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Sloan, NV Car Consumer Discussions

Re: so what's been going on? [Mr_Shiftright]

by duke23 on Sat Oct 04 23:19:47 PDT 2008

Mr.Shiftright wrote: "As for carmakers, look at cagey Henry Ford. Right in the middle of the Depression he comes out with an affordable V-8 for the masses, and the brilliant Alfred Sloane starts a Color and Design department at GM to style cars to brighten up a very grim landscape----while Pierce Arrow and Duesenberg and Auburn and hundreds of other companies just went on "doin' the same old thing" or complaining to the government. As for Kubler-Ross---remember, she ended up talking to the dead " Color me impressed, not only can he revive a dead automobile better than Macgyver with a spool of string and some chewing gum but a student of history is he, as well as a pundit. Good Show ,Good Show.

Re: so what's been going on? [british_rover]

by Mr_Shiftright on Sat Oct 04 09:04:59 PDT 2008

There you go: "always trust in action, never trust in words". A dealership that is flexible, has good staff, decent product, productive service department, not too much fat, is going to do okay. They adjust to conditions. As for carmakers, look at cagey Henry Ford. Right in the middle of the Depression he comes out with an affordable V-8 for the masses, and the brilliant Alfred Sloane starts a Color and Design department at GM to style cars to brighten up a very grim landscape----while Pierce Arrow and Duesenberg and Auburn and hundreds of other companies just went on "doin' the same old thing" or complaining to the government. As for Kubler-Ross---remember, she ended up talking to the dead :P

Re: fezo [dallasdude1]

by grbeck on Wed Aug 20 14:01:50 PDT 2008

dallasdude: Unlike those overseas, our society doesn't tax you as much and therefore we waste. With higher taxes, it's the government that does most of the wasting. dallasdude: Most Europeans keep their cars longer and take care of them better. Many Europeans receive a company car as a benefit, as punitive tax rates make higher salaries much less desirable. Thus, people don't "own" their cars; their employer does. They get to use it for personal reasons as a job-related fringe benefit. People take care of their cars because they have to turn it in to to their employer, which expects to sell it on the used-car market and recoup some of its investment. If you turn in a "trashed" car on a regular basis, that wouldn't make the boss too happy. That has more to do with self-interest than any innate commitment to less consumption. The European car magazines - particularly the British ones, such as Top Gear - regularly refer to cars (particularly cars larger than the Focus/Golf/Astra) as being desirable for middle management, and will often remark that certain cars are tolerable because the owner isn't really paying for it. dallasdude: Then too the technical people are trained better too. The auto companies/repair shops invest more in their employees. This is true. dallasdude: The social experiments by Saturn (a different kind of car company) didn't pan out as the great management/labor partnership. That's because, one, GM already had too many divisions at the time, and didn't need another one, and, two, neither GM management (once Roger Smith retired) nor the UAW leadership were really committed to the Saturn experiment. I had the privilege of speaking with a UAW member who was a leader on the Saturn project. He was an interesting fellow. Let's just say that his "off the record" remarks about both union leaders and GM's top management in regards to how they viewed Saturn wasn't too flattering to either party. dallasdude: You can bring in all these ideas from overseas, but the America has to buy in. And who is at fault if Americans refuse to buy into worthwhile ideas? One of Detroit's biggest problems has been the "not invented here" mentality. dallasdude: The darling of the American business schools is Toyota and the lean mentality. Which, I'm sure, has nothing to do with its success in providing quality goods to customers and making a big profit while doing it. GM, well into the 1960s, was studied in business schools as THE example of a successful, modern corporation. In many ways, Alfred P. Sloan invented the modern corporation. Given GM's billion dollar losses and dramatic sales declines, it is doubtful that it is serving as a textbook example of anything except how NOT to run a successful corporation in a competitive environment. dallasdude: A whole cult of these Six Sigma folks have been trying there hardest to fix companies for years now. Ford has been aggressively implementing Six Sigma into its production processes. It has also shown the most dramatic improvement in quality among the domestics. By some measurements it is now among the top tier of automobile companies in quality. Perhaps this process DOES work...? dallasdude: During good times everyone is happy. However, bad times we see the finger pointing and the UAW looks like an easy target to blame all our woes. And the UAW never does any finger pointing? All of that wailing about currency manipulation (which EVERY country, including the U.S., does), bias in Consumer Reports, and closed Japanese markets (considering that Americans aren't chomping at the bit to buy American cars, one wonders why the Japanese would want them) exists only in my imagination?

