Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable: Motoring Motoring Discussion forum

Motoring Discussion > Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable	Miscellaneous
Thread Author: zippy	Replies: 24

New Wed 4 Dec 13 21:43

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - zippy

My current company car is a 2013 Vauxhall. I won't state the exact model but it is a 1.7TDI. It has now done 20,000 miles.

So far:

The high beam assist has failed and the garage has failed to fix it. They applied a software update but clearly didn't check to see if it worked.

It uses oil, about 4 litres per 10,000 miles.

The 4x4 system regularly warns that it is not working.

The parking sensors stay on intermittently.

The sat nav sometimes speaks German or refuses to work.

The chime for keys left in the ignition has stopped working.

The brakes are taking time to release after being applied – again the garage applied a software fix but it is still happening.

There are rattles and creaks all over the place.

The garage is just so uninterested in customer service. The car wasn’t cleaned at the service, no collection was offered, no lift home was available.

When I open the doors after it has been parked and I guess it has been rained on, a load of water is deposited on the road from under the door. I guess it is collecting somewhere. Will rust follow?

Oh hum!

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New Wed 4 Dec 13 21:52

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - BobbyG

Thank God I got the Hyundai ix35 instead of the Mokka then :)

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New Wed 4 Dec 13 22:01

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Lygonos

Re-skinned Frontera it would appear.

Oh, and the OP would suggest Vauxhalls used to be reliable.

Last edited by: Lygonos on Wed 4 Dec 13 at 22:02

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New Wed 4 Dec 13 22:25

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Haywain

" Oh, and the OP would suggest Vauxhalls used to be reliable."

I understand that Feb 2007 was quite a good month.

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New Wed 4 Dec 13 22:08

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - mikeyb

>> The garage is just so uninterested in customer service. The car wasn’t cleaned at the
>> service, no collection was offered, no lift home was available.

Half the issue is how the dealership deal with these things. Things can go wrong, but they can be made better with the right level of service

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New Wed 4 Dec 13 22:26

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Boxsterboy

So if it's a 4x4 Vauxhall, it is really a far eastern GM product with Vauxhall badges. Aren't Mokkas and Anteras all made in S Korea?

We had an Astra about 10 years ago, and I have to say the dealer then was pretty useless.

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New Wed 4 Dec 13 22:47

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - zippy

>>>Aren't Mokkas and Anteras all made in S Korea?

Made implies some skill and quality control!

The brakes are the issue that concern me.

I told the garage the issue only manifests on a long journey.

When I collected the car, less than 1/4 of a mile had been added to the trip computer so round the industiral estate once to test it then.

I a guess it is a master cylinder problem?

If I do nothing, the brake pedal takes about 10 seconds to come up to its normal hight and the brake lights and brakes stay on. This could prove dangerous!

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 01:47

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Armel Coussine

GM used to be the world's biggest car maker producing reliable products. It seems to have degenerated into a sort of dodgy franchise operation. Other big makers seem to be edging in the same direction.

Must we all buy Bristols to feel safe? Not many of us have the necessary.

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 07:27

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Dog

>>Must we all buy Bristols to feel safe?

Even Bristols often aren't what they oughta be these days, I hear.

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 07:55

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Roger.

I like a nice pair of Bristols.

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 11:42

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - BobbyG

Zippy, out of curiosity, what mpg are you getting on the Mokka?

As I said my shortlist came down to it or the ix35 and at the end of the day I wanted a car with a sunroof and the Mokka was just a bit too tight for a 6'2" son in the back with size 11 feet.

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 20:10

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - zippy

53 per the computer
45 real life, heavy traffic on and off the motorways!

It is excellent up to 60mph. Anything over that and the gauge visibly moves!

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 08:02

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - commerdriver

You say at the start this is a company car, what are your fleet department doing?
The brakes sound like a definite health and safety issue get them on the case, dealer sounds awful, get fleet to get Vauxhall involved to push the dealer to get their act together
They should bee able to sort it out

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 10:45

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - DP

I think modern cars were becoming more reliable right up until about a decade ago when I firmly believe they started going backwards again as a result of sheer overcomplexity. And they still are going backwards in my opinion. I have a less than perfect 320d which has had plenty of glitches with some of the pointless crap they've saddled it with.

I always called my dad a luddite for his dismissal of unnecessary technology on cars as "something else to go wrong". The latest generation of cars are actually starting to prove him right.

