Longest you've had a vehicle in the shop for a mechanical reason?

I've definitely hit a record with the wife's Mazda now. Coming up on 1 month here.

I blahged about my tire/wheel issues last month That was repaired in three days by the Mazda dealership. Still things to be settled there with Jiffy Lube causing the damage, but will know my court date by the 12th of Feb.

Anyways, the car was at the dealership when that secondary issue happened for what I assumed was a thermostat issue. It was not. Turned out to be a warped cylinder head. Or so they say. Have not got the car back running again to test it to make sure. They said thermostat at first, but were wrong, so who knows if they're right with this. The warped cylinder head was diagnosed on 12/22. It's a used car, so I have an after market warranty that requires inspection for any repair over 2K, which didn't happen until 12/24.

We got screwed on holiday shipping for parts with both Xmas and NYE holidays, but even at that we're still waiting for the final parts to come in tomorrow. Apparently when you replace a cylinder head, the valve spacers often need to be replaced as well and that can't be determined until you put the head on to check it against the factory cam shaft?

So yeah, closing in on one month. FINALLY they gave us a loaner today until the car is back on the road. I would like to think that if we bought the car there new, they would've extended us a loaner a lot sooner.

What's the longest you've ever had a car in a shop for a mechanical reason?

We're being told that we'll get the car back on Thursday. That will be exactly one month since we brought it in for the first time. Wonder if they'll fork over the payment for that month? I mean after all, we make a car payment during that month for a vehicle we never used.........:lol:

I think the longest I was without a car was about 5 days when I had the cylinder head gaskets replaced on my Subaru Outback. Ended up renting a car because I was having brake repairs done on my other vehicle at the time.

I'm not surprised about the holiday problems...just had to replace the A/C compressor on my Toyota and it took the shop 5 days to get a new part. Fortunately, the car was completely drive-able and it only had to be in the shop for the day the compressor was replaced.

Nice thing about getting service on my Volvo at the dealer is that, for a one-time fee of $25, I can have a loaner car for the entire time that the car is in service. I'd rather not have the fee but it's better than what I would pay for a rental.

Did your service contract/warranty provide for any substitute transportation? Not sure if that's the norm or not...

1 week when our 2008 Volvo XC70 had to have the front suspension replaced....had their XC90 loaner for the whole time...its a lease, so at the end of the day its their problem...the dealer is 3 miles from my house

I think we would've been offered a loaner much sooner in the process if the dealership doing the repairs is the one we bought the car from. I don't fault the dealership as much as I do the Mazda parts supply chain.

I had about 6 weeks over the summer when my car was rear-ended (not really mechanical, but it sure was frustrating) in a hit and run. Glad I finally got it back.

My younger brother is currently just over a month with his car in the shop (2003? Suzuki Verona), it started with the car not shifting out of park (some brake switch had gone bad), and that ballooned into needing the cylinder head replaced, he's been getting the run around from the Suzuki dealer, and finally said eff it yesterday, went to the local VW dealer and came home with this:



The final straw for him was when they said "Be glad it wasn't the power steering pump, it takes us three weeks from when we order one of those until we see it!"

Suzuki is supposed to return the car to him at some point this week, and when they do he is driving it directly to the VW dealer.

It's his first new car, and he's really excited about it, and I'm happy for him.

-w

deadheadskier said:

I think we would've been offered a loaner much sooner in the process if the dealership doing the repairs is the one we bought the car from. I don't fault the dealership as much as I do the Mazda parts supply chain.

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Mazda's service departments are not shining in my eyes recently... At least based on anecdotal evidence...

There is your situation, and that of my (now former) roommate. He took his car in with a check engine light (07ish Mazda 3), still under warranty. Diagnosis was bad oxygen sensor, we'll swap it out and you'll be out of here in an hour...

The guy who was trying to take out the oxygen sensor couldn't get it to budge and rather than using some PB Blaster, he got a real big breaker bar... Of course he stripped out the threads from the exhaust pipe... Sorry Matt, now we're going to have to replace that... It'll be about a week.

Comes up on a week, he calls to check on it... "Erm, well the new exhaust is in... But we broke an ABS sensor, and have to replace that now... It's on order, we'll have it in a couple of days."

This happened right while we were all trying to move out of the house we were living in, adding more stress than Matt needed at the time... but he finally did get his car back.