At least TEXAS is forward-thinking about alternative power sources

by larsb on Fri Jul 18 08:05:54 PDT 2008

My home state of Texas, in fact very near my hometown (one of the new transmission lines will go through my hometown county) is adopting a very ambitious Wind Power project. ( Unlike Cali, which seems to trip over itself when trying to do the right thing. ) Will steal a lot of power requirements from coal-fueled power plants: Winds of Change In a move that could be a financial boon for the Big Country, state regulators approved a plan Thursday to build a massive grid to transmit wind power from gusty West Texas and the Panhandle to energy-thirsty metropolitan areas. The Texas Public Utility Commission's action opens the door for construction of a far-reaching web of transmission lines that, when completed at a cost of nearly $5 billion over four or five years, would be able to handle enough wind-generated electricity to power more than 4 million homes. The electricity will go to some of the state's most populous areas, including Dallas, San Antonio and Houston. Paying for the PUC plan would add roughly $4 per month to residential customer bills after construction is completed. Passage of the plan is "a real big deal," said Sweetwater Mayor Greg Wortham, who also heads the West Texas Wind Energy Consortium. "It's good for Abilene, good for Sweetwater, good for the region." Good, in fact, for the entire state of Texas, Wortham said. "This will bring billions more dollars of investment to Texas in the form of wind equipment, construction, local revenues and jobs," said Susan Williams Sloan, spokeswoman for the Washington, D.C.-based American Wind Energy Association.

