Cadillac SRX reliability

[mkaresh]

About the same as last month, just 38 SRX owners signed up. I'm now collecting data on nearly every competitor, even the Audi Q7 and Mercedes GL, but I'm not even close with the SRX.

[mkaresh]

Next results in August, but still not collecting data on the SRX. I will have results for the Acura MDX and Audi Q7.

[mkaresh]

Most recent results posted here:

TrueDelta Vehicle Reliability Survey results

[donhenry@aeiwireless]

I signed up - 2007 SRX V6 AWD.

[robhersch]

Originally Posted by mkaresh

About the same as last month, just 38 SRX owners signed up. I'm now collecting data on nearly every competitor, even the Audi Q7 and Mercedes GL, but I'm not even close with the SRX.

Mike,
I find it interesting that we have many SRX folks not only "grumbling" about their SRX problems on this SRX owners forum but also "apparently reluctant to contribute the facts" of those problems to your data base.
Do you think that maybe SRX vehicles are just so much more reliable than the "competition" from the krauts & ricers that reporting is not needed??
We still love our 2005 SRX N*V8 RWD (even with all of the "SRX problems" posted herein).
I still have nothing new (except maybe for oil changes) to report since my last entry above; I just put gas (premium) in and drive it
robhersch

[john d]

Originally Posted by robhersch

Mike,
I find it interesting that we have many SRX folks not only "grumbling" about their SRX problems on this SRX owners forum but also "apparently reluctant to contribute the facts" of those problems to your data base.
Do you think that maybe SRX vehicles are just so much more reliable than the "competition" from the krauts & ricers that reporting is not needed??
We still love our 2005 SRX N*V8 RWD (even with all of the "SRX problems" posted herein).
I still have nothing new (except maybe for oil changes) to report since my last entry above; I just put gas (premium) in and drive it
robhersch

There's also the self inflicted shoot yourself in the foot factor.
Knock the product and lower the demand...lower the demand lower the value.
Not that the value could be knocked any lower than it is already from the problems we contributors here have shared.
Many, if not all, have proclaimed we wanted to buy American.
Save jobs, keep big purchase dollars at home in the U.S..
Help GM because whats good for GM is good for America.
We bought the premier American automobile...CADILLAC ! ! ! !
We paid 10's of thousands for the American trophy automobile.
In return we get serious, even bodily injury threating problems to deal with (often not fixed) like poor designed transfer cases, detuning re-flashes, long downtime for parts, exploding glass roofs, failed catalytic converters, self destroying mufflers, rusty jacks due to unfixable leaks, recall after recall, outdated Onstar equipment, untrained service departments, problem timing chains, stalling in traffic, premature brake wear, etc..... and extreme loss of value in depreciation.
Even Cadillac dropped SRX "Performance" SUV advertising campaigns and then promoted the SRX as a grocery getter. Just another $60 k station wagon.
In nearly 4 years of ownership it seems I've had more service department visits and down time than the 25 cars I've owned since 1956 combined.
Sure sorry I spent my retirement savings on this car.

[robhersch]

Cheer up john d, maybe next time you can get a chinese, korean, indian, libyan or iranian (horse drawn??) vehicle along with a "gibson girl" type air conditioner. Got to be cheaper at third world labor rates and fewer, simpler parts.
We still love our "made in the USA" SRX, high priced US union labor included!!
By the way, have you really experienced and reported all of your listed problems to Mike for his reliability reports??
Good luck.

[john d]

Originally Posted by robhersch

Cheer up john d, maybe next time you can get a chinese, korean, indian, libyan or iranian (horse drawn??) vehicle along with a "gibson girl" type air conditioner. Got to be cheaper at third world labor rates and fewer, simpler parts.
We still love our "made in the USA" SRX, high priced US union labor included!!
By the way, have you really experienced and reported all of your listed problems to Mike for his reliability reports??
Good luck.

Hey Rob - Didn't report any to Mike as he wanted going forward reports and I listed a few that I could recall that others had reported here in addition to many of my own.
Plus, there's the "publicizing" of our value killing problems factor that makes me hesitant to participate in his venture. He makes $, we lose $.
Do want to state that I love the car for what it could be and am devastated by what it is.
Had hoped that in a few years I'd make a gift of it to my grandson (as I had gifted my Town Cars to my daughters a few years ago) but that's now out of the question with it's unreliability and out of warranty repair costs. I'd not be doing him or his parents any favors...

[mkaresh]

There are already other sources of reliability information out there. A high repair rate from my surveys could not reduce the value of the SRX any further.

What results from my survey would do is make it possible to see what a poor rating elsewhere translates to in terms of repair trips per year, an actual number. What many people don't realize is that a relatively high repair rate still isn't high in absolute terms, usually about one repair trip per year on average.

