Focus 580; Consumer Reports 2004 Best and Worst Cars

If you were thinking about buying a new car here sometime in the next few months and maybe a little bit confused you haven't quite been able to make up your mind or you have some questions. I think we should be able to help this morning here in this hour of focus 580 Our guest is Rick Paul. He's the automotive editor for Consumer Reports. The magazine or the organization has just put out the April issue of their magazine and it's the annual auto issue in which they rate cars the best and the worst. They do that in a number of categories they look at things like safety and fuel efficiency and which cars are better if you have family which cars are most reliable which cars their owners are happiest with. All of that kind of information and in addition to that. Some information on how it is that you when you go into the dealership to try to buy your car you go about trying to get yourself the best deal. Of course Consumer Reports has been doing this now for a number of years and this is just the latest. If there is a new car in your future you might want to go out and take a look at the magazine. And of course here questions are

welcome to your we. We can't tell you what kind of car to buy but if you are seeking information or you're have try to sort out what might be best for you out of a couple of different choices well maybe we can do that. Rick Paul a joint Consumer Reports in 2000 he is responsible for the automotive editorial content and consumer reports monthly issues and also their special publications before going to work for Consumer Reports. He was senior feature editor at Motor Trend magazine for nine years and when he was doing that he produced road tests and other editorial features specializing in car care consumer issues travel features and in car electronics and he is joining us this morning by telephone questions from people who are listening are certainly welcome. And I know he'll do his best to give you an answer. 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We do also have a toll free line and that's good. Anywhere that you can hear us that's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 so again 3

3 3 W I L L and toll free 800 to 2. WLM Mr. Paul hello. Hi David how you doing. I'm good thanks and yourself. Pretty good. Well thanks for talking with us we certainly appreciate it. I know a lot of different sorts of things we could talk about I guess maybe one thing that kind of caught my eye. One of the kind of headlines I guess was the the results of your reliability testing and survey and that you found surprisingly that while somebody maybe should use a word like that you found that compared to European cars that American cars actually are doing pretty well better than the European cars the Asian makes I guess still have the the lead but that American products are performing better now than they have. Right yeah. Every year we do a survey of our magazine subscribers which is out four million and also for the first time last year we also

surveyed over a million of our website subscribers. We got about. Six hundred seventy five thousand responses back on on various cars that they that they own. And this is a phenomenal rate and it's many times more responses than any other auto reliability survey that's available to consumers. And when we crunch all the numbers and we give you about different ways one of the ways we look at them is that we you know look at the automakers by nationality and yes here for the first time actually since we've been looking at these kind of numbers in 25 years we see that the on the average U.S. cars are have been more reliable in that survey than European cars. That's really kind of surprising and there are some I don't mean to be a booster for any particular brands but you have automobiles like the Vaal those and Mercedes-Benz that have this reputation

of being a well-made car. And their level of reliability is not as good as American nameplates Buick Saturn pilot and search although they're the ones that are on the top are Lexus Infiniti Honda Toyota Acura Mazda Yeah there's like that yeah. Now I don't want some of this. The European Car short either because actually they did improve slightly over the fall over the previous year themselves. If we look at all vehicles across the board they actually we measure reliability in terms of problems per 100 vehicles and last year for instance the average for all vehicles was 18 problems per 100 the year before was 21. So I'd come down last year and now this. In our latest survey it came down to 17 problems for a 100 vehicle so across the board they did get a little better. The European vehicles went from 21 to 20 so even they

got incrementally better too. It's just that the US cars dropped by a fairly substantial amount from 21 to 18 in our latest survey. And that's a pretty good drop and in problems. OK. What we have already couple people here lined up and ready to go and they would like to talk to the young. We will not make them wait. Start here with line number one in this caller's in champagne. Hello. Yes. Where an arrested in a 2004 Honda Pilot and would like to know what your view is on that. We like the Honda Pilot a lot. We know it did very well on our in our testing. It has very good reliability it had has excellent crash protection in crash tests done by the government and insurance industry and in fact we picked it as one of our top picks in the April issue

which is basically the best cars in 10 different categories and the pilot one in a category we call three row SUV which is of course the SUV that the have that have a third row seat. So for people that need the extra passenger room up to seven or eight passengers and the pilot is it's a it's a car base SUV. It handles very well. It's has a verse to interior the the third row seat fold down slot and it has a split back so it's very nice because that allows you to put it down quickly when you need to load cargo into the car and then raise it again if you want to put passengers back there without having to worry about taking it out. So yeah it's we would like the pilot a lot. Now what kind of gas mileage again. Fuel Economy test. It got 19 mpg in mixed highway and city driving and that is pretty good for a midsize SUV in fact it's

