@katliamom:
Well, yeah, it does, forum posts tend to be like political discussions in this country and what passes for news, sound bites and factoids and so forth. Given we have a country where a large swath of it has tried to make critical reasoning something not to be taught in the schools, lest facts conflict with ‘the truth’ espoused through beliefs.
Musicprnt, though, your posts would benefit from some judicious editing.
My understanding is BMW was tested and passed. They use a physical system (urea tank?) to scrub the emissions. Volkswagen claimed their technology did not require one, and of course we now know what that technology was! Software!
Not now, not ever. Once was enough. We bought THE biggest lemon in the history of mankind and VW gave us zero, less than zero customer service/satisfaction on it. Burned once, I say haha on whatever befalls them.
From what I have heard, BMW and Mercedes system has been used a long time and is very different. VW took another path, they wanted to create a ‘clean diesel’ that also had good performance to set themselves apart, and it turned out they couldn’t do it without cheating.
short answer is No, but then I was haven’t been a fan of VW for a long time. Quality control has noticeably dropped in the past decade or so. Even the Jetta has been cheapened down in the drive for market share.
Haven’t followed this topic very closely but will VW retrofit these vehicles in a recall? Will the re-sale value of these vehicles be effected?
VW does have a big plant in the US, in Chattanooga. This scandal will, sadly, affect US workers. We have a 2000 Passat (not a diesel). Great car, which we’ve maintained meticulously. Our D drives it now. I was seriously considering getting another non-diesel Passat to replace my aging minivan when D is done with college. But I’m ticked off at VW and will never buy another. I’ll just buy an Accord or a Fusion. In that midprice, midlevel segment, it’s not as if consumers don’t have a lot of choices. I wonder if in future this case will be studied in business schools as a classic example of corporate hubris. So much risk for so little gain.
$500 cash and another $500 - $750 to spend at a VW dealer? Is that enough?
I won a VW Beetle in 2010, received it in 2011…the all new redesigned Beetle. I had just purchased a brand new Honda Pilot and daughter wasn’t driving yet. I planned on keeping it for a third car for her. I HATED the way it drove. Going through a sharp curve I always felt like I was sliding all over; the interior looked cool but felt and sounded cheap. I ended up keeping it just for a few months and then sold. Over the years, lots of others who won the car in my same group have posted about various issues…rear bumpers just magically falling off and other weird cheapo problems. I NEVER felt it was got the gas mileage it was supposed to in the brochures and ads.
@Greenwich, heck no that’s not enough. I have a 2012 diesel golf. Great car, fun to drive (love the torque), fantastic mileage. But VW made a profit from selling these cars via fraud and quite frankly, they should give up that profit amount to compensate for their deception. $500 (because what diesel owner is going to buy another VW product?) is way too little. My car is now worth almost nothing; there is no way I can sell it except at a huge discount. I want compensation for that.
And I’m a happy VW diesel owner (or was until this happened).
@NJsue and others:
Companies are often willing to cheat, thinking that the gains of cheating are worth it, that no one will know, they are often like little kids telling each other “mommy will never find out” when doing something they shouldn’t. One of the things I have learned about cheating like that is the blowback from cheating means no matter how lucrative it is, when the manure hits the fan, and it most of the time will whether today, tomorrow or 6 months down the road, and when it does the consequences of their actions ends up being much worse. Especially with something like this, or with issues of safety and such, companies think that covering up the problem will make it all go better, and it doesn’t. Nissan damn nearly went under because they had major quality problems they covered up, for a number of years people were not buying their cars because they saw what Nissan did and were afraid they would end up with a Lemon. Ford put out the Pinto knowing it was a bad design, but insisted they needed to get it out there to compete with fuel efficient cars that were taking sales from them, and when it became obvious the cars were a menace in rear end collisions, it killed the car off (along with simply being a bad, ugly car). Think of the US auto industry as a whole, that once owned 90% of the market, there are a lot of people today who will not buy an “American” car (ie Ford, GM or Chrysler) because they associate it with crap, even though those companies make cars that are as good as anything coming out of the other manufacturers.
Sometimes they are right, for example Toyota with the issues with their cars that required massive recalls, the hit doesn’t seem to be permanent, last I checked Toyota was either the top selling car company or the second one.
In a non corporate way, think of how much the abuse scandals have cost the Catholic Church, even among die hard faithful I know there is a broken trust with the leadership and with the priests, and it has caused Ireland literally to go from being the most Catholic of countries to one that is resembling the rest of Europe. When you cover something up, it may seem like you are making things better, but what they don’t understand is the old axiom, it takes a long time to build trust and it takes only a stupid moment of blindness to totally destroy it. I have run into cases like this professionally, where there were breaches of regulations, or where something mandated by a regulator wasn’t going to be fixed in time, and there were those who wanted to cover it up, or play with the numbers, and I was adamant you are a lot better off telling the truth and then having to fix the problem, that if you get caught lying or cheating the consequences would be a lot, lot worse (and some people don’t learn, one of the people in my case arguing we should twist the numbers to feign compliance, who was really angry that I vocally opposed that, went to my boss and said I should be fired, ended up at another company, had a similar situation, twisted the numbers, and ended up in jail and cost his company a massive fine, and the guy will have a hard time working most anywhere with his reputation)
Well, it looks like consumers have spoken. And they’re buying VWs.
http://www.theverge.com/2015/11/3/9663734/volkswagen-diesel-emissions-scandal-october-sales-rise
You really think “sales up 0.24 percent year over year” is significant? 0.24 percent? I wouldn’t call that a great increase. What are the revenue figures?
From the news release from Oct 2014 to Oct 2015,
Golf is down 53.3%
Jetta sedan is down 36.1%
Jetta sportswagen is down 100% (1235 in Oct 2014 down to -2 in Oct 2015)
Beetle Coupe down 43.5%
Beetle convertible down 12.9%
Golf sales increased because they introduced Golf R, e-Golf and Golf Sportswagen so those sales made up for the loss of sales due to the TDI. It’ll be interesting to see what happens to Passat, Tiguan and Toureg with the new allegations.
I simply would have expected sales to be DOWN. Naive thinking, I guess.
People will buy all sorts of crap if the price is right… How does 0.24% compare to the rest of the industry is a better question to ask. For example, Ford reported 13% year over year October sales increase - without the heavy discount gimmicks to drive up the volume.
My Dh was in the market to replace his nine year old Audi A6 and before the news considered just getting the 2016 version. It’s not a diesel, but he is concerned about the company’s health after this, and also wasn’t sure how much more news would follow. He purchased a competitor instead, and seems very happy with it. So they lost one customer, at least.
A $500 Visa, $500 sales voucher and 3 yr roadside assistance. Lovely.
^^^As the cars continue to pollute. Lovely.