Defective Autos make for Countless Personal Injuries

Hunter Valley, CAArt Masaoka refers to himself as a professional consumer, particularly when it comes to vehicles. Masoaka is also an expert witness for trial purposes on lemon-law cases; he wants to share with other consumers his knowledge of, and experience with, defective automobile products, particularly safety concerns that can lead to personal injury. "The manufacturer makes the same defective repair over and over again until someone gets hurt," says Masaoka.

When Masaoka buys a product, just like any other consumer, he fully expects that product to be safe and satisfactory and that it meets the needs as represented in any advertisements. "Unfortunately, on many occasion I have purchased products that have been subject to recall, safety bulletins or factory recall campaigns," says Masaoka. "The manufacturer may have complied with their remedy to fix the defects as per the recall bulletin. However, the defects can be masked, reduced or repaired to be even more unsafe than before the recall repair."

Masaoka cites several vehicles he has owned that have proven to be defective: a 1995 and a 2000 Ford Contour-- both caught engine fire on several occasions; a 2001 Honda Odyssey van—on its third transmission with only 26,000 miles; a 2000 Lexus ES300 and a 2001 Toyota Camry. "I have gone through three engines on the latter two cars due to manufacturer's defects," says Masaoka. "The head gaskets were recalled on each vehicle—same engine, different kind of car."

In each case, Masaoka says the manufacturer is glad to replace the engine but does not fix the problem. And the recalled defect repair makes the problem worse. "They design a recall kit that the federal government's agency --National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)-- approves," Masaoka explains. "Whether it fixes the problem or not does not matter, as along as a repair remedy appears to fix the problem, that is all that matters. But it may never get fixed.

"Here's a perfect example: in 1987, the Nissan Van had over 20 safety defects. It was cheaper for the factory to buy them back than to try and fix the car. Unfortunately there are other manufacturers that do not have the same philosophy, including Honda and Lexus. I have been employed in the auto repair industry for over 30 years and have seen this trend become more prevalent: the makers will not remedy the defects or buy back the product."

Masaoka works on about two cases per year that involve the lemon law; he only takes on the most egregious cases, "the ones that are such blatant violation of common decency," he adds. "For example, the Honda Motor Company made the transmissions for its Honda Odyssey van, the Honda Accord V6 and the Honda Pilot. This transmission has a guaranteed failure rate at 30,000 miles. They just give you another bad one, then you return that at 30,000 miles and so on...they are hoping that you will exceed the warranty time on mileage and then make you buy a new one for $4,000-5,000. I also have relatives and friends with these same cars and they have similar problems."

According to Masaoka, it happens all the time...

He gives another example. "Did you ever hear of the Saturn View? It has the same transmission defect but at least Saturn is willing to re-engineer the transmission and make it right for the customer. This is not true for Honda Motor Company products."

(I asked Masaoka if he ever worked for Honda. "I never worked at Honda and never wanted to," he replied.)

"Also, researching their blog websites confirms my suspicions about these defects," Masaoka says. "If you look up transmission recalls on the Honda Accord, you will find this transmission defect. I also want to emphasize that this defective transmission is used on Accura automobiles as well. Unfortunately you don't hear much about these kinds of defects unless you look at blog websites on customer complaints.

According to Masaoka, Honda spends a lot of time and effort to train its employees to ensure that their products are not known or associated with transmission failures-- as General Motors was identified with in the 1980s.

He explains that Honda has training programs to write repair orders to reflect something other than a transmission failure so it obscures the true nature of the defect. "To make matters worse, if you are going to seek a buy-back from the manufacturer, it is very hard to prove that the transmission had a defect because the 'service writer' writes the repair order to reflect a repair completely unrelated to the transmission defect," he says. Got that?

"Even upon my insistence to force them to write a repair order that a transmission failure occurred, they refuse to do so and write a repair defect that shows the engine is sluggish or that the engine is leaking oil," Masaoka adds. "They then write a second repair order to reflect the true nature of the repair that I will often never see. So this reason discourages customers from seeking lemon-law buy back remedies. Unfortunately, this is the norm rather than the exception."

What needs to be done to protect the consumer and how can they pursue the lemon law if it applies to their defect?

"The customer needs to be advised of the true nature of the defect by the manufacturer and the dealership,"says Masaoka. He believes that the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), along with some other private entity that can watchdog manufacturers and dealership tactics must be more diligent. Until that day comes, the consumer is going to be at a clear disadvantage when trying to get their car fixed.

"It is unfortunate that there is not one complete resource for a consumer to contact for information about these types of defects," says Masaoka. "The recall defect websites are not comprehensive enough—they cover certain aspects but they don't paint the whole picture. Masaoka suggests that the consumer needs one website that contains a comprehensive listing of all the defects. Currently, the consumer has to research several websites to get a comprehensive list of recalled defects and product quality.

"I find it totally disgusting that manufacturers such as those I have mentioned get away with [making defective products] and even worse, think it is an acceptable and general operating procedure and the norm in the manufacturing process."

If you have a defective product, Masaoka advises that you "always maintain your rights and remedies to get a product replaced with a different product or have them buy it back."

After all, it is the consumer who determines what products will continue to be produced, based on market demand. If a product continues to be purchased, whether good, bad or worse, the consumer drives the manufacturing and sale of that defective product.

You can probably think of several products that are really bad but they still continue to be produced; maybe one is on the top shelf of your cupboard—or parked in your garage. "I have been the victim of bad purchases too, but I make the manufacturer replace the defective product with a new one or refund my money," says Masaoka.

He has one last piece of advice: "Bear in mind that the manufacturer has 'making bad product' down to a science. Their philosophy is that it is cheaper to make bad product and deal with the aftermath, including buy-backs, recall repairs and exchange remedies than it is to design a good product."

Our advice: if you don't get a new product or full refund, seek legal help.