the best fuel economy we've gotten in that in that size car. OK sounds great. Thank you very much. Really the memo. Thank you we'll go next to. Well the caller this is Urbana in its line too. Hello good morning. I have a couple of questions. Let's listen as we said a Ford Escort. Since 1998 it's been a good car for us. But now we have a baby and reconsidered buying a different car. So once more our car for environmental reasons or side car that performs them out early it's a small car in terms of gas mileage but we weren't pounding that if you didn't get our children and then I would ask Do you have any set their time. SEAVEY Yeah we're actually wrapping up a 10. Right now on a vehicle you mention fuel economy and you mention that you want to stay with a smaller car. And those words were

actually finishing up test on of the Toyota Prius hybrid and I don't know if you've looked at something like that but it is a sedan. It's actually it's a four door hatchback is what it is and it provides easy access to the back seat to put for putting children in and out. And it gets excellent gas mileage because it combines a. Electric motor with a gas engine. In fact we've got 44 miles per gallon overall that's again in mix highway and city driving with that car and it hit its high as well. I should say it's the best gas mileage we've gotten in a five passenger vehicle. Well actually what I wanted to ask you about the difference between driving a hybrid car and a big black stop and go traffic versus traffic is really no different the hybrid specially this.

New Prius is it works just like any other car it. It's very transparent in terms of its electric motor. You know it's it starts easily it runs you know it. I think a lot of people I think still confuse hybrids with the original kind of dedicated electric cars that came out in the 90s where those had to be had to be plugged in every night and they had to. And they didn't get very good range. You often had to you know your charger ran out you know pretty quickly so you didn't get a lot of miles for it. But these are these hybrids basically combine electric motor with a gas engine and they and that while some to be to operate just like a normal normal car there's no range problems or acceleration is good fuel economy is excellent. Mission Well the Prius for instance is classified as a near zero emission vehicle by the California Air Resources Board so missions are super clean.

If you look at either a small cars. We also like the way the Ford Focus. We like the Honda Civic. There's also a hundred city hybrid version too we also like to tweet out across all of them. OK. OK well thanks a lot. All right thank you for the call and again other questions are certainly welcome our guest is Rick Paul He's the automotive editor at Consumer Reports Consumer Reports. Now out with the April auto issue. So if you're thinking about buying a car new or used you might want to take a look at it. 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. I guess by myself I'm probably among those people who still isn't quite sure of the concept of the hybrid and exactly how and I understand the I understand all the things about how the emissions are low in the gas mileage is good and it somehow combines a gasoline engine and electric an engine but I guess I'm still not quite sure how this thing works and what makes it different from

an exclusively gasoline powered internal combustion engine car. Actually that's the beauty of a hybrid is is that it. It's that the automakers have developed this technology to make it as seamless as possible for those who are used to conventional gasoline engines. Basically what they do is they take a small gasoline engine they couple with an electric motor. Depending on the company it works in different ways but I take the the Toyota Prius for example that that has a computer controlled system where can operate only on electric or it can operate only on the gas motor or it can combine the two when necessary to for instance to get extra power when you need quick acceleration or something like that. And it does it all seamlessly basically don't know any of this is going on under the hood.

And you just stop put put gas in it when you need it and keep on going so it's very seamless for for people who are used to normal cars. In fact I'm I drove one in the store and so if it's fresh on my mind. And how does where does the electric power to power the electric part of this come from. Well there is a battery pack and the battery pack gets charged while the vehicle is being driven. That's again. In contrast to dedicate electric cars that have no gasoline engine. But they need to be recharged by plugging them in basically every night. The hybrids recharge themselves as you're driving. Also the brake when you brake they actually use some of the braking energy to help recharge the batteries too so that so the battery is battery pack is constantly being recharged so it always has power to the power of the electric motor. So now the there are a few models of these

