My car was at the main dealers yesterday for a service and the “valleter” decided to take it through a roller brush carwash despite the car having the roof rack on.

Result is a bent roof and knackered roof bars.

The garage has been fine and is going to fix the car and replace the roof bars but I’m not keen on using the cycle carriers again as they will have been subjected to some considerable forces for which they weren’t designed.

Would it be reasonable to insist on replacement cycle carriers?

The roof bars are car manufacturers OEM equipment, the 2 bike carriers are a Thule 598 and a 591.

FTR I intend to insist on new carriers.

I think thats logical, they may bulk at how much Thule carriers cost though.

The manufacturer’s OEM carriers are rebadged Thule ones (as are the roof bars) so I suspect that those would be what was offered.
Don’t have an issue with that.

I didn’t realise main dealers had roller type car washes, I thought they all used a guy with a scratchy brush?

FWIW in future always ask them not to wash it. I always ask them not to when I drop ours off and then leave a couple of notes in the car on the dash and seat.

I’ve not had a problem myself but you do hear of plenty of issues. When we bought our Polo one of the window seals had apparently been damaged by the “valeter” so we got VW to fit a new window as part of the deal.

Surely it will be off the valleters insurance so they won’t gaf, I’m not being funny though an actual bent roof can’t be cheap to repair or easy for that matter.

The roof is a structural part of the car… I’d wonder about the safety aspect – designed to keep you alive if it rolls over?

I think the valleter was probably dealers own staff.

@wrightyson yes, I think it’ll be a swine of a job, they said they need the car for 3 days (courtesy car provided). So a couple of bike carriers for £100 each is a drop in the ocean, particularly as they’ll probably be OEM kit (rebadged Thule) so effectively at cost price.

I’ll certainly be inspecting the car very closely before amd after. Have already got pics of the damage.

Completely reasonable imo.

Side point but bent roof => bent roof rack mounting points?

I’d be looking at how bent the roof was and where. Given the thing that damaged the roof was the roof bars being tortured I would be questionning what structural damage may have been done to the mounts (especially if the locating pin type of mount). The last thing you want is new roof bars attached to a weakened roof.

The front mounting points are bent. They are threaded sockets under the roof trim strips.
Agree about structural concerns, not sure how to check the integrity of the repair.
There’s no way they’ll replace the whole car, it’s under 2 years old and has just (yesterday) had its 36k service.

They probably damaged the car wash as well, that’s not going to be cheap.  The cycle carriers will be a drop in the ocean

The front mounting points are bent. They are threaded sockets under the roof trim strips.
Agree about structural concerns, not sure how to check the integrity of the repair.
There’s no way they’ll replace the whole car, it’s under 2 years old and has just (yesterday) had its 36k service.

I’d be insisting on an independent engineer’s report.

This will be an insured loss for them caused by their employee or agents negligence. If it cannot be fixed up to appropriate standard and fully functioning then the car’s not fit to come back to you.

If their mechanic had test driven it and piled it into a wall causing structural damage that couldn’t properly be repaired then this would be no different.

The fact that the car is newer and has a longer future life in which to generate issues from the repairs means there’s an even stronger case for zero corner cutting or uncertainty.

Given what you’ve said about the mounts I’d be very cautious about accepting any repair without understanding more about it.

Having said all that I’m not a motor engineer and there may be established ways of safely repairing this damage but I’d want some serious comfort.

Three days? I wonder what the damage is to the roof? Monocoque car bodies are a structural item.

I would +1 the independent engineers assessment.

Interested in the overstressed Thule 591s for spares if you get to keep them; I have a pair that have lost/cracked quite a few bits of plastic but are structurally sound. PM me 👍🏼

The roof is a structural part of the car…

I missed in the OP that it was the roof itself that was bent 😲

I’d be insisting on an independent engineer’s report.

This ^^^ and I’d want to at least have it assessed by my own choice of body repair shop too

@v8ninety – YGM

Thanks for the replies.
Will be emailing the garage over the weekend with a list of requirements.
Independent certification sounds like a good plan.
If they won’t do that I’ll tell them they can fit me a towbar instead and I’ll switch to a rear mounted carrier.

I suspect the roof concerns and engineers repsort is more concerned about keeping your head attached to your shoulders than bike carrying capacity – not sure a towbar will enhance the roofs ability to do this? 🙂

One of my ex colleague’s wife hit a car park barrier with bikes on their rack. The roof was quite badly dented and the bikes/racks ruined. This was repaired to my surprise.

New roof rack and carriers at the very least, If a main dealer took my car through a roller style car wash then i’d be after a full paint correction detail to remove the swirl marks.

I’ve known two folk write-off cars after taking bike carriers through a car park barrier. More inertia involved of course, but in both cases the roof racks (and bikes) were fine.

I’d be worried about the mounting points, in fact I worry about them when they haven’t been damaged. They are long nuts welded to the roof structure and unless they are exposing them, how can they be sure they’re strong enough to stop your pride and joy getting smaller in your rear-view mirror.

Bit of an update for anyone interested.

Got the car back a couple of weeks ago and the repairs looked really good although the dealer was waiting for the replacement bike carriers, roof bars and a trim strip to cover the roofrack mounting points.

Bike carriers and roof bars arrived last week.

Trim strip was fitted today so I thought I’d make sure the new roof bars would fit as I didn’t want to fit them without the trim strip in place..

Unfortunately the threaded sockets into which the front roof bar fits have been put in about 1mm too high so I can’t tighten up the front roof bar.

Back to the dealer in the morning I go.

Have been very calm so far. That may well change tomorrow…

Oh Bugger! I imagine that’s the kind of thing that’s really hard to get spot on when not on the production line!

Hope they put it right!

<cough>dremmel</cough>

I bet they won’t let you watch as they sort it.

Did you get an independent engineers report? check for filler with a magnet?

Just back from the dealer.

I have now seen what needs to be done as coincidentally they had another car (same manufacturer but different model) in the workshop with similar issue (not caused by the garage on that occasion).

They’re going to get the necessary replacement fitting which fortunately is bolted to the structure of the roof so should be less than an hour to fix. Their challenge for the garage will be getting the repair done before the end of this week as I’ve told them I need the roofrack fully useable before the weekend.

I did ask if I could watch and was told that I was welcome to view them carrying out the works if I wanted to but it would need to be from an office overlooking the repair bay (no issue with that for me).

Repairs have been certified by the manufacturer as its the main dealer’s bodyshop.