Hello, about a year ago, the front section of the exhaust pipe on my 1998 Ford Fiesta fell off. One garage quoted me £400 for repair as they said all three sections would need replacing.

As I had only bought ther car a few weeks before, I took it back to the garage I bought it from and they welded it back on.... Read more

The cam belt failed two weeks agoon our car when we were on our way back to the ferry in france -towed on and off and back home. The car, a citroen c4 grand picasso had only done 30000 miles and has a full service history, bought from citroen dealer at 2 years old. The car has been sitting in a citroen service centre since then whilst we negociate with the garage and citroen who asked us to pay for an "investigation" to be conducted on the car. The mechanic sent citroen the findings two days ago; Citroen then asked for photos and based on these ignored the findings of the investigation (that the belt should not have failed) and told us they would not be paying anything towards the repairs as a water pump had been fitted at 18000 miles and this could potentially have caused the belt to fray - this was very unclear and we asked for a written response and copies of the photos. The mechanic was somewhat dubious about this explanatoina and suggested that the belt would have broken earlier if the fault was with the pump. The pump was incidentally fitted by citroen before we bought the car. We have had to ok the work priced at £2400 as we need a car and the garage have said they will have to start charging for it being on the ramp. JUst wondering if you have any advice? Read more

Hi Folks,

Here's my story. The engine management light came on a couple of days ago. I brought it to a mechanic who hooked it up to vag com. Under engine code faults the only one that appeared was for the front pas door not unlocking but it works fine. we did searched under the obd option and the following code fault was found.... Read more

The Central locking on the above car has packed in, I have checked all the fuses and they are all fine, The boot release bottom on the dashboard doe's not work either. any idea's as to if it electrical problem or any advise would be wecomed. Thanks Paul Read more

Hi

Apologise my first post is to ask for help.

My Wife’s beetle has been smoking from the exhaust for a while now, not all the time but when in slow moving traffic or low in gear. Big puffs of blue spoke that really stinks, so I took it to a mechanic ( a new local one) who thought that the wrong oil had been put into the car when the last service was completed - I've had to top the oil up twice now since that service in February!

The Mechanic flushed the oil and replaced the oil filter and topped up with the correct oil. He phone my wife and told her to collect the car when she arrived the car was still smoking really bad so the mechanic put the car on the diagnostic machine and it retuned and error code which related to the spark plugs so he replaced the spark plugs and said that there was oil in the spark plugs and he thought that the engine seal had broken. The mechanic said the car needed and engine rebuild at a cost of £600 - £700! But he wasn’t sure this was the problem although he did consult 4 other mechanics close by and they all agreed it was the engine seal. I think he was referring to the piston seal? he said one of the 3 seals that keeps the oil seperate from another part of the engine could have blow due to the wrong oil being used or the engine being over filled with oil.

The engine management light does come on every now and then but normally goes off. This light first come on after my last mechanic who I now know to be a compete Muppet serviced the car and changed the timing belt and tension kit - on doing this he left the wires to the injection system touching the engine and they melted. This was the first time the engine management light had come on.
He repaired the wires but the light still come on every now.


Do i really need and engine rebuild?

1.6 beetle
year 2001 Read more