Out of warranty claim for Vauxhall Corsa camshaft

[MartW]

Thanks for the info Dave.

[Guest VX_Max Vauxhall Company Rep]

Hi Martin

I've dropped you an e-mail because I had quite a bit to write but if you'd like to reply back on here that's perfectly fine!

I know we had some private messages yesterday David and of course I do sympathise and did put your case forward for further review, however servicing is a key criteria when we are reviewing for a contribution outside of the warranty period.

As I mentioned yesterday, the vehicle does not have to necessarily be serviced at a Vauxhall dealership but simply for the overall safety and maintenance of the vehicle it does require annual servicing.

In regards to contribution amount, we do take every case on its own individual merits so it's hard to generalise but, we do also take into account the age and mileage of the vehicle. If a vehicle is outside of the warranty period and has had fault free operation for 5 years or a high mileage, this is something we take into account upon review.

Thanks Again

Max

Social Media Agent, Vauxhall UK

[spanner16]

Hi Martin

I've dropped you an e-mail because I had quite a bit to write but if you'd like to reply back on here that's perfectly fine!

I know we had some private messages yesterday David and of course I do sympathise and did put your case forward for further review, however servicing is a key criteria when we are reviewing for a contribution outside of the warranty period.

As I mentioned yesterday, the vehicle does not have to necessarily be serviced at a Vauxhall dealership but simply for the overall safety and maintenance of the vehicle it does require annual servicing.

In regards to contribution amount, we do take every case on its own individual merits so it's hard to generalise but, we do also take into account the age and mileage of the vehicle. If a vehicle is outside of the warranty period and has had fault free operation for 5 years or a high mileage, this is something we take into account upon review.

Thanks Again

Max

Social Media Agent, Vauxhall UK

 

Max,

You are writing as if this is just bad luck and Vx would help out as a goodwill gesture, this is not the case, this is a product failure and is a known problem as admitted by yourselves, when this happens a maufacturer should be prepared to hold their hands up, admit it and deal with it. All manufacturers will have problems, this is a given, its how those problems are dealt with that is the measure of a company. It a shame that Vx should use underhand tactics to avoid their responsibility, even when a full Vx service history is supplied you have never paid out for the full cost of repairs for this problem, so even if your self appointed criteria are applied you still duck the issue.

I am interested to note that you mention the 5 years period, are you saying this is the the lifespan of Vauxhall cars? I thought under the sale of goods act, the fit for purpose clause lasted up to six years?

What do you understand as being high mileage? what is the average miles per annum as far as Vx are concerned?

[spanner16]

Max,

You are writing as if this is just bad luck and Vx would help out as a goodwill gesture, this is not the case, this is a product failure and is a known problem as admitted by yourselves, when this happens a maufacturer should be prepared to hold their hands up, admit it and deal with it. All manufacturers will have problems, this is a given, its how those problems are dealt with that is the measure of a company. It a shame that Vx should use underhand tactics to avoid their responsibility, even when a full Vx service history is supplied you have never paid out for the full cost of repairs for this problem, so even if your self appointed criteria are applied you still duck the issue.

I am interested to note that you mention the 5 years period, are you saying this is the the lifespan of Vauxhall cars? I thought under the sale of goods act, the fit for purpose clause lasted up to six years?

What do you understand as being high mileage? what is the average miles per annum as far as Vx are concerned?

 

Can I assume that youwon't reply to this then Max?

[Guest VX_Max Vauxhall Company Rep]

Hey Dave

 

The 5 years in my previous post was a general example of how age might be considered upon review of a contribution, and Vauxhall doesn't stipulate what is considered high mileage for a vehicle.

 

Once the vehicles out of warranty, there are many factors we will take into account upon review, this includes specific failure, age, mileage, service history etc.

 

I'm really sorry we haven't been able to meet your expectations with this Dave, it has been reviewed on more then one occasion now and we do still stand by our decision.

 

Thank you for all of your posts and comments.

 

Max

Social Media Agent, Vauxhall UK

[spanner16]

Hey Dave

 

The 5 years in my previous post was a general example of how age might be considered upon review of a contribution, and Vauxhall doesn't stipulate what is considered high mileage for a vehicle.

 

Once the vehicles out of warranty, there are many factors we will take into account upon review, this includes specific failure, age, mileage, service history etc.

