Help - Advice needed with car stretched cam chain
Discussion
Posted this in general gassing but probably more legal advice available here.
Having a nightmare with the Mazda dealer for the last 2 weeks since my car was diagnosed with a stretched timing chain.
Its a 11/2010 Mazda 6 2.2 Diesel. I purchased the car in December 2013 at 68k and the vehicle now has circa 85k. When purchasing the vehicle I was told the car was overdue a service but they would service the car and bring everything up to date so it would be like it had never missed a service. I also took out a warranty which was sold to me as the same as the Mazda extended warranty but I could extend it to 3 years as opposed to the Mazda warranty of 1 year max. I double checked this with the salesman several times.
I have just heard back from the service manager a week and a half after the diagnosis (despite me chasing every other day!) to be told as the warranty is for mechanical failure and a stretched chain is 'wear and tear' despite it been a non service item. I have confirmed this with the warranty company whose only response was you can challenge it and we can send an independent engineer to check for failed tensioners etc at which point they would accept the claim because there would of been a failure. I pointed out to the service manager a timing chain is surely meant to last the life of the car and it should be replaced as its not fit for purpose and he said as the car had missed a service its out of Mazdas good will requirements.
All of these reasons to not cover the bill I CHECKED with the salesman during the purchase as I wanted to avoid this hassle.
Do I have any hope with this? I'm going to call Mazda UK in a moment but I imagine I'll just get some call centre working off a job sheet. I will also be emailing the Mazda UK MD Jeremy Thompson to see what he has to say.
I know that this range of cars can have issues but ALL cars of this ilk have some form of issue so please don't just go 'didn't you do your research' its not helpful.
Having a nightmare with the Mazda dealer for the last 2 weeks since my car was diagnosed with a stretched timing chain.
Its a 11/2010 Mazda 6 2.2 Diesel. I purchased the car in December 2013 at 68k and the vehicle now has circa 85k. When purchasing the vehicle I was told the car was overdue a service but they would service the car and bring everything up to date so it would be like it had never missed a service. I also took out a warranty which was sold to me as the same as the Mazda extended warranty but I could extend it to 3 years as opposed to the Mazda warranty of 1 year max. I double checked this with the salesman several times.
I have just heard back from the service manager a week and a half after the diagnosis (despite me chasing every other day!) to be told as the warranty is for mechanical failure and a stretched chain is 'wear and tear' despite it been a non service item. I have confirmed this with the warranty company whose only response was you can challenge it and we can send an independent engineer to check for failed tensioners etc at which point they would accept the claim because there would of been a failure. I pointed out to the service manager a timing chain is surely meant to last the life of the car and it should be replaced as its not fit for purpose and he said as the car had missed a service its out of Mazdas good will requirements.
All of these reasons to not cover the bill I CHECKED with the salesman during the purchase as I wanted to avoid this hassle.
Do I have any hope with this? I'm going to call Mazda UK in a moment but I imagine I'll just get some call centre working off a job sheet. I will also be emailing the Mazda UK MD Jeremy Thompson to see what he has to say.
I know that this range of cars can have issues but ALL cars of this ilk have some form of issue so please don't just go 'didn't you do your research' its not helpful.
I have found similar with my Full fat Jaguar warranty recently. I have a few things that need sorting but they gave me their 3 favourite get outs:
1. Its not broken yet so not covered
2. Its still working within acceptable limits
3. The car has now passed 60k miles so everything is now wear adn tear (not covered)
Based on my last chat with Jaguar from this point on despite paying £1300 for the warranty renewal they are unlikley to accept any claims as it will all be wear and tear. Unless something explodes/breaks totally they wont be paying.
To be fair to them up to 60k miles they did cover about £5.5k of work, although about £2k of that was totally unnecessary due to the wrong diagnosis by the Jag Dealer which I told them was wrong and they ignored me and did the work anyway.
1. Its not broken yet so not covered
2. Its still working within acceptable limits
3. The car has now passed 60k miles so everything is now wear adn tear (not covered)
Based on my last chat with Jaguar from this point on despite paying £1300 for the warranty renewal they are unlikley to accept any claims as it will all be wear and tear. Unless something explodes/breaks totally they wont be paying.
To be fair to them up to 60k miles they did cover about £5.5k of work, although about £2k of that was totally unnecessary due to the wrong diagnosis by the Jag Dealer which I told them was wrong and they ignored me and did the work anyway.
Edited by Dodsy on Friday 18th July 14:11
TheArchitect said:
I pointed out to the service manager a timing chain is surely meant to last the life of the car
Nope. Cam chains still need changing. They don't have a service interval pre-defined, like belts do, but they do still need changing once they inevitably stretch. How quickly they stretch depends on a stack of things, but mainly the condition of the oil.Right been a busy morning!
I wasn't expecting everything to be covered however I have been told the Mazda extended warranty would of covered it. I was told the warranties covered the same areas at point of sale, that said I didn't read the whole document word for word however I cannot find a reason in there currently to not cover it as they do not mention chains only belts which if fail and have been serviced correctly then they're covered. Oh and the salesman recommended this cover for my usage of the car.
I have found out the car has had 2 62.5k services one at 64791 miles and when I purchased the car at 68058 miles. This reduces significantly the overdue service mileage. The car also had its chain changed under warranty at 37598 miles on the 03/07/2012. This means the replacement chain last 2 years and 43k miles not exactly a great lifespan! (good to know for the future though!)
From speaking with the warranty company though I have no hope. My Options I can see are miss selling of the warranty (I shouldnt of taken the guys word for it), and not fit for purpose (used car and done over 20k since purchased despite only been 3.5 years old!)
The Bill has been given to me at £1038 which is less than a lot of people have had quoted from my online research and no damage to the engine. Just the cam chain is out of tolerance.
I'll call up the service manager and see where I stand with a bit more info available now.
I wasn't expecting everything to be covered however I have been told the Mazda extended warranty would of covered it. I was told the warranties covered the same areas at point of sale, that said I didn't read the whole document word for word however I cannot find a reason in there currently to not cover it as they do not mention chains only belts which if fail and have been serviced correctly then they're covered. Oh and the salesman recommended this cover for my usage of the car.
I have found out the car has had 2 62.5k services one at 64791 miles and when I purchased the car at 68058 miles. This reduces significantly the overdue service mileage. The car also had its chain changed under warranty at 37598 miles on the 03/07/2012. This means the replacement chain last 2 years and 43k miles not exactly a great lifespan! (good to know for the future though!)
From speaking with the warranty company though I have no hope. My Options I can see are miss selling of the warranty (I shouldnt of taken the guys word for it), and not fit for purpose (used car and done over 20k since purchased despite only been 3.5 years old!)
The Bill has been given to me at £1038 which is less than a lot of people have had quoted from my online research and no damage to the engine. Just the cam chain is out of tolerance.
I'll call up the service manager and see where I stand with a bit more info available now.
ging84 said:
they replaced the timing chain under warranty around 20k miles ago?
this seems like a fairly important detail
40k and 2 years almost to the day! I have spoken with the dealership and theyve said once the service record is updated on the computer he will go back to mazda and see what good will they can offer. this seems like a fairly important detail
I also highlighted the chain cant be fit for purpose if its only lasted that long and he said he would bring that up when speaking with them. So Monday afternoon I will be checking to see if the record has been updated (mazda have a digital service record) and then chasing the dealership. If im still not happy I will contact the right people at mazda uk and the MD as I dont think 2 years 40k miles for a chain is "Fit for Purpose"
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