riceboyler
06-15-2010, 08:59 PM
I'm new around here, but I thought I'd share the drama I've been through since the purchase of my Legacy, which I LOVE!
A few weeks ago, I purchased my 2000 GT in Louisville, KY from Louisville Motors. Due to the flooding that happened in the Nashville area in early May, there are NO good used cars around here, and Subarus aren't exactly plentiful during good times anyway. So, I bought the GT, and as I'm getting ready to leave the car lot, the salesman says to me (as we're looking over the car) that they had replaced all the brakes, the rear rotors and the front lower control arm. I thought that was interesting, but good to know that they replaced that part, as it must have had issues at some point.
So, I drove the car home from Louisville (about 150 miles), enjoying it the whole way, especially the glorious sound of that boxer engine through a Magnaflow muffler. I drove it about 2 miles the next day as I had to run to the store and it was great again. While I was at it, I fixed the screwed up wiring of the head unit. There was a secondary harness that it was plugged into which made everything distorted. I fixed that, and wired in my aux cable for my Zune HD and pulled the Snorkus. Good day with the car.
The next day (Sunday) I took the car over to a buddy who's a Jaguar Technician (as a side note, he took me for a ride in a 2011 XJ Supercharged, the nicest and fastest car I've ever been in, just sick!) for a little spin. We took the car out on a back road near his house with my 9-year old son in the back seat, and as we went around a relatively sharp corner, we felt and heard a clunk from the front end, the wheel started shaking and then we heard serious scraping. As I turned the opposite direction, the car didn't want to turn and started making more noise. We pulled over on the side of the road and the first thing he said to me was, "Your wheel is touching your fender!" I asked him if the suspension had collapsed and he said that it was the top of the fender, it was on the backside of the fender. When we got under the car, we saw that the ball joint was completely separated from the Lower Control Arm and was sitting inside my passenger wheel. We realized we'd have to get a trailer to get it back to my house so we call a few friends from church, got the trailer in his Durango and went to load the car.
In the meantime, I called the dealership and asked which side the LCA had been replaced on. Sure enough, it was the passenger side. I told him we had a problem because the car had just fallen apart on that side, told him I was very upset because my son was in the car with me, and the damage (to life) could have been far worse. After I threatened to call a lawyer, he hung up on me. So, I called back, apologized for being so upset but explained that I just wanted to get my car fixed. He told me to call back the next morning and he'd give me the number for the shop that did the work. We had to temporarily repair the car just to get it on the trailer, as the passenger wheel went perpendicular to the other three wheels as we pulled it up the ramp. We fixed it, luckily a Good Samaritan had a castle nut in his hardware collection, so we were able to get it fixed enough to get on the trailer. We got it home, and called it a night.
The next day, I called the garage that did the work (Ken Towery) and talked to the manager there who said that his tech's specifically remember tightening everything up. I asked if they remembered putting the Cotter Pin in, and he said he hadn't asked. I explained that it was obvious they did something wrong, as the castle nut and the cotter pin were not on the car when we pulled it on the side of the road. He put me on hold and then came back to tell me to call the dealership. The dealer then accused me of trying to scam him out of money and that he wanted proof that it was actually broken. I told him I'd send him pictures and copy my attorney on them, at which point he hung up on me again, and refused to answer my calls or speak to me again, except to say that I needed to have my attorney contact him.
Luckily, my best friend from college is a lawyer, so he called the next day, only to have the dealer hang up on him as well. I dropped my car off at a local shop to get a repair estimate and went on to work. The owner of the shop told me he'd give me an estimate for the work to be done, which he called me back and gave me over the phone, but he didn't want to work on the car because he didn't want to get subpoenaed to court. I asked to him to just fax me over the estimate and I'd take the car elsewhere. After two days and no estimate (and numerous calls) I called him back again and he said he couldn't even give me an estimate because he could get subpoenaed for that too. I got the car, drove to another local garage and had them fix the car. As I was pulling into the parking lot, the castle nut fell off again (due to previous damage to the threads) and I had the fun of hearing the clunking and scraping again. They, of course, had to order the parts to fix the car (a ball joint and axle, as the axle fell out when the LCA fell and tore the boot, and they found grit in the grease of the axle) but got it repaired and I got it back last night.
So, we're filing suit against both the dealer and the shop that did the work tomorrow for triple damages (including the cost of a replacement wheel, which was seriously scored from the ball joint rubbing on it) + court costs and legal fees. We're hoping it'll scare them into just reimbursing me for the damages and call it a day, but something tells me this guy won't budge. My lawyer wants to cross-examine this guy because the dealer hung up on him.
So that's the great story of the first week of my Legacy. It's a good thing I really like this car! And what ever you do, avoid Louisville Motors. Ken Towery, from what I can tell, is a reputable business that just made a simple mistake (hey, it happens, I have no problem with that), but they need to take care of the damage from the mistake that was made. That's what insurance is for...