 

I'm really sorry we haven't been able to meet your expectations with this Dave, it has been reviewed on more then one occasion now and we do still stand by our decision.

 

Thank you for all of your posts and comments.

 

Max

Social Media Agent, Vauxhall UK

 

I am sorry too Max that a major manufacturer will not do what is right by its customers and will allow this problem to continue, as I type some other poor soul could be breaking down with an expensive fault due to lack of action on your part. I will take this further as I think this issue should be broadcast as loud and as often as possible to highlight the problem and to (hopefully) prevent this happening to someone else, this is not called the consumer action group for nothing. I also hope that the ensuing disruption and possible lost orders will make Vauxhall rethink their policy on any future issues of this sort.

[spanner16]

So the situation is this, Vauxhall have put an unknown number of engines into an unknown number of their cars (mostly Corsas but also Tigras and maybe Astras from what I can tell) that suffer from the following fault, the bolts that hold down the bearing caps for the camshaft are coming loose and causing the camshaft to snap resulting in a very expensive repair, this can happen at any time, my daughters snapped on the M6 300 miles from home, is this something that you would want to happen to you? The bolts need to be checked regularly for tightness, This is not part of the normal servicing procedure and will not be checked unless you ask for it. Vauxhall have not issued any sort of instructions to garages or owners and will only cover the cost of failure in certain circumstances (and even then only partly). You should check with your local Vauxhall garage or yourself as to whether you have one of the affected engines or check yourself. This failure will result in your car being unusable, if you are lucky you will get away with just replacing the camshaft (£240 plus fitting) if you are unlucky (like my daughter) it will result in a new cylinder head as well which brings the bill to just under £2000. Vauxhall Customer "Care" have admitted that they know there is a problem but refuse to take the action that is necessary, check that you do not have one of the affected engines NOW before its too late...

[sailor sam]

This really installs confidence in buying a Vauxhall does it not!?

 

Please Note

 

 

The advice I offer will be based on the information given by the person needing it. All my advice is based on my experiences and knowledge gained in working in the motor and passenger transport industries in various capacities. Although my advice will always be sincere, it should be used as guidence only.

I would always urge to seek professional advice for clarification prior to taking any action.

 

Please click my reputation button at the bottom of my profile window on the left if you found my advice useful.

[spanner16]

This really installs confidence in buying a Vauxhall does it not!?

 

Please Note

 

 

The advice I offer will be based on the information given by the person needing it. All my advice is based on my experiences and knowledge gained in working in the motor and passenger transport industries in various capacities. Although my advice will always be sincere, it should be used as guidence only.

I would always urge to seek professional advice for clarification prior to taking any action.

 

Please click my reputation button at the bottom of my profile window on the left if you found my advice useful.

 

Yes you're right, it's the lack of action on their part which is teeing me off, rather than putting out a warning they are lettting the problem happen and then using all the tricks in the book to avoid paying for the repairs. I intend to bombard the forums until something is done...

[heliosuk]

I have been doing a fair amount of research on the broken camshaft problem, the issue is with the bolts that hold down the camshaft bearing caps, these are working loose and allowing the camshaft to "flap" about and then break sometimes snapping the bearing cap at the same time, this is what has happened in our case. Camshafts cost about £240 plus labour to change but if the cap has gone then the cylinder head has to be changed as the caps are tunnel bored to match the head, we have been quoted £1953 to fix the problem and the Vx garage said its only £800 more for a completely new engine!. There are reports that when the cam cover has been removed you can undo the cam cap bearing bolts with your fingers. The problem only seems to apply to the exhaust cam. This only appears to apply to the 2005 cars fitted with the 1.2 twinport engine from what I can see. The bolts need to be and tightened to 8Nm to avoid the problem, you have been warned! (but not by Vauxhall).

 

I have to say I'm erring unusally towards Max on this one as there must have been significant warning signs before the failure described happened. I also don't believe, if what you also post is correct that VX dealers are not aware and that there is/was no service campaign to check said items when in a dealership for servicing. It is not something that would be subject to a VOSA instigated recall.

 

The 8Nm tightening torque would be about right for a bolt or nut of this particular size so cannot also see the fuss about it unless you know different.

