Chapter One

 

Introduction

German cars among worst for engine failures—

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Many Americans tend to have a romantic attraction for  German engineered cars. They flaunt them like the husband parades his trophy wife. They wax and polish them and want others to see them driving an expensive German luxury vehicle.

 

Vehicles such as BMW, Mercedes, Porsche and Audi carry a reputation for fine design and craftsmanship. But when you look beyond the high price tag and the racy commercials, do these vehicles actually live up to their notoriety? In my humble opinion, they don’t. In fact, many German automakers are living on the fumes of the past.

 

It has the heart of a BMW M5, the bones of an Audi RS 6 and the foul breath of a Seat Alhambra. No, this isn’t one of Jeremy Clarkson’s cheese-fuelled nightmares but a “Franken-car” assembled from the beastly parts of the world’s most unreliable vehicles.

 

Warranty Direct, a third-party warranty provider, ana-lyzed the data from 50,000 insurance policies to create its reliability index, which highlights the worst-per-forming cars in terms of mechanical reliability.

 

The Franken-car is a horrific amalgamation of unreliable components, including the engine of a BMW M5 made between 2004 and 2011, the axle and suspension from an Audi RS 6 (2002-11), the gearbox from a Jeep Grand Cherokee (2006-11) and the air-conditioning system from a Seat Alhambra (1996-2010).

 

According to Warranty Direct, its reliability index asses-ses the trustworthiness of vehicles by combining fre-quency of failure, average cost of repair, vehicle age and mileage. David Gerrans, the managing director, said: “This large variety of vehicles that goes into the concoction proves how typically reliable cars can be dragged down by one poorly performing part.”

 

Audi, BMW and VW ranked in the bottom ten of a study into engine reliability. German-made cars are not as reliable as many believe, according to new research by Warranty Direct.  Warranty Direct’s claims data shows that Audi, BMW and Volkswagen all finished in the bottom 10 out of a total of 36 automakers.  In fact, the only auto manufacturer whose cars had a worse engine failure rate than Audi was MG Rover. Mini wasn’t much better, finishing third from bottom, while its parent company BMW came seventh from bottom. And, despite its reputation for rock-solid reliability, Volkswagen came ninth from last. Mercedes managed to outperform its fellow German brands with a respectable third-place finish.

 

Duncan McClure, Warranty Direct Managing Director, said that engine failures are the worst for motorists as they’re the repairs that can lead to the highest costs because of the parts and hours of labor required to fix them: “The number of failures may be low compared to areas such as axle and suspension damage but engine repairs almost always result in costs reaching the thousands for motorists who aren’t covered by a warranty.”

 

Good Engineering Practices

 

There is no generally accepted definition of “Good Engineering Practices.”  It varies from industry to Indus-try. However, in general, good engineering includes the life cycle of the product (durability), safety and health ramifications and performance.  The consensus of good engineering is:

 

1. Good performance;
2. Reliability;
3. Inexpensive maintenance; and
4. Safety.

 

Most German cars have good performance in terms of acceleration, handling and braking.  The reliability of German vehicles has been on the decline, according to Consumer Reports and other testing organizations.  Maintenance of German motor vehicles has always been expensive.  MyMechanic found that BMW was the most expensive car to maintain by far, with Mercedes in second place.

 

The Porsche has been more reliable that most of the German vehicles. However, and this is a big however, Porsches are the most deadly cars on the road.

 

Overall, German cars are not reliable and are extremely expensive to maintain.  Further, German cars are behind American and Japanese cars in electronics.  Concerning electric vehicles, which will be the vehicles of the future, German auto companies are far behind American upstart Tesla.

 

Tesla in the Rear-View Mirror

 

“German automakers must invest more in electric ve-hicles and take on Elon Musk’s Tesla Inc.,” said Chan-cellor Angela Merkel’s chief of staff Peter Altmaier. Altmeier has been Chief of Staff of the German Chancel-lery and as Federal Minister for Special Affairs since December 2013. Previously he was Federal Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Saf-ety from May 2012 to December 2013. Altmaier is widely seen as one of Chancellor Angela Merkel's most trusted advisors

 

Peter Altmaier said he was thoroughly disappointed by German auto executives following the diesel-emissions...Continue Reading