Driver feedback is after the fact. Once again someone who's not an engineer.

 

You were raised by an engineer who put more emphasis on engineering than other factors. Most people care the most about the outward attributes of the car. Basically all cars today are well engineered and run properly, and most of us don't keep them more than 3-5 years anyways.

And if I wanted to be an engineer, I'd be an engineer lol. I have no interest in being an engineer, and I find the analytical nature of engineers and the emphasis they put on details that in practice are trivial annoying. I've done business with lots of engineers.

 

I was always taught that the engineering of a car is what's most important. The rest of it doesn't mean much if there's not a good foundation underneath. I agree with you that the automotive media can over sensationalize things with an attention getting headline that really doesn't pan out. Too many in the automotive media aren't engineers either. BTW,, John Davis at Motorweek is an engineer. I grew up watching Motorweek with my engineer father. I still watch Motorweek.

 

I was raised to value what's most important about a vehicle which is its engineering, durability and safety. Not all cars are well engineered. Alot can be covered up by looks and gimmicks. I was taught how to spot such things. Because of safety, engineers are very analytical and that's a good thing. Things you might find to be trivial are crucial to developing a durable, safe automobile. BTW, the average age of most people's cars is now 12 years old.

 

I agree, and I'll add "Dealership Service Experience/Reputation" to the list of things to consider.

Unfortunately, there aren't many Media outlets that actually know about those things. You certainly don't get them from JD Powers or Consumer Reports.

I'll throw IIHS into the "once a good source" also. Have you followed the Crash Test Dummy politicization of Safety? Manufacturers pour money into Congress to approve the Dummy that favors their cars. The Dummies are responsible for my safety, as directed by a Congressman's campaign funding.

I've watched CR's recommendations over the years, and all they do is make people on their third transmissions feel better about how reliable their car is "reported to be." Well, only one on his third. But a few on their second. They still like their car because it's "reliable." Just not drive-able.

My suggestion is to decide what's important to one's self and look for a car that matches. For me, it's the driving experience that takes a car from "appliance" to "automobile." Not the cup-holders and sunroof size that are the talking point for CR reviews. I'll pass.

 

Sure, thats how you were raised by an engineer who approaches life in a certain way. Not everybody approaches life that way. I stand by my statement that almost all cars built today are safe and durable, I can buy basically any car and have a car that will serve me for as long as I will have it. If I were going to buy a car and keep it for 10 years, it wouldn't be a Mercedes it would be a Toyota or Lexus.

The average age of cars on the road is 12 years, that doesn't mean the average person keeps a car 12 years. Many cars are bought used, and if you look at the stats of people who buy luxury cars, 60% of Mercedes are leased. Its unusual to see someone buy a Mercedes new and keep it 12 years. You're clearly not a statistician lol

 

There is design engineering, and then there is manufacturing engineering. Manufacturing engineering is concerned with not only how to mass produce parts, but how consistently the production process builds the part to spec. There is a lot of science and theory behind how to build quality vehicles -- it's called 6-Sigma. If you're interested, here's a short 10 min video that explains the concept at the 100,000-foot level. There are also other videos you can watch on YouTube that describe this process in more detail.


Bottomline, it's one thing to engineer a car to be long lasting, but if the manufacturing process can't build the parts to spec consistently, the car won't be reliable -- e.g., the design for an engine cylinder bore calls for a diameter of 3.000 inches, +/- 0.0003 inches, but the manufacturing process is producing cylinders with a diameter of 2.995 inches +/- 0.004 inches. Were the engine built to the design spec, testing has shown it will last >300,000 miles...but unfortunately the as built engine only lasts ~150,000 miles before it needs a ring job due to excess wear as a result of the "out of spec" cylinder bore.

Point being a properly engineered vehicle depends on the production process and how the manufacturer (to include their subs) controls part variability and can consistently product parts in spec so everything goes together as "designed". You can't necessary tell just by looking at a new vehicle -- it's what you can't see that matters over the long term. So, if that's what you mean by "engineering", then I agree.

 

Ah, an "ideas guy"....don't like it when the creative process is derailed by reality!



Just kidding...Cheers!

 

Exactly! LOL

 

As a former automotive engineer, those details aren't trivial. They may seem trivial to a sales person that doesn't understand their important, but these "trivial" inclusions (or omissions) can have very significant consequences, especially when something like a 0.01% failure rate is completely unacceptable for a given component/system. The "trivial details" is what engineering is all about and what separates a bad design from a great one. Sales people don't seem to understand that, and I'd venture to guess it's because they dont know what they dont know. With all due respect, I'd be surprised if someone with this type of attitude could successfully become an engineer. It's a fairly difficult endeavor. I've got no dog in the fight, as the most I use my engineering background for is making formulas in Excel for my tax returns, but the type of engineers with this type of attitude were not particularly successful in my experience.


My real question is how the heck you can assess reliability of a vehicle based on the current model year. Engineering 101 is that the failure rate of a given component is typically a "U" shaped line (parabola). You have a bunch early on due to manufacturing (bolt wasn't tightened, something wasn't plugged in, casting came out bad, whatever). Then it's pretty reliable with very few failures, then as it approaches end of life, it fails due to wear. All a current model year study will tell you is how consistently parts are manufactured and assembled, absent some sort of truly terrible design that, as a result of poor design (likely in a "trivial detail" ) isn't expected to last much longer than a year.


