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Mitsubishi EXPOSED
Dont know if it has been posted as of yet... But this was an article in the Chicago Sun Times this week that was posted on the Chicago Club DSM list..
TOKYO -- Japan's Mitsubishi Motors hid 26 defects in its cars from
regulators for years -- in addition to four problems it publicized
in 2000 -- to avoid issuing recalls for the vehicles, the company
said Wednesday.
The automaker said it would immediately start recalling the affected
cars, estimated at over 160,000 and most of them sold in Japan.
The newly discovered problems are the latest to taint Mitsubishi
since it acknowledged in 2000 that it had systematically covered up
auto defects for more than two decades and issued massive recalls
for the vehicles affected.
In 2000, however, Mitsubishi Motors only made public and issued
recalls for four of the defects even though it had discovered about
30 of them.
A special investigative team the automaker set up last month as a
part of a new revival plan disclosed the additional problems, the
company said.
''We conducted a thorough probe back to 1993, the earliest possible
date we could study,'' said Yoichiro Okazaki, the president of
Mitsubishi Motors, at a hastily called news conference. ''We
apologize deeply for damaging public and consumer trust by failing
to conduct recalls before and also for carrying them out now for
problems rooted in the past.''
The company said none of the defects had caused any accidents that
resulted in death or property damage.
The number of newly recalled vehicles number 163,707 -- including
156,433 sold in Japan and 7,274 overseas, the company said. It did
not give a breakdown by country outside Japan.
Among the defective parts was an oil cooler hose used in 20,056
vehicles -- including more than 3,000 sold overseas -- that might
break when excessive weight is loaded on a car or when the driver
accelerates too quickly. The '92 and '93 models of the Lancer,
Mirage and Libero autos used this part.
Mitsubishi warned that the number of recalled cars could rise and
that the figures it provided were only estimates.
The company's image has been seriously battered by the recalls and
the cover up that came to light in 2000.
Burdened with more than $9 billion in debt, plunging car sales and
the recalls, Mitsubishi reported a much steeper than expected loss
of $1.9 billion for the fiscal year ended March 31.
Sales for May alone plunged 60 percent from the year earlier.
Mitsubishi employs about 3,100 people at its plant in Downstate
Normal-- the company's only manufacturing plant in North America.
The Normal plant produced 156,800 vehicles in the fiscal year that
ended in March. Of those, 18,769 were Dodge Stratus cars and 9,966
were Chrysler Sebrings. It will cease building cars for
DaimlerChrysler in 2005. The plant also produces the Galant, Eclipse
and Endeavor for Mitsubishi.
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