 

I'm not so sure I'd like to pursuit VX on this one unless you have some more definitive information. For example, how many engines you think have been affected in relation to the numbers produced.

 

I further doubt anyone has taken VX to court over this, more likely the dealer who are not VX.

[BrazilianCCK]

Helios, I think the issue is that for a certain number of engines that have ended up in 2005 cars (though there is evidence of the problem in late 2004 registered X12XEP engined Corsas) is that the cam bolts on the exhaust cam were not assembled correctly in that the correct torque was not applied which is resulting in their failure - it's not a design fault but an assembly one. We must have sold 100 corsas in the last few years with the X10XE, X12XE and XEP engines from 20,000 tp 120,000 miles, and whilst they have their problems, basically they are a tough old engine - they are very keen on regular oil changes however, and you know when they have not been well serviced as they get very "chainy". I personally would ignore the 20,000 service interval even with the recomended longlife 5W/30 oil and do it at 10,000 intervals.

 

I think the analogy of camshafts "flapping around" is misleading - I personally would think that it's a certain combination of chain wear and assembly problem that is causing the problem in that any lash in the chain will be transmitted via the cam, and if the caps are even slightly loose then this will result in eventual failure. The fact that it is only widely being reported on certain age cars has to point to an assembly problem that was eventually identified and changed.

[spanner16]

I have to say I'm erring unusally towards Max on this one as there must have been significant warning signs before the failure described happened. I also don't believe, if what you also post is correct that VX dealers are not aware and that there is/was no service campaign to check said items when in a dealership for servicing. It is not something that would be subject to a VOSA instigated recall.

What warning signs would you expect? that would be evident to to a 20yr old girl? There is enough evidence on the net to confirm the high number of failures, just type corse, broken, camshaft, into google to do your own research. Vauxhall ciustomer care confirmed that no instructions have gone out regarding this problem, if you doubt this I suggest you take that up with them and if you would be kind enough to let me know how you get on. I called our local dealer (Drive Vauxhall in Bury St Edmunds) to get a quote for the works and the guy I spoke to said he had not heard that there was a problem.

 

The 8Nm tightening torque would be about right for a bolt or nut of this particular size so cannot also see the fuss about it unless you know different.

Not sure what you are getting at, the 8Nm is a suggested torque, the bolts are working loose and need to be re-tightened to this torque, whether the problem re-occurs after this I don't know

I'm not so sure I'd like to pursuit VX on this one unless you have some more definitive information. For example, how many engines you think have been affected in relation to the numbers produced.

How much evidence do you need? I am teed off that this is a known problem (again Vx customer care confirmed that they know about the problem) and have sat back as car after car has failed and all they have done is weasel out of paying for their mistake. A figure of 10% of cars with the particular engine in question has been mentioned

I further doubt anyone has taken VX to court over this, more likely the dealer who are not VX.

No offence but I suggest you should have done some research before typing that, there are numerous reports on the net of people who have taking Vx to court and won

 

[spanner16]

Helios, I think the issue is that for a certain number of engines that have ended up in 2005 cars (though there is evidence of the problem in late 2004 registered X12XEP engined Corsas) is that the cam bolts on the exhaust cam were not assembled correctly in that the correct torque was not applied which is resulting in their failure - it's not a design fault but an assembly one. We must have sold 100 corsas in the last few years with the X10XE, X12XE and XEP engines from 20,000 tp 120,000 miles, and whilst they have their problems, basically they are a tough old engine - they are very keen on regular oil changes however, and you know when they have not been well serviced as they get very "chainy". I personally would ignore the 20,000 service interval even with the recomended longlife 5W/30 oil and do it at 10,000 intervals.

 

I think the analogy of camshafts "flapping around" is misleading - I personally would think that it's a certain combination of chain wear and assembly problem that is causing the problem in that any lash in the chain will be transmitted via the cam, and if the caps are even slightly loose then this will result in eventual failure. The fact that it is only widely being reported on certain age cars has to point to an assembly problem that was eventually identified and changed.

