2007 Toyota Tundra SR5 from North America - Off Topic Comments

19:31, the problem you describe about your friend's F-150 sounds very similar to an issue I have read about a countless number of times regarding new Camrys. Your friend would be wise to stick with the domestics, a Toyota will surely let him down as well, but with a larger sticker price.

Well, shouldn't a 40,000 dollar car have better quality than a Civic? About time!!!

The plain & simple fact of the matter when it comes down to it, is that Toyota is always the safer & better buy. (There are) no 2 ways about it. Domestic fans on here want us to explain why we love our Toyota. However, shouldn't we be the ones asking the domestic fans why they are so enamored with junk? So why do you domestic fans love your garbage cans you call "vehicles" so much?

Many attribute escalating oil prices for current Toyota sales. I feel they are overpriced, and then reading that they are the most profitable vehicle in America does not change that viewpoint in my opinion. I'd rather spend and get more features and twice the warranty.

I drive and purchase styling, features, performance, handling, comfort and better warranty with domestics as of 2007.

What is a safer buy? If you have to give up mechanical quality and any of the aforementioned points, is saving a few bucks per tank worth it? When repair time comes and it costs thousands, it is it no longer defined an economy car? I would rather have a straightforward comfortable domestic sedan than a Prius for example, which is just out of warranty down the road. It will be curious to see how this vehicles batteries, electronics endure long term.

I'll take a new domestic gas V8... drive to 100,000 miles and get over 20 mpg until its warranty expires rather than buying 2 imports to get the same warranty.

14:54, Uhh, no. That's kind of the whole point. See, the proof is that if he'd bought my Tacoma, which has been perfect for 10 years, then he WOULDN'T have wasted $80,000 combined on three or four domestics that never did run right and couldn't stay out of the repair shops. Beyond all of these pointless comments and opinions, he now knows that through real life experience, as most Toyota owners do.

Early in life, before we know any better, a lot of us bought Ford's and Chevy's because they are more inexpensive. So it would appear, until the repair bills started rolling in and we learned just to pay a little more for a reliable vehicle in the first place and drive trouble-free. Never-mind all of the stories where people say they've had all kinds of trouble with Toyota's and their Fords were perfect.

11:10 I'm not sure what you tried to accomplish there, but it didn't work out. Citing EPA fuel estimates (which Ford cars most always fall well short of) backs up my case. From that viewpoint, the Corolla is head and shoulders above everything you named.

You calling the Milan luxurious was pretty good though. Is it a couch? The new Ford Taurus is nothing more than a renamed Ford 500, renamed because nobody wanted a 500. So now they've renamed it after one of their many problem ridden, discontinued cars. Good move there.

Those of us old enough to remember the first generation of Taurus' try not to drive too close to them in traffic for fear of parts flying off.

The Camry is the best selling car in the United States, and the Corolla is the best selling nameplate of all time worldwide, whereas Ford just makes one mistake after another and discontinues them due to poor sales and hopefully embarrassment.

The new Silverado is safer in a crash test (5 STARS) than Toyotas trucks if you are concerned about safety...

In regards to the comments about saving some bucks buying domestic vehicles, well first of all, you aren't really saving a chunk of change to start with. For example, the new Taurus is $23,000-30,000. The New Malibu, which is clearly aimed at taking on Camry is $19,000-29,000. The Camry is $18,500- $28,000. So in reality, the Camry is actually less than the other two domestics.

As far as truck go, well the new low end Silverado starts at $17,175. The Ford F-150 starts at $18,275. The Tundra starts at $22,290. So indeed- the Tundra is 4k more. But as someone pointed out earlier, the fact that the Tundra will likely be higher in long term quality would automatically save way more than that extra 4k down the road.

Lastly, the days of big honkin' trucks- either foreign or domestic- are numbered anyway. If you watch the news, the fuel consumption in China, India, and the rest of the developing world is eclipsing the US and will continue to do so. 20MPG is going to seem an awful lot like 8MPG in the next 2 years if it isn't already. As it stands today, gas is over $3 a gallon. It costs me over $30 to fill my small Tacoma's 12 gallon tank, and it gets around 30MPG. I can only imagine how much someone with a huge F-250 must be shelling out every week to keep those monsters running.

Big trucks and SUVs are still to this day the breadwinners for Ford and GM. Despite making a good attempt to make these large trucks more fuel efficient, they are going to continue losing market share simply because the loyal fans who've been insistent on driving unnecessarily large vehicles will soon quite simply be unable to afford to keep them running. Folks- we are eventually going to catch up to Europe and have ever higher gas prices. People need to really start asking themselves if that huge truck they're eying is really that great a thing for their budgets when it costs over $150 to fill up.

That's really what this all boils down to anyway. Age-old arguments of whether to buy a Ford, Chevy, and now Toyota will be less and less about whether it is made in the good ole' USA or Japan and more about whether it gets good fuel economy. As anyone can see watching the stock market, we are quite possibly heading into a recession. Americans want good, reliable, fuel efficient, cost effective cars and trucks. It is times like this that innovation becomes imperative for companies entering challenging times. I'm less and less about where something is made or what the badge says. I'm truthfully interested in what the product can do and how it can help me save money.

I spend about $200 week on gas; however, my full-sized domestic makes money, as do many other professional contractors. Homeowners have a different set of needs that are quite limited (in my opinion). Saving gas is great, but not having capabilities is a hindrance. Trucks are the best selling vehicles in America, not cars; you must lose the car mentality.

