2002 Toyota Tundra SR5 from North America - All Comments

!0:24 it would be nice when you use the word "proof" would be to indicate how many full size trucks you have personally owned new or used.

The heading of this review is full size trucks. I will indicate on my comments that I have and currently own full size trucks (not a car... not a little truck). It would also be nice to read exact commenter applications and why you selected what full size truck when you make your unconditional recommendations.

I also feel its helpful to indicate (especially full sizes) whether you bought it new or used, and know its complete current or prior history.

I always buy new, and another comment I will make is if you special order any vehicle, to test drive one exactly as ordered. The consumer guides do not thoroughly cover headrooms, all applications on your full size truck. It's best to get out there, and I have learned by owning several new trucks what works application and feature, benefit wise. That is why I read on my specific category hoping to learn even more not on little cars and trucks. It's so generalized on here not even specific to the exact vehicle under review. Maybe a few others feel the same on here as well.

"Like I've told many people, I've owned nothing but Toyotas and have had no problems"

How can anyone have any OBJECTIVE view of any product, especially an automobile, if they HAVE NEVER OWNED ONE?? If you have never owned a domestic, how can you POSSIBLY state with a straight face that they are "better". That is like saying "All I've ever eaten is chocolate ice cream, but I KNOW it is better!! If all you have ever owned is Toyota, then OF COURSE the "best car" you ever owned would be a Toyota!!

We've owned Ford, Chevy, Dodge, Plymouth, Pontiac, GMC, BMW, Mercedes, Toyota, Honda, Mazda and VW. Not a one of our Big Three vehicles ever had a problem, including many we drove over 200,000 miles. Not a single Japanese car made 100,000 miles without MANY repairs. Sorry, but with our country in major financial distress you'll have to excuse me if I don't rush out and start sending my car-buying dollars to Japan.

"To that end, it is quite a significant testimony against Consumer Reports' "methods" that I and others who have commented here have had vehicles rated as "much worse than average" by Consumer Reports that have been absolutely trouble free, while friends of mine have had vehicles (Toyota's) rated as "much better than average" that have been woefully unreliable. Likewise, I also have to wonder why I see so many Toyota's broken down on the side of the road. Consumer Reports themselves even had to admit they botched the ratings of the 2007 Toyota's. I would argue they botched a lot more than the 2007's, based on my personal experience, and the countless problems we have seen on Consumer Affairs and this site."

Very true. Over the years we have owned a number of "worse than average" or "much worse than average" vehicles. One of these made over 300,000 miles with virtually no problems. One made 277,000 miles with ZERO problems, and one made 240,000 miles with two timing belts and one heater hose replaced.

The worst nightmares we had were a Mazda (that was built in Japan before Ford took over and improved the quality) and a (Heaven forbid!!) HONDA CIVIC!!

We currently own an 8-year old and 6-year-old GM vehicle, neither of which has had a single issue beyond one burned out light bulb. We also own a 2006 and 2007 Ford and they are both flawless. I'm a mechanic and do all my own servicing and any repairs required (which on domestics has been virtually ZERO). The two worst built cars I have ever worked on were the much-ballyhooed Honda and Mazda.

Your observations about Consumer Reports are certainly very appropriate. I found it VERY INTERESTING that in the October 2007 issue of CR they did a story on "Long Lasting Vehicles". On the COVER was a picture of (what else??) a HONDA CIVIC!! Ironically in the ACTUAL ARTICLE it turned out the Civic had the LOWEST mileage of any vehicle in the entire article. The one with the HIGHEST MILEAGE was a FORD!!! (with 488,000 miles). No doubt many people glanced at the COVER and saw a Civic under a headline about "high mileage cars") and were misled. This is VERY typical of so many publications. I also noticed that under the title "The Best and Worst Cars of 2009" CR very prominently displayed a FORD FUSION (which has their HIGHEST rating) directly under the word "Worst". This sort of thing is very misleading, and I think 100% deliberate.

When it comes to broken down cars on the side of the road, I drive 20 miles one-way to my office on the freeway, and over the course of the past 20 years I've seen AT LEAST 20 times more Japanese vehicles than domestics waiting to be towed. Just yesterday on a THREE MILE STRETCH I saw 2: A Nissan Maxima and a Toyota Camry. I honestly can't remember the last time I saw a broken down domestic.

10:24 Thanks for reciting the facts (again) that the domestic owners seem to overlook. "The best vehicles are built by Toyota, Honda, and Subaru". That is correct, and it is fact. It is also a fact that Ford scores near the bottom, or at least in the bottom third. If you want a vehicle that rates low because it isn't built well enough to GET a better rating, buy a Ford. If you want an even crappier one than that, buy a Chevy or a Dodge. If you want the best, buy a Toyota or a Honda. I rest my case.

