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A couple of weeks ago my wife was driving us to the airport when the engine cut-out. Lots of smoke and a burning smell, waited 2 hours for the AA, got towed home, missed flight, expensive replacement flight.
There was a small hole in the coolant pipe and the car had massively overheated. The garage range yesterday after finally stripping the engine down to say that one of the cylinders has partially melted and with a few other things it would cost about £3000 to repair. I can't believe such a small hole could cause so much damage, there was no warning light and no temp gauge.
The car is a 06 reg 1.7 CDTI Astra, cost £3600 6 months ago, it's needed a headlamp repair and a new alternator in that time to so were not minded throw any more money at it. The garage has suggested we leave the car with them as payment for the £600 worth of exploratory work they've already done to it. I'm not sure that I can be bothered to try and find anyone else to buy it but just in case I could get a much better price for it I thought I'd better check the STW oracle first...
Not worth fixing in my opinion unless you can get a replacement or used engine at the knackered yard. Then transfer the engine yourself as the labour cost can be expensive. Or just check with your garage for labour cost on used engine transfer. Who knows the price might be reasonable.
For £4k there are plenty of good cars to choose from.
Bummer. If it was my motor id pay them for there time and take the car home and get busy with the A-team music on.
£600 worth of exploratory work they've already done to it.
Hmmm - that's a hell of a lot of expensive exploratory work.... I'd be asking for an itemised bill stating exactly what they've done for that £600.
I'd then take the car home and fire a new engine in it.
£600 to get the engine out & take the head off sounds a lot to me, & thats assuming they took the engine out to have the head off.
8 hours or less at whatever the hourly rate is would have been my guess.
The garage I use would be the first to suggest a 2nd hand engine, not just leave the car as payment. Dont do it, haggle.
Problem you will have is finding a garage to take on a pre stripped car.
I have no idea really, but £600 to take a cyclinder head off and a guy say that looks ****ed sounds quite pricey ! Surely all you are paying is their labour rate, did it take them 6 or so hours to do that?
ah the no warning light.. no water in engine.. no water to get hot.. no warning light.. simples.
pay for them to loosely reassemble and get it n ebay going to get at least a grand for it .. 400 minimum better off.
The garage has suggested we leave the car with them as payment for the £600 worth of exploratory work they've already done to it.
Sounds like a typical rip-off ploy to me. Clearly there are 3 possibilities here:
the work didn't really cost £600
the engine rebuild will cost them a lot less than £3000
they reckon your car with a new engine will be worth significantly more than £3600
I put my money (something less than £600 obviously) on some combination of the first two.
£500 for a used engine and anther £500 to have it fitted.
The garage will repair it and sell it for 3k cash, for a nice profit. They don't have to pay themselves for their time.
As has been said, stick it on ebay as a non runner, someone will buy it.
Spares or Repairs cars go for good money on eBay. Stick it on there and see if you can knock the garage down a bit. Should work out OK.
5thElefant - Member[b]£500 for a used engine and anther £500 to have it fitted.[/b]
^^^ This. If you can get a used engine and labour.
Was the temperature gauge not working? That's a lot of damage.
As said ask for a breakdown of the cost (see what I did there).
Take it away. Anything over 600 pounds is a bonus.
Smells fishy to me. £600 to tell you the engines knackered doesn't seem fair or reasonable to me.
As said I think their trying to blag your car to sell on. Got to be loads of garages who would source and fit a recon/s/h engine for lots less than £3000.
Thanks for the replies.
aracers thoughts 1&2 were pretty much mine but we're not exactly in a strong position to haggle - and the garage knows that.
I'll do some ebay research but if it's marginal I'll not bother as a few hundred possible saving from £4k isn't worth the hassle.
we're not exactly in a strong position to haggle - and the garage knows that.
Why not? Plenty of places happy to fit a s/h engine, or to buy it for rebuild. The car is still yours, they have no title over it. What did they quote you before starting work, they surely don't have a contract with you for work of unlimited cost?
I had this on a car. Well a car that required numerous MOT fixes but ran all day long. He told me a crazy scenario/price to fix or 'I'll give you this much'.
I said no politely I'll pick the car up thanks. Funnily it wouldn't start when I got there. I asked him what had happened as it was totally fine when I dropped it off. Anyway he magically got it started quite quickly and I left with the car.
I can't believe such a small hole could cause so much damage, there was no warning light and no temp gauge.
Weird. You'd expect more if a cylinder etc had 'melted'.
What I'd do- £600 is ridiculous. It'd take half a mechanic to figure out its ran on minimal coolant and 2+2.
Hes offering you a 'leave it with me mate/£600 just too much to throw at the car again' situation.
Get down there- DONT RING HIM. As if he gets the just he'll have part of your engine out sat there lying round to explain why its 600 reasons why its soo much/the bill.
Pop down and talk to him- no prewarning. Negotiate the bill. Its bloody diagnostic etc then get the car flatbedded away. Are you willing to bin £3,000 in only 6months?
Have a look for someone close to you: http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_odkw=breakdown+hire&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.Xcar+delivery&_nkw=car+delivery&_sacat=0
Get the car taken home. Then cast around for second opinions etc.
Worse case scenario you scrap the car (circa 200) or sell for spares on Ebay (more) and you've lost the £400 difference that the garage would have given you (unless of course you haggle).
Hassle? He'll fit a new cylinder head and I bet he'd only spend a few hundred of his own money to make a lovely profit.
Utter crap - a recon short engine for one of those is only around £800-1000!
You only need the block/head - you have the rest already.
Where abouts are you?