Darkmann

I'm just wondering. We spend upwards of 50K to buy th best engineering offeren in any automobile in the world. Right?? Now, how come Hyundai, Kia etc provide 10 yrs/100K warranty on their vehicles - with "less superior" engineering?? Why can't our "better" vehicles offer such warranties - maybe not 100K, but something more than 40-50K? Afterall, MB's and Bimmers/Volvos/Audi/Lexus/etc are all built like tanks. Like I said, I am just wondering and would like someone to explain the economics behind this thinking.

silverstreak

Seems to me MBz and BMW dealers pull a significant amount of revenue from service and accessories (cell phones, CD changers). With a factory warranty, the factory pays the dealer, rather than the customer, which the factory probably doesn't want to do more than necessary to get the car sold. 7yr/100k warranty is available on a Starmark car to enable the dealer to resale a car that the customer will therefore trust as much as a new car of another make. Otherwise, we buy the teutonic tech new, trusting it's the best rather than trusting to the warranty, which the cheapies need to use to lure their customers.
What warranties do Lexus and Infiniti offer? How many people would choose a Lexus over a Benz based on warranty alone? If market research said it was a number significant enough to outweigh the cost to the factory for paying dealers to repair the 50-100k mile cars, you can bet they'd be doing it...just like any other insurance business, they've got their actuaries who crunch the numbers and tell the bigwigs what the odds are.

Darkmann

You are probably correct. The problem I have, however, is that the cheapies seem to spend much less time at the service bay than our very well engineered machines. The warranties for the BMWs and Lexus are similar to the MBZs with minor variations. All of these cars performed just ABOVE AVERAGE in the Insurance Inst. crash tests. So, that rules out safety (for me at least). I have to believe that as you have pointed out, it's what the number crunchers tell the factory that really matters. That's pathetic, especially when, it seems to me like most MBZ owners barely drive these vehicles to the limit. I have two Nissans ('89 and '95) with over 120K on them and I am yet to launch a major complaint (maybe I am lucky). However, they're not nearly as safe as the MBZ - I'm still confused.

silverstreak

gotta agree with you about the reliability. the q45 that my e55 replaced needed only a master cylinder and macpherson(sp) struts at 110k mi. the original battery lasted 8 years!
the e55 needed the mass air flow meter replaced last week, at 17k mi...but there was no question at all about which car to buy after test driving an e55 and the new q45.
agree with you about the safety issue too. i recall the offset crash test around 1995 that showed the bmw 540i far better than the q45.