The more things change..."Unfair to compare"?

[2011G6E]

Originally Posted by SgtBourne

Ding, Ding, Ding, Ding!

People want a falcon that rivals a BMW 5 series, yet want it to cost as much as a Hyndai Getz

Not really.

They just want to know that when they pay 5 series prices, they get decent quality control and a bit of thought put into little features like even the cheapest and nastiest Asian cars have.

Letting manufacturers know that the general consensus amongst buyers is, apparently, "whatever they give us we'll be happy with, warts and all", is never going to give them the push to improve.
A company is, in the normal scheme of things, pushed to improve quality control and included features when buyers start purchasing the opposition product and thier profits start to drop. It sends them a message that "good enough" isn't going to cut the mustard any more. I've worked in industries where this has happened repeatedly. It appears though that the Australian car industry is a protected species (in more way than one), and is going to continue to be protected and subsidised, from which they will never learn the lesson that must be learned.

But seeing how car magazines from up to 30 years ago still raised that same question, I doubt anything is going to change soon. A start would be to say "No more import duties or tariffs, no more protection or subsidies, you're on your own...if your product equals or betters the competition for the price you charge, you'll survive...if not, you'll damn soon learn to improve things".

[stang65]

which Falcon is priced at the same price as a BMW 5 series?

[2011G6E]

Originally Posted by stang65

which Falcon is priced at the same price as a BMW 5 series?

Probably put that wrong, sorry.

The cars are pretty much equivelant. It's import duties and taxes that make the Beemer artificially more expensive. I meant to compare cars themselves instead of prices.

[DBourne]

Originally Posted by stang65

which Falcon is priced at the same price as a BMW 5 series?

Exactly what I thought..

If you paid 5 series prices for a Falcon, then you deserve whatever wool gets pulled over your eyes!

Keep in mind as has been said, we are a TINY market in the grand scheme of things, TINY!!

That means it costs manufacturers a lot per unit to make a decent car.

So whilst I'm sure Ford AUS would love to equip your falcon XT with rare amazonian rainforest woodgrain and swedish bum massagers in the seats with 400rwkw and 315mm wide rear tyres that cost $200 a corner to replace, you're just going to have to keep in mind it just isn't financially possible.

[stang65]

All good , I know we cop all the taxes and duties, but the goverment takes that, at the end of the day we can only base on the retail price.

as mentioned above.

If these duties and taxes weren`t there i would agree with you, However you are still comparing a car made for a small population in one country to a world car that is exported to many countries and selling hundreds of thousands more.

the more you sell the cheaper it is to make .... economics.

[last fairlane]

Stang says the more you make the cheaper it gets
well Shell BP and Caltex say the opposite
when its cold in Europe and they use more fuel over there
our price goes up
and in winter here we use more fuel
guess what our price goes up
so that argument doesnt hold up
in real life any way
thanks

[stang65]

You got to be kidding, your talking about petrol what are the similarities between that and mass producing a car?

Are you sure when it`s cold we use more fuel? I actually thought the thicker air meant we used less fuel as the air fuel ratio alters. i could be wrong though.

[Ben73]

I know what OP is getting at.
In some countries you can get BMW 5 series for about 50k AUD.

Basically why can't you compare a a Falcon to a 5er since they are worth about the same price in their respective home countries.
They should be competitors.

[stang65]

But we are talking about Australia so you need to compare their worth here.The Falcon is not a world car so how can you compare.

Don`t get me wrong Ford need to pick up their game, but then again so do Holden.

[DBourne]

What a shock that a fuel company would lie?! OMG!??!?!?!oneoneone.

Stang, when it is cold the air is more dense, so you can add more fuel, get more bang, more power. Now I'm not saying you're going to use 5L/100K more in winter, but you will use a bit more. (Also due to new found power you'll probably lay the boot in more... well at least I do)

[divine_afg]

Originally Posted by Ben73

I know what OP is getting at.
In some countries you can get BMW 5 series for about 50k AUD.

Basically why can't you compare a a Falcon to a 5er since they are worth about the same price in their respective home countries.
They should be competitors.

Poor Australian Motorist Paying 3x the price for same car.
Dad use to own 1999 BMW 5 Series. Thats over a decade old and Quality of
cars in australia can't match it. Forget Falcon, Fairlane and caprice can't. Some might say its a big claim but its true have a look at one.

