[AlpineSwift]

I took my car over to Ralph Schomp to get my car serviced. I asked them to check the brakes because there seemed to be a lot of squeaking even with the advice I took from Roland to try and fix the problem.

I got a phone call while I was out getting my phone upgraded (finally part of the dumb phone group. Got a moto droid). Apparently, according to the service tech, my car has aftermarket brakes installed. I don't really know if that means pads, calipers, or disks since my adviser (Mike) couldn't really tell what wasn't stock.

I'm not bitching if its upgraded, but my question is what was changed, and why was it changed while it was a lease vehicle?

Seems like every time I need something looked at, more and more history gets uncovered with this car. It's a pain in the ass not knowing what the hell the real history is with this thing.

[forza1976]

Never run into that, hope it's not too big of a deal.

I hate taking the first year depreciation but I never buy used.

[raceyBMW]

Probably just pads...maybe they took the car to the track once in a while and it needed replacing...though under warranty they will replace no matter what if they are at their minimums. Strange.

[AlpineSwift]

Ok. Update from today's fun and "piss me off" news:

The pads are aftermarket. There's a possibility the previous owner was a cheap ass and never replaced the pads which makes me think the Mercedes Dealer installed them when they took it on trade.

The car was wrecked before. This isn't news to me considering I found this out after I had to get the passenger side fixed. The thing that is raising red flags with me is that the Merc dealer took this thing on trade with a clean carfax. HOWEVER. I know for a fact you must sign a statement that says "to the best of your knowledge, the car has not been involved in a motor vehicle accident etc etc etc" or something to that effect. If this guy said it was never wrecked and figured the next person to own it wouldn't find out, he's in for a rude f%$&ing awakening. I'm getting in touch with Phil Long Mercedes in Colorado Springs and letting them know about all this. I'm pissed to say the least.

There are 4 screws/bolts missing from the drivers side front head light and a part of the HID system is damaged. Auto Image of parker never touched that part of the car when they were working on it which also raises a red flag. Was this thing in a frontal collision at some point? Why would the previous owner be screwing with it? Why didn't Winslow BMW of CoSprings recognize this and make a record of it?

And finally, to top all this off, the fuse that is designed to break in the event of an accident is busted and cut battery power to the engine. So now there is yet ANOTHER lengthy investigation going on as to how this happened and why it was never replaced to begin with.


This car is seriously turning into a total nightmare. I'm about ready to just tell Mercedes of CoSprings that they can buy me a new f$%#ing car and go hammer the previous owner for the money. Someone at the end of all this is gonna be held liable and it sure as hell isn't going to be Auto Image, Ralph Schomp, or Myself.

I have to give credit to Mike at Ralph Schomp and Dan at Auto Image of Parker for helping me as much as they have to this point in sorting all this out. It just sucks everything is now starting to come to the surface now after I've had possession since December.

[Bimmer This]

That sucks to hear about these problems. Hopefully everything turns out for you. Do you know exactly how bad this thing has been in wreck and how did this thing show up w/ a clean car fax? Something isn't making sense????

[raceyBMW]

If there is no police or insurance report, or it is not taken to a dealer to get fixed, then nothing will show up on Carfax. They probably wrecked it and had it fixed by a 3rd party shop. It definitely sounds like the thing was wrecked. Good luck with everything, at least it sounds like evidence and all is on your side.

[The J-Man]

Originally Posted by AlpineSwift

I know for a fact you must sign a statement that says "to the best of your knowledge, the car has not been involved in a motor vehicle accident etc etc etc" or something to that effect.

I've never had to sign anything like this on a trade in, or when selling a car. The odometer and tamper disclosure, sure, but nothing with regards to accidents.

[AlpineSwift]

Originally Posted by The J-Man

I've never had to sign anything like this on a trade in, or when selling a car. The odometer and tamper disclosure, sure, but nothing with regards to accidents.

I've been asked this multiple times in the past.


Latest and greatest off the teletype:

-Front Drivers Side Headlight Assembly seal is busted and needs to be replaced. Cost ~ $2,300.
-Battery has dead cell. Cost ~ $750 (includes reprograming).
-Starter fault. Cost = $0 (Covered under warranty)
-Front Radiator Support broken. Cost ~300.

