What makes Toyotas so reliable?

Interesting video here from Donut regarding Toyota’s design and manufacturing philosophy.

Toyota‘s Reliability Secrets REVEALED

• “Jidouka” — automation with a human touch
• “Kaizen” — change for the better
• practicality over performance

• halt production when needed — 2,000 production line stops per week vs 2 for Ford
• “just in time” production — placing parts/resources as close as possible to the time and place they’re needed -> very little waste of resources.

Anyway, interesting stuff for Toyota fans!
 

ITTOG

Well-known member
Not only do they use these processes but most of the manufacturing world uses them. The catch is most of the manufacturing world doesn't use enough of the processes or they make small changes that basically eliminate the value. There are very rich people out there that do nothing but implement Toyota processes at other companies.

Sent from my Pixel 5 using Tapatalk
 

jlcanterbury

Active member
Kaizen and the Lean method are simple and amazingly effective design, workflow, and management philosophies. It seems to have roots in some ancient foundational knowledge about simplicity, efficiency, and natural evolution itself. Really beautiful stuff when executed properly. Unfortunately so much of automobile design is now limited/forced by hand of the many multinational regulations faced by most manufacturers in all major markets. hard to implement true principles in a world ruled by written standards. I.e. even modern Toyotas are more and more failing to live up to these foundational principles of the company.
 

peekay

Adventurer
HYPE !!!

Nissans and Fords are just as reliable.
I have a 2019 Ford F150 with the 5.0 V8 and a 2018 Toyota Tundra with the 5.7. Performance-wise, the edge goes to the 5.0. Better MPGs, plus slightly faster. But design-wise and build quality, it's not even close. The Toyota is a well built piece of machinery -- what I envision a luxury car to be. The Ford, well, it looks like they cut some corners building it. Plastic oil pan, plastic drain plug, lots of hanging wires on the chassis -- even the oil filler cap feels cheap compared to the Toyota. Hell, even the flip out key on the Ford is junky -- I spent an hour last night sanding and polishing the fob in order to remove enough plastic so that the key part flips out smoothly. Seriously, it was actually kinda funny trying to fix the key on a 1 year old truck. Both trucks have been reliable, but I really have not had them long enough to tell. But just seeing the poor build quality and design on the pieces that I can see with the naked eye, makes me wonder how the Ford engine is built inside.
 

ITTOG

Well-known member
HYPE !!!

Nissans and Fords are just as reliable.

Do you have any personal experience with these vehicles? I don't have a lot of experience but I have personally owned and driven a 1999 Altima, 2007 Tundra 5.7L, and now a 2018 F150 3.5L. The Altima was by far the worse. It grenaded the engine at about 110,000 miles. As for the Tundra and F150, I can tell you the F150 has been in the shop about 5 times as often for recalls and parts failures. That doesn't even include the problems with it that they haven't figured out yet. Also, the Tundra has 185,000 miles on it and the ford has about 42,000 miles. So a vehicle that is six times as old and has almost five times as many miles is still much more reliable than the F150. The only failures on my Tundra was an idler arm and I proactively replaced the water pump. My wife has a 2012 Honda Odyssey that has about 192,000 miles on it and it is awesome as well. We also had a 2000 Honda Accord that was stellar and a 2004 Honda Pilot that has well over 200,000 miles on it and still going strong.

Now anecdotally, I know of only one exception to my personal experience amongst friends and families that have or have had vehicles from these makers. A friend has a 2015 F15 3.5L with about 120,000 miles and hasn't had any issues with it at all. Statistically, that is what Toyota's process would call an outlier.

But hey, no one can match the technological wizardry that Ford has inside the cabin. Sync is so far ahead of what other manufacturers are putting out.
 

XJLI

Adventurer
I have a 2019 Ford F150 with the 5.0 V8 and a 2018 Toyota Tundra with the 5.7. Performance-wise, the edge goes to the 5.0. Better MPGs, plus slightly faster. But design-wise and build quality, it's not even close. The Toyota is a well built piece of machinery -- what I envision a luxury car to be. The Ford, well, it looks like they cut some corners building it. Plastic oil pan, plastic drain plug, lots of hanging wires on the chassis -- even the oil filler cap feels cheap compared to the Toyota. Hell, even the flip out key on the Ford is junky -- I spent an hour last night sanding and polishing the fob in order to remove enough plastic so that the key part flips out smoothly. Seriously, it was actually kinda funny trying to fix the key on a 1 year old truck. Both trucks have been reliable, but I really have not had them long enough to tell. But just seeing the poor build quality and design on the pieces that I can see with the naked eye, makes me wonder how the Ford engine is built inside.

