It's all about the marketing, chaps.
The majority of argument on this thread seems to fall into two camps; those owners and operators who believe that the auto industry has a better record of paying for customer-safety recalls and directives than aircraft manufacturers, and those that don't think this is a valid comparison.
The fact is that certain helicopter manufacturers actively promote comparisons between operating a helicopter and a car, so it's hardly surprising that wider comparisons are made.
The subject of this thread, Robinson Helicopter are an example of this. For every model, they publish an estimated operating costs page. This suggests hourly reserves they feel appropriate for unscheduled maintenance and also compare the cost per mile flown with that cost per driven mile in a car.
Consider the Raven 2 estimated operating costs published by RHC. The reserve for unscheduled maintenance is suggested as $9:72 per hour. Over 2200 hours, this adds up to $21,384 total. Peekay4 at the very start of this thread writes that the estimated cost of the mandatory blade replacement is $30k-$100k per aircraft depending on the model. RHC could revise their publications to take account of the AD costs like blade replacements, etc, if they chose to do so. So the Robbo owner who put his faith in the RHC publication is going to inevitably feel disappointed.
Robinson opened up the market to privateers like me who couldn't have otherwise contemplated getting into the air. But when the marketing material encourages comparisons with car costs, I don't think owners and operators can be blamed for feeling sore when the components don't reach their advertised life limit, but it's the owner that is left to pick up the bill.
I've walked away from the idea of an R66 purchase simply because of the spectre of unscheduled maintenance based on the frequency of the Blade revisions. The 44 has been around a long time now, and they've changed their minds on the MR Blades often enough to for me to question whether the same thing is going to happen to the 66. I don't question who would have to foot the bill if it did.