kind of cars these hybrids available Toyota has one and Honda has one and apparently their Lexus is going is making or is going to make Brit SUV and Ford is planning also a hybrid SUV so there will be a few of those models out there. I guess I can imagine though some people being hesitant. You know the old advice that we all got about never buy a car in its first year of production because it is kind of a new technology I think some people might be a little bit hesitant to jump into it yet. Now I understand that. And sure that it is a still relatively new technology and and we all know you know how durable all aspects of it are for for years yet but we've been very encouraged in that the in our reliability surveys the Prius and the Honda Civic hybrid have done very well in fact the Prius is one of the most reliable cars in our survey. And that's really saying something

concerning it is relatively new technology. Now Toyota did this Prius. Again it's the Prius one and one one of our top pick slots in the green car category. And this is Tell the second generation So Toyota has been making hybrids for a number of years now in fact they they released the first Prius in Japan a couple years before they brought it here and. And I wonder again it's also been producing hybrid cars you know for a number of years now so. So they are getting the experience under the belt the new Prius a get is more fuel efficient and quicker and roomier than than the previous one but still costs about the same which is a good trick in itself. So you know I said that I mean like you say we're going to be seeing more. More versions coming out I think as more it appears people become more familiar with this as being an option that they should look into. The Ford Well we'll have a Ford we'll have an Escape

Hybrid this probably the summer. I don't want to do say a hybrid version of the accord. I think in this fall and the Lexus Toyota are going to have SUV versions of the Lexus are X and the Toyota Highlander coming up soon too. So we're going to be seeing more range and more variety of hybrid vehicles. And I think you know so far the ones have been small vehicles and going forward I start seeing more midsize cars and SUV and things like that. Which is which is really kind of the where the where they're needed most Well that's where the hybrid technology is most needed in order to is the main issue there. Being able to improve mileage on those vehicles. Yes definitely. Yeah. And certainly you know for people a lot of people are interested in SUV because they're versatile they're you know very practical and yet they you know there are a lot of people are hesitant because of the fuel economy so by having a hybrid. Power Plant this could

you know you know bring basically the best of both worlds. Now we need larger vehicles the problem that can be seen fuel economy as good as the small vehicles. You know in a juvie or a mid-sized sedan apartment I could be seeing 44 mpg overall but they should be measurably better than a conventional version. OK we have a number of callers here let's get right back to the phones and I think our next caller is line number one in Aruba. Oh yeah. Hi I am a very big fan of the Kuiper mini But look at the looks and handling and I guess I have a couple of reservations about getting one and I wondered if I could get your comments on it. I guess my main concern is the fact that I live in a community where there is not a dealer. So getting it serviced would mean getting it up to Chicago or Indianapolis. And so that's one of my biggest concerns but I just sort of wondered

what your comments are on the car as a whole and sort of how to weigh those issues. Well the Mini Cooper is certainly a fun car to drive and there's no doubt about that and it's great looking. We it's been interesting to see some of the information come in on that. I did well on our tests and in fact we when we did what we call owner satisfaction ratings which is also based on our annual survey in that we asked our subscribers basically considering everything that they've lived with with their car reliability fuel economy performance comfort everything would they buy it again if they had it to do over again. And it is very telling answers that they give us and from those answers we create what we call owner satisfaction ratings which we also feature in the April issue

and and the Mini Cooper came out it was one of the best the highest ratings among the owner satisfaction so people really liked the car. Are now on the other hand the reliability of it has not been very good from. And so you know I think you know BMW of course makes it. It might be worth holding out a little longer until they get some of the the bugs worked out. You know unless you know you love people just you know want to have that fun and are willing to put up with a car that has below average reliability and that that's you know part of the judgment call you make a second. Certainly there are many different aspects you evaluate before buying a car and reliability just one slice of the pie right. But that when that bigger slice of the Mini Cooper hasn't been so good so far right. And have you heard anything about it or do you have any comments on how to sort of deal with warranties and the fact that you know here we are in a community that doesn't

offer service. I mean is that an issue that comes into play for. Well to tell you the truth I'm not that familiar with the service. Attributes of the many. I don't know I have to have you talk to a BMW dealer or see if they service them. Yeah I have and I know that they don't and that. Once you take it to another dealer that you could then void the warranty as a whole and so I guess my concern is that with that reliability being an issue do I want to deal with it and I know there's other vehicles that have similar arrangements I've heard like I think does that as well you have to be serviced by a Lexus dealer. While it's under warranty so I just sit now with you now. Consumer Reports or any other thing. Yeah that kind of an issue certainly that you know the fact that you're far from a dealer complicates the reliability issue. Right that that could be a problem. Now I know that most

most manufacturers do allow you to take a car to other places when it's under warranty even once under warranty but you have to be careful to record everything that's done keep receipts that kind of thing so. So if there's a problem you can prove it. In fact a couple years ago we looked at the differences in price between taking a car to a dealership for regular maintenance intervals or taking it to an independent repair shops to have the same things done and the independent repair shops are much less work or much less. Expensive then the dealerships and in fact we found that even dealerships of the same make. I gave it sometimes widely different quotes for the same maintenance interval. So even when you do maintenance it pays to shop around. But like I said most bus manufacturers do allow you to take it to other places to have the maintenance done as long as you can back it up. If there's a problem right.

