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      01-17-2020, 04:50 PM   #28
Viffermike
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Quote:
Originally Posted by whyzee125 View Post
That’s simply for false. They may have lower than average reliability now (though my family has had excellent experiences with them) but in the 80s and 90s they were built like tanks and had a reputation for rock solid reliability.
Ummm ... no, they didn't. See Post #9 by yours truly. During that time I actually lived in Germany.

Mercedes, BMW, and Audi were all fighting uphill battles to make their vehicles more 'premium' because in the home country, all three were (and were considered) mid-grade 'commoner' vehicles with some high-line variants. Not only was the perception of each different than in the U.S., but the reality was different because that perception was largely based on actual, real history using a sample size that was far, far larger than the U.S. had at the time.

The U.S. almost always only had premium trims of the smaller models exported to it, and the high-line variants were, frankly, created to fulfill U.S. market demands more so than home-market demands. Example: The primary reason large German GT coupes came to be in the 1970s and 80s -- the BMW 6 series, the Mercedes W116 and W126 variants, and the Porsche 928 (Audi never really dabbled since it had its own set of issues that nearly killed it) was the U.S. market's appetite for them. (We all know how that turned out.)

The U.S. also never saw many Mercedes Turbodiesels. 'Nuff said. (I did, back then. They were horrific.)

I also saw -- regularly -- broken-down home-market M-Bs, BMWs, and Audis on roadsides, in driveways, and elsewhere. I made a mental note of them because of what my previous perception of those cars was. I also remember it vividly because of that.

Finally, I lived in a small German town. My neighbor's son was a gearhead who souped up Honda CB street bikes and had all manner of pals come by with serious two-wheel and four-wheel hardware. I asked him, one day, about how BMW and Mercedes are perceived vs. the U.S. I remember him laughing and basically saying 'To Germans, Mercedes are your Chryslers. BMWs are your Pontiacs. I don't like either because they break and are too hard to fix.'

That's one man's opinion ... but that opinion was formed based on a lot of firsthand and secondhand observation in the place where they were built and used the most.
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