Looks like I've joined the dead chain club!

bigbloke

Hi. First post, directed here from VVOC, so be gentle!

Just had a frustrating afternoon. Car conked out in middle of Cambridge (Newmarket road for those that know it, a nightmare place to be) and had to get RAC out as it was not going anywhere. Top chap from RAC arrived after about 1 hour, not bad on a Friday afternoon I suppose. He lifted the bonnet, got me to turn it over and said "chain gone, no compression". I expleted!

I love this car, and I have spent quite a lot getting it really tidy. It has done only 59K miles and I will try the bash vauxhall route, it was serviced last september at main dealer. However if this fails does anyone know of anyone who can do the work locally or help me do the work? I can't afford a dealer £2k job. I have changed a cambelt many years ago on a cavalier, but I am guessing this is a much bigger job.

Thanks for reading this, and any help you can give me.

Cheers,
Bigbloke

Ian

Im really sorry to hear this mate!! Really bad news :-(

Im sure someone will be able to point you in the right direction :-)

Spooks

Keep bashing at Vauxhall but prepared it may take a while as they are in no rush to cough up, best person to speak to is Benny, it'll prob be worth the effort getting it to him.

baldie87

vocky says if you can do a cambelt you can do a chain

sorry to hear its gone mate,

benny is the local legned on here that does all the chains for a good price but hes in west midlans mate

vocky

the damage will be;

some bent inlet valves, probably cracked valve guides, snapped cam chain

you will need;

new inlet valves (£10 each), new guides fitting (£30 each), head gasket set (£75), head bolts (£30), cam chain kit (£100), lower timing chain gasket (£15), crank oil seal (£10), crank bolt (£5), oil filter (£5), engine oil (£30)

it's not to hard for diy

bigbloke

Thanks for the support guys. I love forums, everyone is so great! I will try and beat something out of Vaux, but reading through a lot of posts on here it seems it may take a while and some effort.

It just seems criminal that they don't own up to the problem. Isn't it the same engine in the Alfa? I have never heard of any problems in that car? (other than all the usual Alfa probs)

Cheers,
Bigbloke

Branners

And another dead chain owner.

Driving up the M1 today, got past Luton and the car conked out. Made it to the hard shoulder and called the AA. 90 minutes later they took one look at the engine turning over and slammed the bonnet down. It was dead.

Its a 2001 CDX estate and I have owned the car since 2002 but never got the recal notice on the cam chain oil feed. Only 58,000 on the clock.

Going to see how much a non-vauxhall garage want to do the work as I cant face paying Vauxhall prices.

Not happy at all.

bigbloke

Sorry you're in the same club Branners.

Well round one results are in:

Spoke to dealer service manager. Pretty sympathetic, she contacted Vauxhall to see if it could be done as a warranty job. They said "no". So I now have to fight the main customer service people. Trust me I am still p!ssed about this, even after 72 hours. "no" is not going to be accepted by this customer.

Will update when I get a further response.

Cheers,
Bigbloke

bigbloke

OK Round 2 results are in:

Received from Vauxhall today:

"Dear (name deleted)

Thank you for your email received on 28 April 2008, concerning your Vauxhall Vectra, registration number XX51 XXX.

I was sorry to learn of your vehicle's timing chain failure and I can certainly appreciate your reasons for writing to us.

I can confirm that whilst there have been isolated reports of timing chain failure on the Vauxhall Vectra, we are unable to automatically accept claims for assistance from our customers, as poor or irregular servicing can have a detrimental effect upon the timing chain, which requires lubrication via the vehicle's engine oil to operate to it's fullest potential.

However, I can confirm that I will be willing to offer assistance, providing the vehicle is inspected and repaired by a Vauxhall dealership and that they can confirm to our Dealer Assistance Centre that your vehicle's timing chain failed due to a manufacturing or material defect.

Therefore, I respectfully request that you contact your local or preferred Vauxhall dealership and request that they schedule your vehicle for inspection. Please provide your chosen Vauxhall dealership with confirmation of your vehicle's service history, so that we can rule out poor servicing as the cause of failure and request that they contact us to confirm their findings.

Should you have any further queries, please do not hesitate to contact me on (number supplied). Please quote case number 1-XXXXXXXXXX in any future correspondence relating to this issue.

Thank you again for writing and for bringing this matter to my attention.

Yours sincerely

Christopher G Harker
Deputy Regional Manager
Vauxhall Correspondence "

I have one small problem now: When I bought the car it didn't have a service book/record with it. However I have serviced the vehicle at the dealer since I got it. Do you think they'll try and worm out?

Any thoughts before I start round 3?

Cheers,
Bigbloke

Spooks

I would have thought the better service history it has the more they will cough up, the thing to consider is even if they contribute towards the repair (if you don't have a full vauxhall service history) would a split cost still be worth having done at vauxhall when Benny could do it for cheaper anyway?

andysh2

When i rang my local vauxhall dealer about my vectra he immediately asked about service history, and because i had bought the car from a non main dealer and they serviced the car before i got it so there was a gap of 31,000 miles in the service book, i was told that vauxhall would just say it was down to poor servicing because my book wasn't right for them. They all just try and get out of it mate.

                          Good Luck cheers Andy.

bigbloke

OK long overdue update. And a small victory for me. Vauxhall have agreed to stump up 60% of this car's repairs.

Still shouldn't have been allowed to happen IMO.

But it does show perseverance can pay off I guess.

Should get the car back next week. (Only 6-7 weeks off the road - good job I had a spare car!)

Cheers,
Bigbloke

ecky1972

well done mate a victory for jo public

vocky

well done, I'm glad they are helping to pay for the damage caused by a defective part

bigbloke

Thanks guys. Couldn't have done it without all the info I gleaned off this site to "persuade" them I wasn't go to lie down on this one. Thanks for setting up such a useful resource, just wish I found it before the snap, so I could have used Benny's services and not gone though the hoops!