Falcon is celebrating its 50th Anniversary, after fifty years you expect quality "fit and finish" to be second to none. I appreciate that these are
machines and they are bound to break and ware off but quality isn't there.

Purchase of a car is said to be the second biggest financial decision one would make after house. No car is perfect is and they all have flaws. As consumers we deserve quality when splashing 50k+- on a car.

Claims of we are small fish in the sea therefore can't survive in the ocean with sharks is becuase sharks have been kept at bay therefore fishes don't have any survival skills. Kept Happy in their comfort zone. Funny thing
is fishes are Holding everyone for ransom and getting empathy becuase they are small.

Cheers
H

[stang65]

Ok so end solution is end building Australian cars and rely on imports.
Bye Bye Jobs, so who gonna have cash to buy these cars and you think the goverment will drop duties and taxes...lol

In case you guys haven`t noticed we are an island in the middle of nowhere, we are a small market that nobody really gives 2 hoots about.

The fact that we even have car manufacturing here you should be proud of.

Boo hoo hoo, our Australian cars are over priced, they fall apart etc.
Like other manufacturers don`t have these problems.

[Polyal]

Which part of compare the budgets do people not understand?

[divine_afg]

Originally Posted by stang65

Ok so end solution is end building Australian cars and rely on imports.
Bye Bye Jobs, so who gonna have cash to buy these cars and you think the goverment will drop duties and taxes...lol

In case you guys haven`t noticed we are an island in the middle of nowhere, we are a small market that nobody really gives 2 hoots about.

The fact that we even have car manufacturing here you should be proud of.

Boo hoo hoo, our Australian cars are over priced, they fall apart etc.
Like other manufacturers don`t have these problems.

A different Perspective

How about Australian manufacturers up the ante and kick the imports out.

[stang65]

Yeah they could do that and charge $10,000 more.
They would want to stay profitable too.

Not directed at you divine, but too many people are turning a blind eye to the fact that volume makes things cheaper. Comparing a world car to a local car.

People on this forum know Ford Australia get a small budget compared to what other manufacturers get yet expect the cars to be better.

If i gave you $500,000 and said build a house and gave you mate $6,000,000 and told him to build a house who`s would be better.


Now if I ask the population of Australia to chip in $1 and I asked the population of the U.S to chip in a $1 who would give me more money.

People know why our quality isn`t as good as the imports, we don`t have the budget.It`s simple no manufacurer wants to run at a loss.

[Road_Warrior]

Originally Posted by divine_afg

A different Perspective

How about Australian manufacturers up the ante and kick the imports out.

unfortunately it will never happen and is practically impossible now, because Australian manufacturers cannot wield the economies of scale and the capital needed to perform such a task. Not only that, in the endless pursuit of profits, many manufacturers have gone offshore (Pacific Brands anyone?) to exploit cheap labour. We're talking about corporations that spend billions on products that Australian manufacturers may spend hundreds of millions on.

Then of course, we all whinge and moan about how Australia never makes anything and that everything we buy is made in China. You can't have it both ways.

'Foreign' car makers (and I use the term foreign loosely because Australia has no true Australian car makers) can bring economies of scale to bear with global cars because they can recoup the capital outlay of developing those cars across a global market. Ford Australia and GM-Holden cannot do this because their products are designed for exclusive use in Australia, a few Commodore exports notwithstanding. Moreover, the corporate overlords at Ford and GM have made it clear that their products take precedence in global markets over our own, regardless of how much we think they are better than theirs (perceived or actual).

Given the right amount of money and time, Ford Australia has demonstrated that it CAN design and build a world class car - the T6 Ranger is a classic example. Funny how that vehicle hasn't rated a mention in this thread amongst all the whinging and nitpicking.

[delete94]

Originally Posted by Mechan1k

I know what you mean.
All you hear on forums are people whinging about this and that.
Unfortunately .. all the happy owners don't really bother to mention to good things about their vehicles.

we must be part of the minority of Ford owners who love their vehicles and really having had that much of an issue.


And ... you will also find there will be quite a number of Euro owners out there with their fair share of issues as well ... it's not just limited to the Fords and Holdens.

Halleluiah brother! I owned my ED for 16 years and nothing ever fell off, the interior was as good the day I sold it as it was the day it was built and everything in the car still worked. Not bad for a car that was supposed to have "rubbish" build quality.

