EVOLUTION

i went to the garage on my way to work. all us not well, in fact, its worse.

got there, the car has been stripped, engine completly in parts format. the no1 piston has comoletly cracked in half, only the rings holding it together, (i will post pics soon) the bearings on the crank, where the conrods are attatched to are shot, the one where the oil came in, no1 was worn through.

the whole exhaust is full of oil, it seaped between gaskets onto the engine tray, hence no oil on the floor. the sump plug i believe was in, but i cant say it was tight, that im 100% certain we will bever find out.

anyway, still never got to speak to the service manager, guess what, he was busy....

the clutch, one side about half worn, otherside ok. called IM from the car park, told to get the garage to submitt a PWA and as a GOODWILL [dare they say it] they will put in a replacement.

so, lo an behold, i call the garage to get them to do the PWA, hes not there, so i tell him to pass it on. 5 mins later, hes on the fone, i promise you will not get this on the warranty, youve abused the car...

no really annoyed, i call IM back, well, he sticks to his promise, hes already got in there before me, told them what he told me. so, for not much more than the standard clutch, i now have a paddle clutch, which i might add, invalidates subarus non existing warranty.

so, now the hunt is on for as many names and address that i can write to, but i must stay within the law and blacken gmd services name and complain about the way in which they treat customers and to complain bitterly about the way in which IM did not want to even know about the engine problems. also, if anyone knows anyone else worth writing to, please pm me or post it here.

GMD have now ordered a new engine, im told w will have it back with in 2 weeks, so thats a total of 4 weeks to supply and fit 1 engine.

thats what i call pi## poor performance in customer care and relations IMHO

cheers

john

justanotherperson

So i know this sounds daft but humor me


1)will they give you a new engine under warranty?

2)how in thier eyes did you abuse the car?

3)If the clutch was worn on one side but not the other,how do they put this down to abuse?

4)If you abused the car so badly how the hell would the piston rings be still holding the piston together?

5)ask which petrol he thinks caused the damage to piston 1 and why not the others aswell, also was there signs of detination on the crowns?

6)ask the dealers who ever this is to let you/them send the piston to a specialist in metals to check the piston along the crack to determin if it was metal weakness to at the very least discredit what ever his exuse might be,if they say not why not? try here http://www.odonnellconsulting.com/index1.html

7)the ecu datalogs does it not,surley there would be some info on it where the point of change was?

ermm what else could there be ?
other than that i hope you get it all sorted

cheers

EVOLUTION

im getting the piston checked at work, i have got 2, the broken 1 and one of the good ones, the best i can hope for though is that the met lab at work tells me that the two are different would that not be right...

al get it done either way.

i have just got a mate to get the clutch plate, i will be taking pics of it and contacting IM myself. not sure what i can hope for as i have already bought an uprated clutch as those very kind people at GMD offered me free fitting would you believe. he honestly thought i should show some gratitude towards him for offering this. i nearly choaked on my drink, or is that drowned....


john

ZEN Performance

If the fault was present at the time of sale, the seller has an obligation up to 6 years from the time of purchase to provide repair, replacement or compensation in the event of a failure. If after 3 months something fails that was okay at the time of purchase, down to so called "bad luck" the problem is with the buyer, unless the seller offers additional warranty cover (in the case of many 12m month warranties).

The initial failure may have been something obscure, like a piston pin coming out partially, or an oil leak at the rear. The piston may have failed at some point after an initial failure, but you can be sure that with the piston in tatters, oil will find it's way out the exhaust very rapidly.

Very difficult to tell, but I can see no way that this can't be covered under the warranty given to you in law, regardless of any extra warranty offered by subaru.

paul

EVOLUTION

cheers for all tge help and advice.

stance is from dealers point of view...

we know you caused this problem, but we just cant prove it. count yourself lucky we are putting the new engine in under manufacture warranty... anything else you can go get stuffed on ie, the clutch, we can say and have said its down to wear n tear, so it aint covered....

well thats all well and good but i have now got nothing to loose other than time on this obe so im going to take it as far as possible in complaining to the top about the dealers behavior and the level of service from IM. i didnt pay this money to be treat like this...

its got to be said, my actions alone will probably amount to nothing, but, there are far to many people who sit and take this crap, if everyone complains enough, they will have no choice other than to book there ideas up

justanotherperson

No they can not say this,they are saying it but you need not admit to any of it,think of it like a car insurance claim,
They are putting a new engine in,if they had proof (as they said) they wouldnt be doing it at all,as for the clutch thats a consumable and i would tell them you want a standard one in,regardless,that way "IF" there was another problem,god forbid,they can not blame the non standard clutch in anyway,remember they have already tried to get out of this claim,dont give them any exuse for the next time,if there is a next time that is.....

