The production of SAIPA’s Pride and Iran Khodro’s Peugeot 405 will stop by the end of the current Iranian year (March 20, 2017), said a top advisor of the Ministry of Industries, Mining and Trade.
Behrooz Riahi made the statement while visiting the pavilion of Tasnim News Agency at the 22nd Press Exhibition currently underway in Tehran.
The advisor said the Automotive Policymaking Council holds meetings every two weeks and surveys the quality and quantity of cars produced in Iran, Tasnim News Agency reported.
“Compared with the past decade, the auto industry has made notable progress but there is still a long way to go before the satisfaction of the people is met,” he said.
“Most complaints filed by automobile buyers concern after-sales services, auto parts and the long period a car must stay at a repair shop before it is fixed.”
Riahi further said the outlets of official representatives, which did not treat people properly, have been shut in provinces.
He added that some of these problems have been traced back to auto part makers, but it must be noted that the car design and limited diversity in models and options also pose many problems.
“We have not been able to properly make the auto part makers observe the standards … Only a few of them are up to par,” he said.
Pointing to cars that have set records in triggering the most number of complaints, the official said gas sensors on IKCO’s Peugeot 405 and electric windows on SAIPA’s Pride are the top two problems faced by the people.
Riahi explained that with regard to Peugeot 405, the gasoline sensor is unable to properly transfer fuel and complaints show that some six out of 10 cars have this problem.
He explained that four out of 10 Prides had faulty electric windows, but a plan was devised to fix this issue and now only one in 10 Prides have this problem.
In the last Iranian year (ended March 19, 2016), over 274,000 Pride models were produced, which indicates that some 27,400 suffered from faulty electric windows. Imagine the scale of harm inflicted on the occupants of these cars in desert and snowy terrains!
“Too many permits have been issued in the motorcycle industry over the past 10 years while certain manufacturers do not comply with the needed pollution standards,” he said.
The official said quality guidelines have been prepared and communicated to the engine manufacturers, adding that some production permits have been cancelled altogether.
“We predict that the production of motorbikes with carburetor engines will drop by nearly 30% by the end of the current Iranian year (March 20, 2017) and their production will stop completely later,” he said.
In Iran, 55 standards are mandatory for car production while several of these standards are not applied in the cars made by Iran’s two leading carmakers IKCO and SAIPA.
Riahi noted that while these standards apply to both locally-manufactured and imported cars, at times Chinese cars assembled in Iran as well as imported ones miss some of the standards.
The official said Iran is not a leading car manufacturing country and started by assembling cars, but some 90% of components in domestically-made cars are presently made in Iran.
In 2013, Iran was the 17th largest carmaker in the world, which ranking this year has dropped by two places and is currently 19th.
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