1998 Sienna trans is a mess, Toyota takes no responsibility!

by lgodiva on Tue May 27 08:06:14 PDT 2008

I am having a transmission problem with a used Sienna that is absolutely frustrating. Below is my story (I have sent this letter to Toyota arbitration, to no avail). Please read it in its entirety - there's a lot to say - and if you can help at all, please post a reply. Is there any other form of recourse other than to shell out $2500 to replace a transmission that Toyota is unwilling to stand behind?: I purchased my 1998 Toyota Sienna minivan from Sloane Toyota in Devon, PA, in the summer of 2003. I also purchased a 3-year extended warranty. Within the timeframe of the warranty, in the winter of 2004-2005, the transmission started making an odd noise and was replaced under warranty by Sloane in June 2005. Within the one-year warranty on that new transmission, my car started experiencing unusual behavior: on the coldest mornings, it would not automatically shift out of first gear into second gear for one to two miles, or about five to ten minutes, even if I pressed the accelerator down quite far. I contacted Sloane’s service department and described the problem in detail to one of the service people. They told me definitively that this behavior was “normal” and nothing to worry about. I questioned this, but was assured that everything was ok with my car. I even called one more time and received the same reassurance, plus the suggestion that I might check the transmission fluid level (I did, and it was full). They did NOT recommend that I bring the car in to be checked, or that there was any reason for concern, or that I should even check the color of the transmission fluid (I will refer to this later). Over the next two winters, there were few truly frigid mornings during which this behavior exhibited itself. Thus, trusting the advice of Toyota’s service department, I ignored it on the few mornings it occurred. (This only happened in the morning when the car was completely cold, never at the end of the day.) Additionally, the car exhibited no other unusual behavior during this time. Then this past winter, my car started exhibiting other odd behaviors that seemed to point to the transmission. The gear slippage worsened - it would occasionally be slow in switching between gears, typically from second to third. I started hearing a high-pitched whine that rose in pitch as I accelerated. I finally brought my car into Sloane Toyota to have it checked; they said my transmission was shot, and that it would cost $5000 to replace it. Sloane said they would not cover the replacement because my new transmission’s warranty had expired. I pointed out that I had experienced and reported unusual behavior earlier on, and that they never told me to bring it in. I also pointed out that it seemed quite clear that my more recent gear slippage was a worsening of the original problem on cold mornings, and thus an inherent problem in the new transmission they had installed in 2005. I said that this all could have been avoided if they had advised me to bring it in rather than assuring me that the symptoms I had experienced were “normal”. I pointed out that I did not bring it in because I was not advised to do so by their own service department – I had relied on their advice. I spoke with the service manager, Jim Nagle, on several occasions, trying to convince him of this, and thus that Toyota had some responsibility in the matter due to their poor advice of his own service department, but he remained firm on this position. I also issued a complaint through Toyota Customer Service and spoke with a regional service manager, Larry Roberts. He indicated that the original problem of not switching from first to second gear on cold mornings was a “safety feature” to prevent stressing the transmission, and that the new problems I was experiencing were completely separate and unrelated. For a second expert opinion, I then took my car to a very reputable and highly-recommended local transmission shop near me, who indicated that the transmission was a mess, that whatever was wrong had been building up for several years (i.e., since before the warranty expired). They said they found many “chunks of metal” in the transmission fluid and that the filter was completely clogged. The fluid was black rather than the usual clear color. They didn’t think it would last more than a few months. I explained the entire history of my transmission and my dealings with Toyota. They pointed out that Sienna minivans have a history of bad transmissions from the late 1990s through the early 2000s, and that my initial transmission replacement was one of many that Toyota quietly did under warranty. I described the “safety feature” concept, and he said it was complete and utter nonsense - that in all his years of transmission repair of Toyotas other cars, there was no such safety feature. Obviously, Mr. Roberts was lying in order to get me off his back, something I seriously resent and am deeply offended by as a Toyota customer. I called Mr. Roberts back to tell him this, and asked him for proof of such a safety feature. He ignored my request and became very gruff, hostile, and non-responsive. My trans shop replaced my clogged transmission filter and refilled the fluid, to at least give my car some short-term life. Their cost to replace the transmission is *only* $2500 (not surprisingly half of the dealer’s price). It surprises and distresses me that Toyota will not stand by their cars in this situation. Certainly, a new transmission should last more than a couple of years, especially on a Toyota! Here are the points I was hoping would convince Toyota to take responsibility in this matter: · Pat’s Transmissions expertly diagnosed how badly my transmission was damaged, compared to how relatively new it was. · The extent of damage points to the certainty that problems started very early on, related to my original problem of gear shifting on cold mornings. I would even suggest that the ‘new’ transmission Sloane Toyota installed was a ‘lemon’, i.e., faulty right from the start. · Sloane Toyota’s service department gave me poor and erroneous advice that the original symptoms I was experiencing were “normal”; moreover, they did *not* recommend that I bring my car in to have it checked while it was still under warranty. · There is a known history of Sienna transmission problems in the timeframe of when my car was manufactured. I have had two bad transmissions in my car over the span of only five years! · As a manufacturer of high-quality cars, Toyota should be expected to stand behind their products. Transmissions should not fail after such a short time, regardless of the arbitrary one-year warranty.

Problems with 98 Sienna trans, Toyota takes no responsibility!