Of course, one comment from some anonymous Ford owner with claims of high mileage and no repairs on a Ford will change those facts... (laughing).

Why doesn't anyone give credit to the Crown Victoria/Grand Marquis/Town Car? They are some of the most reliable and durable vehicles produced. It's no wonder people have problems with most domestic and foreign vehicles, most of them are built the same way: uni-body, front-wheel drive, with overstressed 4 cylinder engines.

GM and Chrysler really started building junk when they dropped their body-on-frame, RWD cars, at least Ford kept them around. The Crown Vic and its sister cars have been tried and true over and over again. When NYC tried to switch to hybrid taxis, they couldn't hold up to the abuse the Vics could and they were doing horribly in safety tests. Oh yeah, and how many police departments use Honda's and Toyota's? Yeah didn't think so. That's because they know that junk won't hold up!

"It is a well known practice in Japanese industry to acquire the intellectual property of American companies to permit that technology to be sold in Japan, and then turn around and sell that same technology to Americans at a loss, making up the difference by inflating the prices of those items in their home markets, with the intend to put the American companies out of business. Name one major technological advance of any Japanese auto manufacturer in the 1980's through early 1990's. There are not any."

That's hardly what I'd call accurate. Sure - right after WW2, American companies offered patent technology to Japanese firms to help them rebuild their economy. But if you look under any hood of any Japanese car from the 70's - today, there's few similarities between them and their American-made counterparts. As far as "copying technology", that's a very vague term given that the four stroke engine was developed in 1854 by Otto in France and later configured into an automotive engine by Daimler Benz... hence in that respect, Henry Ford and other US carmakers did the same thing.

But the difference between Japanese and American engines is drastic, and especially in the 70's-90's time period. The Japanese government employed Edward Demmming, whom was an industrial designer and manufacturing specialist who ironically helped the US develop and manufacture war related items quicker, more efficiently, and with more quality control. He brought this same approach to Japanese firms who applied it to making cars. They used what is known as lean manufacturing where one plant could make numerous cars.

Another thing that Japanese car companies did was focus on making engines and drive trains simpler by eliminating unnecessary parts. This in turn made them more reliable. This was ironically what Henry Ford did with the model T, yet later abandoned in favor of competing with GM, where the approach was to slap the same aged drive train under a new body every year.

Lastly, the attention to quality was above average. Look at any Honda from the 70's. The parking brake cables are sheathed. Look at any American car from that era: No sheathing. It's not like you need it per say, but that one extra step is an example of how companies like Toyota took extra steps that ultimately meant better cars.

I can attest to this personally. My "other" car is a 1955 Mercury Monterey. Under the hood is a 1972 351 V8. Ford made variants of this engine from the 60's all the way up to the 90's. Parts will fit it from numerous decades. The engine is in comparison to the one in my 90's or even previous 80's Toyotas is crudely cast, continuously in need of proper maintenance, and unrefined. There is no comparison here, and if some are suggesting that Japanese car makers "copied" American engines from the same 70's-90's era, then that's a joke in itself.

I had Crown Vics as company cars and they were outstanding. Long distance, stop starting many times daily with decent mileage.

I now have a company SUV and I miss the Crown Vics. I rented a brand new one in Florida recently and was very pleased with it. I haven't seen any Camry police cars, taxis anywhere, wonder why?

I can highly recommend Crown Vics, Mercury Marquis. The only comment is it is sometimes perceived as a seniors car, as is the Camry I might add. Very nice to drive and I was getting high MPG on the digital dash. V8 with overdrive gets great mileage and I would much rather have that than high revving, noisy, rough riding compacts with 4 cylinders overtaxed and overworked.

18th Mar 2009, 12:59 - Yes, I don't see any Smart Cars or Mini's being used as Police Cars around these parts either!

21:04 Well, since our country IS in financial distress, and many of us feel it in our wallets personally, you'll have to excuse me for owning Toyota's because I know they're the most reliable and will cost me the least to own.

I have owned more than one of each of the Big 3's vehicles, and without a lot of money to spare, I'll proudly (and intelligently) buy and drive a vehicle that is made well enough that I won't have to dump my hard earned money into it to keep it running like I did with my Fords, GM's, and Dodges.

I LOVE these high mileage stories from domestic owners. GOTTA love em. Not only did they keep ALL 22 domestics they owned for 200,000 miles, none of them EVER needed repaired. Yeah, sure. The math doesn't even normally work out, which is what is the most funny. If you put on 20,000 miles a year, which is far above average, it'll take you TEN years to put on 200,000 miles. But all the Ford and Chevy owners on here seem to have done this with somewhere between 10 and 30 different domestic automobiles.

