So I've got this Mercedes and I have questions

To be honest anyone discounting a Hyundai or Kia these days needs their head looked at.

Oh and you can get new Passat's from £22,000.

Somehow I've not had an unreliable car since 1997 & I've owned Rovers x 2 Mazda x 2 Vauxhall, Ford, Peugeot, Volvo & Porsche.

I think the mantra of the German stuff being reliable is on par with Boris & the truth previously had 2 VW's and 1 Merc that were money pits.

Oh and for what its worth I have done most of the maintenance work myself.

You want merc on a hyundai budget then are unhappy that it does not work properly

No no no, this is what is pissing me off here. You make it sound like I woke up and decided today I want a prestige car on a budget. When that's totally not what happened. You just aren't reading properly, and making stuff up *about me* which is really irritating.

If you read back the other thread you will see that I wanted another Passat at first. I called dealers about a Tiguan, a V60, and a few others. Mercedes was never on the list at all.

And I am not particularly unhappy that it has a fault, because I can afford to pay someone to fix it. It's just one of those things and I accept that.

You just aren’t reading properly, and making stuff up *about me* which is really irritating

Ahem. I think you'll find your most vociferous apparent critics aren't repeatedly having a go at you.

After all, they keep saying so don't they?

New Passats from £28,800 according to VW, plus I need an auto. There's also a car shortage both new and used. I went to VW several times recently and whatever they had was either much more expensive or not as good e.g. the 1.6 TDI which is so slow I doubt it could tow anything.

Just read back for all the reasoning on this if you care, or just make up whatever you want to think.

EDIT whatever. I like chatting about cars, that's all.

I don’t actually want a nice reliable NA petrol Kia.

I’d quite like a Stinger.

MOlgrips - sorry if you feel I am attacking you - or making stuff up.  Its not my intent.  I am looking at this from a different direction where if I were in your shoes I would be looking for a newer / new more basic car.  You say you do not want that.  I am reading what you write - I just have a different solution.  You said yourself "’I'm not unaware of the fact I could be driving an extremely dull car and maybe not having anything go wrong with it."  thats the solution I would chose

apologies if you feel attacked again.  I'll shut up

I agree with mol on this. New cars and the depreciation soon as they come off the forecourt is horrific. I’ve bought cars new, 2nd hands, company cars and motorbikes new and 2nd hand in the past.
My preference is 2nd hand at 3 to 5 years old. My current car (which me and mols have disagreed on in the past) was bought in April, cost me tyres and servicing so far. Has depreciated by diddly squat, and I love it.
Our other car was 5 years old when bought and I’m selling now at 8 years (cashing out due to van prices) and has needed an alternator as an unexpected cost. The rest is servicing (and a scuffed door that I didn’t do but my wife tells me was my fault somehow)
Bought sensibly, cars don’t need to be a huge cost; ignoring insurance/tax/fuel but you spend this regardless of age.
I quite like spannering most stuff, can afford to get a garage to do the work, and have a trusted garage if I can’t do something. However as I enjoy it I’m not bothered if I spend a Saturday doing some jobs on a vehicle I own.
Once the van’s gone, I’m eyeing up stuff from about 2012 ish as with some of the current daft pricing, that seems a decent age when weighing up the age/cost/condition conundrum.

And Mol is in the best place for advice, as STW does normally come up trumps with answers. Although you have to wade through some dross along the way.

I've sunk £3k and a few months into my 2004 Volvo and £600 into my recently purchased 2004 Berlingo. I think people like Molgrips, me and a few others on here are a dying breed.

I have laughed at his timing of events though on this thread

Yeah I fully admit I've made some poor choices, such as adjusting the sub frame just before a holiday, and I will accept ridicule for that 🙂

How can you enjoy your holiday if you don't inject a bit of jeopardy into it?

I drive a 1992 Leyland DAF 200. Jeopardy is my copilot.

Molgrips, however bad you're feeling about it, remember me in my LDV

Lol 🙂

Also, Passat MOT is tomorrow. Place your bets.

Also, Passat MOT is tomorrow. Place your bets.

Either sail through easily or some catastrophic failure due to some issue you never even realised was there.

Or the tester is on here, and fails it without even look at it due to the subframe, because he stopped reading after the first page and still thinks the weight of the car is is the only thing holding them together.

