Vehicle repairs Help!

richje100

Hi, hopefully i would be able to get some advice on my issue. Long story short

Car had repairs carried out end of March. Picked up the car after parts all fitted was told been out on road and car is fine. Picked it up and light on the dash. Telling me that the timing is out. Messaged mechanic told me to run it for couple days to bed it in. Every other day messaging him to explain still on. Response i get is ill have to check my diary and let you know. Asked me what days best so i replied - no response. messaged next day no response. Car then had more problems so he said to drop car off and he'll look at it that night. Next day said its fine nothing wrong with the car and took it out for 30mile test with no issue - twice!

Picked car back up, looked at dashcam and it was a 10min drive around the local village once. Now cant get car back to him to look at until a weeks time which is no good for me. He knew the car had issues and i expected it to have been stripped down when i dropped it off not just to have the bonnet opened & stared at then a 10min drive.

I've now lost all faith in him and fear hes caused more engine damage so got it booked in to another local garage to diagnose & repair what he should have done first.

Do i have any legal recourse for costs incurred at the other garage? if the parts need to be replaced that i bought for him to originally fit can i add these costs?

I have all the messages between us both & dashcam footage to disprove the road test and engine inspection.

Ditzy_Mitzy

There's not enough information here for anyone to make an informed comment, unfortunately.  Please consider answering the following

1) What was the original fault the car was booked in for?
2) Was the warning light on before the car went into the garage?
3) If 'yes' to 2), was the issue of timing discussed?  
4) What work, exactly, was done by the first garage?
5) Ignition or valve timing?  If the latter then get the car looked at ASAP and probably not a great idea to use it.  
6) What were the 'additional issues'?
7) You mention buying parts.  Have you bought parts for the mechanic to fit, or has he acquired them for you?  
8) What is the make and model?  

richje100

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

There's not enough information here for anyone to make an informed comment, unfortunately.  Please consider answering the following

1) What was the original fault the car was booked in for?
2) Was the warning light on before the car went into the garage?
3) If 'yes' to 2), was the issue of timing discussed?  
4) What work, exactly, was done by the first garage?
5) Ignition or valve timing?  If the latter then get the car looked at ASAP and probably not a great idea to use it.  
6) What were the 'additional issues'?
7) You mention buying parts.  Have you bought parts for the mechanic to fit, or has he acquired them for you?  
8) What is the make and model?  

Thanks for the reply . It is a long story.
1) car booked in to have timing belt, chain and water pump replaced on the 25th March but evening before on 24th March the belt had broke so got recovered to his house.

2) no warning lights at all.

4) inspection carried out to check no damage caused due to belt snapping. Only the rockers broke which is a design to stop further damage. Repair to rockers and carry on with original plan to fit new belt, chain and pump.

5) timing I've been assured is done correctly but there's engine knocking which never did this before and he thinks it's normal.

6) whilst waiting for him to fit me in to look at original fault car overheated twice and only after I left a voicemail he said to leave it at his house and he'll sort. Never overheated before.
Also part of the battery casing is missing and was not replaced. I have before and after photos.

7) I bought the parts because he couldn't get a water pump so it was agreed I'd buy original vauxhall parts and he fit for £250 labour. After the work was done he wanted £540 to cover the rockers that he bought and additional labour (although not much extra work as they rockers were exposed whilst having to carry out the chain replacement but he ignore me a few times id mention it)

8) it's a vauxhall insignia 2016 plate.

Ditzy_Mitzy

This is a difficult one.  I assume it's a 2.0 diesel, given the reference to timing belts and chains.  If I understand right, the engine is a twin-cam with the master camshaft driven by a belt and a short chain drive to the slave camshaft.  The water pump is, presumably, driven by the belt.

The rocker shaft breaking is, presumably, a result of a piston striking a valve when the belt broke.  There's no particular reason that it should have happened otherwise.  A valve strike ought to be dealt with by removal of the head for proper diagnostics, plus replacement of any damaged valves and refacing or replacing affected pistons.  I'm no expert on modern engines but not doing that, i.e. trusting the 'failsafe' breakable rockers, seems to me like cutting corners.  Obviously, whipping the head off is extra work and any proper engineering is likely to be reasonably expensive if done right.  The 'knocking' which has appeared after the belt was replaced, and the timing warning, seem together to be much more than coincidental.  I would suspect internal damage has occurred, rendering the repairs already done pointless.  Doing the job properly will require removal of the timing belt, head, cams and so on.  

The mechanic seems to have done half a job and hoped for the best, but then he's also carried out the work that was agreed in advance.  Perhaps the Vauxhall advice really is just to replace broken rockers, so he may not be at fault in the procedural sense.  The point is, did you agree to half a job being done, and what conversation was had?

Overheating?  Head gasket could have let go at the point the belt broke.  Is it leaking coolant?  

richje100

Hi, thanks for the reply.
He assured me that the only damage was the rocker arms and the valves are intact. Also that he said he's done a compression test to confirm it.

The initial job was to replace the timing belt because it was due.
Replace the cam chain because it was slack and rattling on its casing, and the water pump whilst it shouldn't need doing, when he serviced the car a month before he said this is where I am losing coolant so he said he'd price up the replacement. Couldn't find the part so I sourced it and agreed to do all 3 jobs at the same time.

Also might be worth noting that when the belt snapped there was no dashboard lights. Rac tried to start and plugged it in and no errors. Towed me back to mechanics house where he started the investigating.
Eml only appeared after he's repaired the car