by lgodiva on Tue May 27 08:01:00 PDT 2008

I am having a transmission problem with a used Sienna that is absolutely frustrating. Below is my story (I have sent this letter to Toyota arbitration, to no avail). Please read it in its entirety - there's a lot to say - and if you can help at all, please post a reply. Is there any other form of recourse other than to shell out $2500 to replace a transmission that Toyota is unwilling to stand behind?: I purchased my 1998 Toyota Sienna minivan from Sloane Toyota in Devon, PA, in the summer of 2003. I also purchased a 3-year extended warranty. Within the timeframe of the warranty, in the winter of 2004-2005, the transmission started making an odd noise and was replaced under warranty by Sloane in June 2005. Within the one-year warranty on that new transmission, my car started experiencing unusual behavior: on the coldest mornings, it would not automatically shift out of first gear into second gear for one to two miles, or about five to ten minutes, even if I pressed the accelerator down quite far. I contacted Sloane’s service department and described the problem in detail to one of the service people. They told me definitively that this behavior was “normal” and nothing to worry about. I questioned this, but was assured that everything was ok with my car. I even called one more time and received the same reassurance, plus the suggestion that I might check the transmission fluid level (I did, and it was full). They did NOT recommend that I bring the car in to be checked, or that there was any reason for concern, or that I should even check the color of the transmission fluid (I will refer to this later). Over the next two winters, there were few truly frigid mornings during which this behavior exhibited itself. Thus, trusting the advice of Toyota’s service department, I ignored it on the few mornings it occurred. (This only happened in the morning when the car was completely cold, never at the end of the day.) Additionally, the car exhibited no other unusual behavior during this time. Then this past winter, my car started exhibiting other odd behaviors that seemed to point to the transmission. The gear slippage worsened - it would occasionally be slow in switching between gears, typically from second to third. I started hearing a high-pitched whine that rose in pitch as I accelerated. I finally brought my car into Sloane Toyota to have it checked; they said my transmission was shot, and that it would cost $5000 to replace it. Sloane said they would not cover the replacement because my new transmission’s warranty had expired. I pointed out that I had experienced and reported unusual behavior earlier on, and that they never told me to bring it in. I also pointed out that it seemed quite clear that my more recent gear slippage was a worsening of the original problem on cold mornings, and thus an inherent problem in the new transmission they had installed in 2005. I said that this all could have been avoided if they had advised me to bring it in rather than assuring me that the symptoms I had experienced were “normal”. I pointed out that I did not bring it in because I was not advised to do so by their own service department – I had relied on their advice. I spoke with the service manager, Jim Nagle, on several occasions, trying to convince him of this, and thus that Toyota had some responsibility in the matter due to their poor advice of his own service department, but he remained firm on this position. I also issued a complaint through Toyota Customer Service and spoke with a regional service manager, Larry Roberts. He indicated that the original problem of not switching from first to second gear on cold mornings was a “safety feature” to prevent stressing the transmission, and that the new problems I was experiencing were completely separate and unrelated. For a second expert opinion, I then took my car to a very reputable and highly-recommended local transmission shop near me, who indicated that the transmission was a mess, that whatever was wrong had been building up for several years (i.e., since before the warranty expired). They said they found many “chunks of metal” in the transmission fluid and that the filter was completely clogged. The fluid was black rather than the usual clear color. They didn’t think it would last more than a few months. I explained the entire history of my transmission and my dealings with Toyota. They pointed out that Sienna minivans have a history of bad transmissions from the late 1990s through the early 2000s, and that my initial transmission replacement was one of many that Toyota quietly did under warranty. I described the “safety feature” concept, and he said it was complete and utter nonsense - that in all his years of transmission repair of Toyotas other cars, there was no such safety feature. Obviously, Mr. Roberts was lying in order to get me off his back, something I seriously resent and am deeply offended by as a Toyota customer. I called Mr. Roberts back to tell him this, and asked him for proof of such a safety feature. He ignored my request and became very gruff, hostile, and non-responsive. My trans shop replaced my clogged transmission filter and refilled the fluid, to at least give my car some short-term life. Their cost to replace the transmission is *only* $2500 (not surprisingly half of the dealer’s price). It surprises and distresses me that Toyota will not stand by their cars in this situation. Certainly, a new transmission should last more than a couple of years, especially on a Toyota! Here are the points I was hoping would convince Toyota to take responsibility in this matter: · Pat’s Transmissions expertly diagnosed how badly my transmission was damaged, compared to how relatively new it was. · The extent of damage points to the certainty that problems started very early on, related to my original problem of gear shifting on cold mornings. I would even suggest that the ‘new’ transmission Sloane Toyota installed was a ‘lemon’, i.e., faulty right from the start. · Sloane Toyota’s service department gave me poor and erroneous advice that the original symptoms I was experiencing were “normal”; moreover, they did *not* recommend that I bring my car in to have it checked while it was still under warranty. · There is a known history of Sienna transmission problems in the timeframe of when my car was manufactured. I have had two bad transmissions in my car over the span of only five years! · As a manufacturer of high-quality cars, Toyota should be expected to stand behind their products. Transmissions should not fail after such a short time, regardless of the arbitrary one-year warranty.