I mostly agree with what you have said, I am not convinced about timng chain wear though as some quite low mileage cars have been affected. I used the term "flapping around" as I thought this adequately described a camshaft moving within loose bearing caps, I accept that it is not technically correct. I have had confirmation from a number of peoiple that the bearing cap bolts were loose enough to be undone by hand when they were tested. I do agree that this appears to be an assembly fault but is something Vx should take responsibilty for

[heliosuk]

You're getting to close to being spot on here CCK. Manufacturing process though would and does involve what is known as DC tooling in that the bolts/nuts on both cams would have been tightened to a set torque which is registered. However the failing with this system is that whilst it will register as a pass at the time, it does not allow time for torque relaxation or that the bolts/studs/nuts so an overcheck could well be required further down the line and this is the failing. It's something I've had to deal with on countless occasions. Generally it's now very closely controlled so would suggest there was a batch of fixings that did not meet the requirements.

 

It cannot be argued that it is a design fault as does not affect all cars. Further it is not safety related.

 

The reality is that the longer a car has no fault then statistically it's not a manufacturing defect however this has to be balanced against information fed in and is only available from dealers.

 

One of the things that the block exemption rules failed to address was how fault information was fed back from new cars in service that didn't have to be serviced by a dealer. The consequences of which are seen here.

 

I do though get concerned about oil service intervals as you have pointed out, hence the reason for a lot of goodwill claims being turned down. They must be done on time/mileage purely to the fact that to cut costs. They are learning from the Jap bike industry that you don't need bearings, just a good oil feed.

 

Frankly I think thisn is a no go area unlike the springs and gearbox threads about VX at the moment.

 

In reality CAG should be paying more attention to the VX spring failures rather than gearboxes and camshafts.

[heliosuk]

No offence but I suggest you should have done some research before typing that, there are numerous reports on the net of people who have taking Vx to court and won

 

 

With respect, you can have numerous reports of this happening however you only get reports of things gone wrong. You might quote 10% but from where?

 

Whilst I apprecitate you are somewhat disgruntled by this failure I have to point out that as a mechanical engineer with some 30 years experience of vehicle development I think I have a point in saying that to describe the cam as flailing about is over exagerating for a start and if it was a known issue then the dealers would have known about it.

 

I would also respectfully suggest that when it comes to doing research on this issue you verify the facts first before shouting wolf.

 

When you say 10% has been mentioned, 10% of what? If it's a million engines/ heads then that's 100, 000 affected cars world wide. Errrrrrrrr.............. not heard of that one.

 

So rather than criticise me, it's actually you who need to do the research and perhaps be a bit more accurate as to the failure !

[BrazilianCCK]

Helios - you could well be right in it being fixings hadn't thought of that, but I also wonder (but don't know) if it is only affecting engines that have been manufactured in a certain plant or even a certain line within a certain plant - certainly the fact that it is confined to such a limited timespan of engines must point provide vauxhall with that information but they of course are not going to spill the beans.

 

Spanner16 - I am only guessing on the chain wear bit, but it is clear that the assembly/fixings problem is not sufficient on it's own to make the camshaft fail otherwise they would all have failed - there has to be a contributory factor that in combination with the existing defect is causing the problem - I know there was a modification made to the chain tensioner on these engines at around that time to prevent chain lash as there was insufficient adjustment available.

[spanner16]

You're getting to close to being spot on here CCK. Manufacturing process though would and does involve what is known as DC tooling in that the bolts/nuts on both cams would have been tightened to a set torque which is registered. However the failing with this system is that whilst it will register as a pass at the time, it does not allow time for torque relaxation or that the bolts/studs/nuts so an overcheck could well be required further down the line and this is the failing. It's something I've had to deal with on countless occasions. Generally it's now very closely controlled so would suggest there was a batch of fixings that did not meet the requirements.

 

It cannot be argued that it is a design fault as does not affect all cars. Further it is not safety related.

 

The reality is that the longer a car has no fault then statistically it's not a manufacturing defect however this has to be balanced against information fed in and is only available from dealers.

 

One of the things that the block exemption rules failed to address was how fault information was fed back from new cars in service that didn't have to be serviced by a dealer. The consequences of which are seen here.

 

I do though get concerned about oil service intervals as you have pointed out, hence the reason for a lot of goodwill claims being turned down. They must be done on time/mileage purely to the fact that to cut costs. They are learning from the Jap bike industry that you don't need bearings, just a good oil feed.

 

Frankly I think thisn is a no go area unlike the springs and gearbox threads about VX at the moment.