EVOLUTION

the problem is, i will have to pay up front for the clutch, the subaru one clearly isnt up to th job, yes i drive my car like it was designed for, but im pretty sure it should last more than 6k, a certain membe on here told me that he has had his in for nearly 40k, and thats with numerous drag starts, on a standard subaru clutch.

if i put the old one in, it will have to be replaced, at more cost to myself.

whats the cost of a clutch fitted these days, any idea.

im banking in the fact im going to get nowhere, if i do, result.

just out of interest, what could they blame on an uprated clutch, i thought that they would have to prove a lesser quality item was used therefore causing the whatever to fail...

the clutch i have bought is an exceddy clutch, i thunk im right in thinking thats who make the subaru ones is it not

john

Bob Rawle

By deviating from the std clutch, especially fitting a paddle, any transmission problems would not be covered as it will be argued that the extra shock imparted by a paddle clutch has caused whatever issue has occured. If its a straight forward aftermarket organic then you "might" have a case but it is still not the correct part to support a warranty.

Bob

Flash 1

What dealer did you use

scoobyboy

we had a customer with an sti with 40k on the clock he was the second owner and it drank it's oil 4k miles after a service and knocked no1 big end out. we had authority about 2-3 days later and after waiting for parts the owner had it back with a new engine under warranty and he paid for a new clutch. all in it was about 10 days in total and at no point did we blame the owner, after all we want him to come back for servicing i'd find a new dealer who will treat you with a bit of respect and stop dragging their heels.

Tim W

iTrader: (1)

Let me get this straight, they've offered to cover the cost of fitting a new clutch, but not the replacement part...that's not exactly generous...they would have to fit a clutch to the new engine to fit it back in the car regardless, it's no more or less work than they would otherwise be carrying out in replacing the engine

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Funny that in other cases, Subaru pay for parts out alleged "goodwill" and ask you to pay the labour....now it's the other way round. Seems like they pick and choose to whatever suits them best financially.

Tim W

iTrader: (1)

Don't get me started on 'goodwill' and warranty work, I ran a Mercedes A class for a while as a hack...Never again will I ever run a Mercedes after the way I was treated by the dealers

I discovered that owing to a design flaw some parts needed changing in the rear suspension (the rear radius arm buses had disintegrated after 4 years and 36k miles) Mercedes declared that because the car was out of warranty (funny, when it was sold to us it had a lifetime warranty alegedly...) they would as a gesture of goodwill supply the parts (2x radius arms) foc if I paid the labour to have them fitted...600 quid later I discovered the suspension was still rattling and didn't feel quite right. I wasn't able to get back to the dealership for a month after the work had been carried out so I put another 1k miles on the car, it went in for it's MOT and failed on broken rear springs! I went round to the Mercedes dealer for a word with the service manager...who declared that they wouldn't have re-fitted broken rear springs they must have failed since they did the work...at this point I lost it, in the middle of the dealership and quite forcebly explained that a) they did refit broken parts, b) they were going to replace them and c) I wouldn't be paying for any of this work or the re-test...it's quite funny what happens when I loose my cool, people tend to notice I'm actually quite a big chap, and perhaps they shouldn't be taking the proverbial...

Needless to say new springs were fitted there and then foc, and the car passed it's MOT...

The point though is this the springs cost 11 quid each...the radius arms with fixings and bushes 26...man was I livid...then on the way home the car started spluttering after going through a puddle...thought coil pack, got home sure enough coil pack was wet and the insulation looked damaged (they face down and to the front of the car, great design ) took it to another dealership for diagnosis...no not coil pack, MAF sensor...ok, shouldn't be too bad...wrong...MAF sensor on the A160 is unique, and part of the ECU! 1800 quid to replace!!! WTF sod this....car got chopped in for a Ford Focus TDCI a week later which in 3 years and 55k miles has only needed one fly-by-wire throttle peddle and a boot lid gas spring replacing, at no charge and under warranty...great little car...as is the new Focus ST they invited me to go look at this evening

ZEN Performance

You need to add in the random factor! Or possibly just a bean counter somewhere in the process.

EVOLUTION

no its not at all generous, in fact, like i said before, he thought i should have been pleased at his offer.

im heading for more problems i know i am.