The only reason the Tundra doesnt have more composite parts like the oil pan is because the design is so old it predates the fitment of them. Every new car uses composites to save weight. The intake manifold and oil filter housing on the Tacoma is plastic. And if a Tundra is what you think luxury is... you need to check out some real luxury cars... and actually, a King Ranch F150 blows the Tundra out of the water.
 

BigSwede

The Credible Hulk
I was just reflecting after seeing this - I have had my FJC for 6 years and 80,000 miles (it had 50,000 when I bought it so is up to 130,000 now), and it has never been in the shop. I did go to the dealer once to get a little rubber piece that fell off the rear door opening but that's it.

I'm sure that XJLT will say the FJ is old tech, and it is, but the older I get the more I treasure reliability over flash.
 
This will come as no surprise: https://www.motorbiscuit.com/the-mo...-pickup-trucks-according-to-consumer-reports/

HYPE !!!

Nissans and Fords are just as reliable.

I don’t doubt that there are people out there, maybe yourself included, who have had good experiences over the long term with Ford or Nissan. But generally speaking, over the long term, and across hundreds of thousands of examples, they’re not as reliable.

On Dashboard Light (no affiliation), Ford and Nissan are tied with a reliability score of 26/100. This rating is based on inspections of 290,471 Fords and 175,657 Nissans.

Toyota’s score is 82/100. This is based on inspections of 269,338 Toyotas.

The only reason the Tundra doesnt have more composite parts like the oil pan is because the design is so old it predates the fitment of them. Every new car uses composites to save weight. The intake manifold and oil filter housing on the Tacoma is plastic. And if a Tundra is what you think luxury is... you need to check out some real luxury cars... and actually, a King Ranch F150 blows the Tundra out of the water.

I don’t think he meant luxurious in terms of premium features and appointments, but rather in terms of the attention to detail with how it’s made and how well it’s put together.

I have some experience with Ford trucks as well. We’ve had a 2001 7.3L F350 in my family since new. It will rattle your teeth out of your head driving down the road, but it has been a solid truck for us. Also, my father in law drives a 2016 EcoBoost. Aside from all the time spent at the dealership for recalls, he is pretty happy with it.
 

tacollie

Glamper
We have a 08' Limited Tundra and a 19' XLT F250. Both were work trucks before I bought them. Comfort on the highway goes to the F250 even unloaded. The Tundra is dated but the interior pieces are more solid. We drive a couple lariats and they are nice but not that much nicer than our 08 Tundra. My brother has a $80k King Ranch and it's nice but not least years ahead of our Tundra. I honestly don't get why the Tundra interior gets so much hate.

We were shopping for 12-15' F150s under 80k miles before we bought the Tundra. We looked at 10 F-150 in that range and none of them felt solid. One did drive solid but we hit a bridge expansion gap and the drivers door came open at 70mph. We drove a 07' Tundra with 189k miles and crossed F150s off the list. The next one we drove had 103k miles and is the one we bought. I feel Toyotas age better but I could be wrong. The F250 is beefy and I think it'll be a good truck for us and the extra 2000lbs of payload over the Tundra is super cool.

What makes Toyotas so reliable?

Well, if we're talking about the Tacoma and the Tundra, I'd say it's because they're built in Texas... ;)
My Tacomas were all super reliable......... And built in California ?. I like my Texas Tundra better.
 

ITTOG

Well-known member
This will come as no surprise: https://www.motorbiscuit.com/the-mo...-pickup-trucks-according-to-consumer-reports/



I don’t doubt that there are people out there, maybe yourself included, who have had good experiences over the long term with Ford or Nissan. But generally speaking, over the long term, and across hundreds of thousands of examples, they’re not as reliable.

On Dashboard Light (no affiliation), Ford and Nissan are tied with a reliability score of 26/100. This rating is based on inspections of 290,471 Fords and 175,657 Nissans.

Toyota’s score is 82/100. This is based on inspections of 269,338 Toyotas.



I don’t think he meant luxurious in terms of premium features and appointments, but rather in terms of the attention to detail with how it’s made and how well it’s put together.

I have some experience with Ford trucks as well. We’ve had a 2001 7.3L F350 in my family since new. It will rattle your teeth out of your head driving down the road, but it has been a solid truck for us. Also, my father in law drives a 2016 EcoBoost. Aside from all the time spent at the dealership for recalls, he is pretty happy with it.
Thanks for the links. I found this chart very telling.

1610032358896.png
 

MTVR

Well-known member
My Tacomas were all super reliable......... And built in California ?. I like my Texas Tundra better.

I understand they are shifting Tacoma production to Mexico, so that they can start building the Sequoia in Texas...
 

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