girl needs help with car repair costs!

[hebarnes]

i bought a second hand mini cooper last october, and the wind screen wipers have stopped working and the air bag light come on. i took it to a mini garage as it was also due a service, and they have come up with a load of other 'problems', and have quoted £1,800 plus labour.

can anyone advise on these problems - experience, repair cost, recommend a garage:

replacement wiper motor (quoted £303 for part + £198 for labour)
airbag - side wiring harness (quoted £205)
alternator drive belt (£49)
tyre cut (£114)
replace steering column as noisy due to excess movement (£466)

any advice would be appreciated.

thanks!

[DarkMatter]

Crikey, that sounds like a lot of problems, has the car done a lot of miles?

I'd recommend taking it to another Mini dealer for a second opinion because one main dealer near Southampton failed my wife's Mini's MOT due to excessive wear in suspension bushes, yet another main dealer could find no fault with them!

Hopefully 'blackspider' will see this post and give you some advice - he's an expert

[Loui]

Prices seem about right from a francised dealer tbh

[D_G]

Find a good independant in your area and avoid the dealer like the plague. Its sad but the dealers rip you off to make up for the franchise expenses.

Hope you sort it

Dave

[Heebeegeetee]

hebarnes said:

i bought a second hand mini cooper last october, and the wind screen wipers have stopped working and the air bag light come on. i took it to a mini garage as it was also due a service, and they have come up with a load of other 'problems', and have quoted £1,800 plus labour.

can anyone advise on these problems - experience, repair cost, recommend a garage:

replacement wiper motor (quoted £303 for part + £198 for labour)
airbag - side wiring harness (quoted £205)
alternator drive belt (£49)
tyre cut (£114)
replace steering column as noisy due to excess movement (£466)

Flipping Heck!

You must try elsewhere. Try to find a good independant garage, ask around on the 'net, try the 'Regional PHers' section, (is Hampshire 'South Coast'?), ask friends, rellies, colleagues to recommend a good garage, and get a second (or third) opinion. I would definitely say you should forget what this main dealer is saying. Perhaps try getting a MINI enthusiast who lives near you to take a look at your car.

Let me say this about main dealerships. I'm an old git, and have owned cars and trucks all my adult life. In my experience, with just one exception main dealerships have been absolutely useless, and are total ripoff merchants. I currently own (or am paying for) a Mercedes lorry, value £60k, and the local Merc dealership is utterly, utterly useless. Absolutely, completely and totally useless. A chap I know has used the dealer in Kidderminster, some 40 miles away, rather than go to our local one.

I don't use this dealership at all, I wasted an entire day just trying to get the truck its initial service/inspection and a num,ber of jobs that needed doing because the supplying dealer had just not bothered giving the truck a pdi. Of the 10 tyres on the truck, only 3 had valve caps. The local dealer even wanted to charge me for them. Get the picture?

I would say here and now that your main dealer is playing the 'its a girl, she knows nowt, its bonus time' card.

Trouble is, finding a good garage of any sort can be difficult.

[haggle]

kartechnic in poole are well worth a shout as there all ex mini sercive techs and charge half what the main dealers do for labour

or GTT in blanford forum are mini specailists (but there more of a tuner) but they have been know to do some service work and tbh they are buy far the best ive fiund in the area

Edited by haggle on Saturday 2nd June 14:30

[hebarnes]

Thanks guys. What about buying parts on ebay, for example, and getting a mechanic to fit it? Is that do-able, or do mechanics frown upon this sort of thing?

[blackspider]

hebarnes said:

Thanks guys. What about buying parts on ebay, for example, and getting a mechanic to fit it? Is that do-able, or do mechanics frown upon this sort of thing?

The quote is about right for a main dealer.

A good indie would be alot cheaper...Its the parts that are the baulk cost here.

You can buy the bits from ebay,but be careful with the steering column-upto 04 plate mini's they were prone to clunking/wearing in the upper column,in fact every one was like it-chances if you find one on ebay it will be the same if it isnt new.

Agood mechanic will find all the bits easy except the airbag loom,which i advise is replaced back to the control unit-i've got these down to 40 minutes-the reason I advise this is it seems to be the only way to stop the light coming on again,and chances are its already had a repair to the loom at the seat.

Cheers,BLackspider

[Heebeegeetee]

blackspider said:

You can buy the bits from ebay,but be careful with the steering column-upto 04 plate mini's they were prone to clunking/wearing in the upper column,in fact every one was like it-chances if you find one on ebay it will be the same if it isnt new.

Agood mechanic will find all the bits easy except the airbag loom,which i advise is replaced back to the control unit-i've got these down to 40 minutes-the reason I advise this is it seems to be the only way to stop the light coming on again,and chances are its already had a repair to the loom at the seat.

Cheers,BLackspider

Good advice. I reckon if you bought off ebay you'd just end up with the wrong stuff.

[hebarnes]

Thanks for your advice everyone. I'm going to take the Mini to a local garage to see how much they quote to replace the windscreen wiper motor, although they did say the part would cost the same as the BMW/MINI garage would charge me, just the labour would be different... Maybe I should get that motor off ebay?!

Found a great site for replacement tyre. tyre-shopper.co.uk. They charge the same for the tyre, fitting, balancing, labour + VAT as the BMW/Mini garage wanted just for the tyre!

[DarkMatter]

Maybe you could get a wiper motor from a car breakers yard? These people are breaking a Cooper according to their website http://www.aldershotcarspares.com

For cheap tyres try http://www.mytyres.com - but you have to arrange fitting yourself, typically £10 to £15 per tyre.