European car hierarchy

[BrianWC]

Jaguar saves itself with its XJ class cars. The rest are not impressive. The XJs aren't all that but man they are still beautiful cars. I WOULD NOT feel comfortable owning an XJ without a nice house to go with it.

As for my beloved SAABs, the 9-5 IS horribly outdated and I don't know of many SAABistas who forgive GM for the 9-2s and 9-7. In defense of the 9-3, it is NOT a rebadged Opel. SAAB had significant authority over the design and engineering of the Epsilon 9-3 from top to bottom. So much so that GM corporate was horrified at the expenditure. The 08 and 09 9-3's are going to be really impressive cars. When the 9-3 goes above 300 hp, as is in the works, it'll be a killer car.

As far as the 9-5 goes, it's quite stale but it's still impressive to me for the fact that SAAB has squeezed 260 hp out of a 2.3l 4 cylinder and done so in a way that is not loud and buzzy. Sadly a redesign is not slated until 2010.

 

[Tosh]

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As for the last quote, I think most lower- and middle-class folks do consider those brands as premium (except perhaps VW, but it's German so I threw it in the mix). Not the ultra high-end stuff like some, but certainly more upscale than the average automobile.

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Poor VW: They slit their own throat with the Phaeton to earn some credibility, but are still completely forgettable. (As they deserve, for competing directly with Audi.)

 

[Auto-Union]

Audi
Audi
Audi

 

[Tornado Red]

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Whatever it is, VW goes at the VERY VERY VERY VERY bottom of that list. They LOVE to put out garbage and ride it on BMW/Mercedes/Porsche's coattails as "German Engineering."

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The Europeans do not consider VW's to be garbage, because they're not. Good engines, good or great transmissions, decent suspensions, pleasant designs (not always though), but electronics that need some technical expertise to diagnose problems.

The problem in North America is with the dealership network, not the product. See this chart:

There is no good reason why VW owners have to take their cars back to the dealerships over and over and over again.

I can't answer the original question, because those of us in North America only get a small percent of the models that are sold in Europe and elsewhere. Mostly we get the mid-to-high range, with only a handful of the engines available.

But if I had to answer... they're all good. Maybe Audi slightly ahead of BMW, Porsche, then MB...

 

[97tbird]

BMW, Merecedes/Jaguar, Volvo, Saab
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Audi/VW.

 

[Auto-Union]

I like how certian people who have never owned a European car come out with strong opinons on the subject. Lame.

 

[Big O Dave]

I don't know what happened to my earlier post, but from my personal experience in the auto repair business, I'd rank the hierarchy as follows (in terms of lack of problems):

Porsche & BMW
Jaguar & Volvo
Saab
Mercedes & Audi & VW

 

[Quattro Pete]

But "lack of problems" was only one of the original poster's aspects of the ranking. And honestly, if we are talking about upscale car market brand image, I'm not sure if it even make sense to look at all aspects at once. If someone wants an upscale fancy car, reliability usually takes a back seat. Same goes for performance and handling - many times the tradeoff is less than stellar durability.

I know we've had heated debates here questioning why an upscale car with great handling and performance, packed with the latest technology can't be the most reliable as well, and it all goes back to the target market and what tradeoffs it will accept. It's not easy for a car maker to do everything right and still offer it at a price that enough people are willing to pay in order to support the R&D and the production run. For cars to be affordable, economies of scale are key. Otherwise we're jumping into the way above $100k territory that the original poster was trying to avoid.

 

[Big O Dave]

I completely agree with you, Pete. That's why I was trying to be clear about what aspect I was talking about.

Most of my customers who have Audis, for example, really like them despite the niggling problems. I do have quite a few Mercedes customers who like many aspects of their cars, but more than the other luxury brands, are getting sick of the problems. Some cars (Audis, for example) seem to inspire more passion in their owners than others (Mercedes, for example) and that passion seems to outweigh whatever hassles they have to put up with.

Jettas and Golfs seem to be on the wrong side of the passion/hassle ratio, compared to Passats. From what I see, they have many more problems than Passats, and I think that's what tips the scale.

Volvos and Saabs don't seem to inspire as much passion, but they also are less problematic.

BMWs seem to have hit the "sweet spot" of relatively few problems coupled with the capability of inspiring lots of passion.

Jaguars appear to be higher on the passion scale than Volvos and Saabs, with about the same level of problems.

Of course, all of these observations are my unscientific opinion based upon what I see at my shop and in my friend's shops.

 

[Quattro Pete]

Dave, understood. FWIW, using my personal experience as an example, my current bimmer is way more problematic than my previous A4, and to top it off, the A4 was more fun to drive. And I can't even blame the previous owner for the problems, because they are not related to maintenance neglect... it's mostly electronics going bad, and they are all very common issues on the e39: A/C final stage unit, passenger occupancy sensor, passenger seat electrics, dead pixels in instrument cluster and radio, thrust arm bushings. All this at less than 40k miles, and went bad within 6 months of purchase. The dead pixels issues were thankfully covered under BMW goodwill, but the rest was out of my pocket. Between repairs and maintenance (which I am meticulous about), 4 grand was spent over the last 8 months. The passion/hassle ratio is pretty low with this one. If (and that's a big if) I ever buy another BMW, it'll be a new one with warranty.

 

[Tornado Red]

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...Some cars (Audis, for example) seem to inspire more passion in their owners than others (Mercedes, for example) and that passion seems to outweigh whatever hassles they have to put up with.

Jettas and Golfs seem to be on the wrong side of the passion/hassle ratio, compared to Passats. From what I see, they have many more problems than Passats, and I think that's what tips the scale.

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Stick a TDI engine in those Jettas and Golfs, and the number of hassles goes down most of the time. But I can sure understand why there's not a lot of passion for the base 2.0-liter engine, recently discontinued.