June 14, 2009
Why do GM interiors suck?
The Truth About Car's Robert Farago says an inside source -- dubbed "Agent X" -- has given him the scoop on why GM's interiors haven't measured up to the standards set by the foreign competition:
[E]ver since GM was founded, its execs have either been driven by a chauffeur or provided with carefully prepared and maintained examples of the company’s most expensive vehicles. Of course, there are times when the suits must sign off on the company’s more prosaic products. Since 1953, this intersection between high flyer and mass market occurred at GM’s Mesa, Arizona, Desert Proving Grounds (DPG). The execs would fly into Phoenix’s Sky Harbor airport, limo out to the DPG and drive the company’s latest models.
Our agent says that all the vehicles the execs drove were “ringers.” More specifically, the engineers would tweak the test vehicles to remove any hint of imperfection. “They use a rolling radius machine to choose the best tires, fix the headliner, tighten panel and interior gaps, remove shakes and rattles, repair bodywork—everything and anything.”
Did the execs know this? “Nope. And nobody was going to tell them . . . As far as they knew, the cars were exactly as they would be coming off the line. That’s why Bob Lutz thinks GM’s products are world-class. The ones he’s driven are.”
I asked Agent X if the GM execs would ever drive the cars again. Did he know if Wagoner or Lutz dropped in at a dealership to test drive a random sample off the lot? He found the idea amusing.
Well, did the DPG at least send a list of changes to the design and production teams? “The tweaks were never reported to anyone,” he says. “That would’ve been a sure way to kill your career . . . We’d see the cars come back to us after production with the exact same problems.”
According to Farago's source, the problem is getting worse, too, which should really help GM (Government Motors, thanks to the bailout) reclaim market share.
Make sure to read the comments following the article.
I particularly like the fellow who purchased two Corvettes -- and noticed that "The Legend Lives" sticker on the door was applied crooked to both of them.
Years ago, when I was at The New Jersey Herald, I picked up an Oldsmobile Achieva at the plant to drive for a week and review. The fit and finish was horrendous, leading me to become probably the millionth journalist to dub it the "Unda-Achieva." Did I mention the razor blade left in the pocket behind the door handle? Ouch.
It was around the same time that I took a good look at the Cadillac CTS, the supposed reputation-making car at the New York AutoShow. Glue on the carpeting, glue on the headliner, misaligned interior panels -- it was a quality-control nightmare.
However, in all fairness, my GMC Sierra pickup has a pretty sweet interior, with high-grade plastics and soft-touch surfaces.
Well, there is that rattle from the A/C vent the dealer couldn't figure out. And the diesel exhaust smell in the cab, but that's only when the REGEN cycle for the particulate filter is running, nothing having the windows down and an air-sickness bag close by can't fix.
Posted by Mike Lief at June 14, 2009 09:05 PM
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Two words: Unions that reward mediocrity, and sycophants in management.
That's also how lawyers count words in length-limited briefs.
Posted by: The Little Coach at June 15, 2009 08:25 AM