Buick Enclave named top midsize crossover in quality study
The Buick Enclave, among a trio of crossover vehicles produced at General Motors Co.’s Lansing Delta Township assembly plant, was named the top midsize crossover in this year’s Initial Quality Study by market research firm J.D. Power and Associates.
The Enclave is the only locally produced vehicle to earn honors in the study, released Wednesday. It measures vehicle appeal and design and production quality. Among large crossovers, the Ford Expedition topped a segment GM historically has won.
GM earned a total of four awards.
The Enclave “performed at an exceptional level this year,” said David Sargent, J.D. Power’s vice president of global automotive.
J.D. Power, based in Westlake Village, Calif., has issued the study for 26 years as a gauge of quality among new vehicles. This year, 26 of the 34 measured brands improved and overall quality increased by about 5 percent from a year ago, to 102 problems per 100 vehicles, the firm said.
“The industry is producing better-quality vehicles than it has ever done in the past,” Sargent said, adding that the rate of improvement is the fastest since 2009. “This year’s vehicles are even better than last year’s.”
Customers increasingly are reporting problems with their vehicles’ multimedia systems, according to the study. Problems with hands-free technology systems, in particular, are up 137 percent in the last four years.
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