Unbelievable that all this is coming to the surface. I'm at such a loss for words and thoughts I just don't know what to do anymore. This car was gorgeous on day 1 and now even though it still is, I have my doubts as to it being 100% fixed after this shit.

[raceyBMW]

Front radiator support damage is a sure sign of a previous front end collision...there is just no other way that damage would occur otherwise.

[Born4Flying]

Man, this totally sucks. Curious, where did you buy the car from and was it CPO?

[Bulldog 6]

Originally Posted by raceyBMW

If there is no police or insurance report, or it is not taken to a dealer to get fixed, then nothing will show up on Carfax. They probably wrecked it and had it fixed by a 3rd party shop. It definitely sounds like the thing was wrecked. Good luck with everything, at least it sounds like evidence and all is on your side.

+1...I've also seen where loaners or test drive vehicles are wrecked and the dealer fixes and sells thems with no report. A good tip off is a low milage non-CPO'd car.

[AlpineSwift]

Originally Posted by Born4Flying

Man, this totally sucks. Curious, where did you buy the car from and was it CPO?

Originally Posted by Bulldog 6

+1...I've also seen where loaners or test drive vehicles are wrecked and the dealer fixes and sells thems with no report. A good tip off is a low milage non-CPO'd car.

Picked this one up with roughly 20K miles as a CPO car. Its a big mystery right now as to who the hell is telling less than the truth and who is gonna be shelling out money for this mess. I'm almost to the point that if a nuclear bomb somehow was discovered somewhere under the trunk I wouldn't be the least bit surprised.

Long and the short of all this non sense is that someone, and I don't know who as of yet, is paying for all or some money for all the shit that is being replaced right now. I get the car back monday and I'm still waiting for the snow to go away so I can put this *ucker on the performance wheels/tires to see if it truly is back to 100%.

This goat rope has made me so unbelievably pissed off with BMW/MERC dealers that if it does surface anymore out of the ordinary problems, I'm gonna ditch it, get a *ucking Subaru and be like the rest of the lemmings that rant and rave about their quality/performance.

[richpike]

Did you buy your car at Winslow, or Phil Long? Winslow has always been fantastic for me. Phil Long, on the other hand, seems to only hire extremely sketchy people and appears to have no ethics (at any of their dealerships).

I can't imagine Winslow would sell a CPO car like that, but I almost hope it was them because I expect they would make you whole. If it is Phil Long (which wouldn't surprise me in the least), I wish you the best.

Also - doesn't Carfax have some sort of buyback guarantee? Not sure how it works, but that might be worth looking in to.

Good luck.
Rich

[AlpineSwift]

Originally Posted by richpike

Did you buy your car at Winslow, or Phil Long? Winslow has always been fantastic for me. Phil Long, on the other hand, seems to only hire extremely sketchy people and appears to have no ethics (at any of their dealerships).

I can't imagine Winslow would sell a CPO car like that, but I almost hope it was them because I expect they would make you whole. If it is Phil Long (which wouldn't surprise me in the least), I wish you the best.

Also - doesn't Carfax have some sort of buyback guarantee? Not sure how it works, but that might be worth looking in to.

Good luck.
Rich

Serviced and CPO'd at Winslow. Bought car from Phil Long Merc.

Carfax only supports the buyback guarantee if their records were false, not unreported events. Its all done through police and insurance reports so if it isn't on file with either, then they won't list it because they don't know.

The car is back to 100% but Phil Long is DEFINITELY paying for some if not all of the headlight assembly. I asked Mike to save the busted parts for me. I'll post photos of the radiator support tomorrow. The battery WAS covered under warranty along with the programing (Huge thanks to Mike for this) which knocked down the cost significantly.

What kind of background do you have on Phil Long, Rich? Is it experience or what others have run into? This could help me out for hammering their sales manager if I need to take the gloves off.

[AlpineSwift]

Here's the pics. Ok, first off, notice how the passenger side is all one piece in this section?




Not the case on the driver's side.





No wait, there's more. See how the center support looks distorted?




See the white $hit that looks like someone blew their load? That's epoxy. Fantastic huh?

Gotta love asshole previous owners and shady shops.