Ps. Hope it passes, it’s always nice to get a pass if you’ve wielded spanners on it yourself.

It's only failed once on the drop link rubber boots. It had to be re tested twice as I initially changed the wrong side!

I am going to ask £1750 for it and maybe buy new tyres with some of the proceeds.

Chuckling at the thought of towing a modest 4 berth van behind pretty much anything Hyundai has to offer other than the big stinger or the tucson(do they still exist -edit no I see it's the Santa Fe now the Tucson's been recycled into an ev)

I like to fix things. But if soemthig I'd just bought at premium from a dealer with a warrenty was a bag of bolts ....fix it I would not.

We explored the warranty situation extensively, don't you remember?

Get rid of both passat and merc; use proceeds to buy phaeton.

Phaetons are available for the same or less than the Merc, but older. I did look 🙂

trail_rat

.... or the tucson(do they still exist -edit no I see it’s the Santa Fe now the Tucson’s been recycled into an ev)

My brother's just bought himself a petrol Tuscon, so maybe they do ev versions (not sure) but they definitely still do ICE versions too.

I think molgrips is being pretty rational. He knows what's wrong with his cars and whilst I would no longer do any work on cars myself he's OK to do so.

Our 2 cars were both bought on PCP then bought out. I had the money to do so then, now it's a little tighter. One's 9 years old, 115k miles. The other is 8 years old, 125k miles. Both have been serviced properly, one by the family owned main dealer (very rare now) and the other by a local specialist. The lower mileage one has been expensive recently - clutch and DMF, wheel bearings and drive shaft, routine cam belt change, probably £2k in the last year - but still cheaper than paying £350 / month on PCP.

I did something similar with my previous car. It got to 155k miles then started to become too unreliable. I was working 180 miles away from home so if the car didn't work I had to hire one for the week to get to work. I fixed the last problem and traded it in.

Get rid of both passat and merc; use proceeds to buy phaeton.

Isn't that WCA's plan?

I'm on molys side.
Tcw are not ace I wrote n administrated their warranty if i remember correctly...

I don't see cars as disposable or as white goods either.

Though I'll say as I've said it's not a new car but that said it should be right.

I think there's grounds to complain about the warranty tbh.

Weren’t you driving company cars for ages?

Yes, those more expensive cars that aren't any more reliable.

That's not really the point, though. I've done my own spannering out of necessity, I've driven nice cars and I've driven bangers. If you see it as a hobby (like I do with computers) and enjoy doing it then that's fine, crack on and I'll try to remember to say no more about it. But if I spent a fraction of the time under a bonnet that you seem to do, it'd be on Autotrader before the week was out. I had an Escort once that was in bits more than it was moving, when I finally stuffed it (I was too busy looking a girl's legs across the road) I was actually relieved.

completely ignoring the fact that any other car I might buy could also have problems.

... and completely ignoring the fact that any other car might not.

I’ve got the T&Cs right here

You have a manufacturer's warranty which allows amateur tinkering up to and including "I think I might have to take the engine out"? Wow.

You were all exhorting me to send it back when I had no legal basis to do so, and I KNEW this was the case.

You were still wrong even back when it was still in lower case. You had 30 days to return it as faulty.

Also, Passat MOT is tomorrow. Place your bets.

Subframe? 😁

I bet it fails on something absolutely petty like an indicator bulb or a windscreen wiper.

We explored the warranty situation extensively, don’t you remember?

If you bought a warranty and it turns out that you can't get something fixed under warranty, ask for a refund on it?

---

Though I’ll say as I’ve said it’s not a new car but that said it should be right.

It should. Bought through a main dealer, you have the same statutory rights as new.

If you bought a warranty and it turns out that you can’t get something fixed under warranty, ask for a refund on it?

"I'd like to make a warranty claim on an indicator bulb that has failed."
"We don't cover bulbs."
"Then I demand you refund the cost of my warranty."

You have a manufacturer’s warranty

No, it's a third party warranty. It'm says nothing about not fixing it yourself. AFAIK neither do manufacturers' warranties now, since they banned the clause that said you had to have them serviced and repaired at main dealers a few years back.

You had 30 days to return it as faulty.

I did take it back and the denied it was faulty. Don't you remember all this?

