Drealers dealers drealers - fix one thing break another

[Dreamspinner]

Took our 2001 NB 1.8T to the dealer in Roseville b/c the headlights were dimming intermittently. They replaced the wiring harnesses to both. Went to pick it up today, Sunday and the battery was flat - the service geniuses had left the lights on.
One of the junior sales people was flailing around in the engine compartment with the battery booster cables, so I clipped them on myself. Got it started and headed home (60 mi) On the way I found that the passenger window would go down but not up - just makes bad noises. My wife and I would swear that it was working fine when we gave it to them. Could it have been the young sales guy rooting around in the engine with the jumper cables. The flat battery? A voltage surge when it was jumped?

[digitalputty]

That sucks. Dealers suck. I cannot answer your question though. Sorry.

Took Zoomer in for a new battery a while back ... in the process of them installing a new battery, they broke my hydraulic arm thing that keeps the hood open. Ugh.

Good luck in getting a new battery and getting your window fixed!

[noR]

The failing window regulator is a seperate new issue completely.

Just an unfortunate coincidence.

Those noises on that window are going to get worse, eventually it will bind, the cable will break and the window will fall down into full-open.

There's a problem w/the window regulators, there was a 7yr recall on them, but um; you're past that now. Good luck trying to talk them into covering the repair for known-defective design.

[Dreamspinner]

Thanks anyway. With the tutorials online and my Bentley manual, I'm going to give it a shot myself.

[spinjector]

My headlights have been doing the intermittent dimmy thing since I bought the car three years ago. I think the problem is design, not failure; I think the wires to the headlights aren't thick enough and don't supply enough current to the lights, but I could be wrong. I've seen this problem on many other brands & models of cars - it happens as the battery charging regulator switches on & off with a change in the charge & engine RPM. And it's more noticeable if the battery is low or old.

As for your window regulator, mine just broke recently too. It happened on the first warm day we had this spring when I opened the window for the first time in months. I haven't looked at it yet, but the first thing I'm going to do when I fix it is to disable/disconnect/smash the "anti-pinch" thingamajigger because that's what made it break completely in the first place.

The window tried to go up and wouldn't/couldn't, and then that stupid &&^%#$ anti-pinch piece of @%$$*^$ tried to force the window back down and SCREEEEECH!! KACHUNK!! I was really, really, really, really ticked off. Nothing is more infuriating than watching some bass-ackward automatic system break itself on purpose.

<rant=on>

As for dealers? I can't say what I think of dealers here without violating the code of conduct. I would NEVER let a dealer touch my car. Ever. EVER. Unless I was completely totally screwed and had no other choice at all. Look at it this way - car dealerships are some of the biggest penny-pinching, low-paying, high-turnover operations around. That's not the kind of environment where I want my car worked on.

A friend of mine (a real friend, not "a friend") is the service manager at the local Audi dealership; one of the big ones. He's a Beetle freak, but is currently driving one of the newish VW 4-door medium-sized grocery-getters of which the name currently escapes me and is irrelevant anyways because it's not a Beetle, Jetta, Golf, GTI, or "The Thing". =-)

So anyways, this nameless VW sedan had it's timing belt go kerplooey about halfway through its planned lifespan. So he had it fixed right there in the Audi shop that he managed. He had his senior technician do the job. This was the crew chief, the big kahuna, the dude that supposedly had the most training & most experience.

And Mr. Kahuna screwed it up. Apparently he forgot to completely tighten the bolts on the crank pulley and it FELL OFF inside the timing belt cover on the way to work a couple of days later. But this time it happened at a high rpm and the valves, guides, & pistons got wrecked. He got a new engine out of it, but this time he did the work himself.

I should also add that the one and only time I ever had my Noob worked on at a VW dealer was when I lost my keys. It had to be towed so they could put the computer on it to program the new remote. And they did it wrong; I got back to work and the new remote didn't work. I had to go back and have them do it again.

<rant=off>

[spinjector]

Nor, what's this about a recall? This was never mentioned when I had my new remote programmed, nor any time I bought parts at a dealer and gave them my VIN.