Testing is AFTER the fact. To make a reliable vehicle…you have to make design choices BEFORE the car is built. Obviously even if you do that…problems may crop up. You have to be able to make changes quickly.
Many years ago I read an article in WSJ. It was an article about Ford and Toyota. There was a bearing plant went on strike and Ford decided to continue building vehicles with bearings from another plant despite the fact that this plan had major quality control problems. Toyota decided to wait and buy a limited number from another plant that had higher quality. While Ford had higher sales numbers that year…5 years down the road they were having higher then normal transmission failures (the main place the bearing were used).
The biggest problem that GM/Ford and Chryco had over the years…were with ridiculous executive bonuses that forced the executives to make decisions that were in the best interest of their pockets, but NOT in the best interest of the company. Chryco has changed that model. Not sure about Ford. GM was forced to change with the government bailout. We’ll see what the future holds.