OK well thanks for your help. Let me thank you. This is a really interesting example of a car that has really grabbed a lot of people just by its looks and apparently when you drive it it's a lot of fun drive and that there is this interesting balancing act that people are doing between the way they feel about the car and the potential problems that it might have. And I find myself going back to again that sort of conventional wisdom about well maybe you want to wait at least a year when a new car is introduced because if there are any problems then it will take them some time to get it worked out. You have to think that the people at BMW know how to build cars so what do you think is really going on with this car and why is it that it seems to have had so many problems. That's a good quote. BMW starting out how to build cars they have very very fun to drive cars. They usually do very well in our testing. Typically in our test scoring they are at the top of their their categories but they have also had you know problems with

keeping vehicles above average in our in our reliability surveys. And then that gets back to what we talk about earlier about you know Europeans being third on the totem pole now in terms of reliability when you look across the board. BMW 3 Series is above average in our survey but some of the models are below average and there there are seven series sedan which is you know their top aligned sedan had many problems had real real problems with that in reliability data. In fact in the 2003 seven series had more problems than an eight year old Lexus LS 400. So you know it did you know it. The sad things happened then and again we can look at looking at the European cars. Again as an example one could argue that a lot of them that are sold in this country are a

higher higher end models with more power equipment more or you know things that can go wrong. And certainly that's where we are seeing a lot of the problems as an electrical systems and power accessories. That kind of stuff. But again you can also then turn around and look at Japanese cars like Lexus and infinity and an Acura that have virtually the same type of equipment and yet still get excellent reliability. We are a little past mid-point here we have some other cause we'll get right to I would just like to introduce Again our guest Rick Paul is automotive editor at Consumer Reports and has been there since June of 2000. He's responsible for automotive editorial content in their monthly issues and also their special publications before going to work for Consumer Reports. He was for nine years senior feature editor at Motor Trend magazine in Los Angeles and if you're in the market for a new car you might want to take a look at the April issue of Consumer Reports. It's their annual auto issue and they rate cars in a number of categories and things

like safety and family friendliness and reliability and how popular they are with their owners and number of things like that. So you might go out and take a look at the magazine. Questions are welcome 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. It's all free. A hundred to 2 2 9 4 5 5. Next caller is in champagne wine 3. Hello hi. I want to get back to your discussion about the hybrid. I have a few questions the first is I do have a copy of the April look at who reports and I was read with interest the material about the Honda Accord hybrid I heard you mention in passing that you think it will come out in September. Is that a firm date or time can you say anything more about that Accord Hybrid. One thing I've learned tonight watching the auto industry is it's never a firm date. It is expected this fall and

I doesn't necessarily mean September. And we have certainly seen many cases where it's even been pushed beyond that after instance the Ford Escape hybrid. Was it. Supposed to be out last summer and and we're looking at it maybe this summer hopefully the summer. So you know that things do get pushed back to the we. Basically it's part of the Accord hybrid goes it will be using hundreds hybrid system same one that's that's used in the civic Plus it'll be coupled with the with a V-6 engine for the variable management. Right and that's an interesting system that is it's a feature we'll probably be seeing more of going forward where when the when the car gets to cruising on the highway where it doesn't need a lot of power it will automatically cut out three of the six cylinders. And that with that is another fuel saving measure c using

less gas to just cruise. Then if you if you need the power for it you know the past six hour a whatever the other the three owners will come back in and you'll have all six going and the GM has a similar engine a system like that and and I guess I think we'll be seeing more of this happening and that's another way that they're they're going to be able to stretch gas mileage so that the accord will have that plus will have a high. A bridge system. Now we have no way of estimating what the fuel economy will be at this point. Has that system been used in Japan or is it brand new and therefore more questionable reliability that's one question I have and that and that sort of brings up the another set of questions which is in terms of getting service for either that let's say the Honda Accord Honda Civic hybrid or the approved Toyota Prius hybrid you're pretty much dependent on the deal.

