Although Honda and Toyota (and their luxury marquees) are often at the top of the heap for reliability, their models often have serious problems as shown by the Automatic 2001-2003 TL's on the Acura side and the MR2 spyder by Toyota. I hate to be a conspiracy theorist but they seem to get many of those affected to still rate them highly due to "quality service" (extended warrenties, free oil/gas, etc)

Here are some links to analyze:

2nd Gen TL (seems the 2004 redesign isn't any better if you search around)

http://www.petitiononline.com/acura/petition.html
http://www.acura-tl.com/forums/showthread.php?t=52016

MR2 Spyder
http://www.spyderchat.com/phpBB/view...engine+failure

Toyotas in general
http://www.msnusers.com/ToyotaOwners...rsstories.msnw



For all the tuning and HP we pump out of the 4G63, I bet our Transfer Case and Clutch failure rate percentage wise is still less than these two reliability winners from Consumer Reports! The grass isn't always greener elsewhere.