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PLEASE HELP - GREENBELT VW IS SCREWING ME OVER!!!
by
stevenrossi
on 28 Dec, 2004 16:59
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Hey guys, I hate to bring my troubles to this forum but I've got no other resources...I really really need your help.
My Car:
1994 Golf GL TD 1.9L w/ 210 000KM
I took it into greenbelt VW because it needed a new rear bearing and serpentine belt pulley and I ended up 'splurging' and just got a whole whack of stuff done. I've worked in the Auto industry for years now and needless to say, If i wanted it done cheap...I know tones of shops...my mentality was "if your going to have it done for a special car, you might as well have it done right" --- that and I know the service manager there.
Anyway, I brought the car in to have the following done:
Passenger Side Rear Bearing
Rear Brake Shoes
Timing Belt
Water Pump
Serp Belt w/ pulley
And I supplied all the parts - it ended up costing me just over $1200 before parts and about $1500 after parts.
Now --- the service guy I knew went on vacation the week that the car was in the shop...i was dealing with an alternative. I took them about a week to get it done (suspicious) and they hardly ever called me...I had to call them all the time...I got a lot of 'I don’t know whats going on...we'll call you in a few minutes to let you know" (never called me back). I started to get really nervous but I went to go pick it up in the middle of the night about a week later...REMEMBER NOW that the car had NO problems before entering the shop...it may have had a TINY oil leak, but nothing serous...never burnt anything, smoked, sputtered...etc. Anyway, back to the story...I go pick it up w/ my brother..
I start it. its got a bit of a 'cold start squeak' --- I don’t mind, figure it'll go away once it warms up. Meh, it's ok. I sit in and just make sure that everything’s ok...looks in order. So i pull off and start going. Now for you who are in the Markham area this place is at 407 and Kennedy. I start driving it forward and I get to 14th ave (on Kennedy --- about 1 KM later) and I'm just cruzing...never go crazy w/ it...it only have 70HP anyway....I start smelling some BURING...I got distracted and keep on going nice and easy...no cars on the road...I get to Milliken Mills and i see a red light flashing at me...its overheated!!! not only that, its all the way over to FULL HEAT...so i shut off the engine and coast into Milliken Mills Community Center and just park it...I call my brother and my Dad and he calls CAA - the tow truck driver comes and drives it back...IM FURIOUS at this point...I know overheating is terrible for any car.
The following morning:
They call me and tell me that its my "fan switch" which just HAPPENED to not work at that time...not even that...they said that it only functioned on HIGH SPEED
Things I found odd:
-No diesel will EVER over heat on a -5 (degree) night in just 2KM of easy driving
-If my high speed fan worked, where’s the problem...it worked at its highest speed, so if there would be any problem, it would be that my car would stay too cold? no?
Anyway, they stick to their guns and said "We gave it an EXTENSIVE test drive before parking it and it ran fine" --- so they claim it was just coincidence... :roll:
Anyway...they change the switch and even charge me $30 for it...BTW that took 2 days!!! 2 DAYS to do a fan switch...again, I have NO clue what’s going on...I’m FULLY in the dark...and apparently they changed the oil again...even though it wasn't on the receipt... :shock:
...2 weeks later...I check my oil...NONE!...its gotten a lot colder since (-20 degrees) and I figure something’s odd...sounds a little rough. Its not leaking anymore then it was before this (a drop here and there) but now I notice that its smoking....MY CARS BURNING OIL --- never burnt a DROP of oil and nothing funny happened since i got it back...it was probably burning oil since then but I just never noticed, otherwise...again, nothing weird...no REVVING or CRAZY DRIVING or OVERHEATING...etc...Just regular driving to and from work.
...its been parked for about a week now and GREENBELT is sticking to their guns that it just overheated by coincidence and they've got nothing to do with it.
What do i do??? this engine is nearly $2000USED and I really don’t think I’m responsible for it...what do i do??? HELP!!!!
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#1
by
farkman
on 28 Dec, 2004 19:42
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Steven
Sorry to hear about all this, especially at this time of year. It definitely sounds like this stealership is screwing you over. First off, I would talk to service manager, the one that you know, and tell him what's wrong. After spending $1200, they should do everything they can to fix your car right.
Have you checked the coolant level in the overflow tank. Maybe the morons who worked on your car filled it up only once to the top and though it was full, not realizing that as the air moves out of the system the coolant level drops. Also the temperature sensor located in the head probably wasn't submerged in coolant so it wasn't reading actual coolant temperature. I'm guessing that's why you only went a kilometer or so before the light went off.
