head gaskets

[puremalt]

That's awful, you have been conned here. I would take the earlier advice and complain to Caterham and to the MD of the Midlands franchise. Their own diagnosis was incorrect from the start, that is abominable.

I have just had two new side skins, new bonnet, a visit to Arch to straighten the chassis,new o/s clamshell, new starter, new battery, four bilsteins, two yokos, new lower front wishbones (both sides), two trunnions, new block (yes that's right), and new air filters.

Oh and a respray.

 

Cost at a Caterham franchise was in total £4600. I paid £850 and the insurance the rest.

Puts it in perspective don't you think?

Let us know what happened, they don't need the threat of an open letter to Low Flying do they?

 

 

 

Excellent!

[Miff]

Have just recieved a reply from Caterham Midlands to a letter sent to Simon Lambert at Caterham HQ. (I did send it before the above post actually).

 

Not much to add, they have stated that I was told the head gasket was not the cause of the high idle speed - I think reading the post above show this to be wrong!

 

They say that the other stuff they replaced was "faulty" and not working at "100% efficiency" so had to be replaced to prevent future failure. The exception to this was the IACV which they said was "not acting as fast as it should have been, but it had not failed" and it was this that was causing the main problem.

 

I will never know whether the head gasket had truly failed.

 

To their credit they have said that if I think the problem has not been solved then they would fix it gratis. They have also offered me £50 off my next service with them.

 

However, since I plan never to go near them again this is irrelevant.

 

I would strongly recommend that if you have a problem with your seven anywhere in the midlands you drive anywhere but Caterham Midlands to get it sorted.

 

I have had to pay for all of this, I think the main lesson is: Listen to blatchatters despite reassurances from the 'experts', it will probably save you money.

[chris x cross]

It seems to me that Caterham Midlands have made in the short term (sadly at your expense ) and lost out in the long term as blatchat is an immensely powerful communication device.

 

[Micky]

Miff

 

Did Caterham give you a professional opinion that the idle fault was caused by the leaking head gasket? If so, you can now demonstrate that the professional opinion was flawed.

[Miff]

Indeed, but only verbally. They do now, however, claim that they informed me this was not the case and that the head gasket failure was not to blame for the tickover problem.

 

Funny.

 

I actually rang them back after they had told me the HG was the root fault to confirm that this was definitely the case and they said yes. Obviously have no written proof of this.

[Micky]

Miff

 

Assuming that Caterham Midlands read Blatchat .... YHM

 

M