That's true yeah. Yeah but I would be hesitant to go to a invited shop drive so if so pay up for what is. What sort of service to go to be and what life time on things like battery etc.. Do you have any sense of that. I know that the the battery pack is certainly a question mark right now. We're told that well the the previous battery pack for instance has a warranty of 8 years or a hundred thousand miles I believe. So it's a long time and then in in the states that use the California regulations clean air regulations it's boosted it 10 years or so. So does have a. Warranty on the battery pack and the hybrid system and that and certainly

you know Toyota and Honda also has a long warranty on those systems and that's their way of helping to ease you know buyer's concern about this new technology. Now once the warranty is up down the road a ways. You know what the reliability of the battery pack will be or how long it will will be durable. It is one of the questions that still remains unanswered. Toyota spokesman told us that it's supposed to be supposed to last the life of the vehicle. But you know that's that's Toyota So we have no way of verifying that. And they estimate now that. That on the pretty at the pack if you had to be replaced today which is everything's under warranty at this point so if it's a theoretical thing but it had to be replaced today out of warranty it would cost between three thousand thirty five hundred dollars. But they also say that that price should come down significantly by the time

the first warranties are up. That's that's that's where you were just have to wait and see how how they do and how that works and so it is one of the question marks in buying a hybrid this time. You know you said you're driving a Prius. Yes or no on a regular basis for just today. Now are we. I drive all of the vehicles that we test and it just happens we have the Prius at our office for this month. And so I'm spending at least a week in it myself to you know get used to it now. Now I explain that we have a Consumer Reports has their own tests the cod in Connecticut and I work in New York and and we have it's a facility it's basically one of the best test facilities of any publication.

OK. Do you think I would say I'm quite familiar I've been using Consumer Reports of all my vehicle purchases purchases and that goes back till to the 1980s. So good that I'm very happy with with the Consumer Reports review and that's why I was particularly looking forward to finding out about the Honda Accord hybrid since I'm thinking about that. Yeah. So. Well I've got a hell of static. OK well I guess do we get all your questions taken care of. Very very much. Let's go on here we got somebody on a cell phone in line to do that. Hello. Well yes probably kitching up continuing that same line. Is there any thought of putting a diesel in a minivan or a hybrid power plant by any of the manufacturers. Diesel some some manufacturers do see diesels as really

their direction to tackle this fuel economy thing. Chrysler for instance is coming out with a Jeep Liberty diesel the Mercedes-Benz diesel E-Class will be returning. So some manufactured to see diesel as it has a more promising route than than the hybrid for them. Now that I've been prototype hybrids that have run with a diesel electric motor and a diesel engine although I right now don't know of any production models that will have the combination. Hunter doesn't plan on doing a hybrid minivan hybrid or Chrysler to kind of bring up their share of our common country. Well I wouldn't be surprised to see an odyssey hybrid down the road but from what they've announced so far there's no plans at this time I think it really depends on on how cars like the their the Accord and the

SUV that are coming up are accepted if they if they sell well then certainly automakers will be encouraged to make a hybrid system available on more types of models for diesel. You know I think that's an easier call and again it depends on how the initial diesel vehicles sell one of the one of the things diesel diesel technology has come a long way since you know in the last couple decades. And they're they're smoother they're they're cleaner but they still pollute more than a conventional gasoline engine in at least a couple areas. Particular it's and nitric oxide emissions for example and I think the gas that the fuel companies will be taking the sulphur out of the gasoline in upcoming in the next couple years which will help diesels be even cleaner so that that will make them I think more publically acceptable. Again I you know I'm interested to see how

this all pans out as far as the return of diesels into the U.S. marketplace. Thank you very much. Laura thank you. Go to our next caller and this is back in Champaign in line one. Oh yeah I wanted to ask you quest. And about pricing and cost I forgot to take my consumers with me when I went to the diner to sis for Honda and he quoted me a price for one hundred seven hundred accord and when I got back I realized that the price he quoted me was over $3000 more than your the price you list and I just wonder. I guess I'm not sure. My question is exactly is it is this huge well and I suppose you can get down a little bit but you know how to think. How do they decide if they're going to tear it right