As for the oil situation, they probably filled the engine with crappy 5W-30 non-synthetic, gasoline rated engine oil which will not stand up to the punishment of a diesel engine. This would be my first thought as to why the oil is burning/evaporating.
Good luck with all this.
Peter
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#2
by
vwmike
on 28 Dec, 2004 20:21
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Not that I'm taking sides, but if your fan doesn't work on low speed, it won't work on high either. It needs the momentum of the fan moving on low to be able to speed up to the high setting.
Also, it could be burning oil because it overheated.
One thing that really hurts your case is that you took it in the middle of the night. It would be one thing to show up and get their ok and drive off and have these problems, but they can claim it wasn't finished or something which will definitely not be beneficial to your claims.
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#3
by
stevenrossi
on 28 Dec, 2004 21:04
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I took it when they gave me the go ahead...they even had the invoice printed up...I can match up the invoice time/date to when the tow truck picked me up as well as my visa statement. If it wasn't finished, there would be no invoice printed. Furthermore, this is why I think they're lying...they say my fan turns on @ high speeds but not low, using your statement...that can't even be true.
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#4
by
stevenrossi
on 28 Dec, 2004 21:05
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Steven
Sorry to hear about all this, especially at this time of year. It definitely sounds like this stealership is screwing you over. First off, I would talk to service manager, the one that you know, and tell him what's wrong. After spending $1200, they should do everything they can to fix your car right.
Have you checked the coolant level in the overflow tank. Maybe the morons who worked on your car filled it up only once to the top and though it was full, not realizing that as the air moves out of the system the coolant level drops. Also the temperature sensor located in the head probably wasn't submerged in coolant so it wasn't reading actual coolant temperature. I'm guessing that's why you only went a kilometer or so before the light went off.
As for the oil situation, they probably filled the engine with crappy 5W-30 non-synthetic, gasoline rated engine oil which will not stand up to the punishment of a diesel engine. This would be my first thought as to why the oil is burning/evaporating.
Good luck with all this.
Peter
That was my guess, I bet they didn't fill it up properly because its next to impossible for it to overheat that quickly.
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#5
by
jtanguay
on 28 Dec, 2004 21:57
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ya right... fan doesnt even need to work in winter time... I'm actually thinking of a way to bypass the rad (so i can get some heat!!!) with a solenoid or some kind of valve switch... Maybe that guy didn't have much experience with diesel??? If there is no oil in your engine maybe they didnt put the oil filter on right--if the guy changed your timing belt he must have known how to time it, which means the mechanic isn't that stupid...
I'd never go to a stealership--I got a nice mechanic who does all my work. He charges me $150 for bearings (installed + everything!)
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#6
by
chrissev
on 29 Dec, 2004 02:25
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Not that I'm taking sides, but if your fan doesn't work on low speed, it won't work on high either. It needs the momentum of the fan moving on low to be able to speed up to the high setting.
Also, it could be burning oil because it overheated.
the fan won't come on in 2km of driving in -5 degree weather. Only the top half of the rad will heat up, though the coolant will circulate. The fan mainly comes on in city driving in the summertime, or during periods of extended idling.
It only has one speed that I know of.
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#7
by
chrissev
on 29 Dec, 2004 02:36
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Anyway, I brought the car in to have the following done:
Passenger Side Rear Bearing
Rear Brake Shoes
Timing Belt
Water Pump
Serp Belt w/ pulley
And I supplied all the parts - it ended up costing me just over $1200 before parts and about $1500 after parts.
you replace the rear wheel bearings in pairs. Never just one.
I get to Milliken Mills and i see a red light flashing at me...its overheated!!! not only that, its all the way over to FULL HEAT...so i shut off the engine and coast into Milliken Mills Community Center and just park it...I call my brother and my Dad and he calls CAA - the tow truck driver comes and drives it back...IM FURIOUS at this point...I know overheating is terrible for any car.
Vapour lock probably. They must have known how to put coolant in a VW.