[forza1976]

Man this sucks buddy. Sure hope it all works out and you get some satisfactory resolution.

[richpike]

Originally Posted by AlpineSwift

What kind of background do you have on Phil Long, Rich? Is it experience or what others have run into? This could help me out for hammering their sales manager if I need to take the gloves off.

My main experience has been with Phil Long Audi. When I was first looking at purchasing a new car their sales people had little knowledge of their cars (which is a major pet peeve of mine) and were extremely pushy - they continued to push a different car on me than what I was looking at regardless of me telling them over and over I wasn't interested. Needless to say I didn't buy from them, however I did end up buying an Audi.

Like an idiot, I had it serviced at Phil Long - at first they were very good (Ray was my main advisor and he was excellent - interestingly, he is actually at Winslow now). However, after my car was out of warranty I had an issue with the gauge cluster in my TT - this is a very well known issue on TTs - well known enough that Audi actually issued a recall for them. Long story short, I took it in and Phil Long was convinced that it wasn't my gauge cluster, but was instead my fuel sending units. In their defense, this is another common issue on TTs, so I paid to have those changed, but I was smart enough to ask for the old fuel sending units back. The issue remained, so I took it back in and they replaced my gauge cluster (which did fix the issue). I asked them to refund my money on the fuel sending units and they refused saying those were also at fault - this was clearly BS as the issue didn't change after they replaced them, but did change after replacing the instrument cluster. Fortunately, since I had asked for the fuel sending units back, I did a sweep on them with my DMM and sure enough, they were fine. If I hadn't gotten the old ones back (and been smart enough to know how to test them) I would have never gotten my money back from them. IMHO, a reputable car dealer would have admitted their mistake and offered me my money back - it was clear that they had "guessed" wrong, and I shouldn't have had to pay for their mistake - sadly, most people wouldn't have had any recourse against them.

Sorry for the long story that pales in comparison to yours - good luck!
Rich

[AlpineSwift]

Originally Posted by forza1976

Man this sucks buddy. Sure hope it all works out and you get some satisfactory resolution.

Ralph Schomp has never let me down when its come to resolving issues in the past. Mike Gibson, my service adviser, has gone above and beyond to help me with this crap. I can't say enough good things about Schomp. Hell, they even polished up my crappy snow wheels so they look damn near brand new again! It's all going pretty good despite these set backs.

Originally Posted by richpike

My main experience has been with Phil Long Audi. When I was first looking at purchasing a new car their sales people had little knowledge of their cars (which is a major pet peeve of mine) and were extremely pushy - they continued to push a different car on me than what I was looking at regardless of me telling them over and over I wasn't interested. Needless to say I didn't buy from them, however I did end up buying an Audi.

Like an idiot, I had it serviced at Phil Long - at first they were very good (Ray was my main advisor and he was excellent - interestingly, he is actually at Winslow now). However, after my car was out of warranty I had an issue with the gauge cluster in my TT - this is a very well known issue on TTs - well known enough that Audi actually issued a recall for them. Long story short, I took it in and Phil Long was convinced that it wasn't my gauge cluster, but was instead my fuel sending units. In their defense, this is another common issue on TTs, so I paid to have those changed, but I was smart enough to ask for the old fuel sending units back. The issue remained, so I took it back in and they replaced my gauge cluster (which did fix the issue). I asked them to refund my money on the fuel sending units and they refused saying those were also at fault - this was clearly BS as the issue didn't change after they replaced them, but did change after replacing the instrument cluster. Fortunately, since I had asked for the fuel sending units back, I did a sweep on them with my DMM and sure enough, they were fine. If I hadn't gotten the old ones back (and been smart enough to know how to test them) I would have never gotten my money back from them. IMHO, a reputable car dealer would have admitted their mistake and offered me my money back - it was clear that they had "guessed" wrong, and I shouldn't have had to pay for their mistake - sadly, most people wouldn't have had any recourse against them.

Sorry for the long story that pales in comparison to yours - good luck!
Rich

I appreciate your input. The sales manager is starting an "investigation" right now. I have a feeling this is gonna be a long drawn out affair.

On a lighter note, if anyone wants to come out to a meet this weekend, the cars and coffee meet at the Great Indoors near park meadows is saturday at 7AM.