What is Quality?

[Johnson David-QA2282 <David.R.Johnson@domain.elided>]

Just a comment on the coupe versus sedan build quality thread.  When I was in college (many moons ago), I had to take a series of classes falling into the general catagory of "industrial engineering".  Classes as diverse as sociology, material science and accountancy were lumped together under this heading, but one class was titled "quality assurance".  In this class we were told that the definition of the word quality in this subject was "fitness for purpose", and that this differed from the meaning in general conversation.

The idea behind this is that the level of perfection built into a product should depend on the intended use and the expectations of the customers.  You do not need Lexus levels engineering in a disposable toothpick.   A high quality product will perform the function intended for the vast majority of users for the design lifetime, at a reasonable price.  If the product goes much beyond this, it is over-engineered and is likely to be too expensive to sell profitably.  The level of perfection expected depends greatly on the marketing image projected, and this can be a problem when trying to compare different products.  Comparison is typically done by survey, and the average Ford buyer is apparently satisfied with the product and service (since they keep buying them) while a Ferrari or Rolls Royce buyer would expect more.  And quite rightly too, since they have paid more for it.  But Ford would rapidly go out of business trying to sell their cars at Lexus prices even if they backe!
!
d that up with an equally well engineered product since that is not what their target market wants.

This point may seem somewhat obvious, but it is frequently forgotten when people start to talk about comparative quality, and this makes the term seem vague.  In fact, there are many objective ways to measure how well a product is designed and built, but the difficulty comes in determining how fit a product is for it's intended purpose.  In the case covered by this thread, Alfa designers apparently paid more attention to reliability and serviceability in the practical sedans, and concentrated more on style and image for the coupes.  It seems to me that this is in line with what the new car buyers wanted, and there was no reason for the designers to think ahead to the dilemna of the enthusiast trying to decide between a coupe and a convertible both well past their design lifetimes.

Although one of the wonderful things about Alfa is that they did not follow this line of thinking to the point of building characterless econoboxes without any engineering style or driving flair.  Unfortunately that seems to be exactly what the majority of the population wants.

Dave J.
1987 Milano Verde (practical but not currently reliable)
1964 2600 Sprint

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