Not literally, obviously. But I have been deprived of my beloved MY99 PPP for the last 7 weeks (and counting) while the accident repair place - that's a long story - waits for a "suspension arm" from Prodrive. And waits. And waits some more. I'm not a technical guy but just how hard can it be to get this part all the way from Oxfordshire to Kent. Or have they just stopped stocking them and making them.

The irony is that I went for a UK PPP rather than an import precisely because I wanted to avoid problems with spare parts and servicing. I was a big fan of Prodrive until this but 7 weeks driving a Peugeuot 106 courtesy car with no radio and no air conditioning (and no acceleration) has turned me into a bitter and twisted individual.

Has anyone else had this experience?

Andrew

 

Reading some of the recent posts, I realise now that I have broken forum rules by NOT complaining about IM!

Things really have got bad since I last spent much time on Scoobynet.

 

er, won't this just be a standard alloy wishbone arm from sti - as fitted to all stis ,P1 etc... if so this should be widely available + fairly cheaply from breakers such as gradea ?

maybe your repairer is the hold up not prodrive?

Paul W

 

Mike Wood at Prodrive very kindly contacted me to point out the same thing and tell me that 77 of the steel wishbones and a number of the alloy wishbones are currently in stock. This is a direct contradiction of what my garage have been told and are currently being told by Subaru.

Are the lower suspension arms on the upgraded MY99 usually alloy rather than steel? I bought the car used so I wasn't responsible for getting the PPP fitted and the garage that sold it to me advertised it as having a "Prodrive suspension upgrade" (although the salesman himself denied any such upgrade and the price I paid at the time didn't reflect it).

I suspect that the fault is not Prodrive's but a mixture of my garage and Subaru UK. So I apologise for complaining about Prodrive and realise that this should probably have been yet another I hate IM thread...

I am still the man with the broken Subaru, unfortunately. I'm just now a more confused man with a broken Subaru.

Andrew

 

Steel arms on uk cars, alloy on jap imports and P1's (and type uk 22B's )

Tony

 

I think there is a valuable lesson here.

We are often way too quick to place blame on companies. The problem is that some of that sticks even when it turns out later that it was not their fault.

A big apology to prodrive is in order IMHO. Can we please be sure to check our facts in future before publicly slating. If it wasn't for prodrive being so keen to support us and actually contacting Andrew direct, this may have just dropped off the page and everyone would have thought prodrive was at fault.

Best regards

webmaster

 

PS.. I've just noticed the comments on IM also... Maybe an apology to them wouldn't go a miss either.

 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:<HR>Originally posted by DaBoss:
<B>Mike Wood at Prodrive very kindly contacted me to point out the same thing and tell me that 77 of the steel wishbones and a number of the alloy wishbones are currently in stock. This is a direct contradiction of what my garage have been told and are currently being told by Subaru.

Are the lower suspension arms on the upgraded MY99 usually alloy rather than steel? I bought the car used so I wasn't responsible for getting the PPP fitted and the garage that sold it to me advertised it as having a "Prodrive suspension upgrade" (although the salesman himself denied any such upgrade and the price I paid at the time didn't reflect it).

I suspect that the fault is not Prodrive's but a mixture of my garage and Subaru UK. So I apologise for complaining about Prodrive and realise that this should probably have been yet another I hate IM thread...

I am still the man with the broken Subaru, unfortunately. I'm just now a more confused man with a broken Subaru.

Andrew[/quote]

I guess you probably know Prodrive supply various kits the PPP is the performance kit, ECU and Exhaust basically. There are other purchable kits, interior upgrade pack, exterior upgrade pack, suspension upgrade pack +others which I cant rememeber . If you put all the packs on I think its in excess of 10K

Your car may have a PPP but it doesnt mean it has a suspension pack as well and obviously vice-versa. It was done that way to allow people to pick and choose what they wanted.

cheers

chrisp


[This message has been edited by chrisp (edited 31 August 2001).]