This thread wouldn't have reached over 1000 posts if people who know nothing about the situation didn't keep on posting the same old rubbish over and over and over again.

when I finally stuffed it (I was too busy looking a girl’s legs across the road)

Known in 'the trade' as a CCC (Crumpet Caused Crash).

No, it’s a third party warranty.

Apologies, I didn't realise that.

It’m says nothing about not fixing it yourself. AFAIK neither do manufacturers’ warranties now, since they banned the clause that said you had to have them serviced and repaired at main dealers a few years back.

I can understand removing monopolies / captive audiences, taking it to a third-party garage should absolutely be fine and tying you to dealers is borderline scammy. But those garages are qualified professionals and you, my fine friend, are not. For all a warranty provider knows, the vehicle was absolutely fine until you started buggering about with it. What's to stop you swapping out a load of components with shagged parts from a mate's near-identical car and then going "it came like this, warranty plz kkthxbi"?

I did take it back and the denied it was faulty. Don’t you remember all this?

Honestly, I didn't. I do recall now that you mention it.

Its a listed parts warranty.

Some 3rd p warranties are good.

Also it might not be a warranty it might be an administrated dealer gaurentee so underwritten by tcw and not an insured product.

Again not all of those are shit either.

For all a warranty provider knows, the vehicle was absolutely fine until you started buggering about with it.

I didn't start buggering about with it (also known as repairing it) until after I'd got shut down by TCW, that was the whole point of going back there.

And of course it's a used car, they've got absolutely no way of knowing who else has fixed it and how qualified they are. I'm pretty sure there's no system for certifying repairs done by qualified people in cars at all. We have the right to repair our own cars, and to deny a warranty claim they'd have to prove that something you did directly contributed to the failure you're trying to claim for.

I had an Escort once...

Ooo, the thread took an unexpected turn when Cougar's chequered past was uncovered...

Its a listed parts warranty.

Yeah. It's sold by TCW, branded by RAC, underwritten by some other place I had to call because the wording was unclear.

The problem is that I was told "if anything goes wrong with it you're covered". Well clearly that's not the case. Should I, as a non-mechanic (for the purposes of this discussion!) be expected to analyse the list of parts in the cover and assess how useful it would actually be? When told I'd be "covered"?

Probably the suggestion is/was when the warranter refused to cover the defect found within 30 days, return the car as defective. Yes there was a disagreement on the defect (as you'd probably expect) but you'd get a report from the MB main dealer on the defect supporting your position before making the return.

If you'd had MB and the warranter saying 'no fault found', you 'knowing' there was a fault could/should have then got your hands oily. This was initially about engine mounts IIRC?

In essence, you've paid £1k for a non existant warranty. An easy thing to do. I've always been very wary of those 3rd party aftermarket warranty jobbies and usually self insure after 3 years (or whatever the manufacturers cover is).

The problem is that I was told “if anything goes wrong with it you’re covered”. Well clearly that’s not the case. Should I, as a non-mechanic (for the purposes of this discussion!) be expected to analyse the list of parts in the cover and assess how useful it would actually be? When told I’d be “covered”?

i know that one... i'm not sure who my 'warranty' is with. But 4 days after buying my used Qashqai it developed an EGR valve issue on the dash... I took it to Nissan and they called the warranty company who said "Nah we don't cover EGRs".... Luckily the dealer i bought the car from either doesn't want it back or as i believe, is actually a nice bloke, is paying the £900 repair bill directly when it goes into Nissan next week on Tues.

But yeah, 1 warranty claim, 1 rejection from the 'super warranty company'.

The engine mounts were worn, if not actually failed. But they are designed not to actually fail, they just get progressively worse. Leading in this case to a rattle on shutdown. So it boiled down to what constitutes too worn and needing replacement. Obviously we have different views on this. Merc said it was possible that it was engine mounts but they'd need 3-4 hours to verify that. Clearly more money than it's worth. This was raised in the 30 day period during which I could have returned it has they admitted it was a fault. Engine mounts are not listed in the third party warranty.

I was dead right as it happened, the rattle has gone after fixing, the engine is about 5mm higher and the cars smoother.

In essence, you’ve paid £1k for a non existant warranty.

Yeah, and it's specifically designed to be difficult to claim on and to discourage you from using it.

Aye it's bloody annoying when you're sold 'everything's covered' and it turns out everything's covered but the stuff you actually need to claim for. Bastards!