I may also be wrong, but I think this doesn't take into consideration mileage. Certain cars (IE: Porsche) will likely have a lot less miles than GMC, that focuses on trucks and SUVs for working folks. There's also probably a big difference in owners. I haven't seen too many lead footed Buick drivers. Lastly, components. It's not really fair to compare something that has doo-dads and tech widgets out the wazoo compared to something that is typically sold as a stripped out base model.


All in all I'd say these two things:
1) the first year is not a good indication of how it will fare at 100k miles, like we typically think of when we say "reliable car."
2) the first year is under warranty so I dont care.
3) I'm not sure how valuable those studies are.
4) Buy whatever you want. It's pretty hard to buy a bad vehicle. And if you do, there's plenty of warranty to get your through it.

 

I'm a smart guy, I went to college, I own and have owned and run multiple businesses. If I wanted to become an engineer, I would be more than capable of becoming an engineer. I'm not denigrating engineers at all, I'm just saying that you are focused on certain things given your background, and many people just don't really care about those things. The fact that I don't really care is likely why I have and had no desire to be an engineer. Lots of characteristics about me that make me a good salesperson that you likely don't possess...

Its like you said later on in your post, "It's pretty hard to buy a bad vehicle"....so...why sweat all of these engineering details? Like I said they are all well engineered enough for my use case.

Those are 4 things.

 

You sound like you're training a new engineer. That's disrespectful. Lol.

Wow a Psych major (?) telling an engineer how to look at statistics? Lol. And yes, most of these folks here don't keep their cars past warranty. Even Lexus, if I remember correctly their lease number is about or higher.

 

Hey, I was right lol

Lexus is 50% I believe. Thats why I ultimately left Lexus for Mercedes, I was leasing and not keeping them past 50k miles so I was missing out on the best attribute of a Lexus, the longevity.

 

One can not say a car is reliable if it doesn't have issues first year out. But one can say a car is not reliable when it has issues first year or day. There's nothing about engineering here. Now if we're talking about engineering and new product introduction, you know that before releasing a new product, there are these qualification tests to test the product at extreme conditions well beyond normal operating environments to ensure the product will work as designed and last. This thread is about the GLE's reliability in particular. Apparently there have been a significant number of issues, whether it's a design issue or assembly issue, from this one, more so than any similar priced vehicles. Thus lower rank. That's also not engineering. Engineers know how things work. Consumers don't and don't have to. There are only work and don't work in their book. If a design does not work as designed, it doesn't. Being complex is not an excuse for a poor design. If one thinks automobile engineering is tough and they have excuse for errors, try healthcare equipment engineering.

 

Ha, I meant write few things.

It's pretty hard to buy a bad vehicle because these pesky engineering details were sweated by someone else. More or less, that's my point.
I'm a trial attorney now, and that's pretty much high pressure sales all day long.

 

Then we agree. I didn't mean those details weren't important, I just meant they werent primarily important to a typical consumer because they are well handled with almost all cars today.

LOL, you ain't wrong.

 

First, yes you can. If a car has three problems in the first month, and then no more problems for the next 100k miles, that's a lot more reliable than a car that has no problems on day one and 10 problems at 75k miles. The initial failures are likely very independent of those at 100k miles.

I'm not saying that having a complex design is an excuse. If anything, complexities are necessary evils which should be kept to a minimum, not features. I'm saying that having more components and features makes it difficult to compare. For example, if one car doesn't have touchscreen, it's one less part that can go wrong. If it doesn't have HUD, it's one less part that can go wrong. So while one car may have far less failures per "operation," it may have more failures per vehicle simply because there are more "operations." Numerator vs denominator.

Healthcare probably has a lot more critical components, but by and large, they are fairly simple devices and failure isn't a big deal. Sure, a pacemaker can't fail, but a) it's not the complicated and b) the majority of devices aren't life and death critical. If the MRI machine breaks down, you just get it fixed. They also (generally) don't have exceptionally tight tolerances and don't have to design to maximum efficiencies. No one cares if a ventilator is 3lbs heavier than it needs to be. No one cares if an MRI machine is heavier than it needs to be. Implants and such are a big deal, but they're generally pretty simple (we're pretty good at making rods and screws with ease). There's obviously plenty of complex cutting edge stuff, of course.

Aerospace, especially military/fighters, which is where I worked at the end of my career, is a much bigger deal. A loose bolt likely means millions of dollars of loss at best, and likely death(s). They literally do not use washers in an engine so you can't forget them and/or no loose washers can make their way into an engine during build or service. Everything has to be made as light as possible. IIRC, the USAF valued weight at close to $1MM/lb. Weight has crippling effect on range (and a lesser extent, other capabilities). We keep whittling parts down and optimizing them so they are very close to their minimum weight. And then there is design for serviceability. The amount of hours of maintenance per hour of flight time is a very big deal.

 

Counselor, I give you Exhibit A....fortunately the ACES II worked like a champ.

 

this proves it. I’m wrong and Fighter jets are basically spot welded garbage.

 

Lol 😂. Funny how things go down rabbit holes.

 

You don’t need to be an engineer to complain about a broken product. Period. I don’t care how it is built. I just care it works. Do I have to be a chef to complain about a burnt steak? No.

 

Retired Engineer here and 6-Sigma Specialist. Had fun in the NM Desert most of career...can share this old video:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7drp8hp2Kto

 

I still get to have fun in the NM desert several times a year..and in Fort Worth too!