We’ve now updated to an FG, and I think the fit and finish looks great. Seriously, looking at it, I really just can’t see anything to complain about in terms of fit and finish and I for one don’t understand where all that criticism comes from. Perhaps if you measured all the gaps with a micrometer, I’m sure they wouldn’t all be perfect, but then, maybe I’m just easily pleased. Will it be as reliable as the ED was, I hope so, but only time will tell.

What I think is that buyers of Euro cars may generally have a bit more pride in their purchase and so tend to look after them a bit better. I’d like to know how some of the Falcons out there that seem to suffer from all these fit and finish problems have actually been treated. I’d hazard a guess that many of them have had a pretty hard life and I’d bet a Euro wouldn’t have performed any better.

I sometimes wonder as well, why some people in these forums actually own a Falcon in the first place.

[Ford_The_Win]

Originally Posted by delete94

Halleluiah brother! I owned my ED for 16 years and nothing ever fell off, the interior was as good the day I sold it as it was the day it was built and everything in the car still worked. Not bad for a car that was supposed to have "rubbish" build quality.

We’ve now updated to an FG, and I think the fit and finish looks great. Seriously, looking at it, I really just can’t see anything to complain about in terms of fit and finish and I for one don’t understand where all that criticism comes from. Perhaps if you measured all the gaps with a micrometer, I’m sure they wouldn’t all be perfect, but then, maybe I’m just easily pleased. Will it be as reliable as the ED was, I hope so, but only time will tell.

What I think is that buyers of Euro cars may generally have a bit more pride in their purchase and so tend to look after them a bit better. I’d like to know how some of the Falcons out there that seem to suffer from all these fit and finish problems have actually been treated. I’d hazard a guess that many of them have had a pretty hard life and I’d bet a Euro wouldn’t have performed any better.

I sometimes wonder as well, why some people in these forums actually own a Falcon in the first place.

Maybe I'm just fussy...but I wouldn't say this was an acceptable level of build quality or finish for a vehicle that would cost the equivalent of over 40k in today's money. Yes the car is old but it has been well looked after and I can safely say my experiences with Japanese cars puts them leagues ahead.

[divine_afg]

Originally Posted by stang65

Yeah they could do that and charge $10,000 more.
They would want to stay profitable too.

Not directed at you divine, but too many people are turning a blind eye to the fact that volume makes things cheaper. Comparing a world car to a local car.

People on this forum know Ford Australia get a small budget compared to what other manufacturers get yet expect the cars to be better.

If i gave you $500,000 and said build a house and gave you mate $6,000,000 and told him to build a house who`s would be better.


Now if I ask the population of Australia to chip in $1 and I asked the population of the U.S to chip in a $1 who would give me more money.

People know why our quality isn`t as good as the imports, we don`t have the budget.It`s simple no manufacurer wants to run at a loss.

I can appreciate your point of view, I will also say that I would personally
be happy to pay $10k premium (in some cases why should we ) and I am confident that I am not alone on this.
If provided Ford can increase its quality, take an aff member on here (I dont exactly remember the details) but it had to do with his G6 noisie door trims i think.

I believe he has voided his warranty by doing the repair himself because the dealer CBF. Why..... such thing to happen on 50k car. To me this is unexceptable.

Cheers
H

[2011G6E]

I think that "for the money we pay", the cars are sometime crap. Let me rephrase that...maybe not crap as such...just slightly short of the car they could be with a little more effort.

Those photos above are a point...why is it ike that? It could cost literally no extra money to be sure it's done properly. Not to mention standing u to normal use for more than a few years.

No you're not picky. I love our new G6E, but the little things that I can't overlook are cheap overhead passenger handles that smack back into place instead of soft closing like on any cheap Hyundai, a center console lid that cracks down with a bang, unpadded and no soft close, paint in a beautiful colour (Edge) that looks amazing but seems so thin it in't funny...one little touch of anything harder than human skin and it scratches, one tiny stone and it chips to the metal...in only a few months and 10,000km of use it looks like a ten year old car, despite being especially careful and choosing the expensive paint protection option. Not to mention the ever-attractive rusty looking unpainted bare metal engine (and a couple of other spots they probably think people won't notice).

As I said, we love it, but does it look to be "worth" $50,000+...? Nope.

Consumers in other markets wouldn't put up with it...why should we?