...2 weeks later...I check my oil...NONE!...its gotten a lot colder since (-20 degrees) and I figure something’s odd...sounds a little rough. Its not leaking anymore then it was before this (a drop here and there) but now I notice that its smoking....MY CARS BURNING OIL --- never burnt a DROP of oil and nothing funny happened since i got it back...it was probably burning oil since then but I just never noticed, otherwise...again, nothing weird...no REVVING or CRAZY DRIVING or OVERHEATING...etc...Just regular driving to and from work.
this is weird to me. You say the car is leaking oil. It shouldn't. You should fix oil leaks when you find them. When you say it had no oil, do you mean it was empty, or there was no oil showing on the dipstick? I believe those cars take almost 5L of oil, and the dipstick registers the top 1L so if nothing shows on the stick, you have 4L in the pan (or less). If there was no oil at all, believe me, you wouldn't have made it to the bottom of your driveway. As for the oil burning, I don't see how changing a timing belt and a water pump could make a car burn oil. Oil burning is usually the result of worn piston rings. It takes 100s of thousands of kilometers of driving to wear out piston rings. You usually find worn piston rings only on very high mileage cars. The only other cause for this could be a partially blown head gasket, which could have happened when you overheated the car by driving with the cooling light on. Either that or a cracked block or cylinder head, but that is unlikely, as the head gasket usually blows before anything cracks (pressure takes the path of least resistance).
been parked for about a week now and GREENBELT is sticking to their guns that it just overheated by coincidence and they've got nothing to do with it.
What do i do??? this engine is nearly $2000USED and I really don’t think I’m responsible for it...what do i do??? HELP!!!!
you need to find out what happened to all that oil. 1L is a lot to lose. Hopefully the people at the dealership will cooperate with you. Try to be polite but firm.
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#8
by
ricosuave
on 29 Dec, 2004 06:50
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damn dude.
i have nothing to offer but support.
please keep us up to date with the details.
maybe get the vw corporate office involved in this? another mechanics opinion via a 100 pt inspection?
rico
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#9
by
okumaguru
on 29 Dec, 2004 19:02
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I have personally had the problem with the "vaporlock" situation. I improperly filled my coolant after blowing a heater hose. I started my 1981 VW Rabbit Diesel, left work and didn't make it over a mile before it started overheating. I promptly shut it off, sat there a while, filled it with coolant again, this time with the engine running and "revving" it up occasionally and drove it home. I didn't have anymore trouble after that with it heating up.
I believe that is why it overheated, they didn't know what they were doing filling it up with coolant.
My .02 cents worth.
Tim
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#10
by
Dr. Diesel
on 29 Dec, 2004 19:20
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once, i had a very fast overheat because the coolant in the rad froze, too much water. no heat from the dash vents either, the heatercore was frozen. coolant was too watered down.
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#11
by
srivett
on 29 Dec, 2004 21:03
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Check to see if something like the drain plug or valve cover is loose. I worked at an oil change place where some guy came in twice with his car dripping oil on his brand new driveway. My job was to wash windows so I didn't know what was going on but later found out that they didn't look at his car the first time and on the second return they found that his drain plug was about to fall out. Rather than pay to have his driveway repaved they tightened the bolt and said they couldn't see anything wrong. :shock: I would have liked to make things fair for the guy but it was too late to do anything to do anything when I found out.
Steve
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#12
by
Otis2
on 29 Dec, 2004 22:46
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I doubt that the VW head office will give a rat's rear end how a customer who owned an eleven-year-old car was treated by a dealer. VW dealers, in my own experience, are incredibly short sighted in respect of wanting to provide decent service to older vehicles. They stay in business by selling you the next new thing, like an $80,000 Phaeton, not by giving you nickle & dime repairs on your old car... particularly when you bring your own parts in, so they can't even charge the usual dealer parts markup!
These days, you can't even talk directly to the mechanic who works on your car at a VW dealership. You talk to a "service advisor" instead, who is nothing more or less than a salesman. The last time I seriously considered getting my vehicle VW-dealer-serviced, the questions I asked the service advisor were obviously well beyond his own mechanical knowledge & ability, and he had to take a message and act as go-between to ask the mechanic directly. The answer he eventually gave me was a garbled mess, as you might expect would result from a grade-school game of "telephone". So I eventually managed to get the mechanic on the phone directly, much to the irritation of the service advisor. After I had my correct answer from the horse's mouth, the service advisor got back on the line and told me in no uncertain terms that Vanagons were too old to be of any interest for the dealership to service, and he suggested I check the yellow pages for an independant European car mechanic for future service work.
So, from that experience, I have determined that VW dealership service departments are run by a$$holes. I distinguish the service advisors & managers from the mechanics themselves, who IMHO are not to blame for this sorry bean-counting mess. (The mechanic I spoke with on the phone said as much to me, which must have embarassed the hell out of the service advisor if he was in ear-shot). This is a chain-of-command issue, from the top down, which is why I so seriously doubt you'll get any joy from VW of Canada head office for the way you were treated with a 1994 car.
