People are stupid.

[Nowhere]

On topic: 6 year old Megane, 50 000 driven.
No real problems at all (level of gasoline was freaking out when car was left on sun in the summer (first summer of the car), so whole thing in front of driver diplaying things was replaced (innards also); and some modification to brakes made at some point "just in case" to all meganes)

[bsdgeek]

Feh. Have you DRIVEN a Ford passenger car lately? Or GM? Or Chrysler, even - although their merger with Mercedes is FINALLY producing results...

I was forced, 2 years ago, to rent a car while my BMW was having body work done. (Julie spun out on ice, managed to divert into a ditch instead of traffic! Woo!)

The first was a Dodge Stratus. It had 20k on it... and I thought I'd die. Literally. It was horrifying. Granted it was a rental, but it was BAD. The car LOOKED nice, everything inside was shiny, but it ran like ass and shuddered and shook. Essentially the entire suspension was BEAT after 20k.

Then just last year I rented a Ford Taurus. It was brand new. I was the second person to rent it. 300 miles on the odometer. It was... tolerable. It was, after all, a new car. But it still felt like driving a Taurus, and I saw no indication that it was built any better than the LAST Taurus I drove.

My Aunt bought a Chevy Malibu (yeah the uber-compact reissue). Urk! Horrible little shitbox. No idea why she bought it, she ended up trading it in a year later.

I've driven Ford derivatives, pretty much each version of the Lincoln Town Car since 1984. My grandparents liked what they had the first time and stuck to it. They never had any major problems and kept each car for several years, holding on to one of a pair of 84s until about 2000 - and giving it to my dad. Town Cars were always smooth, but the engine did seem to get smaller with each generation. That's my only gripe.

Plus on the other side, I've driven Hondas and Subarus. They worked but didn't exactly blow me away, you know, like they would totally own an equivalently priced Detroit machine.

But passenger cars? Feh.

And the JD Power ratings? Useless, in my opinion. They consistently gave an easy-to-fix, cheap-to-repair BMW 3-series (E36, so I'm talking 1999 and older) an absurdly low rating, JUST because it was a German marque. JD Powers is astonishingly biased.

I'm not sure what else I could reference? The problem is that we could both continue coming up with anecdotal evidence for both sides, so if you know of any better ratings...

Has Detroit gotten better? Sure. Just not better enough to justify the pricetag.

That's the thing, they're all priced more or less equivalently to their imported counterparts.
For the price of a Honda Accord or Toyota Camry you could get a Pontiac G6, Chevy Cobalt or Malibu for the upper price range.

For an Avalon you could have a Buick Lacrosse, Dodge Charger (!), Magnum, Chevy Malibu Maxx, Impala.

GM can match or beat most, if not all, other makes in all price ranges. Mopar has some really good deals from $20k - $40k, I didn't even realize how good until just now.

I'll be honest with you, I've never cared for Ford either, except for having a soft spot for Lincoln. Their cars just don't appeal to me. I didn't bother looking into their models as such.

Also, I just looked at your link. Did you look at the "problems per 100 cars" chart? Note that GMC is the ONLY American maker ABOVE the industry average? Ford was WELL below. EEp!

Most of the GM brands and Lincoln were above average on the link. Hummer is better than Honda!

And American SPORTS CARS have always been something special.

Now American TRUCKS... nothing beats 'em.

That's all I wanted to hear.

[Nowhere]

Now American TRUCKS... nothing beats 'em.

Unimog!

[Jon P. Inghram]

Ugh, the Focus they sell in the US is, to put it politely, a festering pile of whale vomit. My parents make the terrible mistake of buying one: ignoring the large number of recalls and various mechanical problems, the interior finish quality alone makes the VW Beetle we had when I was a kid look like a Rolls Royce. For example, the plastic trim near the bottom of the center console appears to have been delibriately engineered to remove large areas of skin from your legs unless you wear kevlar pants.

[GT98]

Ugh, the Focus they sell in the US is, to put it politely, a festering pile of whale vomit. My parents make the terrible mistake of buying one: ignoring the large number of recalls and various mechanical problems, the interior finish quality alone makes the VW Beetle we had when I was a kid look like a Rolls Royce. For example, the plastic trim near the bottom of the center console appears to have been delibriately engineered to remove large areas of skin from your legs unless you wear kevlar pants.

What the heck are you doing with your legs? I've never had a problem with mine! LOL

[Fluff]

Gurm, the Focus over here is WAY more expensive. Did they release the RS in the states?

http://www.rsportscars.com/eng/cars/focus_rs.asp

[GT98]

Gurm, the Focus over here is WAY more expensive. Did they release the RS in the states?

http://www.rsportscars.com/eng/cars/focus_rs.asp

No becasue it would endanger the Mustang...

We had version of the Focus ST170 called the SVT Focus (the car I own), but they quit building here in 2004.

[gt40]

Ford rules.
anybody who says otherwise will have to come face to face to argue the point.
and I'm not biased, my first vehicle was a Chevy, and I still own one now.

[agallag]

I've never understood why tall people say they only fit in full-size american cars. I've tried several american cars, and while they're big on the outside, and have huge trunks, the passenger area has always been too tight for me. Even the big Caprices and such, I could never get comfortable. Tjalfe, you should seriously try out the Mazda6. I know, it's pretty much a ford, but it was designed by the Japanese, and they did a remarkable job. It's too big for my taste, but I think you'd like it.

The cars I've owned (at 6'6" remember), in order:

1991 Isuzu Impulse - headroom was iffy, but plenty of legroom up front. Tiny little sportscar. No room in the rear for adults. Handling was unreal. Could've used more power.

1998 Mazda Protege - Piles of room for front and rear passengers, big trunk, decent performace, from a sub-compact economy sedan.

2000 Mazda Protege - Even better than the 1998 model. First car I ever fit comfortably in that had a sun roof. Still had a couple inches of clearance overhead, plenty of legroom up front, and I could actually sit comfortably in the back seat with the front seat also adjusted for me. I think there was some sort of space-time distortion in that car, because the inside was way bigger than the outside. Freaky.

1998 Honda Accord. Not as good as the Proteges for interior space, but it had a bigger trunk. Decent engine, but handled like a Buick. Folding rear seat was one piece, so I couldn't get three people plus snowboards inside. That purchase was a mistake...

2005 Mazda 3 hatchback. Front seat room is best yet, but it sacrifices a little rear seat room to get the front seat to slide back so far. Hatchback more than makes up for that. It's also the best performing car to date.