It doesn't hae to mean a bigger budget and pricier cars...it just requires the maker to take a little care and attention screwing them together. If a better part or process is required, then even a market the size of ours means economies of scale work, so there's really no excuse...

...apart from a public that just accepts whatever is thrown at them in order to be able to say it's an Aussie car.

[delete94]

Originally Posted by Ford_The_Win

Maybe I'm just fussy...but I wouldn't say this was an acceptable level of build quality or finish for a vehicle that would cost the equivalent of over 40k in today's money. Yes the car is old but it has been well looked after and I can safely say my experiences with Japanese cars puts them leagues ahead.

I can understand how you feel based on the photos. My ED had none of those problems. However, if you don’t mind me asking, have you owned the car from new, or near new? If you know that’s how it came from the factory, then I can see your point. But if the car was already a few years old when you got it, can you be sure someone may not have had those trim pieces off for some reason and they weren’t put back properly?

I’ve actually gone back and had a good look at the FG and I still think the fit and finish looks great. There’s nothing that stands out as being obviously wrong or out of alignment. The only thing I think may have been done wrong on mine is the front passenger footwell light. It looks like instead of the bulb holder having been inserted from behind the glovebox, so that the bulb actually protrudes into the footwell area to illuminate it, I think it’s been put in the other way, ie. the bulb holder has been inserted from the footwell side and the bulb itself is behind the glovebox and so doesn’t really light up the footwell area! I don't know, maybe there was a new person on the line that day, but if that’s the worst of it, I’m really not worried.

I guess some things may be generational as well, which makes some aspects of this issue a bit subjective. For example, and this just my own personal feeling, things like the lack of soft closing passenger grab handles and centre console lids don’t worry me at all, but obviously these things are important to others.

At the end of the day, all I know is after 16 years in the ED, we love the G6ET. It’s light years ahead of the ED in safety and technology, performance, handling, ride quality and build quality and we couldn’t be happier.

[DanielXR8]

Originally Posted by stang65

unfortuantely we live in a tiny little country with a tiny population and due to the volume we cannot compete with the U.S . Simple economics

This applies to most things from overseas.

This was a problem when Ford owned close to half the Australian market in the old days, simply nothing has changed. It is more a corporate culture that puts revenue, over longterm reputation. Even when being squeezed the first response was cost cut, not improve the product.

The Button plan certainly raised the locals quality and features, but only to a fault.

Still Ford US have big problems with the Mustangs at the moment and Ford Sync mark II is not exactly working great either.

Ford Europe recently tanked in the customer quality surveys in Europe and didn't rate in the top ten Manufacturers. Ford Europe didnt have a single car in the top three for any category. Epic fail by any standard.

Its Fords corporate attitude that is the problem. They don't get the long term ramifications of their attitude towards their customers. They just seem to think they will be forgiven. Well the Ford faithful on here generally do, but the general public and fleets increasingly aren't.

The first step if nothing changes is we loose the locally produced cars. The second is Ford starts burning through the buyers of their imported cars, while the competition continues to raise their quality and value equations.

Without a corporate change in Ford, its hard to see Ford doing anything but continuing to slip. The current success of the imports won't be sustainable without a quality dealer network and good customer support.

[Ford_The_Win]

Originally Posted by delete94

I can understand how you feel based on the photos. My ED had none of those problems. However, if you don’t mind me asking, have you owned the car from new, or near new? If you know that’s how it came from the factory, then I can see your point. But if the car was already a few years old when you got it, can you be sure someone may not have had those trim pieces off for some reason and they weren’t put back properly?

I get what you mean and yes the car is old and I have only owned it for about 18 months but I bought it off a retired couple from the country and has only travelled 115,000 kilometres, garaged it's entire life. It's not just the one plastic panel that is like that, I could excuse that - unfortunately the whole car looks like it was put together by Blind Freddie.

The crude, clipped-together, overlapping trim is not something that comes with age, it was like that from factory. The paint is terribly thin, scratches easily and has plenty of marks to prove it - good to see nothing has changed there, 2011G6E. The doors don't line up properly anymore. There's glue, sealant and silicone poking out everywhere.

The turning tide against Ford and Holden isn't something that happened overnight, years of this sort of stuff would have put off a lot of customers.

Nothing sits as flush as I would like, could pull it apart with my hands.