Worth getting a second opinion
 

A good friend of mine has his own car workshop and because he is getting close to retiement is not bothered about new customer,s he keeps busy with the customers he has. Last week he was asked to give a second opinion on a car owned by one of his customers brothers, basically he has been told that the car was not worth fixing as it needed a new engine and that was going to cost more that the car was worth. The car arrived and was obviously misfiring and running very badly, no codes and it had obviously had new spark plugs and coil packs. He did a compression test and everything was within spec.


He looked at the live data and it looked OK but he noticed that the Lambdas were both showing a lot of modifiers, within spec but he orderd a couple as thought it had to be worth a shot, as soon as he started the car it sounded better and the modifiers were within 2%. He took it for a test drive and it was obviously fixed. Total cost of 2 new sensors was under £150.


The car is a 9 year old Audi A3 with less than 70k on the clock, a new engine was going to be £6k.


The original diagnosis was done by an Audi dealer. You would think they would no better.

Typical unscrupulous main dealer, why settle for £150 when you can get £6k out of the mug.

I have repaired cars that were deemed scrap by dealers / garages, usually for less that a couple of hundred £, the stigma of 'Its a Rover the head gasket is gone'

A couple of months ago a young lady turned up with her diesel tourer, sub 100k, connie se with all the toys, her local garage had told her she needed a new car as it had various fault and was 'An old rover'

T4 showed it was faultless, not even the usual glow plug relay issue!! She left reasuured, knowing her new purchase was safe to be driven and what she had paid was a bargain.

Never trust a hippie (Oops, I mean never trust a back street garage)

Or a main dealer by the sound of it! :o

Simon

They are the worst! When I got the dorchester it had a receipt from the main dealer in Norwich for a full cambelt change and water pump etc, the water pump was changed but the original cambelts were still fitted to the engine, the cam covers were glued on with black silicone and every clip on the engines wiring harness plugs had been broken off.

Thanks Andy, I agree with you entirely.

Simon

I love these ‘never trust a main dealer’ stories.... I wouldn’t like to guess how much as a percentage the factual technical data posted on this site in the early days original came from people actively involved with MG Rover at factory or dealer level when they were still trading but that always seems to be forgotten! We only ever get one side of a story and can never really verify the complete truth. Yes, dealers are more expensive and have nice showrooms but they also have huge outlays including training techs as part of meeting manufacturer standards.
The other side is when an independent has spent 10 hours at considerable cost trying to fix a car by firing the ‘parts Cannon’ at it and then goes to a main dealer and is fixed in a fraction of that time and cost as the dealer tech knows that particular system operation inside out.
We see all the time with 75 and ZT’s being diagnosed incorrectly and the garage or recovery company are slated but we only know so much about these cars as we’ve read on here all the faults and fixes. Any technician can’t know everything about every car but that doesn’t mean they are bad at their job.......

My guess with the Audi, and it is a guess, is that with no codes apparent to give any clue as to where the fault lies a pre set amount of time was allocated and the customer declined anymore diagnostic time at the set labour rate.


In my very limited experience lambda or oxygen sensors either work or don’t and with the use of live data or a scope wide band or narrow band sensors are usually easily checked. I’ve never heard of ‘modifiers’ within data analysis although so I’m guessing he means percentage of fuel trim instead?

In my experience both main dealer and independent garages can be both great and terrible.

My 2007 daily BMW 530d is looked after by an ex BMW mechanic who keeps his certifications up to date (M cars, X drive etc). He's more expensive than a general mechanic might be but he's much more affordable than the dealers. He's out to keep customers happy so does not RIP you off or try to upsell you.

It went into the dealer on Tuesday for a recall relating to the battery cables. Got a call from them saying it needed wipers which they could do for £60+vat. Firstly, it had the MoT in December and wipers were not even an advisory. Secondly, I know when to change the wipers. Thirdly, I can change them myself thank you very much.

I've been using this guy since buying the car in 2016 and will continue to do so. As he's a BMW specialist he might even be able to work on the 75!

In over 40 odd years of motoring, I've yet to find a good main dealer in terms of the overall package of skill, cost, customer service etc. With one exception and that was a Toyota dealer. If they'd have had a suitable car when I was looking to change, I'd be driving a Toyota, not a Rover.

Our very local independent looks after out MoT's and stuff I can't do myself and, of course, one of the main reasons I do drive a Rover is this forum and it's wealth of knowledge and experience, freely given.

Most specialist mechanics became specialists because they worked at main dealerships for many years and had all the training. We have one such outstanding Mercedes specialist nearby.

Similarly, I will be visiting a Jaguar specialist in Bury St Edmunds when the weather improves just for a chat and a look around so I can decide whether to build a long term relationship with them to look after our XF. Their mechanics are all ex-JLR main dealer employees.

With our cars being so old, I don't think our experiences can be considered typical. I think people such as Andy (trikey) and Terry (tsauto) are an exception not to be taken as the norm.

Kerridges in Needham Market were an excellent MGR dealership workshop.