Yes, the Crown Vic and its Mercury stablemate are among the best cars on the planet. And of course no sane police department would use a Toyota or Honda. Drivers would laugh so hard they'd crash. No front drive car is really competent as a police pursuit vehicle (though some Impalas are used). Most all of the new police vehicles in our area now are Dodge Chargers. They have NO PROBLEM catching anyone. Now that Ford has dropped the Crown Vic, both the Dodge Charger and Pontiac G8 both seem very capable replacements.

All major sources (MSN, USA Today, Consumer Reports, J.D. Powers, Edmunds, and even the highly biased Car and Driver are now admitting that Ford has equaled Honda and surpassed Toyota in reliability. Of course I've known that for a VERY ling time. I've never seen a Toyota with half a million miles on it. That is not all that rare for Fords.

"GM and Chrysler really started building junk when they dropped their body-on-frame, RWD cars"

Don't the 300, Charger, and Challenger fit into that category?? I know I've seen dozens of Charger police interceptors. Minus the Crown Vic, Chrysler has been the company primarily responsible for the revival of the rear drive concept.

If the Japanese built body-on-frame rear wheel drive cars, it's doubtful that domestic governmental and quasi-governmental agencies would use them in any large numbers. In most areas there are enough people who feel that anything but domestic vehicles are unpatriotic that many governmental agencies don't include them in their fleets. Even county vehicles that don't get hard use are domestics.

In most of the places I've been police, fire, county, state, and federal vehicles are all domestics. Domestic manufacturers have offered pretty significant fleet discounts as well, so many rental fleets were domestically biased too.

These facts neither prove the value of domestics or imports. If you want to show that domestics are wonderful and imports are "junk", you'll have to do it some other way.

"We've owned Ford, Chevy, Dodge, Plymouth, Pontiac, GMC, BMW, Mercedes, Toyota, Honda, Mazda and VW. Not a one of our Big Three vehicles ever had a problem, including many we drove over 200,000 miles. Not a single Japanese car made 100,000 miles without MANY repairs."

We've owned Hondas, a Nissan, a Toyota, a Jeep, a Ford, Chevies, a Pontiac, a Saturn, and a Buick. The worst two were a Chevy Citation and a Honda Civic. Both were purchased used and had been (apparently) abused by their previous owners. Everything else has been reliable... imports or domestics. That's just my experience. Others may have different experiences.

Several things seem to be happening on here.

#1 People have a certain set of experiences that they think are universal. That viewpoint is myopic and lacks circumspection.

#2 They have some bad vehicles and think that reflects on the products of an entire region, rather than just on the product in question.

#3 Anyone who has the gall to cast doubt on the universal nature of their assertions is labelled "biased" or "brainwashed".

#4 If independent research doesn't affirm their experience, "the research must be flawed". These have been true of both sides of this debate (at times) so far.

I buy vehicles, not companies. I buy vehicles, not regions. I buy vehicles, not countries. The fact that my vehicles have been reliable, doesn't serve to prove that ALL the vehicles from the region or country in which they were made are reliable. No reasonable person can make that claim since even the manufacturers admit that some of their products turn out less reliable than others.

Right now, there may be an economic reason for purchasing domestically. It may be lessened by your viewpoint of unions, management or product planning. But from a strictly selfish standpoint, you'll likely be worse off if these big manufacturers fail. I don't want to overplay this or call anyone "unpatriotic" if they buy something else. But just remember that each and every purchase DOES matter.

Today I'd likely buy domestic products.

The Crown Vic and Grand Marquis are dinosaurs. The only reason Ford still makes them is for police cars and cab drivers.

19th Mar 2009, 08:15

""GM and Chrysler really started building junk when they dropped their body-on-frame, RWD cars"

Don't the 300, Charger, and Challenger fit into that category??"

No they do not - they may be rear wheel drive, but they are not body on frame. Virtually everything is uni-body nowadays.

17:11.

I work extensively with intellectual property, am an engineer and registered United States Patent agent. Japanese companies have historically required US companies to license their intellectual properties to Japanese companies as a condition for them being sold in Japan. I am not talking about right after WWII either; I am talking primarily about electronic components in recent years, for instance the notorious Japanese TV monopoly of the 1980's that you might have heard of, which (no disrespect to the Japanese people) is a notorious example of the disreputable trade practices Japanese "companies," with the aid of the Japanese government, have become famous for.

The following article sums this and many other issues pertinent to this matter very well:

http://www.uwsa.com/issues/trade/japanyes.html

I personally do not know how any American could read the preceding article and buy another Japanese product.

I will grant the Japanese that they developed many innovative manufacturing processes, including effective quality control methods, that deserve complement. But major "technological" developments, no. There simply aren't any as far as I am aware.