I would like to revise my prediction to 2k posts by Boxing Day.

Passat passed the MOT. Of course 🙂

I'll look out for the passat ad on autotrader - lovingly cared for and professionally maintained...

Lovingly maintained in a sort of love/hate codependent semi-abusive relationship.

Age: well, about 75% of it dates from 2006
Mileage: again, varies quite a lot.

I would like to revise my prediction to 2k posts by Boxing Day.

🤣🙃

and Huzzzah for the Passat 👍

Passat passed the MOT. Of course 🙂

Am I the first to say...... Sell the Merc ?

Age: well, about 75% of it dates from 2006

Well, I laughed.

Grats.

Am I the first to say…… Sell the Merc ?

Not by a long chalk. 😁

Passat passed the MOT. Of course 🙂

*Applauds*

Am I the first to say…… Sell the Merc ?

No and you're not the first to think of it either.

I'm too paranoid driving the Passat now - on the way back from the MOT place I was constantly listening for noises. No-one else buying a £1500 car is going to care that much so it has to go.

so what if you hear noises ? if it starts and stops it's all good.

Passat passed the MOT. Of course

As if there was any doubt. We’ll done, as I said in my post yesterday. Always nice to get a pass when you’re invested in the repairs personally.

For those who might be considering the Passat, I saved this last time Moly talked of cleaning out the ashtrays...

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Well done on the MOT!

Was that ---^ because something on the heater/aircon bust?

No, he'd dropped a pound in the footwell

First go at helicoiling the subframe mounts - from the inside... 🙂

Was that —^ because something on the heater/aircon bust?

No, it filled with water when it rained. I pulled all that back to find it leaking at the base of the windscreen, which was a replacement so maybe that was it.

No, he’d dropped a pound in the footwell

Thanks, now I need to go flush cola out of my sinuses.

A warranty is there to cover breakage

Your mounts weren't broken. They where worn. It's why the car is less money than a new one.

If you read your policy it will say sudden and unforseen failure and breakage and not failue due to in service degradation. Or very similar

Yiu could if it's insuranced warranty try the FSa but I doubt you'll get anywhere.

Some policy' ain't like that.

I also don't like tcw. If I remember they where a pain to deal with.

Fair re the mounts. But not the boost pipe. There is nothing about the induction system, the only mention of turbo is that coked up vanes aren't covered. Nothing about the vacuum system either.

But, this wasn't made clear at time of purchase.

mols, if you do a lot of your spannering on the drive...post some pics as it should be in a bit of a state.
Can you identify the various stains by vehicle and fluid type?

My Jag warranty has been very good, but then it does cost me an arm and a leg to be fair. I recently had the timing belt and water pump done (7 year service interval), and bizarrely the idlers were not included in the kit. Dealer got them covered under the warranty, as they thought it was equally ridiculous they weren’t included..

Pity the Passat is RHD. It would make a perfect Mongol rally car. I reckon it would get there and back trouble free with just the addition of sump and tank guards and some slightly higher/stiffer springs. I'm surprised there isn't already a queue of STW bangernomics fans with a roll of 20s in their pockets outside your door, Molgrips.

No comment on the Merc, *bites tongue* musn't comment on the Merc *picks up guitar, turns away from keyboard*...

Updates:

As I said earlier, initial diagnosis was boost pipe, and the place who diagnosed it were booked up til mid Jan. So I took it to a different specialist who have smoke tested it and said it's the inlet manifold. A very common problem on this engine caused by incorrect torquing of the bolts at the factory which causes the plastic manifold to split. He quoted £1000 to fix it.

BUT

The inlet manifold IS listed in the warranty! Let's see if I can actually get money out of them. The guy at the specialist here thought that I'd be able to have them do the work, pay them and claim it back.

🥳 don't let them weasel out of it!

Also, the website they direct you to make a claim links you straight through to their preferred supplier booking system; however you are actually allowed to take it anywhere, which is a huge help.

Interesting...

Surely the cracks in the boost pipe would also have shown up in the smoke test though?

If they are cracked, they'll also need replacing - although I guess they're only a pittance compared to the manifold and labour.

Well first specialist didn't smoke test it, just examined it and used the throttle to look and listen for leaks. They thought there was a crack in the boost pipe but apparently not the case. Based on that I'd already bought the pipe but it was only £50 so I'll have them put it on anyway for good measure since those pipes can also crack.

