seat leon paint

hewhoisnotintheknow

My mate is chopping in his 99 registered golf for various reasons, looking to replace it with a hot seat leon.

A few of them we have looked at have had chipped paint and flaky laquer. Is this a common fault

Also is there a known problem with the starter motor and tensioners as 2 of the 3 we have looked out have both pointed out that they have had these items changed, as if its a good thing

bclark

I had a Mark 1 Leon Cupra and I am hoping to buy another Leon soon so spend some time on SeatCupra.net. From my research on there, there seem to be no major problems reported with paint quality or starter motors.

Which model is he looking at?

djheath

hewhoisnotintheknow wrote: »

My mate is chopping in his 99 registered golf for various reasons, looking to replace it with a hot seat leon.

A few of them we have looked at have had chipped paint and flaky laquer. Is this a common fault

Also is there a known problem with the starter motor and tensioners as 2 of the 3 we have looked out have both pointed out that they have had these items changed, as if its a good thing

I had a MK1 leon and its funny you mention the tensioners. One of mine broke and shot through the timing belt cover. Luckily the belt didn't lose timing so was still ok to drive but made a horrid sound. £300 later for a new belt and tensioners it was all fixed but still a pain.

I ended up selling the car because I found too many things kept going wrong with it -
Electric window lifters failed causing the windows to drop into the door one time whilst driving - £70 part to fix - fixed it myself.
Closed the boot once and the rear light smashed - £45 to replace
Engine would never idle properly unless I cleaned the maf sensor every few weeks.
Tensioner problem as above.

For a car I spent a lot of money on, I decdided it wasn't worth the hassle and so got rid of it. Went back to banger-ecnomics and bought a pug 406! Never looked back! At least with a pug you expect problems, but as of yet, I haven't had any!!

harveybobbles

Starter motors are a common fault on the Golf/Leon family. They just hang in a bit longer than they need to. Nothing to worry about, but some people are picky and want it replacing.

The windows dropping is, again common on VAG stuff. 9 times out of 10 it's one of the door switches that's gone duff.

As for the flaky paint - that's cos it's a hot hatch and gets thrashed! So it's probably been up a tree, thru a hedge, into the car infront etc and had lots of respraying going on...

chorlton

I have a Black MK1 Leon Cupra (2003)

The paint is quite 'soft' + marks easily, mines got 3 or 4 stonechips on the front and quite a few scratches (which i think would polish out) around the doors, from just brushing past with coats and bags when getting in and out.

No mechanical probs in 2 years but mine has got one of the Leon's common problems - the indoor swimming pool feature...

Water gets through the internal front door seals and somehow finds its way into the rear footwells. (The other common leak is through the pollen filter - you get a pool in the passenger footwell with that!)
So when you are looking make sure you check the carpets are dry!

seatcupra.net is a good call - there's a really helpful forum.

harveybobbles

A nice squirt of silocone around the pollen filter housing sorts that problem out. Same on Passats etc...