Has car manufacturing quality gone downhill or is it just me?

[TechMinerUK]

Pattern/third party parts are very hit and miss recently, even supposedly decent suppliers.

You must be luckier than me as I've never had great luck with pattern parts, they were always fine in a pinch but they quality was always lackluster (Maybe mine were just dodgy)

 

[dlockers]

Main thing with Vauxhall was at least GM made solid engines. Most of them were best in class in the hot hatch wars. Just a shame they couldn't do the same with gearboxes.

The same with Peugeot. When I was at 6th form and college in the early 2000's. The 205,306,106 were the cars to have. Peugeot 405's were tanks that you could run forever on Kebab waste oil.

I remember the 306 diesel being an absolute stalwart of solid banger that could be tuned very easily for some fun. I imagine all of these have rusted into nothing though.

 

[fez]

I would say that with the increasing complexity of all the electronic systems on a car, everything else has suffered as a result to keep costs low but that would only make sense if cars hadn't gone up in price a ridiculous amount in the past decade.

 

[Nasher]

Quality went down, profits went up. Same with almost everything now.

Annoyingly people are much bigger mugs than they used to be.

 

[TechMinerUK]

Quality went down, profits went up. Same with almost everything now.

Annoyingly people are much bigger mugs than they used to be.

The ensh*@fication affecting cars among other services

 

[BUDFORCE]

Annoyingly people are much bigger mugs than they used to be.

You only have to look at some of the threads on these forums.

 

[fez]

Quality went down, profits went up. Same with almost everything now.

Annoyingly people are much bigger mugs than they used to be.

Everyone is used to having things on the tick or paying monthly for so much that they don't bat an eyelid at spending hundreds a month on a car. Impresses their mates for 3s as well which is well worth it.

 

[fez]

There should 100% be more consumer protections on cars. If a non consumable part has a failure rate that is above a certain percentage, manufacturers should be forced to replace it free of change within a reasonable window.

 

[Terminal_Boy]

I remember the 306 diesel being an absolute stalwart of solid banger that could be tuned very easily for some fun. I imagine all of these have rusted into nothing though.

Not in the parts in France where roads aren’t salted in the winter. 40°C summers mean that a lot of surviving examples will have sun-faded and blistered paint though.

 

[lordrobs]

I don't think rust was ever a big problem for the 306 anyway.

Really liked my 306 even though it was a lowly 1.4. It was way more reliable than the Octavia vRS that replaced it and on a twisty country lane probably quite a bit more fun as well. Certainly taught the importance of conservation of momentum