7th Jan 2007, 13:08

6:42 is brainwashed... address Toyota air bags that malfunction, sticking accelators, brakes and bad transmissions. Is that your idea of quality? I looked at the 2004 Silverado site... very well presented with technical information. Read it and weep...

7th Jan 2007, 13:38

"I so much enjoy seeing that dozens of domestics broken down on the side of the road every time I take a trip somewhere, especially when it's some big, expensive Tahoe or something. "

Oh, this is so hilarious!! Even when I drive 2,500 miles across the country, I have never seen "dozens" of cars broken down. At the height of summer, I have seen a handful of cars broken down from overheating along I-70. They are a mix of all brands, typically 3-10 years old, the point at which people have stopped doing routine maintenance. They include Chevrolet, BMW, Volkswagen, Toyota, Ford, Dodge, and Honda. Keeping any car running is a matter of maintenance. There is nothing magical about Japanese cars. Anybody who thinks that a Toyota will never break down just because it's a Toyota is living in a fantasy world. I've seen Toyota and Honda cars with their hoods up plenty of times, and they didn't have 400,000 miles on them, either!

7th Jan 2007, 14:17

To 12:36; every sentence you wrote is completely incorrect.

8th Jan 2007, 20:45

As far as you know this might just be a kid just getting a rise out of you. The main thing is you know in your own mind. There are a lot of intelligent individuals that are wise enough to evaluate and especially test drive before they buy. The vehicles will present themselves if you take them out and see how they perform. I knew in less than 10 minutes in my test drive I was buying a new Silverado... and drove it home the same night.

8th Jan 2007, 21:07

I couldn't agree more with 19:26! People seem to have forgotten what hard work is all about, but pretend to recapture it by buying fluffy little yuppie-mobiles that they would never so much as haul a pair of pliers in. Where I live, people actually use trucks for work, and would be ashamed to buy Japanese. You are absolutely right. Where I live, nobody drives Toyotas and the only time you see them is when some yuppie, environmental activist, commie agitator, or loser surfer dude gets lost looking for a latte bar.

9th Jan 2007, 17:00

To 19:26;

Parts are parts; the QUALITY (and that DOES mean something, more now than ever) is in HOW the parts are assembled, carelessly, as with Ford and Chevy, or carefully and precisely, as in Toyota. There IS a difference in the assembly. Toyota's are better built - get used to it.

And you are wrong in your assessment of MOST of the parts you named if you park the trucks side by side. The Toyota, by design, is the better truck. I shouldn't even have to mention the superiority of their motors, as that goes without saying. I wouldn't argue that a Ford or Chevy has a better gasoline engine than Toyota, because they don't, and surely never did.

Also, you're missing the idea behind the trucks altogether: Toyota never had it in mind that people are going to put a half ton snow plow on their pickup trucks - unless it's a dump truck, or something at least as big as an F-350.

But for the AVERAGE guy, that hauls enough stuff to work on his house; maybe a few sheets of drywall, occasional load of mulch or gravel, or whatever, the Toyota WILL outlast any other make. This is the category that probably 98% of people who buy trucks fit into - light and infrequent hauling. Toyota trucks are designed more for superior on and off road use rather than heavy hauling. They are the best of their kind for what they intend to accomplish.

If you want to haul a 30' long horse trailer, buy something else. If you want the best all-around, most fun to drive, most reliable and best built small and midsize truck available in the world, buy a Toyota. No, I'm not and never have been a Toyota salesman as some people will probably try and say. Ford and Dodge make the best super-duty trucks; Chevy doesn't make anything at all worth buying, and Toyota makes the best of every other kind of car, truck, and SUV on the market.

9th Jan 2007, 18:57

(This is the writer of 19:26) Thank you for proving my point. You say it better than I can. Are you listening boys and girls? The Tundra wasn't made for actually hauling a half ton of payload. It was made for light duty stuff.

That's what I've been trying to say all along. That's why no one should be bragging about their Tundra. Your engine is superior to Chevy and Ford because it is never put through any abuse, so it will last longer. Not to mention the fact that the Tundra weighs roughly 400lbs less than any of the bottom of the barrel domestic equivalents (more proof of the lack of metal).

Also, where exactly was I wrong about the side-by-side comparison? You couldn't name one part. As I said before, I defy you to name one part of the Tundra that is better re-enforced or a heavier duty part when compared to a domestic. What part of the Chevy engine or Ford engine is inferior to the Tundra engine?

Is it the rockers? The pistons? The piston sleeves? The cam shaft? The valves? The oil pump? The block? The valve covers? The cam lobes? The crank-shaft? Do you even know what half of these parts are? Are you sure you even know how an engine works?

I am not comparing it to an F-250 or RAM 2500. I am talking about the F-150, the Silverado 1500, and the RAM 1500.

I see quite a few of those class of trucks moving now plows.

As for Chevy making things that are worthless, I could take my 29 year old "worthless" Chevy and fold your Tundra into an accordion. Why? A little magical substance called steel. How much would your quality truck be worth then? There would be chunks of quality all over the place.

You have proven my point to all of the other readers. I would imagine you never even look under your truck. I've spent a lot of time on my Chevy trying to restore it to a newer condition, it is three decades old and has had a long life of abuse and neglect. Yet the "low quality" engine still fires right up. I've seen just about every bolt and piece of this truck. I know its structure quite thoroughly. I know what it takes to be a heavy-duty work machine. The Tundra hasn't got a clue.

Call me foolish all you want, the metal is what it is. The skinny-ness of your Tundra is what it is regardless of what words you speak about it. Curse my truck and its 100 year old maker. I've seen what it's been put through over the years and yet it still sits in my driveway and is used weekly. It has nothing left to prove.

Tell me, where will your Tundra be in thirty years. I doubt it will be in any driveway, unless a dog is living in it.

Uh-ho! Are you going to boast about a lot of highway miles, now? Well, five days a week I watch the trip odometer on my F-150 count up to 200+ miles on my round trip delivering parts to body shops. The odometer is at 256,000 miles and counting. This little V-6 has been abused and driven to death having to move a 5000lb chassis and whatever parts are in the back. Yet I can still burn the back tires off of it (if I want), and it fires up for me time after time.

I don't care if you like your Tundra. To each his own. But every time I see a Tundra owner (without being provoked) start bashing a domestic in their review or in their comment, I will be there with my two cents. I know what I'm talking about. I've seen these domestic trucks getting treated mercilessly and keep right on going.

So even though the Tundra is made of skinny parts, the workers at the plant do a good job putting the skinny parts together? Well good for them. Maybe they do. What good is it when the parts themselves are poorly made and re-enforced? They can build them as well as they want. The best assembled Tundra on Earth is still going to be made of skinny and flimsy parts. So I take that form of quality as a grain of sand.

If your Tundra makes you happy and serves your purpose, good for you. You shouldn't have had to pay so much for it and you should be getting a better MPG out of your "superior" engine since the chassis is lighter. But please understand, the domestics were made to endure a harder life, so they don't need to be bashed. If you don't like them, then don't buy one. That's what I will be doing to the foreign trucks. Just quit insulting peoples' work machines.