 

In reality CAG should be paying more attention to the VX spring failures rather than gearboxes and camshafts.

 

To be honest I am not sure what your problem is here. this is a copnsumer action group not a technical discussion forum. I am a consumer and follwing a course of action that "may" get Vx to do something. I am surprised that you are on here essentialy criticising someone for trying to get something done. There IS/WAS a problem with the cam cap holding down bolts on these particular engines, Vauxhall have admitted that, I can give you the name of the guy in Customer Care if you want to take it up with him? They ARE still failing and WILL continue to fail. Does retightening them cure the problem, possibly Vx could comment on that, it is likely that it does. CAG is made up of posters like me (and you) it is there for any of us to post on whatever subject, I happen to be a very vocal poster who is not afraid to shout when something is obviously wrong (and will continue to do so) I haven't had a problem with springs but wouldn't tell someone not to post on it because I thought it was less important than my problem.

[spanner16]

With respect, you can have numerous reports of this happening however you only get reports of things gone wrong. You might quote 10% but from where?

 

Whilst I apprecitate you are somewhat disgruntled by this failure I have to point out that as a mechanical engineer with some 30 years experience of vehicle development I think I have a point in saying that to describe the cam as flailing about is over exagerating for a start and if it was a known issue then the dealers would have known about it.

You know when you make an argument and you need to describe something in as few words as possible to get over an impression? well that's exactly what I did with "flailing around" this is not a technical forum its a consumer action group. You use the word disgruntled, I can tell you I am a lot more than that, a known problem, admitted by Vx anfd nothing done until the failure occurs and then they offer to pay for a percentage of the costs, disgruntled doesn't even come close.

I would also respectfully suggest that when it comes to doing research on this issue you verify the facts first before shouting wolf.

The facts are there, Vx have admitted the problem it is only who should pay for the repiars that is in question, are you saying the problem doesn't exist? in which case you are disagreeing with Vx themselves

When you say 10% has been mentioned, 10% of what? If it's a million engines/ heads then that's 100, 000 affected cars world wide. Errrrrrrrr.............. not heard of that one.

I don't know how many engines are affected, how can I tell? Vx probably don't know which is why they have not issued an instuction about it, how many need to be affected before someone shouts about it?

So rather than criticise me, it's actually you who need to do the research and perhaps be a bit more accurate as to the failure !

When this problem occured to my daughters car, (4 young women broke down on the M6 300 miles from home) I had never heard that there was a problem with these engines, I thought it was just bad luck, It was a struggle to get them home and then gave her a real problem with transport, luckily we had another Corsa she could use. The AA man diagnosed the problem and he was spot on, I took the car to a mechanic I use and that was when we found the broken cam cap as well as the broken shaft, at that time I thought the shaft had snapped and taken the cap with it so I contacted Vx customer care and asked them whether it was unusual that a camshaft should go after 60K. It was then that I discovered that there was a problem with loose cam cap holding down bolts and Vx had known about it and failed to issue any sort of warning/instruction. I don't know what fact you want, Vx have confirmed there is a problem, the holding down bolts come loose allowing excess movement of the camshaft and causing failure, as an engineer are you saying that this is not what is happening? I doubt that you would say that its OK and that loose caps are something that the shaft can cope with so as an expert what sort of failure would you expect from loose caps?

[spanner16]

heliosuk, have you read the Daily record coverage? what do you make of it?, it says that Vauxhall will issue a statement but I can't find any trace of it so far

[spanner16]

Max, Just re-reading the Daily Record story about the broken camshaft problem dated 28th March, it says that Vx were going to issue a formal statement about the problem a week from then, do you know if this was ever done? if so can you tell me where to find it please

[spanner16]

Thought this was worth cutting and pasting- from the honst john website which has 4 volumes on this problem

Snapped Camshaft - pete and ed.

 

We have just received final settlement of the claim, and have notified the court that no further proceedings are required.

To re-cap:-

The 2005 Corsa 1.2 SXi 33k miles suffered a snapped Camshaft on 10th of March 2009.

car had fully up to date Vauxhall service history.

Car was repaired by a Vauxhall garage and we got it back on the 25th of March, at a 70% cost to us of £862.45p.