And the result would be based on more recent information, so if the repair rate improves or worsens this would be evident more quickly. This could provide manufacturers with an additional incentive to improve reliability.

It is important to accurately report repairs. TrueDelta's results must be credible if they are to help correct for others' failure to post absolute and not just relative repair rates.

I think the main reason I don't have enough SRXs is that there simply aren't that many of them. Acura sells far more MDXs, for example.

[cfishkin]

John, sorry you've experienced those problems, my 2005 AWD, Ultraview, V6 has only been to the dealer for oil changes. It's almost exclusively used around town, and I still have the original brakes after 38,000 miles and my wife drives 60mph to the stop sign and slams on the brakes.

[z32drifter]

2005 must have been a good year, our SRX has only suffered a few minor trim issues. Still has original brakes and tires at 31k, and I expect both to go over 40k before replacement. So far the knob for the rear air fan in the roof control panel as cracked (easy to see at night), the shifter slide stuck or was damaged, one of the block off plates in the rear of the headliner comes loose and needs to be replaced. We bought ours as a CPO with 21k, the previous owners records showed normal maint and replacement of a leaky pinion seal. I hope it continues on the reliable road.

BTW I work for VW so compare it to a Touareg..... They go thru tires every 20-25k and brakes last about 40k, dealer brake job is around $1500.00 parts alone are around $1000.00.

[mkaresh]

One thing I hope my research will make clearer is that "below average" isn't often actually bad. These days, it just takes a couple of minor problems for a model to be "below average" in reliability.

Also, even with such models cars that require no repairs at all are not uncommon.

With the SRX, 2004, 2006, and 2007 are all about halfway to the minimum needed to get started collecting data. It is harder to get there because not many are sold.

With the Acura MDX, I have twice as many owners for the 2007 alone as for all years of the SRX put together. But they also sold 5,000 of the things last month.

If you're not yet signed up, please consider doing so. A number of the owners already signed up have told me they really want to get started. But I won't start before enough owners are signed up, because that would just waste people's time.

For the details, and to sign up to help:

Vehicle reliability research

[RobVuk]

I checked out your survey and found it confusing at best. Wouldn't it be better to be able to average the number of miles between service visits for any given model instead of visits/year? It doesn't mean much if an 05 model has never been in for service in 3 years if it only has 5,000 miles on it. The nature of probelms is often misleading to the facts too. I've seen where people will bring a performance car in for service because they think there's too much brake dust on the wheels.

I also question the reliability of the data for the older cars. I surely couldn't tell you how many times I've serviced my 9 year old GMC jimmy with any accuracy after 140,000 miles. I traded it for a 2008 SRX V8 AWD just last week, so I am new here and at this time I have nothing to contribute to your survey but I admire your efforts.

Thanks
Rob

[mkaresh]

Rob,

You make some excellent points, but it sounds like you don't understand how the survey process works. First of all, when the car is brand new is the best time to join.

I know people can't accurately remember things unless they happened recently. For this reason and to minimize bias, the data are collected going forward, not based on what's already happened. After someone signs up, they get an email each month. If they had a repair the previous month, they respond to the survey. If they had no repair, every third month they simply report an approximate odometer reading. Other months they don't need to do anything (though it's possible to click a "check in" link to avoid follow-up emails).

In other words, people just report on what happened the previous month, not the previous year or (!) the previous ten years.

I personally review every repair that's submitted. Very few of them are for frivolous items. Issues involving brake pads and rotors are excluded from the analysis you saw because they have many potential causes, many of which are beyond the control of the manufacturer.

Also be aware that the current analysis only includes "successful repairs." This means that the owner not only felt something was wrong, but the dealer agreed and was willing and able to do something to fix it. This no doubt excludes some aggravating problems that the dealer can't fix, but it also excludes complaints like the one you mention.

It would be nice to report, as others have also suggested, a mean time/miles between failures. But to do this each vehicle must be having failures, and these days failures can be quite rare. In other words, there's no way with my data to calculate such a result. Maybe in a few years, when many owners have been involved for an extended period of time, but not today.

In general, I plan to provide additional results in the future, with larger sample sizes permitting more detail. Right now I'm concentrating on trips to the shop per year because it's viable with small sample sizes and a limited timespan of data. Next to each result you'll see the average number of miles on each vehicle at the end of all quarters reported on, so you can see how new the vehicles are and also about how much they tend to be driven.

Please let me know if you have further questions. I haven't been able to collect any data on the SRX yet, but a few 2008s have already signed up, so maybe the current model year. One more would certainly help.

[RobVuk]

Well that does sound much better if you actually review the complaints. Even with small samples, you can divide the total number of miles by the number of repairs. If you have 10 cars with an average of 30,000 miles on them that would total 300,000 miles. And with 30 repairs total, that's simply put as 10,000 miles per repair. You might have another explanation but it would be more meaningful to me. Just curious.

I will register.