1995 with 60K. Drove it till 2005 when one hydraulic lifter failed at 247K. Spent 160 dollars for break disks and 5 dollars for small fitting in cooling system. Replaced alternator due to seized bearing. In retrospect I should have fixed the lifter and keep the cars until something more serious failed.
Ford Taurus 1993 bought to replace the Buick.
Bought it from old lady with very low miles for little money. But had to replace the trany about year later and was glad to get rid of the car when it lost coolant on interstate and blew a head gasket before I was able to stop safely. It had many small issues like windshield wiper switch not always working, serpentine belt tensioner bearing squeal, cooling pump leaks and that sort of thing.
1992 Buick Regal
I am currently driving is former wife's car before she got the Sub. 210K and so far no significant repairs. One fuse is blowing out due to rodents chewed some wires. Replaced radio by a JY unit also damaged by a rodent nest.

In other words I have good luck with Buick cars. I think that the perceived quality of Japanese cars is much better than the actual quality. It turn the perceived quality of US made cars is much worse than actual quality. May be presently the quality of Toyota and Honda is the best but you pay for it because even used cars are expensive.

I will need another old car sometimes this year to replace the Sub. Don't know what my next pick will be. May be it will be firs new car we have ever bought. Any suggestion. We need good mileage car because of about 90 miles daily commute to the town.

 

[Diamondpilot]

With a 90 mile commute you need a airplane, not a car.

Chris

 

[Builder]

Yep, I am a big KID! I like playing with tractors, trucks, boats, airplanes, ect.

Chris

Then maybe you oughta find a kids website?

 

[Diamondpilot]

Then maybe you oughta find a kids website?

LOL

Chris

 

[toy]

I would expect that the non-unionized auto manufacturers closely monitor the wage/benefits packages negotiated by the UAW and the Big 3 makers so that they are more or less competitive, 1 - for attracting new employees and 2 - keeping the ones they have happy and less likely to try and organize themselves. Where I work there is a mix of unionized and non-unionized (non-mgmt) employees. After a contract renewal, the company gives raises/cost of living allowance increases to the non-unionized staff in line with what has just been negotiated for the unionized employees.

You have got the right thought on what is going on about the nonunion workers getting their pay raises as the unions gets theirs. I was talking to a boss one day and he was complaining about the union demanding too much and I asked him if the union gets some new benefit whether pay or holiday or what ever I asked him had he ever noticed that shortly afterward he would get a benefit to offset that raise and he admitted that was right. But you know we face a bigger problem than the debate between union nonunion, we have a problem of our [can't say who] orchestrating a goal of wage oppression against American workers. Now some of you on here were lamenting on how they couldn't understand how they were getting paid a lower salary than the assembly line worker, considering how they had college degrees or some highly skilled talent and they had a large student loan, well you are the ones that they have been targeting to keep your wages lower, but you are just one of the groups. I have heard them plainly state it, I have read articles that they have written where they have clearly expressed it, and I have through paying attention to small snippets that these individuals have said, that have made it abundantly clear of their intentions. While I was sending my son to college and he was close to getting his first degree and his major is in the high tech industry when I heard what this group was trying to do you better believe I paid attention to it and have been tracking what this group has been doing ever since, and they do have power especially if no one is paying attention to them, they will sell you on what they are doing as being good but in actuality in the long run it will hinder you in your ability to earn a high wages. When a man sees his children thriving that is a cause of real satisfaction knowing that he don't have to worry about his children making their own way in this world, my son has given me that satisfaction, but I have seen other parents that have tried to set their kids up for secccess, and the kids have doen well in their study but yet can't seem to get traction to be able to be successful

 

[Redneck in training]

With a 90 mile commute you need a airplane, not a car.

Chris

That is my retirement plan. My garage door is 36 ft wide and I can put about 1850 ft long runway right behind the house. Have not decided what plane I will get yet. Most likely I will get a STOL homebuilt.

 

[Diamondpilot]

That is my retirement plan. My garage door is 36 ft wide and I can put about 1850 ft long runway right behind the house. Have not decided what plane I will get yet. Most likely I will get a STOL homebuilt.