 

I apologise (again) for involving Prodrive in the discussion. The garage gave me what now turns out to be inaccurate information about waiting for a Prodrive part(perhaps because they are themselves confused). Mike has been very helpful in clarifying the situation.

However the fact remains that the garage has been waiting 7 weeks for what should be a relatively simple-to-obtain part. The car was sold to me by a major UK Subaru dealer as being a UK car with a PPP as the only performance mod, although as I mentioned above there was some discrepancy over whether the "performance pack" modification extended to the suspension being upgraded or not. Even if it did I understand that this would NOT have involved changing the suspension arms.

So, the scenarios are:

(1) the Subaru dealer that sold me the car misdescribed it and it in fact had an extra, non-Prodrive modification in the form of alloy lower suspension arms; or

(2) It has the standard steel suspension arms.

In either case it doesn't seem like great service to have to wait seven weeks for the part to be delivered and I would question whose fault that could be other than Subaru's, unless the garage failed to order it (and having heard them on the phone to Subaru myself I find that hard to believe).

So it's a mess, probably caused either by a dealer misrepresentation or by some serious malfunction in the Subaru supply chain, or both. But not by Prodrive.

Andrew

 

7 weeks is way way too long to wait for a simple part like this to be fitted.I would demand a written explanation as to exactly why it has taken this long. If you still get no where name the dealer and ask your questions in open forum, be polite, factual and accurate and I can see no problem. IMHO that is one of the functions of this BBS if the webmaster has further advice take note. I agree care is required when flinging mud about as it sticks to the innocent (Prodrive and IM in this case) just as much as the guilty but do not be too put of the scent by that too much, you have every right to vent your frustation here, I certainly would in your shoes.

 

I went to the garage this morning to try to work out what was *really* going on. After talking to three people, I finally got a story that makes a little bit of sense. The short version is this:
- the Subaru dealer who sold me the car (used) was wrong: it *does* have the Prodrive suspension upgrade: Bilstein dampers were clearly in evidence (now that Mike Wood has told me what to look for)...
- the part my garage has been referring to as a "suspension leg" is not in fact the lower suspension arm at all, it is the damper (!)
- the garage was originally sent a standard damper by Subaru and then when it asked for a Bilstein damper was told that would have to come through Prodrive
- there were allegedly none in the country and the wait has been for the DAMPER to come from Japan (I have absolutely no idea why a German part should have to come via Japan...)

Quite a comedy of errors, and it hasn't been confirmed by Prodrive that this is really the case. But the part has allegedly now arrived in the country and is coming to the garage, via Prodrive for some reason.

So I have been misled by the Subaru dealer I bought from (in my favour, in fact). And I was wrong to assume the garage might know what was going on. And there is something a little strange in the Subaru supply chain, it seems to me.

Or am I expecting too much?

[This message has been edited by DaBoss (edited 01 September 2001).]

 

After contacting several dealerships over the last year or so regarding Prodrive modifications it has become apparent IMO that many are in the dark regarding the details of these "official" upgrades. Only a few seemed to know what they were really about. The dealer near me that didn't have a clue has since closed - draw your own conclusions form that!

Maybe this is because they take your cash and then send the cars off to Banbury or follow Prodrives fitting instructions?

 

Agree with the above comment about dealers not knowing about Prodrive options. Took my car to a different dealer recently, and while I waiting I asked one of the salemen about changing the rear silencer.

Was informed that I could only buy an exhaust for my '00 if I bought the whole PPP for £2000. I thought that this year the PPP parts were available separately, and the cost was now down to £1600/1700 for the lot anyway?

No mention of the WR Sport or P1 exhausts. He did suggest that they would be happy to fit a Scoobysport, but then said that would void my warranty.

Couldn't be bothered to tell them that I'd already bought a WR Sport 2nd hand..... or that before doing this I'd spoken to their own service dept., and they quoted me a price for the WR Sport or a P1 exhaust!!!