However, the VW service advisors are not hypocrites at least, which I suppose is a point in their favour. That service advisor I'm writing about more or less said, in all honesty: "I'm going to be an a$$hole to anyone with an older car who isn't going to generate the kind of money a newer vehicle will generate, because you frankly are not worth my time."
Moral of the story - find an indy VW mechanic who you trust, or buy a Volvo, where the dealerships provide excellent service to older cars (in my experience). Volvos are (or at least, used to be) sold on their longevity, while VWs never have been. The Volvo dealer treats (or used to treat) the older-model car owner with respect, as the dealer knows that owner (and frequently his whole family) will probably stick with Volvos over the long haul, and will doubtless buy a new vehicle (or several) at some point. Volvo dealers take a much longer-term view to profit-making than VW dealers, in my experience. The VW dealer needs the quick-hit cash infusion NOW NOW NOW!
(By the way, for comparison's sake, anyone know what a VW dealer charges to de-coke the intake on a new-ish TDi? I'm betting it's $1000 for that job alone. If you think $1200 spent at the VW service department is a big investment and they should pay attention to you for it, from the dealership's perspective, and probably head office's, too, you have another think coming.)
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#13
by
stevenrossi
on 30 Dec, 2004 16:52
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I doubt that the VW head office will give a rat's rear end how a customer who owned an eleven-year-old car was treated by a dealer. VW dealers, in my own experience, are incredibly short sighted in respect of wanting to provide decent service to older vehicles. They stay in business by selling you the next new thing, like an $80,000 Phaeton, not by giving you nickle & dime repairs on your old car... particularly when you bring your own parts in, so they can't even charge the usual dealer parts markup!
These days, you can't even talk directly to the mechanic who works on your car at a VW dealership. You talk to a "service advisor" instead, who is nothing more or less than a salesman. The last time I seriously considered getting my vehicle VW-dealer-serviced, the questions I asked the service advisor were obviously well beyond his own mechanical knowledge & ability, and he had to take a message and act as go-between to ask the mechanic directly. The answer he eventually gave me was a garbled mess, as you might expect would result from a grade-school game of "telephone". So I eventually managed to get the mechanic on the phone directly, much to the irritation of the service advisor. After I had my correct answer from the horse's mouth, the service advisor got back on the line and told me in no uncertain terms that Vanagons were too old to be of any interest for the dealership to service, and he suggested I check the yellow pages for an independant European car mechanic for future service work.
So, from that experience, I have determined that VW dealership service departments are run by a$$holes. I distinguish the service advisors & managers from the mechanics themselves, who IMHO are not to blame for this sorry bean-counting mess. (The mechanic I spoke with on the phone said as much to me, which must have embarassed the hell out of the service advisor if he was in ear-shot). This is a chain-of-command issue, from the top down, which is why I so seriously doubt you'll get any joy from VW of Canada head office for the way you were treated with a 1994 car.
However, the VW service advisors are not hypocrites at least, which I suppose is a point in their favour. That service advisor I'm writing about more or less said, in all honesty: "I'm going to be an a$$hole to anyone with an older car who isn't going to generate the kind of money a newer vehicle will generate, because you frankly are not worth my time."
Moral of the story - find an indy VW mechanic who you trust, or buy a Volvo, where the dealerships provide excellent service to older cars (in my experience). Volvos are (or at least, used to be) sold on their longevity, while VWs never have been. The Volvo dealer treats (or used to treat) the older-model car owner with respect, as the dealer knows that owner (and frequently his whole family) will probably stick with Volvos over the long haul, and will doubtless buy a new vehicle (or several) at some point. Volvo dealers take a much longer-term view to profit-making than VW dealers, in my experience. The VW dealer needs the quick-hit cash infusion NOW NOW NOW!
(By the way, for comparison's sake, anyone know what a VW dealer charges to de-coke the intake on a new-ish TDi? I'm betting it's $1000 for that job alone. If you think $1200 spent at the VW service department is a big investment and they should pay attention to you for it, from the dealership's perspective, and probably head office's, too, you have another think coming.)
Well Said --- i'm talking to Dr. D right now, maybe I get get back on the road for a good price.
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#14
by
ricosuave
on 30 Dec, 2004 18:36
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well, that isnt going to help him right now, is it?
how about complaining to the bbb, or taking it up with the local paper, etc.
im not saying its going to be an easy fight, but jeez, i wouldnt roll over and take it up the *** either!!
rico