karl

My Big End bearing broke after 8,500 miles on my new 1998 Turbo. The engine was stripped and rebuilt under warranty and last weekend after a total of only 11,000 miles my engine ceased completely. I presume I am going to need a new engine and I'm not a very happy camper, because I don't fancy trying to sell a 1 year old car that has had its engine replaced.
Subaru are looking into it at the moment, so nothing is sorted yet, but again I find myself in a rented car (an 1100cc Rover...eeuggghh!!), with my Turbo being towed away on the back of a truck for the second time in 3 months. I have had Porsche 911's with 150,000 miles give me WAY less trouble than this.
Whatya think of that then? I'd be interested to hear. I would like Subaru to give me a new car or my money back, but I need to find out where I stand legally.

Karl

GCollier

From the "help" columns I have read in car magazines, you are far better off legally by rejecting the car in writing as soon as possible, rather than letting the dealer try to repair it. If you give the dealer a second chance to repair the engine, you have probably lost your chance for recompense through the legal system.

Stevebyng

I am no legal expert but I always read the cases in car magazines carefully. Having already allowed a dealer to fix the first fault has certainly weakened your case for rejection and if I was in your position I would be enlisting the help of one of the following:-
Consumer TV programmes - Watchdog etc.
Car Magazine helplines - What Car etc.
A good solicitor - do you belong to the AA or RAC - as they provide assistance to members with this type of problem.
At the end of the day I would either try hard through one of the above or just accept a new engine - as in my experience you have been extremely unlucky to have had this type of problem on these vehicles, with such a good reputation for good engine strength.
If the engine is fitted and supplied under warranty you would not normally need to declare this when you sell the car as it was fitted by the manufacturers representative.
I would certainly try to get some assurances in writing that after this next repair you would be entitled to an exchange or refund if the fault is not finally fixed - which I suspect it would be.
It all therefore depends how "heavy" you want to get and whether you believe, like I do, that the engine failure was a rare occurunce that is unlikely to happen again.

Colin

Karl,

Did the dealer or Subaru give any explanation as to why this happened? And under what conditions did it fail? If Subaru put a brand new engine in the car then I would have thought that's not a bad solution - thing is I'd worry about the fitting workmanship - as it's an operation dealers probably don't have a huge amount of experience doing. In my opinion, it's not entirely surprising that the engine ceased completely after a rebuild. Finally, if the dealer says it won't affect resale value, then try insisting he buys it at market value!

Best of luck.

karl

Just to let you know.....I threatned the distributors (i.e. Subaru themselves) with legal action and an email to the Top Gear office concerning the reliability of the cars and they are now going to replace the engine in the car. However, I am not really keen to have that car back, so i am upgrading to a 1999 Model Year car and Subaru will pay for the Sikura Alarm and an Air Conditioning unit, to bring the specification back up to match the car that I had. They also gave me a 2.0 Legacy AWD to tip around in until the first week in January when I will register my new car in order to get a '99' year number plate. I'm going to end up spending some money now that I hadn't planned on, but I have a new car again and they can do what they like with the old one.