Have you had a fault just after warranty expires?

  • Yes - within a month

    Votes: 4 36.4%
  • No - or after a month

    Votes: 7 63.6%

  • Total voters
    11
  • Poll closed .

paulfs

Active Member
Nov 10, 2009
281
0
New Forest, HANTS
All,

Simple straw-poll - who's had faults just after their warranty expired?

The sceptic in me thinks that Warranty Expiry Dates are programmed into ECUs - all computer controlled now... :shrug:

Humour me :think:
 
I have had people not just on seats but on other make and models and as soon as there warrenty is up......something happens!

Wondered why this happens - hmmmmm
 
My gearbox has just gone on my Polo GTI, my warranty runs out in 3 days!
 
The majority of car parts are designed to last just over 3 yrs i.e. your warranty period. It's no coincidence that things go wrong around the 3yr mark, if you buy new then its worth getting a longer warranty if you can
 
Didn't one of the major japanese manufacturers a few years back get caught doing something to the programming that caused failures after a certain running time ?
 
The majority of car parts are designed to last just over 3 yrs i.e. your warranty period. It's no coincidence that things go wrong around the 3yr mark, if you buy new then its worth getting a longer warranty if you can

Not sure how they manage that when some people drive 30K a year and others 3K.

I've never had something die within weeks of warranty running out. There's always a first time.
 
I had the ESP light get stuck on the day before the warranty ran out and it ran out on a Sunday! I phoned the dealers on the Saturday and got them to agree to fix it the following week as the problem had occurred whilst it was still under warranty.
 
The majority of car parts are designed to last just over 3 yrs i.e. your warranty period. It's no coincidence that things go wrong around the 3yr mark, if you buy new then its worth getting a longer warranty if you can

I do appreciate that manufactures test & design to certain limits, but always amazes me just how much this does happen, with so many variables in play i.e. mileage, driving style, irregular maintenance, outsourcing etc etc list is endless, but always appears a high percentage of 'just outside warranty' failures - & not just cars!
Then you have the likes of Kia & Hyundai offering 5 / 7 year warranty - would you say they make better quality built cars than SEAT, which after all are VAG!!!
 
Not sure how they manage that when some people drive 30K a year and others 3K.

Haven't quite finished my degree yet but when i do i should be able to answer that one properly ;)

Mechanical design limits will be such that the major components like the engine and gearbox will last for the life of the car. Suspension component failures are dependant on the amount of abuse they get, motorway miles are fairly easy but if you drive around town a lot where there are speed bumps and potholes you'll find their life will be reduced quite a lot.

From what i've read on here the water pump failing is common on VAG engines, this could be due to material life or Cavitation. I'd assume that the pumps were designed such that cavitation didn't occur over their operating rotational speed so it could be that the operating parameters are such that say 60k or 5-6 of years will cause them to fail due to material fatigue/ degradation

You also have to contend with the variations in manufacturing and material quality and the complexity of the component as well as the number of parts in each component. Also electronic components have a new phenomenon to contend with known as Tin Whiskers which is all down to solder no longer containing lead and component spacings being so small. It should be noted that this applies to all electronics apart from anything in aerospace or that the MOD makes :whistle:

Whether Kia or Hyundai offer a better build quality or not i don't know, I've never really paid much attention to them. They probably do build fairly good cars, its not going to be financially viable to build crap ones and keep fixing them under warranty, plus the owners would get shot of them if they had to keep getting their car fixed. It's also a pretty good marketing strategy so they can build up their reputation, in another 3 or 4 years their quality and warranties could be completely different