Yah, with tools and random toys I like to buy American if its deserving of the price premium. Probably the bulk of my purchases goes towards European and Japanese brands though. The two biggest things I've invested in that are American is my home theater/speakers and my gym.
But I've never had a love of American cars. Probably will never buy one, too many other good options out there.
I've caught several lessons on buying the cheapest product. Now I tend to look for the intersection of price and strong reviews. I don't always buy from Amazon but I do usually research on there because if there's a high volume of reviews and the thing averages 4.5 stars you are probably getting a good product.
I have a very low opinion of American passenger cars. Certain makes of pickup I would trust the American brand, but for anything else I will probably always be a Honda owner. I watched enough friends' American sedans fall apart one thing after another, just slipshod manufacturing. Ex had a Jeep Liberty, it was one thing after another with that car. A window clip that must cost $0.01 to manufacture that would break and result in a $600 repair. All defective, shell out your money one opened door
I forget where I heard it but I once heard the difference in Japanese vs American auto manufacturing like this:
The Japanese asked, "How can we build it better?"
The Americans asked, "How can we build it cheaper?"
I'm in my late 30s now, I feel like I've lived through the shift from quality manufacturing to planned obsolescence in my lifetime. Somebody told me lately about a repairman or salesman saying a certain brand of fridge tends to last about 4-7 years. A refrigerator/freezer! Those things easily cost over $1,000, my parents have had the same one in their house since before I was born.
It ought to be a f***ing crime to sell an appliance for that much that dies that quickly. That's one thing I like about Honda, they don't turn around and slap you with the "caveat emptor" if something goes wrong on their vehicles.
For example our Odyssey had an engine defect that made it prone to misfiring on certain cylinders. They extended the warranty for that issue to 7 or 8 years, it occurred on our 2012 in the final year of warranty. I practically got a rebuilt engine on the thing at 70K miles.
I just put a wiring kit in it for trailer lights, you can see the forethought Honda put into giving you a proper access to fuses in the rear of the vehicle, a diagram right on the panel that is prelabeled for where trailer fuses should go, a clean run to string your wiring, easy on/off interior paneling.
I follow a mechanic sub on Reddit, they are constantly mocking and complaining about Chrysler/Fiat and their wretched quality and stupid engineering.