out of a price. So let me ask you wear which when you say that is $3000 over what we list. Where did you see the price that we list in consumers in the April issue. Yeah. And so I guess I'm under each arm right under each low profile there of the year. OK I didn't make sure that's the price. Yeah. Now let me see if you have a range. All right. Yeah I just want to make sure I know exactly who you're talking about those prices that are listed under there are the base price range and the base price is the vehicle. This is its manufacturer suggested retail price without any options. So that would be basically the lowest you could buy it. So if you have air conditioning that's an added. Yeah. Well not always but it can be it depends on the model. Sometimes it's standard equipment other

times it's optional and that's where you have to look carefully at what you're being quoted. Certainly you know it's not unusual for a vehicle to be you know with options out with a lot of extras to have be $3000 over the base price. That's that's not unusual at all. Although what we recommend people do is not. Really base their their price on the sticker price that's on the outside right on the window. We recommend that people find out what the dealer paid for the car and then negotiate up from that. And how do you find that out. Well there are different ways. Basically there's a dealer invoice price which is published in. Basically a lot of places now you can even find it on websites such as Edmunds dot com whatever admin. Yeah Edmonds ETM un d s dot com. Kelley Blue Books website which

is k b b dot com. KBB dot com. They do have your invoice price there and when you see the dealer invoice you can see how much the car's been marked up for retail. Now even the dealer. Our invoice is not necessarily what the dealer actually paid for the car because often there's incentives behind the scenes that that give the dealer more profit margin. And that's an area where our Consumer Reports tries to help people with what's called a new car price report. And these are $12 each and you can order it through our website. But basically it includes a price we call the C.R. wholesale price. And and that is based on the dealer invoice at plus any dealer incentives that are current at the time such as you know. A what's called a holdback which is a little like a little refund the manufacturers give the

dealers or or sell consent of where Dior if they sell a certain model they'll get some money back. And these kind of incentives give the dealer extra profit margin. And if you know that about this extra profit margin then you know how much you know leeway the dealer has in the price range so you can even if you allow them what's a reasonable profit margin maybe 4 to 8 percent. You can still get you the final price can be still be much lower than the sticker price. Or things. Wow. OK. When when they. I assume that when they originally quote you a price that they expect you to go back and well oh I know what I was going to ask you that the dealer price. Does it vary by geographic location.

Usually not. No but the incentives can vary. The incentives and the like I said the behind the scenes deal incentives can be regionally based. Right. OK well thank you very much. All right thank you for the go. We have about 12 minutes left. Maybe I'll just introduce Again our guest We're talking with Rick Paul he is automotive editor at Consumer Reports and he's the guy who's responsible for the automotive editorial content in Consumer Reports. If you're in the market for a new car you might want to look at the April issue of Consumer Reports that's their annual auto issue. We have a number of people standing by here and we'll go next to Hartsburg Illinois. Our toll free line line for yellow. Oh yes I did it was a long time. Happy owner of a Saturn that's serious and recently bought an additive. I wanted to ask a couple of things One is that friends have seen very little

very few items and it makes me wonder about the future of the car. And then after I bought it I checked Consumers Report. Most of the reliability little bit I'm certain and want to inquire about the reliability or serious I get oh so sad and changing and their relationship with GM. What future changes will Saturns have. Well taking one step at a time. The ion actually did well in our reliability survey it. It is in our IT most recent to for the 0 3 model. It got above average rating for reliability. In our test however we rated only fair in our small car category which is about maybe 15 models included there. It's like third from the bottom so we want real crazy

with the ion. In terms of our testing of it now as far as changes going forward that's not something that I have any information about. OK well thank you. OK let's go to next. At length Illinois this is lawyer 3 no talking back to Quest. And on a Mini Cooper. I'm only a few miles from the guy from Harrisburg by the way that's unusual. But anyway I have a Mini Cooper and like the lady that called earlier I'm a long ways from service. And I you know used to English cars being that car is BMW that is meaning when I'm used to reliability problems. But I just wondered what areas the car should I look for as far as being unreliable and then the second question is I understand the engine the tri tech engine is a Chrysler design engine that's made in Brazil and I

just wondered what is the reliability of that engine I understand that it's in other European cars also. Listen here. What model Mini Cooper do you have. It's a have to look at the 2004 2004. OK. We have. Two years worth of data on the Mini Cooper for the 2 and 0 3 models. And in the 0 3 model which was the new At the time that our survey was being done. It was having some problems in the cooling and transmission electrical and also in the power equipment and body integrity which is like squeaks and rattles things like that. This way these were areas in which it was below average compared with the average of all other vehicles out there. The engine however has been excellent in terms of reliability for both the years that we have data for

