Thanks in part to the help of people from TTAC, TrueDelta received a record number of responses to July’s Car Reliability Survey—over 22,300. Updated car reliability stats have been posted to the site for 570 model / model year / powertrain (where warranted) combinations. With partial results for another 464 cars, the total is now over 1,000. These stats include car owner experiences through the end of June 2011, making them over a year ahead of some other sources.
Among 2011s for which we received enough responses, the redesigned Jeep Grand Cherokee is the only one that’s clearly worse than average thanks to common problems with the optional air suspension (also a common problem area in Mercedes SUVs), sunroof rattles, and a transmission shudder. Get one without the air suspension or the sunroof, and the risk of problems goes way down.
The new Buick Regal might also be a bit worse than average, but we have only limited data for this model.
The 2011 Fiesta improved to “about average” this time around, so there don’t seem to be many new problems with the car once the initial glitches are taken care of. We’ll have initial results for the 2011 Explorer and 2012 Focus next time around, in November, with a preview for participants in October.
Most new or revised models for which we received enough responses are also near the average, including the BMW 5-Series, BMW X5 / X6, Chevrolet Cruze, Ford Edge, Honda Odyssey, Hyundai Sonata, Infiniti M, Kia Sorento, and Nissan JUKE.
Three new 2011s clearly had clean starts: the Honda CR-Z, Hyundai Elantra, and Toyota Sienna.
We’ve also updated statistics for the percentage of cars that required no repairs or 3+ repair trips in the past year. These statistics can be more useful than the averages.
We’ll update these stats again in November. The more people participate, the more models we can cover and the more precise these results will be.
To view the updated results:
Car Reliability Survey results
Repair odds stats
Come across something interesting? Have a question? Post it in the comments.