German Muscle vs. Japanese Hustle (335i vs IS350)

[Mike Lowrey]

He is right. Nice try but he is right

Actually, I do not agree. I have an alternate theory. One that does not include the conspirasy of making recyclable cars.

Many auto makers are going to synthetic oils and extended service lengths. Is this for the better? No. Cars are recyclable now. If you truly wait 15,000 miles between oil changes you are doing damage to your engine. It DOES NOT last that long.

Actually synthetic oil WILL last that long, but regular oil will not. As the lubrication in the engine improves you should be able to go longer intervals before changing the oil. This is provided that the addatives also last long enough, and the filtering of the oil is efficient enough.

Most automakers have "lifetime" tranny fluid and diff fluid. "Lifetime" is the life of the car. Not your lifetime. If you drive your car and never change your auto tranny fluid it will break prematurely. Funny how a 1988 535i with automatic and 300,000 miles still works great.(BMW used to say change ever 30,000 miles) 2002 540i the automatic will fail between 100,000 and 120,000 miles. Only thing changed is the fluid is "lifetime" and the dealer wont even change it.

BMW uses plastic end caps on radiators. They have for 30 years. They break every 80,000 miles. They know they break. Why not make them out of aluminum? Then they won't break.

All the rubber bushings. You could use Urethane(70a) and it is only marginally stiffer(most people would never notice) and then never replace rubber bushings. Why don't they do this?

How come my 1989 325i all the interior plastic is perfect. Nothing chipped or broken or damaged. My Mom's 2001 e430 Sport Mercedes breaks interior pieces all the time.

You go to a dealer and a brand new lexus/bmw/nissan/benz all have cheaper and cheaper plastics yet the cars price inflates. Why? Because they are putting electonics in and extra bullshit. He is right. My e30 runs on 1 o2 sensor and got 34 mpg on the highway. 2.5L I-6. My m3 has FOUR of them and gets 26 if it is lucky. It has 2 cats, 2 resonators and a huge muffler. All new cars do this. It is more stuff to fail and means instead of one 100 dollar 02 I need 4 of them.

My old boss was an engineer for Mercedes Benz in Germany. Engines/trans etc they want to last. That in the mind of "most" customers is the biggest thing. Will it start and run. Past that they made parts to last a certain length of time and to a certain point. BMW and Benz used to make parts 2x where the value of X was the strength the part needed to be. Now BMW and Benz make it 1x. Thus more failures.

Sorry pal but this is just how it is. Even on a camry and accord. New ones have more stupid pointless failures then any of the old ones did. The cars that are simply cars "built to last" they put in more and more bullshit.

So it is all a conspirasy then? Nice try.

Years ago the manufacturing process was not able to achieve the tight tolerances that they are able to meet today. What does that mean? You don't have to figure in a extremely large factor of safety in when designing the components, just to overcome the manufacturing defficiencies. You are able to use a smaller factor of safety, which saves both money and weight.

You say there are more and more plastics?! Yes, they are light-weight and cheap. Years ago they were not able to manufacture the complex shapes required for certaint parts on the car, and they were also not able to hold the tight tolerances needed. Due to advancements in these areas, plastics are able to be more widely used. Why? Because they are light and cheap. You want good gass milage while having a powerful car? You then need to have that car be a light as possible.

Oh, and your arguement on the O2 sensors? Talk to the government, not the auto makers. As the requirements for cleaner and cleaner emmissions increases, you will have things like this. You used to be able to get away with 1 O2 sensor, and 1 CAT. Now you need to have a CAT as close to the exhaust manifold as possible to heat up quickly, for clean emmissions upon startup and then you need one down-stream for further emmissions requirements. You also need an O2 sensor to make sure the CAT is functioning.

It is much simpler than the consiracy theory that you propose.