If you have a Consumer Reports online account and you go and check their reliability report for the 03 350Z you will find that it gets excellent in almost every category except for a couple. One is body integrity (things like water seapage through seems and noise). The other is the category of suspension. Both of these got a raiting of better than average (those of you familiar with CR know it as the half red, half white circle). According to CR this means that 2% - 5% of respondents mentioned suspension as a problem. To get excellent you have to have less than 2% of respondents claim something as a problem. Overall they give the reliability of the 350Z a better than average raiting. None of the systems received lower than better than average.

 

I simply cannot understand why any sports car enthusiast gives a rats azz what CR has to say about the 350Z. CR compares refrigerators and vacuum cleaners. It is not a car magazine. Look at what Road & Track, Car & Driver, and AutoWeek have to say about the Z. The mindset at CR is that a car is an appliance. We know better. Throw away that rag and enjoy driving your Z.

 

Amen! We know more about the fine details of the Z than CR. That publication is for people that dont know much about a product and are willing to pay other people for their knowledge in that area. If i wanted to buy a blender, or an iron, I might read CR because to be honest, I could care less about doing the research for those products and will just take their advise and live with it.

I cant imagine deciding on which car I drove by reading their report anymore than i could imagine deciding which CD to buy by reading a music review.

 

Well, despite them not liking the Z and all in the latest issue... if you saw the Behind Closed Doors w/Joan Lunden ep giving a behind the scenes look at Consumer Reports testing, you'd find they are pretty thorough.

However, if you ignore all their subjective reviews, I still look at them if for nothing else, their reliability reports. There are tons of tables in the annual April auto issue. It's based on surveys mailed out annually. I at least trust them to report the stats and I've found their marks to be usually on the mark. In many cases, where many people have had trouble w/a certain system on a particular car is where we've also had trouble.

No other car mags really do reliability reports and surveys and some of JD Power's figures to me are suspect but many of their figures correlate pretty closey w/CR's reliability findings.

 

AAALLLEEEYYYLLLUUYYYAAA!

 

I agree. Those charts are very helpful when reliability is part of your purchasing criteria.

 

I also agree on the CR reliability reports. The wife has a Malibu for a company car and CR hit the mark on every reliablity related issue for that piece'o crap car.

 

The point of my post was not to hail CR as the source of what car you should choose. It was about how they had 2% - 5% of their respondents who own 350Z mentioning suspension as a problem. I wonder if this number is indicative of how many Z owners are having feathering problems.

 

CR is a joke when it comes to cars.As Mr. Kool Aide said:who give a rats azzz.

 

I wish you guys would give my butt more respect!!

I'm a long time reader of CR. No doubt they screwed the goose on the Zzz review but the above comments on CR's reliability ratings is spot on. It would be foolish to ignor the ratings as part of a buy/don't buy decision.

 

Consumer Report is hourseshiet.

If anything, look at J.D.Power for reliablility ratings.

 

But J.D. Power's doesn't really give individual reliability ratings for cars (only if there are winners in a category) nor do they rate anything older than about 3 years old. Also, they don't point out which spots are problematic or reliable on any model.

 

I take back part of what I said about CR. Seeing the reliability of a car is very important. My error!

 

ignore everything about their car reviews, except for the reliability ratings. from everything i've heard (and personally experienced) their reliability ratings are the most accurate available.