Whist it was stripped down I found out, that 3 Camshaft Bearing Blocks were found to be loose, this fact was noted by the Vauxhall mechanic and stated on the Vauxhall visual health check report.

As we could not get 100% compensation thru, the garage, I sent a letter of intent to the Vauxhall Head Office for the attention of Mr W Parfitt MD. this stated we would issue a County Court Claim against Vauxhall Motors UK. to recover all costs in full including court fees, out of pocket expenses and any interest incurred up to a maximum of £5000 if I had not received a favourable reply within 14 days.

Vauxhall replyed on the 3rd of April with an increased offer of 50% from the 30% this offer we turned down, and issued court proceeding on 7th April 2009.(Cost £85)

The claim was against Vauxhall Motors UK - and reads.

Vauxhall UK sold a new Corsa which was NOT FIT FOR PURPOSE ie The Camshaft Bearing Caps in the engine, which locate the Camshaft were not secured correctly on initial engine build, which resulted in the caps working loose and allowing undue pressure and stress to be exerted on the rotating camshaft, causing it to fracture.

Value of claim:- £862.42 Cost of repair

£225.00 Cost of private inspection report.

£1260.00 Expenses due to loss of transport

£85.00 Court Fee.

Total - £2432.42

On the 20th of May received the Defendant's (Vauxhall) defence from their acting Solicitors, Duane Morris. They deigned everything but then made a gesture of good will by paying the repair costs, expert report and court issue fee. a total of £1177.42 which we received by cheque on the 30th of May.

We decided to carry on with the case and try to get the loss of transport expenses.

We attended a pre-liminary hearing on 11th August to resolve this outstanding issue, It was ordered by the Judge that we could only against petrol/mileage costs.

Our new claim was issued on the 22nd of August for £324.05p.

On the 7th September we were offered £200 in full and final settlement, which we accepted.

 

During the whole episode (6 Months) Vauxhall have never admitted any fault with the car, and we have not had the opportunity in court to bring the Snapped Camshaft problems to the attention of the court or general public, perhaps now that Vauxhall is under new ownership there may be a better chance in getting a recall, but dont hold your breath.

 

Regards

Pete Kershaw

[heliosuk]

I have read the Daily Record articles spanner16 kindly suggested I did and it was very enlightening!

 

Essentially, you will notice all of them have significantly variable mileages which does tend to disprove the accusations that it is a manufacturing defect. As I have previously said, the longer a part lasts, the less likely it is a manufacturing defect. So from an engineering perspective there are little or no grounds to accuse VX that hey have a manufacturing problem.

 

Having read the articles and looking at other web sites there does not seem to be a design defect either. For a start, you need to be able to correlate the number of failures with the number produced, something which is difficult to prove but the info is available freely if you have the time to look for it.

 

I'm also aware that this forum is not a technical discussion forum however all too often there are posts saying go the legal route and claim which have no foundation and if were defended then could end up costing the "aggrieved partie" somewhat more than they bargained for.In fact there was a link to a post where the defendant counterclaimed and it led to the claiments bankruptcy, so determined the claiment thought they were in the right.

 

I appreciate your concerns with this camshaft issue but I honestly believe you need more conclusive evidence with a stable pattern of failures, then perhaps you have the evidence to hit Max with. I would further suggest that the failure mode, however you feel, is described accuratley as to complain to the manufactuer of a "flailing camshaft" will get an automatic rejection as it's just not possible! The exageration of such complaints does the case no good whatsoever.

So again, far from being a technical discussion, you might like to think how your claim will be reviewed by the descision maker which will invariably be technically based.

[spanner16]

I have read the Daily Record articles spanner16 kindly suggested I did and it was very enlightening!

 

Essentially, you will notice all of them have significantly variable mileages which does tend to disprove the accusations that it is a manufacturing defect. As I have previously said, the longer a part lasts, the less likely it is a manufacturing defect. So from an engineering perspective there are little or no grounds to accuse VX that hey have a manufacturing problem.

