What car has the best ever build quality?
Discussion
p4cks said:
K11 Micra?
This, surely. The oldest ones are now 25 years old, the newest ones are 16 years old, and they are still a common sight on our roads. Literally thousands of them still running, with years of life left in them. And in 2002 when they were about to be superseded by the new model, they were on sale for £4995.Just staggering.
The MK3 Ford Mondeo. Honestly.
Hugely reliable, interiors that wear incredibly well, perceived quality is good, actual quality is excellent. I can't think of anything more reliable than a 4 cylinder petrol MK3 Mondeo.
Interestingly this isn't an opinion shared by many Brits but it is shared with many other Europeans, Germans being one.
Hugely reliable, interiors that wear incredibly well, perceived quality is good, actual quality is excellent. I can't think of anything more reliable than a 4 cylinder petrol MK3 Mondeo.
Interestingly this isn't an opinion shared by many Brits but it is shared with many other Europeans, Germans being one.
Edited by lee_erm on Saturday 10th November 21:16
From experience Mercedes I the Eighties, up to early 90s. Yes, Volvo 940 was good but MB had the edge, appeared to be made of granite. The “ordinary” saloons were massively dull to drive, though.....Start up, not much happens ,then car creeps forward with a subdued sigh, if you have managed to find and release the awful foot button ‘handbrake’, as you move the huge ship’s steering wheel, nothing happens, some 20 seconds later the distant bonnet star ,unless vandalised, deigns to move through its arc. The M Tex vinyl seats are hard and spartan, though likely to remain so for several aeons. The build Quality really was there. The Micra K11 was a good shout on this forum, sadly sill and front cross member rust kills them because, unlike the Mercs, they are not seen as worth spending on. I have excluded Rolls and Bentley (older) because they are in a different league way beyond my ken.
lee_erm said:
The MK3 Ford Mondeo. Honestly.
Hugely reliable, interiors that wear incredibly well, perceived quality is good, actual quality is excellent. I can't think of anything more reliable than a 4 cylinder petrol MK3 Mondeo.
Interestingly this isn't an opinion shared by many Brits but it is shared with many other Europeans, Germans being one.
Hugely reliable, interiors that wear incredibly well, perceived quality is good, actual quality is excellent. I can't think of anything more reliable than a 4 cylinder petrol MK3 Mondeo.
Interestingly this isn't an opinion shared by many Brits but it is shared with many other Europeans, Germans being one.
Edited by lee_erm on Saturday 10th November 21:16
Mk3 Mondeos are bloody awesome cars, but, compared to something like an e39 they don't even come close when it comes to build quality. As you say though, they do seem to last, there are still thousands of them on the roads (mainly diesels too, which according to the internet are unreliable as f*ck!!) and even the very newest ones are over eleven years old, in comparison an eleven year old Sierra would have been a knackered oil burning rot box.
lee_erm said:
The MK3 Ford Mondeo. Honestly.
Hugely reliable, interiors that wear incredibly well, perceived quality is good, actual quality is excellent. I can't think of anything more reliable than a 4 cylinder petrol MK3 Mondeo.
Interestingly this isn't an opinion shared by many Brits but it is shared with many other Europeans, Germans being one.
Great cars. I often see them in the works car park and those of clients (amongst some fairly expensive cars). Possibly not quite as solid as other cars in this thread, though.Hugely reliable, interiors that wear incredibly well, perceived quality is good, actual quality is excellent. I can't think of anything more reliable than a 4 cylinder petrol MK3 Mondeo.
Interestingly this isn't an opinion shared by many Brits but it is shared with many other Europeans, Germans being one.
The Mk4 is pretty good (the Mk4 2.0 diesels are very good), although the interiors are not quite as robust.
True but the turbo models and gt cars are good in that department let’s see how the new 3l lumps hold up
But the build Quality on a 911 now I think is excellent as is the panamera they are just well made in a way that a Ferrari doesn’t quite feel and forget about Aston
Also another point on build quality perhaps
A 911s first service is 2y after purchase which is impressive for the kind of car it is
Other than that would also vote for the land cruiser
But the build Quality on a 911 now I think is excellent as is the panamera they are just well made in a way that a Ferrari doesn’t quite feel and forget about Aston
Also another point on build quality perhaps
A 911s first service is 2y after purchase which is impressive for the kind of car it is
Other than that would also vote for the land cruiser
yonex said:
The Volvo S60 is built like a tank, 190 Mercedes are great, things like EK Civics are unbelievable, same goes for other Japanese stuff from the 90's. I'd say build quality was a 'German thing' quality control was all from Japan.
We had an S60, the first engine dropped a cylinder due to piston damage (although I put that down to the tip falling off a crappy spark plug rather than any inherent build issues), but the main thing was we had no end of issues with the ABS system, seemed like every day there was a new warning popping up saying it had malfunctioned yet again. And none of the 4 rims would hold a constant pressure despite being cleaned, sealed etc.. a few times. Very comfy seats though, but I'd never buy another one, it felt a bit too much like the daily electrical lottery that was 90s Peugeots.We also had a 2002 Civic for about 14 years and 120,000 miles, it was just unbreakable. The only repair it needed was 1 abs sensor in all those years.
I drove an LS400 yesterday...wow what a car! I am seriously considering selling my mx5 to buy it, but possible rear subframe corrosion has me just a bit too concerned over the lack of spares.
Edited by anonymous-user on Sunday 11th November 09:54
JimSuperSix said:
We had an S60, the first engine dropped a cylinder due to piston damage (although I put that down to the tip falling off a crappy spark plug rather than any inherent build issues), but the main thing was we had no end of issues with the ABS system, seemed like every day there was a new warning popping up saying it had malfunctioned yet again. And none of the 4 rims would hold a constant pressure despite being cleaned, sealed etc.. a few times. Very comfy seats though, but I'd never buy another one, it felt a bit too much like the daily electrical lottery that was 90s Peugeots.
The early P2 Platform cars (S80/S60/V70) had plenty of niggling issues, they were a massive leap forward in complexity for Volvo and the "never buy something from the first couple of years of production" rule very much held true. The ABS problem was common across a few manufacturers though, a duff ABS module from ATE I believe?With the gearbox issues, the general awfulness of the 4 speed GM auto in the T6, and the driveline fragility of the XC90 I think Volvo suffered a lot of reputational damage at the time.
dme123 said:
Very probably a Volvo 940 or the later I6 960/V90 as the earlier V6 was a bit fragile.. The rust proofing is far better than their Mercedes contemporaries too.
Agree, at that particular time one of Volvos largest markets were Sweden (still is I assume) so there were no way of selling a car that is rust prone, some parts of the country has winter like conditions for the better part of half the year and down south we have simply insane amouts of salt on the roads, E39's have been mentioned alot in this thread and as nice as thay are they rust ALOT compared to Volvos of the same era, I know, having had 7 e39's and all of them apart from the current M5 have been more or less rusty, the latter hasn't seen salt for the last 15 years atleast so that's probably why.Pre GM SAAB's are fab, W126/124/109 must stand out aswell for being very well built cars in general, Lexus LS400/430 aswell.
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