Scirocco Central

So a bit late but here's the story of my black gt from London - remember him? Not that fun a story but if it helps anyone not buy a lemon then it's worth it. And yes I still drive a rocco (just not this one!):

Standard black 2.0 gt, 3 years old, 36k on the clock. 09 model and plate, red mfd. Bought from a VW dealer 100 miles from home, with warranty. HPI clear, no signs of previous modding, 1 owner.

Viewed the car, it looked fine to me (non-car expert). Test drove it, loved it. Asked the dealer to put parking sensors on (£350) and picked it up a week later. On collection I soon found the petrol flap didn't lock properly and there was a bit of loose trim on drivers' window. Not a deal breaker, easy fixes under warranty. Drove home, someone jumped out in front of me, I beep... silence. So at what stage in their 260-odd point checkup did they not press the horn? That's an MOT fail right there, not to mention illegal.

Anyway, booked it in, had them all fixed, no problem. Teething problems, on I went.

A couple of hundred miles later I heard the clutch humming every now and then. Technician saw it twice and as he was pulling into the forecourt on the second test run he heard it. New clutch under warranty.

A month later the engine warning light comes on. Slid into the nearest Vw dealer, told them to vag-com it, air intake manifold. Booked it in locally, fixed under warranty (despite them not plugging sensor in when i went to pick it up and had to take another day off work the following day). All fine for a while.

Next month the rear started squeaking when the rear left was raised over a bump. Dealer thought it was suspension, roccopedia research said it was faulty weld points; some cars between certain build dates suffered from this (they shipped with 17" spa alloys instead of 18" interlagos) and mine fitted this criteria. Got it back with new suspension… no change. Idiots.

Re-booked it in, had the entire rear stripped and re-welded over wheel arch (so they say). Two week wait. Speed bump, squeak. It'd been in the dealers 11 times in a year by this point. Going mad.

Sherlock mode. I dig out the V5, google the hell out of it and track down the previous owner, ring them. Someone up north, it was his wife's car. She’d been hit in the rear left hand side at low speed, someone pulled out of a junction. They had it fixed under warranty then sold it to Audi for a Q8. Woah! So it's been in a crash, repaired, sold to Audi, flipped to Vw, sent south and sold on.

Realised the juddering windows probably weren't a standard feature and the warranty was running out so booked it in again. Faulty ignition switch. They ordered the wrong one this time, couldn't retro-fit the old one and so another three day wait. Windows were fine after that, chassis squeak/grind was like pulling teeth at this point, just wanted it to stop.

Lots of calls between my repairing dealer and those who sold it to me.

Did loads of tests, like padding bumper, wheel arch, strapping things down, padding between seats, everything... and diagnosed a squeaky rear light cluster and snapped/broken bumper mount. Whether it was crash damage or badly retro-fitted parking sensors is unclear, but either way Vw really should have noticed and fixed it, especially when they stripped the whole rear to re-weld it.

Bought a new rear light cluster off eBay, fitted it and squeak free for a week then it’s back and I go to Vw to buy a new clip even though I suspect the chassis is bent and causing the light cluster to fail. I explain this and my service advisor tells me to just give up. So I did.

The dealer who repaired it wouldn't buy it from me. The one that sold it to me offered part-ex. Er, no thanks.

On a positive note when I went to buy my R I was lucky enough to have two roccopedia pro’s go with me to make sure it was straight (cheers boys)!

So what’s did I learn? Well…

1. An HPI clear car doesn’t mean it’s not been in a crash - if it’s repaired under warranty it doesn’t get registered.
2. Roccopedia is better at diagnosing issues than the dealers!
3. Get a look at the V5 and find out who previously owned it, they’ll tell you the truth if you ask nicely and it could save you a LOT of hassle.
4. Warranties can save you thousands, although...
5. Dealers can and do sell cars that have 'had a bump'.
6. Don’t buy the one I had!

Some things for people to remember about any used car,

Newer cars can suffer a large amount of damage before being written off, it's not a question of a repair under warranty its a question of the repair economics. Some years back, My old mk5 gti had over £4k of repairs and a whole new side and rear end when someone drove into it. The car was never the same, and although a good quality of finish, I could see it and eventually sold it. If that happened to it today, despite strong values it would be written off, yet the level of damage would be the same.

Vw like many dealers only require you to declare it is not a total loss at trade in time, many near new cars can thus be repaired and be trade ins. These make their way either directly onto dealer forecourts or via auctions. I suspect You would be surprised how many dealer used cars come via trade auctions, as per your audi to vw example.

You have to look carefully at any car, even new as many are repaired once they leave the factory. Look at panel gaps, spray lines, typical areas where signs of spray work remain such as door shuts, boot or bonnet shuts etc. look for factory stickers, paint colours under bonnet and boot floor etc.

Thanks for sharing.It would be useful.