Software driven precision fuelling instead of carburettors makes sense. Software control of optimal ignition advance or diesel injection makes sense. In all cases they measurably improve fuel economy, performance and reduce emissions. Good. Accepted. Software controlled nonsense like "high beam assist", and software influencing the release of the footbrake simply doesn't need to exist, and nobody would miss them if they didn't. They also wouldn't be in the OPs failure list.

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1

New Thu 5 Dec 13 11:20

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Stuu

I had to clean an Insignia the other day - with a very hit and miss electronic handbrake, had to hit the button 4 times before it would release. I hope I never have to buy these new fangled modern cars, they seem designed in such a way as when they go wrong it is in ways cars never used to. My handbrake works fine, I yank a big lever and the car stays still, why anyone felt the need to change it I have no idea.

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 11:31

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - rtj70

>> why anyone felt the need to change it I have no idea.

It no doubt is a cost thing - cheaper and easier to adapt left and right hand drive might be part of it.

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 20:42

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - zippy

The software is just an excuse imho.

The update the software and hope its fixed without any testing.

The hardware needs fixing sometimes!

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 21:15

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - BobbyG

Can the fleet company not apply pressure to get it resolved?

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New Thu 5 Dec 13 21:34

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - idle_chatterer

You have my sympathy, I have refused to even hire a GM product since 1999, my company Vectra of that era had myriad problems which dealers often failed to cure, they frequently created other problems whenever they worked on the car through sheer shoddy workmanship.

To put this in context, the car had 9000 mile service intervals and was being serviced at one point every 4 months, it never made it between scheduled services without multiple other dealer visits for oil leaks, steering rack failure, handbrake failure, trim disintegration, aircon failures, ECU failures, wiper failures, water leaks and many other things. The car managed 44 miles (from delivery) before its first breakdown when the cat disintegrated, this set the tone for 4 miserable years.

I will never buy from this brand, ever - when I am tempted by one of their products I tell myself to get a grip.

Sorry I can offer you no words of comfort - learn the lesson and avoid Vauxhall in the future is my only advice, I've never suffered anything remotely comparable from Ford, VW, Audi, BMW, Honda and even Peugeot since then.

You can look forward to the day when the lease finishes I guess, my experience was so bad I opted out of our company car scheme until they offered shorter lease periods and more 'discounted' brands so that I could escape being saddled with a lemon for more than 2 years.

Rant-over

Last edited by: idle_chatterer on Thu 5 Dec 13 at 21:37

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New Fri 6 Dec 13 04:27

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - madf

GM were the world's largest car maker. They totally refused to follow a path of technical superiority, design superiority or quality superiority.. but just opted to cut costs in design.

It may work in the US where people buy cars with separate chassis but in the real world even conservative Toyota ran rings around them with Lexus and hybrids.

Meanwhile GM stuffed up Cadillac, SAAB and Vauxhall.

Not a company to buy cars from - no USP worth having.

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New Fri 6 Dec 13 08:55

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Fursty Ferret

In defence of Vauxhall, my Insignia has been pretty much flawless.

The DAB radio packed in within a fortnight and took six weeks to get a replacement part from Germany, and there's a deeply irritating rattle coming from somewhere near the rear passenger seat that no one can track down.

Apart from that, it uses no oil (actually, the oil is filling up and was over the max mark on the dipstick last time I looked), gets it's advertised fuel economy if not driven like a loon, and is comfortable and easy to drive.

I do wish I'd specced the heated steering wheel though...

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New Fri 6 Dec 13 09:43

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Zero

>> Apart from that, it uses no oil (actually, the oil is filling up and was
>> over the max mark on the dipstick last time I looked),

Its replacing the oil with diesel....

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New Fri 6 Dec 13 10:22

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Fursty Ferret

My conclusion too. No doubt they'll drain it out at the service in a few weeks.

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New Fri 6 Dec 13 12:31

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - Boxsterboy

If there's an engine left to drain from ...

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New Sun 18 May 14 00:42

Vauxhall - And I thought new cars were becoming more reliable - zippy

Just as an update:

I took the car in to the garage after the sticking brakes became intolerable on a long journey and advised the lease co.

The garage found nothing wrong again so I refused to take the car back. The lease company arranged for a hire car from Vauxhall and instructed the garage to contact Vauxhall technical services for advice.

The garage was told that this is a known issue with the brake peddles sticking when becoming hot. I had told the garage that it happens on a long journey! The garage started the car and left it running for a while and tested the brakes and they stuck on.

It took 3 weeks for the new parts to come in and I have had the car back for a couple of months and put another 4,000 miles on it with no more issues, fingers crossed!

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