A) the oil cam through the exhaust... into a CAT i would imagine, or possibly all of them, and i know for certain that isnt going to make them work to well.

B) when i was in the garage, i had a look at the engine bay of the car, the rear of the radiator had some quite serious damage to it, bright silver bent finns, i can only imagine that this was caused during engine removal.

So, i will be down there yet again, to take photos of the RAD, which i will send to IM to complain agian, bitterly about the quality of the work that is being carried out on the car.

TBH, i cant ever seeing this car running right ever again, its major work stripping an engine, building it back up with new parts, one this is for certain, my whole point in buying this car has now been blow away. I bought it for the RELIABUILITY, WARRANTY and the fact i could generally TRUST the dealers. ALL GONE NOW

The dealer in question here, is GMD SERVICE AND PARTS.

Now as far as im aware, i have not made any comments about any persons at the company nor will i be on here and i would expect other SN users to take the same stance. Read the posts, make of this what you will.

WEBMASTERS, is there a problem in posting this???

Cheers

John

p1doc

i would seriously think about getting a second opinion before it is all put back together so they can see rad/cat etc is good enough as once put back they could say you have damaged it,preferably an independent scoobyclinic/tsl etc
generally it sounds like p*ss poor customer service
martin

jasonius

iTrader: (1)

You're fears about the cats (all three of them) could well be right..!

Any oil contamination the them will ruin for sure..! Middle/3rd cat may be ok but how are you really going to know this.

Then there's the turbo, what damage may have been caused to this with bits of piston ring going through it..?

Unfortunately the aproach of the dealer has (rightly so) killed any confidence you had in them. Having been following this thread it almost sounds to me as if the dealer may be covering their **** for something they did previously that may have contributed to the failure..!

Is there anyway you could get what remains of your car to another (read better) more trustworthy dealer..? If not get an independent inspection of the car before and after the work has been carried out..!

jasonius

iTrader: (1)

^^^^Damn, you type fast...!

p1doc

thanks-that is with only 1 finger!!
martin

stockcar

Edited - Due to commercial content/advertising

don't normally post our company name, was purely trying to help the chap out???

oh well sure someone else will put him right.....................alyn

alanbell

iTrader: (6)

John , really hope main dealer sorts your scoob for you , But if you want a good proven scoob garage in your area give alyn >> as performance a ring 0191 4103770 , he will help you , >> and not mess you about, >> good luck,

justanotherperson

the first cat will be shot more than likely,
the rad might be ok but then again if it was damaged when the engine was taken out that will be easy to prove as the engine wasnt out out befor so there would be no damage to the back of the fins and i wouldnt want a knackerd rad in there after all of this out of principle.

The turbo as said ealier could also have problems now as they dont like bits of metal going through them when its spinning up,if that is damaged now and its not replaced,there may be a day when it lets go and you may have bits of turbo going through the inlet thus giving you another rebuild nightmare.

If i was you i would get a private report done on all this because i think your battle is only just begining mate,

I hope you get it all sorted anyway,

goodluck

EVOLUTION

thanks again guys.

alyn, i work right behind you in the ROF, so i will drop in after my shift tomorrow to speak to you if you wouldnt mind, are you in at around1.30pm tomorrow???

Cheers

John

Tim W

iTrader: (1)

Leaving the rad in when removing the engine is down right lazy, it's not exactly difficult to remove

EVOLUTION

my thoughts exactly.

its got to be said, the more i read and the more i think about, the more i dont want this car back. to many shortcuts have been taken that i know about, i dont believe that i have caught every one of them.

at what point does this car become not fit for the purpose sold.

anyone been in this situation, im starting to get a tad sick of this now and could do with some help,

thanks

john

EVOLUTION

hi

this i would very much like, these guys spend all day rebuilding chevrolets and fiats, so i want the car back to Gilesgate unless anyone has anything interesting to say about them, but lets face it, cant get worse


john

justanotherperson

with ford, up until 1 yr old you can have the car taken back from you if you have too much trouble and problematic,this would cost nothing to yourself and i would try for this route with Subaru uk,in fact i would put EVERYTHING in writing and send it recorded delivery,telling them what happened,when it happened and everything else thats gone wrong with the car and if you have one i would send it to your solicitor also.

stockcar

normally no problem..............unfortunately i'm probably going to be collecting a vehicle from Northallerton after lunch, doubt i'll be back until around 3'ish.................

sorry, be around in the morning or later, back to normal tuesday..........

the lads will be in the workshop if your after some general pointers

cheers, alyn