Toyota Motor Sales 2013 Lexus GS 350.10:46 a.m. | Updated Lexus earned the top overall score of 79 in the Consumer Reports 2013 Annual Report Card, the magazine announced on Tuesday.
Subaru and Mazda tied for second with scores of 76. The magazine said both brands build solid cars that have good handling and fuel economy, are versatile and relatively affordable.
Rounding out the top five were Toyota and Acura with scores of 74.
Honda scored a 72, hurt by the Insight and CR-Z, which had low scores.
Audi and Mercedes-Benz were the only non-Japanese brands to break into the top 10. Audi’s score of 70 put it into 8th place and Mercedes was in 10th with a 69. Audi was the only European brand to have very good reliability over all along with an excellent road-test score.
Eight of the top 10 brands in the report were Japanese. Most Detroit brands were toward the bottom, with European brands generally in the middle.
The magazine used a new grading system this year. In the past, the magazine calculated one overall score for each automaker, but this year there are separate scores for each brand and for individual brands. In the case of Toyota, its three brands, Lexus, Scion and Toyota, get separate scores. Ford also gets separate scores for the Ford and Lincoln brands instead of just one overall score for Ford.
It is more in line with the way consumers shop, the magazine said. Grouping Scion with Lexus doesn’t make a lot of sense from a consumer’s point of view “since they are rarely cross-shopped,” Jake Fisher, director of automotive testing for Consumer Reports, said in a telephone interview.
The 2013 Annual Brand Report Card rankings, Top Picks and more were released by the magazine at a news conference before the Washington Automotive Press Association in Washington.
A brand’s score is calculated using road test and reliability scores, equally weighted, for each of the models tested. The reliability scores come from information provided by the magazine’s subscribers during its Annual Auto Survey.
The bottom five on the Report Card were Chrysler with a score of 52, Ford with 51, Lincoln with 50, Jeep with 47 and Dodge at the very bottom with 46.
Although the new Dodge Dart is an improvement over other small cars from Dodge, “it is not nearly up to the levels of the best competitors,” Mr. Fisher said.
Ford and Lincoln are still suffering from problems with the MyFord and MyLincoln Touch infotainment systems, as well as with the dual-clutch automatic gearbox. Those two issues hurt Ford (including Lincoln) in last year’s Report Card as well.
Ford has made some improvements, but not nearly enough; and problems are spreading as more vehicles have the MyFord and MyLincoln Touch system, Mr. Fisher said.
Those issues have been joined by performance issues related to Ford’s new 1.6-liter and 2-liter EcoBoost turbocharged engines.
“They both have less performance and drink more fuel than the competitors; it hurts their road test scores,” Mr. Fisher said.
To be included, the magazine must have data for at least three models, which meant Fiat, Jaguar, Land Rover, Mitsubishi, Porsche, Ram and Smart were not rated.
The April issue will be on newsstands March 5 and online for subscribers to the magazine’s Web site on Tuesday.
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