Mitsubishi best selling brand in NZ

Used to have the Mistubishi plant down in Bloomington near where I live. There were quite a few Eclipses from that plant running around in this area. Course, they never ran for long because they were about the worst built vehicles on the road. Quality was terrible from the start and they were always trying to find a way to shut that plant down. Then they did and it sat idle until Rivian decided it would be a good idea to buy it and start trying to produce their EV trucks there. I imagine that the same thing will happen to Rivian in the near future with this plant.
 
I'm going out on a tree branch limb and saying it may have something to do with I don't even think they make commercials no more so they're overhead is probably lower so they can charge less. I think I've only seen one Mitsubishi dealer maybe two and all of northeast Kansas. I mean if they can undersell their cars that I'm sure that people will buy them right now because everything's really expensive. It was my understanding for quite a while that either Kia or Hyundai built the motors for Mitsubishi as they were better. I always liked their cars back in the 90s but being that they had so much involvement with Chrysler was one of many reasons why I would have no part in owning one.
 
I hear you. A Mopar freak pal also had Mitsubishi products. I do believe the tech flowed from Mitsu to Chrysler.
Of course, like any Pentabasher, I'd bet Chryco would've demanded lesser QC and lousier parts from the Tridiamond.
 
I have mentioned this before but in my opinion there was a world of difference between Mitsubishi’s assembled in the US compared to those assembled in Japan. You could see it right on the dealer lots.
 
Many thing's on BITOG have a bap reputation that is not warranted. Welcome to an internet forum!
Not really, remember members here are from all over the country and other parts of the world. Their experience with different issues is going to vary wildly eg rusted bodies and undercarriages, broken bolts from rust in the salt belt that would be rare in so cal or southern states, they have their own issues to deal with that would be rare in the salt belt.
Things on this forum tend to get a bad rep for good reason.
 
I have mentioned this before but in my opinion there was a world of difference between Mitsubishi’s assembled in the US compared to those assembled in Japan. You could see it right on the dealer lots.
When they left the UAW in 2017 and the Sport went back to Japan the materials are now of less quality from first hand experience.
The steering wheel stalks are lower quality and the fabrics are a few steps down. The front face of the rear seats is a super thin piece of cloth.

I had no issues with the two 2014 models and the interior was better.
The Japanese weighted and insulated the hood and the mpg is now better as well. But the new ones have cut material quality..
That said they have added more standard options however.

The CVT has improved as well.
 
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Uh, the Ridgeline is only sold in North and Latin America, not in NZ.
The topic of this thread is "Mitsubishi best selling brand in NZ" and the question I was responding to was "Where are Honda?" Honda's vehicles are sold by order over the Internet in NZ, like Tesla does here, so they are a very small player there.
Furthermore, the Ridgeline is NOT a real truck IMO. It is a SUV (Pilot) based transverse-engine unibody FWD/AWD chassis with a cargo bed. The Maverick isn't a real truck either. I didn't say that they don't have their place, they do, but they are NOT real trucks IMO. All 4 of the top selling pickups sold in NZ are smaller traditional body-on-frame longitudinal engine RWD/4WD chassis real trucks.
I never said that Hondas were not sold in other parts of the world, I said... "Honda is not a big player outside of North America and Japan", but I should have said Asia instead of Japan.
Since you are going to nitpick, I'll play. You said "Honda does not make pickups", which was incorrect. You did NOT originally say "Honda doesn't make real pickups". Normally it wouldn't matter but you HAD to come back with a long post about real vs non real, stressing the point that it was your opinion.

[insert long internet discussion about real vs not real pickups here]

Have a nice day!

/hijack
 
When they left the UAW in 2017 and the Sport went back to Japan the materials are now of less quality from first hand experience.
The steering wheel stalks are lower quality and the fabrics are a few steps down. The front face of the rear seats is a super thin piece of cloth.

I had no issues with the two 2014 models and the interior was better.
The Japanese weighted and insulated the hood and the mpg is now better as well. But the new ones have cut material quality..
That said they have added more standard options however.

The CVT has improved as well.


I have not been impressed with some of their stuff after being swallowed up by Nissan Renault.

Now, the new Outlander is just a Rogue with some Mitsubishi embellishments.


I should add that back in 2000 when I purchased a new Montero Sport I also glanced at the Galant which was US assembled. The fit and finish inside was not good at all. Loose knobs on the instrument panel. Body panel s were not fitted well. Compare to the Montero which was perfect inside and out.
 
My first new car was made by them.. A 1973 Dodge Colt GT with the 1600 cc Hemi engine....Orange with black striping. It was a nice car and good on gas...no a/c no power brakes and no power steering...
 
Used to have the Mistubishi plant down in Bloomington near where I live. There were quite a few Eclipses from that plant running around in this area. Course, they never ran for long because they were about the worst built vehicles on the road. Quality was terrible from the start and they were always trying to find a way to shut that plant down.

Their outlander sport and evo was pretty great, along with anything VR4. Everything else was.......eh.
 
I may play the "mechanic" card a lot here, but I can't help it. In my experience, Mitsubishi vehicles (up to and including the recent Mirage) are underrated and overlooked. Sure: they're lacking in flair, features, and overall appeal. However, from a repair standpoint they truly hold up. Here in the US, Mitsu suffered from nothing other than a lack of manufacturer support. The dealer network was trash, as was their "curb appeal". That tends to happen when you try to build 3 completely separate models off one platform. Towards the end, the same basic layout was used to create everything from the Eclipse to the Galant to the Endeavor. It's no surprise those models were DOA.

On the flip side, from a repair perspective, those products were much more solid than they were given credit for. Take the engines: the 4G and 6G engines are still some of the best built. There's a reason that the designs were licensed by other manufacturers for years.

IMO, Mitsu failed here because they failed to invest in their products when it mattered most. Look where that got them... the new Mitsu's are nothing more than rebadged Nissans. Really? I would trade a trash Nissan QR25 and CVT for a Mitsu 2.4/Auto every day of the week and twice on Sunday.
 
When we had CKD assembly plants here, every vehicle rusted out. Now the Triton comes from Thailand, and everything else from Japan - quality is superb, and there is no rust.

There are a lot of Hondas on our roads, we have 3 in our family....but most are imported used from Japan. We import over twice as many cars than are sold new. You can see that the Outlander sells well here, 6th on the list - but we import more used.

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No matter what, this brand is just a car for bland folks, not car people. so thankful they suck so bad never had to work on them where I live !!
 
Not really, remember members here are from all over the country and other parts of the world. Their experience with different issues is going to vary wildly eg rusted bodies and undercarriages, broken bolts from rust in the salt belt that would be rare in so cal or southern states, they have their own issues to deal with that would be rare in the salt belt.
Things on this forum tend to get a bad rep for good reason.
Like Mobil 1 because its loud and causes high iron? Or Pennzoil because it contains wax? Or Fram filters because they are total junk that will ruin your engine? Or how all CVT's are trash? Or how direct injection is evil? Or how thin oils will ruin your engine?

My point being people parrot things they've heard over and over with little fact. But of course my statement was a generalization. Plenty of members here are actually interested in learning.
 
The Eclipse Cross is very easy to work on and a nice in between size but the mpg is pretty bad. The city and hwy are like 1 mpg off if I remember right and it is pricey too.
 
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