Hybrids Can Be Cheap to Make, Toyota Says

[StephNW4Clark]

It's about time.

(Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp showed off the production site of its gasoline-electric hybrid cars to journalists for the first time on Thursday with a powerful message: they don't have to be expensive to make. Not long ago, many leading auto makers, including the world's biggest, General Motors Corp, questioned the benefit of developing hybrid cars, arguing they are merely an interim solution before zero-emission fuel-cell vehicles take over.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20031002/tc_nm/autos_toyota_hybrid_dc_1

[papau]

1. Finally - hybrids are the way and Toyota wins! - & Detroit screws up again

We need Japanese mamagement of Ford and GM!

[Mairead]

2. I don't doubt they can make them relatively inexpensively

But I really wonder about the maintenance cost. That's 2 different systems and their interface. Just finger-in-the-wind, that feels expensive.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Cheer up - that's local jobs

If you're going to spend money on transportation, isn't it better to be on local, well-paid mechanics jobs than importing oil (and cutting carbon dioxide at the same time)?

[Mairead]

5. Oh aye--but it's not much fun if you're the one who's to do the paying

[punpirate]

4. They're being discounted now...

... because the volume is so low, but the people at Toyota are nothing if not sensible. They've been selling them, at a loss, to rental car agencies, etc., to get a handle on their reliability here.

When I worked in the garage of a Toyota dealership in the `80s (yes, factory-trained Toyota mechanic), I found that most models introduced in this country had already been for sale in Japan for 3-4 years, but a lot of market testing was done in this country because, well, it's a big market.

In the early `80s, the Japanese were just hammering the US makers, rapidly converting sub-assembly lines to robotic assembly (engines, transmissions, rear ends, hub assemblies, dashes), but they were still doing extensive testing here on older models.

One of my favorite stories from time at the Toyota school was the instructor relating an odd thing he saw on the street around the port. Three people, obviously Japanese, walking up and down, looking for 6-8 year-old Toyotas. When they found one, they waited for the owner to come back to it, asked if they could do some tests on the windshield wipers. Squirted something that looked like Maalox on the windshield, measured how much was removed on one stroke, how many strokes it took to completely remove it, tested the spring tension of the arms, etc.

Cleaned everything up, and then their old-guy Santa rummaged around in his bag and gave the owner a small gift for his time.

The first dual-overhead cam Supras showed up in Sept., 81. In mid-`83, I got one with a broken valve spring. No parts locally, no parts in Long Beach, the main US warehouse. Turned out Toyota didn't stock parts that had never broken. I had found the first broken valve spring in the US. Toyota, when they got a request for the part from Long Beach, sent one international overnight, with instructions to send the broken spring back via international overnight. The engineers wanted to look at it, because it was the first they'd heard of a broken valve spring on that engine anywhere.

Deming taught them right. They really know quality control. Now, I have no doubt that some of the hybrids are going to break, and like most cars today, they going to be expensive to fix. But, if it's a design screw-up on Toyota's part, they'll extend the warranty for that item--have seen them do it on other models.

My principal concern about hybrids is not the engine or the traction motor or the generator--it's the life of the batteries, and whether or not, if the cars become popular items, they will present a recycling problem. I'm hoping that Toyota and Nissan will come up with recycling suggestions or exchange procedures for them as time goes by.

Cheers.