jacked up

[angus67]

i noticed on my jack, it says Toyota. it fits fine in the holes. made by same company? just wondering
and,,,,, why is there a sticker under my hood that says honda of america?(my sig)just curious. know they were assebled here, but why are they cons. imports? is it cuz the parts are overseas?

[visualpoet]

Your jack is a wannabe. Your car says Honda of AMerica, because it was built in America. It's considered an import because the parent company has it's headquarters overseas and originated overseas. At one time, all Hondas were built in Japan.

[mondojackal]

i really dont care where a car is actually assembled. personally, i think the Japanese manufacturers win not because they put together a great car, but because they have much better R&D techniques than american and other car makers, and they design cars better, too.

i think it really comes down to who designs it, not who glues it together.

*edit* as for the actual jack, i would presume that someone didnt have a jack in the lifetime of the car before you bought it, and i would think that most passenger vehicle jacks are pretty similar in overall size and design.

[visualpoet]

i really dont care where a car is actually assembled. personally, i think the Japanese manufacturers win not because they put together a great car, but because they have much better R&D techniques than american and other car makers, and they design cars better, too.

i think it really comes down to who designs it, not who glues it together.

I agree and disagree. Japanese manufacturers do win because of R&D, but also because their workers take greater pride in a job well done than most Americans.
For instance. I've been trying to get the JDM center caps for my Kosei wheels. After emailing Kosei and having my email forwarded through a few departments, I was directed to tirerack.com. The guy at tirerack emailed me back and told me that they couldn't get those caps and that they wouldn't work for my wheels anyway. I emailed back, told him those caps are the ones shown on my wheels on Kosei's website, and that Kosei had directed me to tirerack to purchase them. I sent a CC of the email to the person who had answered me at Kosei and he has gone out of his way to acquire the last set of the caps they had before they threw them away (they are discontinued). He then told me that I would only have to pay for shipping, and when I emailed him Monday to make sure he had received my payment (he doesn't deal with PayPal and can't process my credit card since he's doing this outside the company as a favor), told me that he had not, but that if it didn't arrive by the end of this month, he would ship them to me at his own expense! The American employee at tirerack blew me off, whereas the Japanese worker has bent over backwards to provide good customer service and ensure my satisfaction with the product.

The American built Japanese cars are overseen by Japanese management, so they also run things the way they do back home, giving them much higher standards. For a long long time, the big three thought that they could just slap cars together and the American public would continue to buy them. They had good R&D, but the quality was garbage. It doesn't matter how good the research or design are if the guy putting it together doesn't make sure he builds it to spec. It does no good to have a car designed by Enzo Ferrari but built by some guy with an IQ of 95, who's hungover and has a piss poor attitude because his wife is running around with the neighbor while he's wrenching.

[mondojackal]

indeed. i agree about the people thing. but most modern cars aren't early 20th century fords. a lot of stuff is going to be assembled by robots, or it is a part that snaps in or something like that, so that the part is either installed properly, or not installed properly. and if it's not installed properly, then it wont pass quality control inspection.

but i totally agree about the japanese people being very helpful. it's just in their culture. they want to do a better job than everyone else.

japs ftw.