I have had the same thing with mine but on mine they put a bit of tape over the cel light but its all sorted now.

 

that sounds like at **** poor attempt at fraud

the ecu thinG sounds like an auto electriciain with a bit of savy trying to con the customer- in this case FSC- unless the electrician was an employee of FSC.

 

I bet its not the 1st car they have used this cure on

 

I got the LEDS from here, seemed good to deal with..

http://www.ultimatemods.co.uk/

 

This isn't trouble, if they knew what they were doing it's a 20 minute bodge, and costs pennys. Much cheaper than a lambda.

Thing is, I DIDN'T know they were lying cheats until after I bought the car and read about others having problems. Saying that, the car is a good car, now that I've sorted the CEL problem. It's been well checked out...

 

I know, I am well aware of the UK law, and it's crap, but my main concern is the car is sorted. I have done that myself, and all I'm doing is put pressure on them to pay for a lambda sensor, supply and fit. If they pay for that, fair enough. I'll still give them the benefit of the doubt, just, as they sent it out to a mechanic/auto electrician as they are sales only.

I'm really getting these pics and story out so that it's on the forums so others hopefully don't get caught out this way. I was lucky I caught it...

 

I've subtly mentioned Trading standards, and they know I'm a Press Photographer so waiting to see if they cough up for lambda. I can't be arsed dragging it through the small claims court, if they don't pay up I'll just fix lambda myself and then phone all my motoring editor friends.

 

Lambda sensors cost money, two bits of wire, a bulb and a bit of blu tac costs pennys... These guys have done it before and I reckon they could do it in 20 mins...

 

Well, pretty easy actually. I viewed the car with a CEL showing, had it put in my receipt that sale was on condition of CEL fault being repaired. At this stage, bodge couldn't have been in place as bodge blocks CEL. Afterwards, CEL was blocked, and I have documented the removal of bodge, my mechanic will do an engineers report, and I have the removed parts with photographs and that report.

I'm an ex Police Photographer / Scene of Crime Officer and I'm more than happy to speak to the evidence trail on this one...

Saying that, I've fixed the bodge, my mechanic will fit a new lambda sensor and I'll move on. However, I've told the dodgy garage they will be paying the cost of supply and fit the sensor or I will move forward with my trading standards etc.

If they don't pay, well, I'm not going to stress it. I'm happy I found the bodge before I potentially missed a serious fault and I'll pass the story around the forums as well as my newspaper contacts. (I'm now a newspaper photographer.)

I know some garages are as dodgy as anything, and that will never change but good to get the word out about certain bodges/garages.

 

Err, no. I'm not going to break the law and potentially get into bother just because of these arseholes. I'll sort it legally and if no joy then just spread the word.

 

Oh yes, doing that....

I had thought of that, although I'm playing the game with the salesman, letting him know that I know what's happened and almost subtly suggesting what I will be doing. There is no point threatening these people, that just gets them stubborn. They need to come to the conclusion about where it's going to end and realise that they are better sorting it. Softly softly catchee monkee... of course if that doesn't work I just get blunt and tell them straight what I'm going to do. It won't do me any harm to pass my report to Trading Standards, they probably have a large file on this crowd anyway.

 

LATEST UPDATE: Ok, the garage phoned me and said they had a lambda sensor for me, and I picked it up today. They told me they had sent another car to the auto electrician/mechanic that they use, (they are sales only, small garage) with a known faulty lambda sensor and it came back worse than mine, same way of mimicking the charge light but this time they had cut wires as they bodged it. I'm actually glad they only used Blu-Tac on mine. They assure me they have "dealt" with the auto electrician/mechanic and he will no longer be getting work from them. (Hopefully because he has two broken knee-caps!)

I have to accept what they say, I believe them on this. Whether my mention of Trading Standards or the fact I am a Press Photographer with contacts throughout the media made any difference I don't know. Also the fact that I knew what I was talking about and made it plain what had happened and what was needed to resolve the matter probably helped. I'm a good judge of character and sitting face to face with the salesman today I'm happy with where we are at. There's no damage done to the car, I'm delighted with the car overall, and happy to accept a lambda sensor, fit it and move on. Case closed as far as I'm concerned. Hopefully others have read this and it has made them more wary of things, and hopefully the dealer has learnt to deal with proper auto electricians/mechanics, and hopefully it saves others from being screwed. Who knows if anything will change, but one thing is still the same, KNOWLEDGE IS POWER!

 

Just read the whole thread. Glad you stuck your guns and got something from them. Did they pay for the fitting of the sensor too?

 

I had originally asked that they pay my garage to supply and fit, then they offered the sensor. I couldn't be bothered to argue so just took the sensor. It's not a big deal to fit a sensor and I just wanted the whole thing over and done with. I'm happy...

 

What I don't understand. If it does have a simple oxygen sensor fault...the time and labour involved in fixing it would be far LESS than the labour effort involved in removing the instrument assembly, stripping it and modifying it to bypass the CEL light.

 

No, I disagree... a Lambda sensor is around £120, the front one is more of a footer to fit than the rear one.

These guys have done the bodge before, it's easy to remove dash, jam a bulb in with blu-tac and jam the wires under the charge light bulb holder. Now I've stripped it I know I could do it in under 30 minutes.

The thing is, the cost of a bulb, two bits of wire and a bit of blu-tac? Pennies... that's what these things are all about, money..