Beyond the headlines, humdrum recalls annoy consumers

The year has been monopolized by headlines about General Motors ignition-switch recalls and Takata airbag recalls.

But a broader perspective is in order.

According to iSeeCars.com, a vehicle search engine headquartered near Boston, the single most recalled nameplate of the 2007-13 model year period has been … the Toyota FJ Cruiser.

And the second most recalled nameplate of the period?

Anyone?

The Toyota Tacoma pickup. Followed by the Toyota Tundra, Toyota RAV4 and Jeep Grand Cherokee.

This ranking represents an interesting take on tallying recalls. The iSeeCars data are primarily undertaken to gauge the consumer side of the nuisance -- to estimate how much of a vehicle owner’s time has been consumed in recent years with pesky recalls and sitting in service department lounges.

Bear with me.

The ranking is computed using government recall notices and third-party data, with iSeeCars calculating it by trim level. Explains iSeeCars CEO Phong Ly: “Consumers don’t really care whether a nameplate has been recalled. They don’t own an entire model line -- their vehicle is a specific trim level. All they want to know is whether their particular car was recalled.”

In other words, you’re probably not even aware of a recall over a little glitch in the navigation system used by your model if your specific car doesn’t contain that nav system.

So iSeeCars counts every recall of every trim package -- even redundantly counting the same recall several times if it occurs over multiple trim packages. The FJ Cruiser, for example, came in nine trim packages between the 2007 and 2013 model years. So if one recall encompassed all nine trims, it would count as nine recalls in the data.