macfly4

As some of you might know, i purchased my car from a store in Oregon that was in pretty good shape about 4 years ago but left to live in Finland the week or so before the car was delivered to my family in Virginia. On one of my visits back home i noticed things that needed to be fixed, one of which was the windshield washer nozzles not spraying. I decided that since i couldn't be there i would just have my folks bring the car to tysons dealership and have them do all the repairs. expensive, yes, but i figured they would be done right and thoroughly.
just got back to the states last month and noticed that the nozzle on the left wasn't working at all (it had been since i got the work done) so i popped the hood, took off the black plastic tab under the nozzle area and took a look. the tube was floating loose and appeared to have a break in the nozzle itself with what looked like a hard rubber cement around the part that is broken.
I go down and look at the old receipt and it says the following:

customer states drivers washer does not spray. check valves plugged and left nozzle stem broken. 92271999 (cp 1.00) Replaced all 4 washer check valves and reglued previously glued stem on left washer nozzle. Reamed washer nozzles. regular and intensive washer both work.
then parts
4 x 914-628-215-00 washer system va $10.19 labor $40.76
0 x 928-538-032-02 master w/alarm $70.18 0
total labor and parts $164.76


Now someone please explain to me, am i wrong to be pissed about this? REGLUED broken stem nozzle? WTF?! since when would a shop try to glue a part that is obviously broken when they are doing all sorts of other repairs (and $7k of other work)? obviously i did not notice this earlier because everything worked and I didn't go through the bill with a fine tooth comb.
what am i missing here? i don't think i can really go back and complain 3 years later but I'm just a bit steamed that they would pull something like this.

guess i would need to replace the whole nozzle unit now so that the tube has something to actually connect to.

Ducman82

what would they not replace it? WTF?

Landseer

And its pretty easy to replace. Too lazy to order it.

I remember your posts about the tb job. I needed work at the time and lamented how I could have done that TB job here for sub $2.5K with premo parts and fed the family.


You have to understand the mentality in the technician area of the dealerships. It does not favor any car out of warranty. It does favor identification of the jobs on which you can beat book hours and the political relationship with the service writers to get those cherry assignments stacked your way.

When a 928 shows up, the short straw guy gets it. And he personally looses hundreds of dollars working on it. Not to mention the other bad (at book or above) jobs he got nailed with. Major hit to his personal pocketbook.

macfly4

I seriously just about fell over today when i looked up under there. incredible. should i go back to the shop and bitch about it or just let it go? how hard is this to do myself without screwing up the paint on the hood?

fraggle

Bummer man. Don't worry, they'll have another event out there soon and we can go drink all their free booze. I did last time, it was great!

BC

You lost me at thinking a stealership was going to ANYTHING properly.

Landseer

Well, you might insist on a refund on the bill first. Don't let them touch the car, though. May not be a typical VA inspection sticking point, but it is in other states --- it is a safety issue.

Buy a used nozzle / should be available, and maybe some of the check valves new, as they might be brittle.

The nozzles are tabbed from underneath and can be removed fairly easily.

Local guys should be able to help you.

jheis

A while back, I needed to replace a couple of brake caliper cross-over lines that had been damaged in shipping. Since these are fairly unusual parts, no one had them in stock - but all the independents said they could order them for me & they all quoted me exactly the same astronomical price - Porsche Factory retail.

As a last resort, I tried the dealership which shall remain nameless - i.e., Sonnen Porsche in Mill Valley, CA.

Same story - no stock, but Sonnen would be happy to order them for me & quoted me a price that was exactly 20% higher than the price everyone else had quoted.

So....., I should pay retail plus 20% for the privilege of buying from the stealership.

Yeah, right....

James

macfly4

yeah, this was at a point at which i had barely driven the car and did not know of any reputable 928 mechanics in the area so i just figured the dealership would get everything right even though it might cost more. but this is just shoddy workmanship. glued.

heinrich

Your car looks awfully familiar. The VIN wouldn't end in 1385, would it?

heinrich

Macfly:
You are probably right to be pissed, I would be as well. Eat the cost, don't go there again and buy the nozzle yourself and instal it. Never a good idea to air publicly, what should be discussed in private (I know from experience) ... but yes I agree with you.

Ducman82

+928

Jerome Craig

macfly4,
Take a quick look in a mirror.... you see that guy looking back at you? He's the most reputable 928 mechanic you can find in the area. He's not necessarily the best, but there isn't a mechanic around whose going to care more about the quality of work done to your car. IIRC a couple of weeks ago you met about a dozen reputable "helpers". That's how you avoid going to the stealership.

Jerome

WallyP

"A while back, I needed to replace a couple of brake caliper cross-over lines that had been damaged in shipping. Since these are fairly unusual parts, no one had them in stock - but all the independents said they could order them for me & they all quoted me exactly the same astronomical price - Porsche Factory retail."


I think that you are dealing with the wrong independents...

Tom in Austin

The fateful words ... "i figured they would be done right and thoroughly"

In four years of 928 ownership I cannot tell you how many loose, broken, disconnected, missing fasteners, and other screw ups I've found where someone worked on the car for the PO. What's worse is I have a stack of service receipts showing thousands of dollars the poor bastard paid for this.

All I can figure is they're in a hurry to return the car to the customer and gluing something together so it works again and they get the car turned around drives all this behavior.

I have had many of my amateur wrenching efforts delayed by checking and double-checking details, getting additional WYAIT parts, replacing lost washers and fasteners and so on. I don't have to get it done by 5:00, so I consider it a luxury to be able to take the time to do it right. And, as others have said, if you can find someone like Sean who owns 928s and cares about doing it right, then you have the best of all worlds. The other guys, I wouldn't even bother with them.