re: Making a product "too good". Has this ever been a problem with a product?

Toyotas in general. The Hilux, Tacoma, 4Runner, Pado, Tundra, Land Cruiser, and LX and GX Lexi especially.

Every Chevy truck I have owned was garbage after 5 years. My Tundra has wear but nothing major has gone wrong with it after 10.

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Any mechanic worth his salt will tell you, car companies are in the business of selling cars, first and foremost....not fixing them. Case in point....my Ford has a power transfer unit (AWD) that is supposedly a "lifetime fill" on the gear fluid. A little research will show you that those PTUs FAIL quite frequently if you follow the manufacturer's recommended maintenance (which is NONE). Heck, even the first tranny service isn't called for until 150k miles. If you do it the way they TELL you to, you'll be buying a new car in no time.....or shelling out big bucks to fix yours.

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Ive been told similar things from my mechanics. Don't take service interval recommendations from new car companies as they use the benefit of less frequency to make a sale.

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Intentional on Apple's part?

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Definitely.

Why do you think Apple doesn't allow you to easily change the battery or upgrade the memory with an SD card.

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Heck, even the first tranny service isn't called for until 150k miles. If you do it the way they TELL you to, you'll be buying a new car in no time.....or shelling out big bucks to fix yours.

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I personally know two people who had their transmission fluid changed and serviced and their transmission went out within a week.

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I have doubts that we can't make a washing machine that would last for all of your adult years. We can send a damn robot car to mars for pete's sake.

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I suspect that a washing machine priced like the robot car would last as you'd desire

Anything made with mechanical parts and requires lubrication will need service and parts. Vehicles have been lasting longer for a while now. It is nothing to put 150-200k on a vehicle without any major repairs. Automakers rely on people's vanity and need for new things.

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My iPhone battery

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Intentional on Apple's part?

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Yes, without a doubt!

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I believe European cars hold up much better than American ones (not including trucks). I had a Volvo that felt as solid 4 years later as the day I drove it off the lot, and the BMW I drive now is the same. They just don't develop the rattles and loose bits that American cars do. Cost more when things DO go wrong, but they go wrong a lot less often, in my experience.

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You should check out the ever-falling reliability rankings of BMW and Mercedes from major American publications. Both of them are now making cars that are pretty broadly known to be "lease-only" automobiles, because they tend to suffer major mechanical failures soon after the term of a typical lease ends.

BMW and Mercedes of today are not what they were in say, the early '90s. They've fallen victim of the typically German urge to "over-engineer". The WWII German tanks had the same problem. Germans for whatever reason like to always use the most bleeding-edge technology. They also love complexity for the sake of complexity. They favor power and performance over ease of maintenance or the ability to field-fix anything or replace one single part. It's almost as if fixing them is an afterthought, even though all the complexities and bleeding-edge technology make fixing them a sadly frequent necessity.

There couldn't be a more stark contrast in the world of automaking than BMW and Toyota.

BMW sells a driving experience. They focus on engines and suspensions and try to make driving as enjoyable as possible. Every new model (and they're new frequently) has its own engine designed brand new from the ground up. They're dropping new engines every couple of years. And they're always the most advanced possible. It's fun, but you'd better lease it because that new complex engine they rushed to develop is going to break, expensively.

Toyota sells an ownership experience. They focus on the vehicle not breaking. They do nothing to impress you performance-wise. They take a decade or more to come out with new models, and even then the engine in it is just an evolution of the one before. It's no fun, but you can depend on it.

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Had to replace the ice maker about 10 years ago and that's it.

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My wife and I bought a refrigerator about 18 months ago and in that time the ice maker has broken 4 times. They have all been covered by warranty (which just ran out) but I wouldn't have expected it from a $3,000 refrigerator.