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Posted on 01/31/2010 3:08:40 PM PST by Chi-townChief
Toyota is the latest Japanese corporate icon making headlines for all the wrong reasons.
News of the automaker's massive vehicle recalls over faulty gas pedals in the U.S. came just days after Japan Airlines, a once proud flag carrier, filed for bankruptcy, saddled with billions in debt.
Sony has lost its lead in consumer gadgets to the likes of Apple Inc. and has suffered its own quality mishaps. Honda, Japan's No. 2 automaker, is recalling 646,000 cars worldwide because of a faulty window switch.
Taken together, Japan Inc.'s stellar reputation for quality has taken a hit — just as China is about to overtake it as the world's No. 2 economy and rising South Korean companies compete ever more aggressively.
What went wrong with the economic giant that arose from the ashes of World War II?
The problems that confront Toyota, Sony and JAL differ, but experts say their struggles have some common themes: the perils of global expansion, a tendency to embrace the status quo, and smugness bred from success or a too-big-to-fail mentality.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
So only American-built Toyotas are affected? I wonder what's going on there...
Maybe the American gas pedals are imported from China.
Who really knows what is happening. My sons bud has a year old tacoma. The suspension was bottoming out there was a recall. The tailgate collasped from the weight of a 750cc motorcycle. Maybe they are having problems.
I would suggest that the author of this piece take a look at Mitsubishi Jidousha’s problems circa 1999-2001 before he calls the current Toyota one unprecedented.
This whole gas pedal thing is a scam by Obama and Obama Motors.
They told Toyota to recall voluntarily for a few cases where people got into accidents and blamed the pedals. I have talked with a guy who sold Toyotas for years and they’ve never seen problems with gas pedals getting caught in floor mats.
The fact GM had commercials waiting to go saying “If you trade in a toyota we’ll give you an extra thousand bucks” makes me not believe this to be a real problem.
Time to buy Toyota stock!!
I don’t think so - What’s new is that Toyota and other Japanese companies were generally able to keep these quality probelems isolated to their own market. This appears to be the opposite.
Socialism is beginning to catch up to the Japanese.
I had the same thoughts when I heard about this.
I'd say there's a definite conflict of interest here somewhere as the Obama administration runs the largest car manufacturer in competition with Toyota and other Japanese brands.
I'm sure he has considerable influence over the NHTSA.
The slam on Ford about the Pinto isn’t in the original headline.
From what I have read, its caused by an American made gas petal that is the problem. I have a 09 Tundra Crew max (90% parts made in the US) by US workers in Texas and am not worried about it.
I saw a show a year or 2 ago called Autoline Detroit on a Sunday morning. The host was interviewing the arrogant GM CEO of world wide sales that was comparing GM to the Japanese mfgs (Toyota and Nissan) pointing out that GM’s quality was better because GM has not had any recalls like the Japanese mfgs have. The host pointed out that if the Japanese determined they had a defect, they would fix it via recall, and he (the host) was told that GM would not do a recall and GM would settle individual lawsuits instead cause it was cheaper that way. He gave the CEO a chance to deny or correct that explenation, and the GM CEO sat there dumbfounded for a few minutes and then said yes that is their policy. I owned an 05 GMC Sierra that had a steering column defect (in GM Sierras and Chevy Silverado) in the intermediate steering shaft (that connects the steering wheel to the front wheels) for 6 model years GM didn’t consider a safety problem, and would fix the problem on demand (of the vehicle owners) only after coming up with 2 different fixes after the first after 5 model years. Two “fixes” later the problem still returned so I traded the GM in on my Tundra.
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The pedals affected in the recall came from Toyota’s supplier in Indiana.
FORD POSTS FULL YEAR PROFIT FOR 2009
Ford Motor Company | 01/28/2009 | Ford Motor Company
Posted on 01/28/2010 4:36:05 AM PST by taildragger
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2439162/posts
No but this is reminiscient of that situation.
I don’t care what’s going on here, I will never, ever buy another GM car. Ever.
It all depends - I wouldn’t mind finding a good price on a Pontiac or Saturn right now. I don’t know if I’ll ever buy a Japanese car, at least until they market them better to Americans and a Chinese or Korean car is doubtful as well.
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