18:40 Toyota's factory warranty on the batteries and electrical system is 10 years, which is a lot longer than the 100,000 mile warranty on a domestic, unless you only drive 10,000 miles a year, and most people drive nearly double that.

Also, there's no way a Ford or Chevy V-8 is getting 20 mpg (which isn't very good anyway). Not unless you live right next to a freeway and that's all you ever drive on, with the truck empty, and a very light foot.

The larger V-8 in the Ford F-150 has a sticker with the EPA estimate of TEN!! miles to the gallon on it. My 1993 Toyota Tercel, with technology now 14 years old, got 38 mpg with me driving it like a racecar, and Ford and GM STILL don't make anything that can do that. And no, the Aveo won't do it either.

I agree with 10:15's statement. However, GM and Ford might possibly lose market share from where they stand, but in thinking that way, you must also realize that the Tundra is a big ol' honkin' truck also, with similar EPA standings.

If people will cease to purchase trucks, yes the domestics will lose market share, but Toyota will never gain it also.

I am making this statement EXCLUDING any reliability remarks, because in my mind these vehicles are equals. Focusing just on gas, ALL will lose.

I don't think it is exactly beneficial to deny the fact that while gas prices are high, they're bound to get even higher. In many parts of Europe, gas costs around $5 A LITER. I don't think it is entirely out of the question that gas could potentially be $5-$6 a gallon or more by the end of the decade.

I understand that there are people that depend on large trucks for their work. That said, something like 70% of the large trucks and SUVs are bought strictly for pleasure or as grocery-getters. If it eventually costs over $100 every single fillup, then people will stop buying large trucks regardless of brand. This goes for contractors too. If you're making the average contractor income, which is anywhere from 35-65k, then spending several hundred dollars a week just to keep the tank filled is going to eat up some serious income. That and the national housing market is crashing which means less work on top of all that to boot. I myself make well into a six figure income and even for me, I can't imagine paying what it must cost to fuel a full size truck these days.

I think it is safe to say that GM and Ford are still way too reliant on large SUV and truck sales. The writing is on the wall, which they're well aware of. The problem is that they ignored the car market for too long and produced really crappy cars more as fillers than anything competitive. Even if the new Taurus (re badged 500) or Malibu are actually better quality, they still have a lot of people to convince who got burned by their products earlier. Time will tell.

Hopefully, cars and trucks that run on things like high efficiency Diesel engines, ethanol - and perhaps even hydrogen will become realities because as it stands now, the cars and trucks on the market aren't acceptable in terms of what is inevitable in terms of gas prices.

16:13 if Toyota warranties the drivetrain the same as the electronics... as they are claimed to be perfect by some reviewers I will buy one.

Consumer reports started publishing in 1936, which was a good 30+ years before Japanese cars were even sold in any large quantity in the US. To say that somehow or another, Consumer Reports must surely be the evil snaked-tongued mouthpiece of the Japanese auto industry and their evil job-robbing plight against all those hard-working union autoworkers is kind of silly. The fact of the matter is that in 1996, Consumer reports was involved in a lawsuit not with a domestic auto manufacture, but Isuzu.

Now I'm sure that there some people who think that the world would be perfect if the only cars allowed in the US were American-made and that we, as dutiful, patriotic citizens owe it to our countrymen to buy nothing, but US-made goods. But unfortunately, that's not how capitalism or free trade works. If we were as such, then we'd be more of a socialist country. Think about cold war era China and Russia and how they only cars and trucks you could buy were poorly made, state-owned vehicles that barely functioned. The fact that there was zero competition meant that there was no pressure to improve the product.

If the US had kept this policy, then we would still probably be driving huge clunky cast iron engined cars that lasted 50,000 miles or less. Look at it this way- Yes- US branded cars have improved a lot in the last 20 years. If you can recall back in the 80's, the difference between Japanese and American cars was embarrassingly huge. The engineering, quality, and reliability of Japanese cars was literally YEARS ahead of the American cars of that time period. It was this kind of competition that made US brand cars better and better. The difference between domestic and import brands is drastically more narrow.

If the US had not gotten this pressure, the quality would not be at the level that it is today. The same can be said for everything we buy. Sooner or later China will start selling cars here as well, at huge discounted prices- just like the Japanese did back in the 70's. It will start the cycle all over again and likely lead to even more innovation.

This is the benefit of having a free trade society. You as the consumer have the ability to choose from the best products. The product that sells well is either priced well or of better quality. Free market forces are probably the best way to get answers to what products are more reliable and better built.

Besides, most vehicles are composed of so many internationally sourced parts, that the only thing remaining of their national origin is the name. We are in an international economy where brands from every country are everywhere. Embrace it.

10:26 Exactly. Toyota's sold cars for years, and at a higher sticker price than the Big 3, yet outsells them in the car market.

Common sense should be enough for anybody to figure out why. They make a better product.

GM and Ford cars are cheaper, that's a fact. If they were also BETTER, they would with no doubt outsell Toyota cars, but they don't. People are willing to pay more for a car that is built better and will last longer.

And their trucks are just as good. The U.S. truck market will be a tough nut to crack, only because people have been in the habit of buying trucks from the Big 3 for decades, whether they were good or bad, but just as Americans got tired of buying junk cars from the big 3, the same will likely happen with the truck market in years to come.