wrote:
On Tue, 24 Dec 2013 03:56:25 -0600, Leon wrote:

"Lew Hodgett" wrote:
I have a 1999 Toyota Tacoma P/U truck with 128,000 miles on it.

Today it started running "Rough" so stopped by my mechanic to
have it checked out.

Turns out that a spark plug wire had shorted out.

An after market set of four (4) wires were $48 while wires from Toyota
were $83.

Looks like a straight forward decision, after market parts are the
way to go, but there is one more piece of information that is needed
to
be known.

The original wires lasted 90,000 miles with no problems when they
were changed out with an after market set of wires which only lasted
38,000 before failure.

Based on that information, the Toyota set of wires for $83 looks like
the best deal, and they were installed.

Time will tell if I made the correct decision.

Lew

There is a reason that Toyota is one of the most reliable brand vehicles on
the planet. Toyota does not use after market parts to manufacture their
vehicles. I think you made the right decision Lew. Other brand vehicles,
maybe not.

Huh?

1) The parts an OEM uses to manufacture their cars are, by definition,
NOT "after market".

OEM was never previously mentioned, until you must mentioned.
OEM and after market are NOT necessarily the same. OEM parts are
manufactured to a specific standard. Not all after market parts are.



2) Toyota does not manufacture all of their parts, themselves. They
buy from the same "Tier-1" companies as everyone else.


Again no one mentioned that they did. However they do not use after market
parts unless they meet specifications dictated to qualify as OEM.
GM owned a brand, Delco. Delco made lots of replacement parts for GM
vehicles. Also available Exclusively through GM were OEM parts referred to
as "Target" parts. Many of these parts had the Target Parts logo on the
packaging but were not necessarily manufactured by a GM owned company.
These parts were OEM. Not all brand after market parts would qualify as
OEM.

There is a lot of after market that does not qualify as OEM.

What I am saying is that Toyota uses better quality parts regardless of who
makes them than the less expensive brands that do not measure up.




I in another life made my living exclusively with selling parts and repairs
and warranty work on GM vehicles.

When I was the service sales manager for an Olds dealer I was once advised
by the Oldsmobile service hot line to use aftermarket parts to solve a
brake problem on a customers vehicle while it was still under warranty.

Our warranty department literally had hundreds of parts, replaced under
warranty, waiting to be inspected by an Olds service rep. Our next door
Toyota dealer had 3 items waiting to be inspected.

Our latest Toyota vehicle that my wife drives has about 15,000 miles on it
and is 16 months old. We have yet to have any warranty work performed on
it.

That's not surprising. I'm sure there is even a Chrysler, out there
somewhere, that's a couple of years old that hasn't had warranty work
done on it.