-w

Hopefully it will be smooth sailing for a while when we get the car back. My wife really likes the vehicle.

First of all that situation screams of incredibly POOR customer service --------------UR right to broadcast that fact to whomever will listen . Dealerships that treat customers like that richly deserve to LOSE business and be exposed -- call your Better Business Bureau and the AAA and the Cof C about this .

I've only had a car in the shop 2 days and that was for a fender bender and a head gasket job on my old saab 900 . and I got a loaner .

deadheadskier said:

Hopefully it will be smooth sailing for a while when we get the car back. My wife really likes the vehicle.

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You'll get it back in time to take the snow tires off. I hear Jiffy Lube does a great job with the swap .... :lol:

Warp Daddy said:

First of all that situation screams of incredibly POOR customer service --------------UR right to broadcast that fact to whomever will listen . Dealerships that treat customers like that richly deserve to LOSE business and be exposed -- call your Better Business Bureau and the AAA and the Cof C about this .

I've only had a car in the shop 2 days and that was for a fender bender and a head gasket job on my old saab 900 . and I got a loaner .

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Honestly? I don't think it's a case of the dealership. The service manager is from the same area as much of my family, knows some of the same people. He seems like a straight up guy. He's also willing to help me in any way possible to stick to Jiffy Lube for the tire issue.

It's Mazda corporate that I think is the issue.

Then if that is where you FEEL the problem resides let corporate know of your poor experience. and don't mince words .

I think my '97 Saab was in the shop for a whole day when the clutch cable snapped about 6 years ago, and my wife's SUV was at the body shop recently for 2 days to repair damage from an unseccessful argument with a wall, but other than that, been really lucky with cars and not needing things fixed. Fortunately.

we had a brand new volvo back in 2000. it was the new V40 model when it first came out. had the car about 6 weeks when my wife got t-boned at an intersection...$12K in damage, but the insurance company did not total it. volvo dealer said that volvo had not yet begun producing many replacement parts for the car since it was just into production. wait time for repairs was expected to be...10 MONTHS!!!!

we took the insurance check and sold the car at a salvage auction for $8K...i lost $9K in 6 weeks on that deal.

happyjack said:

we had a brand new volvo back in 2000. it was the new V40 model when it first came out. had the car about 6 weeks when my wife got t-boned at an intersection...$12K in damage, but the insurance company did not total it. volvo dealer said that volvo had not yet begun producing many replacement parts for the car since it was just into production. wait time for repairs was expected to be...10 MONTHS!!!!

we took the insurance check and sold the car at a salvage auction for $8K...i lost $9K in 6 weeks on that deal.

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Ugh. That's harsh. Sorry man... It's too bad that the insurance company wouldn't work with you on that.

-w

The only Mazda I ever owned was a 1991 Navajo that was a rebadged Ford Exploder 2 door. Parts supply was never an issue with that car. I bought the Navajo mostly because it had a 50K factory warranty instead if the Ford 36K warranty and bumping it up to 100K was inexpensive. I'm glad parts were easy to get. They certainly replaced a lot of them under warranty.

6 weeks IIRC? It was about a year ago. The engine went in the A6. It was a real struggle with the warranty company who screwed us in the end. (Fawk"The Choice"...what a POS warranty that was). Luckily, the dealer(private dealership) gave us a loaner on day 1. I drove around in a MKIV Jetta with a 2.0 and a radio that didn't work so well. However, they didn't charge us for the loaner...I just had to put in gas.

Well,

The car is FINALLY done. Wife gets to pick it up after work today.

AND

Got a message from the manager of Jiffy Lube, which I assume means that he received the court documents today stating my intentions to sue him for the damage to the hubs. Cost of damage and court fees is about $1000. I'd be willing to settle out of court for $750 to avoid the hassle. If that isn't offered, bring it on.

Good luck! Glad the car's finally coming home, though!

Longest I've had a vehicle in the shop... My 1986 VW Jetta spent ~5 days in the shop back in 1997 or 1998 (the only time it went to the shop for a repair as B did all the other repairs). They couldn't figure out the problem at first but it turned out to be fuel injector issues. $500. Then again I only paid $1200 for that car and it lasted me 2.5 years with that being the only major repair--can't complain too much about that.

Jiffy Lube is offering to cover 50%. I told them if they reimburse me $750, they have a deal. We'll see.

you forgot AND FREE OIL CHANGES FOR LIFE!