Chevrolet Lumina VX SS
Discussion
My Lumina has been off the road with an automatic gearbox failure since July 2004. It's a long story but as usual the only winners so far are the lawyers. The gearbox has failed and been rebuilt under warranty 3 times, so when it failed for the fourth time at 10 months old, enough was enough. I am rejecting the car under the sale of goods act, but the garage are claiming my mileage of 28000 within 10 months was excessive use and contributed to the failure. The also say that my car is virtually identical to an HSV GTS and that the price I paid for it (£22000), meant I got I bargain compared to the £40000 plus I should have paid. How can I prove my car is not the same as the HSV (I wish!) and is in fact a rebadged version of the poorer relative, meaning my car was not virtually half price? They are also saying that it was GM that imported the HSV, but this isn't true either. Any experts out there that might be able to help? I loved my car, it wasn't meant to be like this!!!
I bought the car from an importer based in Essex. It was registered brand new in 2003 but was actually built late 2001. They gave me a 12 month warranty and a mechanical breakdown insurance policy. They are now saying the warranty is with the warranty company and not them. GM obviously won't touch it which is fair enough, but in this situation, the liability should be with the retailer. The law should be on my side but you know what these courts can be like. They are fighting me every step of the way and are very wealthy.
Looks good, but after spending over £5000 so far in legals etc., I don't really feel like adding a new box to my list of costs. From what I have been told, a rebuild is a botched repair and the whole gearbox should have been replaced in the first place. Saying that, if a faulty engine management system caused the fault, who's to say the same thing wouldn't happen to a new box? I'll be going Network Q when I finally get this muddle sorted!
I know it seems like a long time ago now, but I actually rejected the car 18 months ago when it was 10 months old. I didn't really want to go down this route but the alternative was to let them do a fourth repair for an identical fault, then have it fail on me again 2 months later when the warrant ran out. Spoke to the guy in Hornchurch. He knew his stuff but it's kind of beyond that now. He knew the people the garage sub contracted the repairs to though. Apparently they are known within the trade as 'bring em back Bob'! Basically, every time the fault occurs, it exhibits slipping clutch type symptoms in fourth gear, then third, then loses all drive from those two gears completely. They have said in their witness statements that the failure must be the result of me driving aggresively. Most of my 28000 miles were motorway miles. You just can't believe how much something like this can drain you! Part of being able to reject the car after a period of time such as this is to prove that it is not sufficiently durable or that the fault was inherent within the build of the vehicle. Common sense says that should be easy, but since when has the legal system applied common sense. I just hope the judge is a Commodore fan but I think I might be clutching at straws there somehow!!
Gassing Station | HSV & Monaro | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff