Yes, we want to know what the worst engineered factory junk pile you ever had was.
Warranty claims can really vary. Sometimes you get something that has been recalled and those are probably the easiest. Drop it off, pick it up “fixed” (to the satisfaction of the lawyers who whittled down the cost of the repairs). Sometimes you just get the bad apple of the bunch and suffer through it. There are a million and one ways to play this game.
When I was a kid, my parents bought a brand new 1986 Taurus. The spaceship looking car was the hit of the neighborhood and looked like nothing else on the road. While this does not qualify as a warranty nightmare, the Taurus had a fresh engine and transmission in it by the end of the second year my parents owned it. To be fair, they had the thing an additional decade after that, so it was a pretty good family truckster for the Lohnes clan.
I remember my dad having to take a warranty claim all the way to some sort of appeals board at some point with a pickup truck that he had. That was about as protracted a battle as I’d ever seen him fight.
We know that there are warranty horror stories out there. Yes, we went full Vega with the lead photos here because that aluminum engine was one of the biggest gaffes that any car company has EVER had. Diesel to gas engine swaps at the deal from GM, Chrysler transmission issues? What’s your story?
BangShift Question Of The Day: What’s Been Your Worst Warranty Nightmare Car or Truck?
2003 FX-45 Infiniti used a quart of oil every 900 miles for the entire 114,000 miles that I owned it. Our dealer in Baton Rouge even ran tests and sealed the oil fill and had me bring back after a thousand miles. Sure enough was more than a quart low. They stated that that amount of oil consumption was within the factory specs and therefore no repairs would be made. They told me that since it was a high performance engine that such was normal. I told them that my Ford Lightning was much higher performance and never used a measurable amount of oil between changes and there would be no more Infiniti’s in my future.
Chevy cylinder heads with worn valve guides, soft camshafts in late 60’s Chevy small blocks and the greaseless ball joints in GM trucks,
I’m on only the second car I’ve ever owned to have a warranty, but it might count… at least for the previous owner, and certainly for the manufacturer. It’s a VW from Dieselgate. Previous owner took the buyback when the scandal broke. So I was able to get it for cheap with a two year warranty from the factory once they reprogrammed it to meet emissions targets even if it wasn’t being tested.
What’s a warranty?
I’ve never put myself at risk for Chevy warranty issues, but I remember well Vega’s! If you got 30K out of an engine you scored big time…
I worked at a Chevrolet dealership, can you say Chevy Citation ? They even warrantied the entire floor pan at one point!
Kia Optima 2.4L engine issues. Bought one new in 2013, loved the car for commuting. At about 70k miles, the car started using an obscene amount of oil between changes. Took it in and the dealer did oil consumption tests. Service records were provided however warranty was denied by Kia themselves for “lack of service” despite proof it had been done.
Sold the car and received a recall notice for oil consumption issues about 6m after this went down. Kia totally knew about the engine issues however weaseled their way out of it since a formal recall hadnt happened yet.
The issue was an air conditioning failure a refrigerant leak. I had the truck in 7 times (3 different dealerships) before the problem was resolved. At one visit the service write up person told me the truck “had an internal leak not an external leak and that is why they were having difficulty seeing exactly where the refrigerant was escaping.” He informed me the tech would use a borescope in the compressor, start the truck and find out where the refrigerant was leaking! Most of the other visits were BS and incompetence too..I did get my truck replaced thru the Michigan Lemon law..