Americans. There you go. Chris writes for the larger the electronic first aspect I don't know about the fixed rate vs. the price. But the transmission problem could be suspect. Yeah. The end I would say that it's from our data. People have told us that they've had more problems with the transmission then than the normal car. Yeah OK well thank you very very much. All right thank you. Over to Indiana for another color line too. Hello. Well I was wondering if you've ever consider sectional sectioning world automobile production other than just European Asian United States because you know I know there's other countries like Brazil so I wonder if it's ever been. S. So you can see like production per worker or production per unit of something you know. And I yeah we we don't slice it in that

much detail in fact I will say that even I look at different nationalities it is you know kind of rounding things up so to speak because it's such a global autumn our auto market right now. You know there's a lot of import cars that are that are built in the United States stares you know U.S. cars that are built overseas. There's automakers enough there's U.S. auto makers that own import brands. GM own Saab Fordham's and Valvo for instance. And then of course you know I'm a Chrysler which is basically a German company owns Chrysler so. So when we do look at the big three the big American automakers we do just assign them a two to the brand nationality we don't we don't. And why is it based on a model by model basis and which model is produced where.

So it's kind of a general look at things. OK thank you. OK I think we have another call here on Cell Phone Line 1 below. My wife and I were very pleased with it and we really liked the hybrid technology so much so in fact that one time right. I had heard that Toyota was considering coming out with a pic of a pickup truck hybrid technology. I was wondering if you knew of anything in that vein and if you have any ideas on you know what it would be a full price for many or what kind of course or it might have. Yeah I've heard talk about bringing up pickups with a hybrid engine. I haven't heard specifically about a Toyota. But I think GM was looking at it year or two ago although there's no firm plans and I admit that I've heard announce at this point so I

think I think the cops are cops excuse me would it would still be a little ways off. OK but you don't have any idea on whether they were considering 10 trucks or larger sizes the ones that I've heard I think. We're full sized. How many years do you think that might be down the line. You know I have no. If there are so many variables and like I previously said that it I think a lot of a lot of it depends on how the initial hybrid sound. And if they if they do well the end automakers will be encouraged to bring out more models with that option. And if they don't do well then then you know then certainly that will stymie the growth of that segment. OK well thank you very much. All right let's go to bonus at least get one more call here one for hello and thanks for saying we're going to. I would like please your opinion of the over five correct and that is the

Volvo SUV. Right. Yeah. B. They're both you know good vehicles the the x ninety six hundred ninety I should say Valvo. That's that's a very competitive category because of the price and the you know it's an upscale SUV as is the touring and. Both of them are basically in mid pack in our ratings but but they still did very good and that's an indication of how strong this segment is if if you're able to pick up the April issue for instance you you'd see a complete ratings of all the vehicles we've tested which is about one hundred eighty two. And they're all listed by categories so you can scan the whole SUV category and see how our ratings fall is that for all four or five months we

have the weight we tested before actually 90 and touring their line on the 05. No I don't unfortunately. But but like I said they they did well the testing was really in a very good but because it's such a strong category they're still only mid-pack in that category. Do you endorse David dictum that is issued a while back that you shouldn't buy a car in its first year model around here. I think from a. A dollars and cents standpoint Yeah that's that's good advice. We do recommend you know that you wait you know and but we also understand that there's a lot of passion out there for for new vehicles and so you know that people don't always take the dollars and cents look at things. You know it's there obviously there's a lot of times when there are you know recalls or

bugs to be worked out. And and for Certainly there's been example of this there. Their focus for instance when it first came out four or five years ago had a lot of recalls a lot of problems it did very bad in our reliability surveys and it's really just in the last couple years that we started to see through I believe in the focus for instance come up to to average or above. So you know it's a it's generally good advice now for some reason vehicles like Toyota and Honda companies like that tend. They they they have somehow been able to find a way to bring out vehicles that are reliable right out of the gate with few exceptions. We we've got to go I'm here at the end of the time I want to thank you very much Mr. Paul for talking with us today. I enjoyed it we appreciate it Rick Paul automotive editor of Consumer Reports the April issue is their annual auto issue. So if you're in the market for a new car you might want to look at it.