Today The Lemon came home from its overnight stay in car-hospital.
Total bill for the cooling system repairs: $1100. Costs you less to have children.
It turns out that the water pump was busted, and the nice chap who did the repair sees a lot of this model for the same fix. At the same age, the water pumps all go. Apparently they are in such demand that the suppliers have them on back-order.
While they were at it, they replaced the special hard-to-get-at Y-shaped hose that the dealer service people had suggested might need replacing – it was leaking so it had to be done.
And in order to do the water pump, the timing belt needed to be replaced as well. You have to pull the timing belt to get the water pump off. But it was just as well, the timing belt was shot and pretty much ready to give up the ghost at any time. He kept it to show me the cracks in it, and questioned if it had ever been replaced.
Now on this car, the timing belt is supposed to be replaced every 60,000 km. the car has done 105,000 km. I just checked back through the service receipts – the 60,000 km service was a shocker – at that time they replaced the water pump also (so it’s now on #3), timing belt, and a bunch of other things. In other words, the timing belt was replaced when it was supposed to be, but the replacement may not have lasted the scheduled time. And getting under 60,000 km from water pumps?! What were these designers thinking?
Interesting though was the price for all this work:
Item |
Quoted Holden Dealer Price |
Price I paid |
Y Shaped Hose |
$170 |
$121 |
Coolant |
$65 |
$50 |
Labour for Y shaped
hose replacement |
2 hours |
1 hour |
If this is what a nice guy in the ‘burbs can charge – for genuine parts, then watch out – your friendly Holden dealer is most likely ripping you off.
The whole repair has been very expensive – but as the nice man said – had the timing belt gone, it would have been 3 times the price to fix it.
I can thoroughly recommend the chap who did the fix: McLean Automotive Services at Ridgehaven. They seem to be honest, they charge less than a dealer, and most impressively – the workshop is immaculately clean – a sign that they take a great deal of care. This is our second dealing with them now, and they’ll be getting more of our business in future.