Are Those Highly Touted JD Power Studies More Fiction Than Fact, Or Is There A Better Resource?

All such studies of ANYTHING by ANYBODY are flawed. They all reflect the bias of those taking the studies - since they are the ones that make up the questions - and that is where they can lead a person to a particular answer without that person realizing it. I would never consider the results of a study to be anything more than that - UNLESS - I have actually read the questions asked - in the same manner they were asked as well.

However - the APEAL study - based on what I know about how they asked the questions - was far more than flawed - it was just about useless. Why would you compare cars - based on the advanced equipment in them - unless you are trying for the high priced cars with all of those features - to come out on top. AND cars that do not have the features would be lower in the study. I do not see the relevance of the study to real world - where people have budgets to keep. And that is just one problem with the study.

CR is the gold standard in this category by pulling together various analysis from their surveys. Most recent about vehicles/engines with unusually high oil consumption. Some though don't like to see the results on their Favs.

CR is the "gold standard" of garbage, just as useless as this study.

JD Power is fiction. They are in the business of selling their endorsement and as a result they skew their data factoids to have their non-scientific measures say anything they need it to say.

CR is as much of a sham as JD Power.

THere are actually two different "CR"s - Consumers Research - and Consumer Reports.
Actually - "JD power and Consumer Research" and CR(Consumer Reports) are not in the same business. Jd power and Consumers Research are essentialy research company whose basic product is the results of surveying customers. CR (COnsumer reports) is actually a testing company - that purchases and tests products and reports on the results of those tested. CR does not accept free samples or advertising from the companies whose products it tests - and it actually purchases every tested item so that the companies cannot prepare their product in advance. Actually Consumers Research ALSO did testing for its first 50 years and was very similar to Consumer reports - but it dropped its testing back in the 1980's to be more like JD power.

Again - merely questioning consumers is not an accurate way of finding out information about a product - since it brings with it the bias of the consumers - along with the bias of the people who make up the questions in the research - along with the bias of those asking the questions - if done in real time. While actually testing a product ALSO brings with it the bias of the testers - it also generally brings an amount of information over which the testers have no control. Traditionally - CRs testing has been more basic than that of other testing companies - and in autos - it is biased towards the more basic use of them as transportation devices (Rather than super high performance thrills) - it still provides information about ergonomics and performance and reliability (Some of which is provided by customers surveys) that you often do not get from the now more performance oriented Auto Magazines.

Right ON >> MrEE / USNA / MD