Thanks for reading all the way through this mess, and I hope none of you have the experience I've had. I'm glad to be here!
A few weeks ago, I purchased my 2000 GT in Louisville, KY from Louisville Motors. Due to the flooding that happened in the Nashville area in early May, there are NO good used cars around here, and Subarus aren't exactly plentiful during good times anyway. So, I bought the GT, and as I'm getting ready to leave the car lot, the salesman says to me (as we're looking over the car) that they had replaced all the brakes, the rear rotors and the front lower control arm. I thought that was interesting, but good to know that they replaced that part, as it must have had issues at some point.
So, I drove the car home from Louisville (about 150 miles), enjoying it the whole way, especially the glorious sound of that boxer engine through a Magnaflow muffler. I drove it about 2 miles the next day as I had to run to the store and it was great again. While I was at it, I fixed the screwed up wiring of the head unit. There was a secondary harness that it was plugged into which made everything distorted. I fixed that, and wired in my aux cable for my Zune HD and pulled the Snorkus. Good day with the car.
The next day (Sunday) I took the car over to a buddy who's a Jaguar Technician (as a side note, he took me for a ride in a 2011 XJ Supercharged, the nicest and fastest car I've ever been in, just sick!) for a little spin. We took the car out on a back road near his house with my 9-year old son in the back seat, and as we went around a relatively sharp corner, we felt and heard a clunk from the front end, the wheel started shaking and then we heard serious scraping. As I turned the opposite direction, the car didn't want to turn and started making more noise. We pulled over on the side of the road and the first thing he said to me was, "Your wheel is touching your fender!" I asked him if the suspension had collapsed and he said that it was the top of the fender, it was on the backside of the fender. When we got under the car, we saw that the ball joint was completely separated from the Lower Control Arm and was sitting inside my passenger wheel. We realized we'd have to get a trailer to get it back to my house so we call a few friends from church, got the trailer in his Durango and went to load the car.
In the meantime, I called the dealership and asked which side the LCA had been replaced on. Sure enough, it was the passenger side. I told him we had a problem because the car had just fallen apart on that side, told him I was very upset because my son was in the car with me, and the damage (to life) could have been far worse. After I threatened to call a lawyer, he hung up on me. So, I called back, apologized for being so upset but explained that I just wanted to get my car fixed. He told me to call back the next morning and he'd give me the number for the shop that did the work. We had to temporarily repair the car just to get it on the trailer, as the passenger wheel went perpendicular to the other three wheels as we pulled it up the ramp. We fixed it, luckily a Good Samaritan had a castle nut in his hardware collection, so we were able to get it fixed enough to get on the trailer. We got it home, and called it a night.
The next day, I called the garage that did the work (Ken Towery) and talked to the manager there who said that his tech's specifically remember tightening everything up. I asked if they remembered putting the Cotter Pin in, and he said he hadn't asked. I explained that it was obvious they did something wrong, as the castle nut and the cotter pin were not on the car when we pulled it on the side of the road. He put me on hold and then came back to tell me to call the dealership. The dealer then accused me of trying to scam him out of money and that he wanted proof that it was actually broken. I told him I'd send him pictures and copy my attorney on them, at which point he hung up on me again, and refused to answer my calls or speak to me again, except to say that I needed to have my attorney contact him.
Luckily, my best friend from college is a lawyer, so he called the next day, only to have the dealer hang up on him as well. I dropped my car off at a local shop to get a repair estimate and went on to work. The owner of the shop told me he'd give me an estimate for the work to be done, which he called me back and gave me over the phone, but he didn't want to work on the car because he didn't want to get subpoenaed to court. I asked to him to just fax me over the estimate and I'd take the car elsewhere. After two days and no estimate (and numerous calls) I called him back again and he said he couldn't even give me an estimate because he could get subpoenaed for that too. I got the car, drove to another local garage and had them fix the car. As I was pulling into the parking lot, the castle nut fell off again (due to previous damage to the threads) and I had the fun of hearing the clunking and scraping again. They, of course, had to order the parts to fix the car (a ball joint and axle, as the axle fell out when the LCA fell and tore the boot, and they found grit in the grease of the axle) but got it repaired and I got it back last night.
So, we're filing suit against both the dealer and the shop that did the work tomorrow for triple damages (including the cost of a replacement wheel, which was seriously scored from the ball joint rubbing on it) + court costs and legal fees. We're hoping it'll scare them into just reimbursing me for the damages and call it a day, but something tells me this guy won't budge. My lawyer wants to cross-examine this guy because the dealer hung up on him.
So that's the great story of the first week of my Legacy. It's a good thing I really like this car! And what ever you do, avoid Louisville Motors. Ken Towery, from what I can tell, is a reputable business that just made a simple mistake (hey, it happens, I have no problem with that), but they need to take care of the damage from the mistake that was made. That's what insurance is for...
Thanks for reading all the way through this mess, and I hope none of you have the experience I've had. I'm glad to be here!