Newsgroups: rec.autos.vw
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 22:16:30 -0500 
From: Jason Paul Togyer <jt3y+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: Jetta experiences (Was:Re: info on jetta)
	<96y128a@rpi.edu>
Distribution: rec.autos.vw

Craig L. Squier writes in "Re: Jetta experiences (Was:Re: info on jetta)"

<My original message deleted>
"THIS IS NOT A FLAME:
    Jason's experience's don't mean that ALL Vw's are junk, they're 
  definitely not. EVERY model of car has it's bad ones. Jason seems to have 
  gotten one of these "Monday " or "Friday" cars. His pluses seem  to be
  the norm for VW's as well. I feel bad that he's been disenchanted by
  VW's wonderful cars. VWG has complained themselves about the lack
  of customer service by VWoA. My experiences show, however, that VW's
  are an excellently engineered car for the money, and that the reliability
  -type maintenance(things that keep you from driving your car) is 
  excellent on these cars, regardless of how inept VWoA is. The thing that
  hurts me most is not that VW is losing face, but that VW is losing
  customers who probably would have bought a VW again if the customer
  service types had been cooler. Sorry Jason, maybe after your GM or 
  RIce-burner does the same thing you'll come back to VW again.
  ONCE AGAIN, THESE ARE MY OPINIONS, NO FLAMES PLEASE>
  Any reasonable comments are cool, however.... :)
 LATER                                                -Craig"


Okay, I didn't take it as a flame.  8)

Anyhow, I don't mean to imply that all VW's are "junk" (I have a friend
with a Fox that is indestructable).  Nor do I feel that me Jetta was
poorly engineered.  On the contrary; the car is well laid out and seems
thoughtfully designed.

However, my personal experiences with this car have been bad.  It has
not been a reliable means of transport, which is all that we wanted in
the first place.  This, coupled with VWoA's "The public be damned"
attitude and the dealer's incompetence have scared me away from another
VW product.  If your Jetta is reliable, then more power to you!

I know about Monday and Friday cars.  In fact, I think my car is a
Monday-after-a-long-weekend-car [ 8) ].  But it's really not an excuse. 
Was it an excuse for the "Big 3" in the '70s?  No.  And it's one of the
reasons that VW is getting its clock cleaned in the US, just like the
Big 3 got their clocks cleaned in the '70s and early '80s.  By the
"rice-burners,"  I might add.  GM, Ford, Chrysler, AMC, et.al. got a
reputation for indifferent quality control and sloppy workmanship,
partly because they had so many Monday & Friday cars.  Mazda, Toyota,
and Honda must not have Mondays and Fridays, I guess.  ;)

If this was an expensive sports car and it exhibited these problems,
then fine, I might be willing to put up with such annoyances.  But it's
not.  It's meant to be a daily driver/economy car, and I don't have the
money to haul it into my local garage, nor do I wish to make repairing
it a hobby.

And as far as my "GM doing the same thing?"  After everything I've been
reading, I may trade this car in on a Saturn.

Or another '70 Beetle.   Hmmm..........................

--Jason Togyer
     Carnegie Institute of Technology
     Pittsburgh, Penn.

**"The moral of the story is: don't count your boobies before they've hatched."
       --James Thurber
            'THE UNICORN IN THE GARDEN'