That's my dream also. I just need to find a place where it is on a lake for my other hobby, boating.

Chris

 

[Redneck in training]

You have got the right thought on what is going on about the nonunion workers getting their pay raises as the unions gets theirs. I was talking to a boss one day and he was complaining about the union demanding too much and I asked him if the union gets some new benefit whether pay or holiday or what ever I asked him had he ever noticed that shortly afterward he would get a benefit to offset that raise and he admitted that was right. But you know we face a bigger problem than the debate between union nonunion, we have a problem of our [can't say who] orchestrating a goal of wage oppression against American workers. Now some of you on here were lamenting on how they couldn't understand how they were getting paid a lower salary than the assembly line worker, considering how they had college degrees or some highly skilled talent and they had a large student loan, well you are the ones that they have been targeting to keep your wages lower, but you are just one of the groups. I have heard them plainly state it, I have read articles that they have written where they have clearly expressed it, and I have through paying attention to small snippets that these individuals have said, that have made it abundantly clear of their intentions. While I was sending my son to college and he was close to getting his first degree and his major is in the high tech industry when I heard what this group was trying to do you better believe I paid attention to it and have been tracking what this group has been doing ever since, and they do have power especially if no one is paying attention to them, they will sell you on what they are doing as being good but in actuality in the long run it will hinder you in your ability to earn a high wages. When a man sees his children thriving that is a cause of real satisfaction knowing that he don't have to worry about his children making their own way in this world, my son has given me that satisfaction, but I have seen other parents that have tried to set their kids up for secccess, and the kids have doen well in their study but yet can't seem to get traction to be able to be successful

The problem isn't if non union workers get similar pay as unionized workers. The problem is the pay disparity between the pay of in example car company workers on one hand and in example waitress or store clerk or even teacher somewhere in rural US on the other hand. For those people relative to income car is very expensive.

US is losing not only unskilled but also skilled jobs. But there is a hope. I work for a company that manufactures specialized industrial control systems. Since our export is about 90% of production the company hired engineers in foreign countries such as India to be closer to our customers but also to save money. Well the second part doesn't work that way anymore. Just recently we hired several guys from India, Indonesia and Malaysia. It used to be that 20000/year would satisfy Asian eng in the past. Today if we offer 70000 they stay year or two learn the stuff, take all the know how and leave. To buy their loyalty we have to treat them right and pay them much better than that. So the play field is getting level. At least in our business. Only inexpensive engineers are from China today and only because they have travel restrictions. But they are smarting up (with our help) very quickly too.

 

[toy]

The problem isn't if non union workers get similar pay as unionized workers. The problem is the pay disparity between the pay of in example car company workers on one hand and in example waitress or store clerk or even teacher somewhere in rural US on the other hand. For those people relative to income car is very expensive.

US is losing not only unskilled but also skilled jobs. But there is a hope. I work for a company that manufactures specialized industrial control systems. Since our export is about 90% of production the company hired engineers in foreign countries such as India to be closer to our customers but also to save money. Well the second part doesn't work that way anymore. Just recently we hired several guys from India, Indonesia and Malaysia. It used to be that 20000/year would satisfy Asian eng in the past. Today if we offer 70000 they stay year or two learn the stuff, take all the know how and leave. To buy their loyalty we have to treat them right and pay them much better than that. So the play field is getting level. At least in our business. Only inexpensive engineers are from China today and only because they have travel restrictions. But they are smarting up (with our help) very quickly too.

I wonder how many of these companies that have hired these foreign engineers brought them here on the hb1 visas trained them and thought they was getting a great deal because they was getting them for such a small salary, and after they were fully trained they would leave USA and go back home and apply their knowledge in creating a manufacturing company that would then be a fierce competitor of the company that trained them. Several years ago there was a billionaire that built schools in India to train engineers and it was touted as a great charity project but now he wants to be able to bring these engineers to the USA, it wasn't a charity work it was an investment that should be made to fail. I was always taught that charity should start at home and since our schools have been declared a failure and you mentioned the low pay of our teachers and these that are so charitable have written off the American children, then I think it is past time that we write them off, and put our children first and our citizens first again.