A very common problem on this engine caused by incorrect torquing of the bolts at the factory

Will the warranty and 'in service failure' cover extend to a factory build error?

(Genuine question)

The garage called the warrant people, apparently they will pay, except for associated stuff like coolant (it needs draining) and gaskets. FFS how do you replace an inlet manifold without changing gaskets? Even when they pay out they're shit.

I guess they don't know the specifics of why an inlet manifold has cracked and if the allegations about bolts are correct (in case they are reading!)

They should cover the gasket.

Coolant I get it can be caught and reused.

Now that is a result. £1k for warranty, £1k for warranted fix. You're now ahead of the game Moly. Congratulations. 😉

It's back, well before Christmas so thanks to Cassley Autocare of Cardiff, great service. All done within a week, unlike the other two places that quoted me mid Jan.

The car is definitely quieter than it was originally. The leak may have been there from the start slightly, as it had sounded ever so slightly whooshy before at times. It doesn't feel any quicker than it did originally, really, but it may be a touch more economical. And the transmission is now much smoother, which makes sense because if the transmission was expecting the engine to be producing more torque than it actually was it wouldn't have been able to shift properly.

However given that I can't imagine life without jobs to do on the car, I still have two. One is to fit the Alexa Auto thing so I can have full music access whilst driving, the other is to try and get what I think is an ink stain out of the expensively AMG branded passenger side floor mat.

 Alexa Auto

hahah. Everyone's experience with voice control in cars;

You: "Play driving play list"

Car "calling your mum"

Well the hope is that Alexa will be better at it now than Mercedes were in 2009. Calling my Mum isn't so bad, what's worse is calling a random work contact that I used to work and be relativley friendly with a decade ago but really don't care about now, that's a far more stilted conversation.

However given that I can’t imagine life without jobs to do on the car, I still have two. One is to fit the Alexa Auto thing so I can have full music access whilst driving, the other is to try and get what I think is an ink stain out of the expensively AMG branded passenger side floor mat.

I sit here with mixed emotions.
Positive, as it seems the problems have been fixed and you're left with 2 reasonable simply tasks left.
Negative, as I was hoping for more entertainment over the Xmas period.

Is there even a small chance that fitting the Alexa will mean you have to drop the engine? Or at least, could it turn into a much bigger job?
This year of all years, we need this. Please.

I sit here with mixed emotions.
Positive, as it seems the problems have been fixed and you’re left with 2 reasonable simply tasks left.
Negative, as I was hoping for more entertainment over the Xmas period.

This ^^^

Congrats on getting it all sorted. For now... 😉

Is there even a small chance that fitting the Alexa will mean you have to drop the engine?

Most likely outcome is that I damage part of the interior then fixate on repairing it.

Oh, there's another one. Whoever fitted the towbar didn't use thick enough cable for the fridge 12v supply so whilst it works it doesn't work very well. I might try and change it for some thick stuff. That could get messy.

Good news Mols,a well deserved Christmas bonus.👍

@molgrips do you need an Alexa or do you have one already? Have one sitting doing nothing.

Ah, I bought the car specific one in black Friday week, only £20. Thanks tho. I plan to use it for music only as my phone has Google assistant which I use for other stuff, and whilst it integrates with Amazon Music a bit, it's not very good.

I'm wholly sold on the Echo infrastructure, but I'm lead to believe that the Auto variant is gash. I'd be very interested to hear your experiences with it.

Well, it was reported as being gash because it's crap at doing satnav style directions. Which is fairly obvious, really, it's never going to be any good at that. You can't follow just the audio with satnav. My car has satnav, phone integration, it'll handle SMSes and that. The only thing I want Alexa for is asking to play stations and playlists. Maybe I'd set a reminder or drop in but probably not. I might drop in on the house cos my wife's phone is often on silent.

It connects directly to the car for BT audio, and the Merc appears to do separate connections for phone and for audio, so I should be able to do phone via the phone and audio via the echo.

I was considering a widget that you plug into the older Merc infotainment and it can do the full wireless Android Auto experience on the original built-in screen using all the car's built in buttons and mics etc, but a) it's £500 and b) it still doesn't solve the Google -> Amazon Music integration issues.

You can’t follow just the audio with satnav.