Contrary to what you have said I think there is every reason to believe it is a manufacturing fault, I believe the cam cap bolts were not tightened properly , I believe the reason Vx did not do anything about it is that they are waiting and seeing how many actually cause a problem rather than deal with the issue en masse, which would be mega expensive, if the bolts were not tightened to the correct torque and will in many cases work loose then i would have thought that this would be dependant on mileage, type of use, type of driver, location and probably a few other factors that I haven't thought of, this surely explains the varying mileage as it is ublikely that any two cars are worked in exactly the same way, I doubt that any identified fault on a car has always failed at the same time especially to do with working parts, it is likely that Vx will "get away" with some not failing at all and if they can control the amount that they pay out on the ones that do then they have used the correct strategy as far as damage limitation is concerned. This is a strategy that has been used many times in industry and in fact I have worked for two companies that have done this, it is usually a financial decision pure and simple and we do have a problem these days with decisions being made by accountants.

Having read the articles and looking at other web sites there does not seem to be a design defect either. For a start, you need to be able to correlate the number of failures with the number produced, something which is difficult to prove but the info is available freely if you have the time to look for it.

 

I'm also aware that this forum is not a technical discussion forum however all too often there are posts saying go the legal route and claim which have no foundation and if were defended then could end up costing the "aggrieved partie" somewhat more than they bargained for.In fact there was a link to a post where the defendant counterclaimed and it led to the claiments bankruptcy, so determined the claiment thought they were in the right.

I am surprised you don't consider that the camshaft issue is real, do you thnk someone is making up all these posts? do you believe that Vx are not paying out for the repairs? don't you believe the newspaper reports? do you not believe that VX customer told me that they know that there is a problem?

I appreciate your concerns with this camshaft issue but I honestly believe you need more conclusive evidence with a stable pattern of failures, then perhaps you have the evidence to hit Max with. I would further suggest that the failure mode, however you feel, is described accuratley as to complain to the manufactuer of a "flailing camshaft" will get an automatic rejection as it's just not possible! The exageration of such complaints does the case no good whatsoever.

So again, far from being a technical discussion, you might like to think how your claim will be reviewed by the descision maker which will invariably be technically based.

You seem to be hung up on the flailing camshaft issue, I used that term in an open post on here to get my point across, this term has not and will not be used in any claim or otherwise with Vx, I am not sure why you would think that as it only confuses the issue, can i suggest that you get over it and move on.

The wording used in the Pete Kershaw claim seems to fit the case perfectly.

[heliosuk]

Spanner,

I don't have any problem other than you trying to grasp at supposed facts and exaggerating the claim you pupport to have. When you have facts that you can substantiate then perhaps come back with them. At the moment your accusations are flimsey and based on what you have posted, frankly just hearesay.

 

You come back with x number of engines have been reported with this failure against x number produced then I'll advise as to how I see you should proceed.

 

At this moment in time you are throwing your toys out of the pram purely because I question the validity of your claim.

 

Forget what you have read in the papers, each claim is dealt with on the info supplied, and more so with the case of goodwill claims, the attitude of the claiment.

 

You go into VX claiming manufacturing defects with nothing to back it up, which you don't seem to have or have done, then it's not surprising you get turned down.

 

Respectfully engage brain first rather than emotion.

[spanner16]

Spanner,

I don't have any problem other than you trying to grasp at supposed facts and exaggerating the claim you pupport to have. When you have facts that you can substantiate then perhaps come back with them. At the moment your accusations are flimsey and based on what you have posted, frankly just hearesay.

 

You come back with x number of engines have been reported with this failure against x number produced then I'll advise as to how I see you should proceed.

 

At this moment in time you are throwing your toys out of the pram purely because I question the validity of your claim.

 

Forget what you have read in the papers, each claim is dealt with on the info supplied, and more so with the case of goodwill claims, the attitude of the claiment.

 

You go into VX claiming manufacturing defects with nothing to back it up, which you don't seem to have or have done, then it's not surprising you get turned down.

 

Respectfully engage brain first rather than emotion.

 

Heliosuk, what do you think I am really trying to do here??? engage in a technical discussion on the whys and wherefores of a failed camshaft? think about it!!, what do you really think hurts companies. I have campaigned for many years on lots of different issues using various tactics, some more succesful than others and continue to use and improve different methods, do you really think I am here to discuss with Vx why their camshafts are failing prematurely? you are the one that has taking it further and further down the technical route for reasons only known to yourself. I am starting to wonder what your motives are here, they certainly don't seem to be with the consumer in mind, can I suggest taking your arguments over to a technical forum where they might be more appreciated