Venting--Dealer "service"

Company car, 2011 Subaru impreza. Less than 4000 miles. Driver side wiper arm stripped out, rounding off the splines on the shaft as well as the female end on the wiper arm. Nut was only finger tight. Since it's not old and still under warranty, I arrange for it to go to the dealer 45 minutes away one direction. Drop the car off, drive back to work, and 15 minutes after I get to work they call back and say it's ready. I say that's quick. Send my employee to go pick it up. He's semi retired, used to own some auto parts stores and a body shop before he retired, so he knows his way around a car. Calls to tell me they just put the old arm on and tightened it down, did not replace a part. No idea if they glued it on or they are just hoping the pressure of the tightened nut is enough to hold it in place.

Does this sound reasonable to you? I'm not pleased. Can't believe I wasted my time on this. Waiting for the cars return to see exactly what they did.

I'd be having a conversation with a Subaru Zone Rep.

lest they not forget...a wiper blade is a safety item not a convenience item.
Ask the dealership if they feel they have acted with regard to your safety.

Unless they said they had a new one ordered and just put the old one back on for the time being, I don't know if there is much you can do. Even on the tech level, the comeback just means about nothing.

Can you get them to do that 2 more times and then force a buyback under lemon laws? ;-)

I don't want a buy back. I want the car fixed. Hell I can fix it. We have a vehicle maint department that can fix it, just give me the damn parts. One of my club mates is a tech there. I'll be speaking with him tonight to find out at what level this lack of attention to detail started and act accordingly. If the tech was directed to do it that way, then my gripe is with the dealer. If the tech did it on his/her own the dealer needs to know cause it's horse pucky.

sachilles wrote: I want the car fixed. Hell I can fix it.

I have been know to fix this stuff on my own. Same thing with a house I had built 11 years ago. When it was under the 1 year warranty and minor; I just fixed it as the builder didn't move too quickly once I owned the house.

Under warranty, I'd have replaced the wiper arm and looked REAL HARD to find any damage on the splines on the linkage so I could replace that as well (for the customer's benefit to be totally honest). If it were a customer pay job, I'd have given you the option.

that sounds like good solid business sense there, Dr Boost.. when a car is under warrenty, you want the customer nice and cozy so they return when they either need a new car, or need some non-warrenty work done.. if they are screwing you during the warrenty period.. who knows what happens afterwards

mad_machine wrote: that sounds like good solid business sense there, Dr Boost.. when a car is under warrenty, you want the customer nice and cozy so they return when they either need a new car, or need some non-warrenty work done.. if they are screwing you during the warrenty period.. who knows what happens afterwards

Thanks. I really do try to treat folks how I want to be treated. The way I look at it, the customer is paying dearly for that warranty and I'd like to get them all the value from it they can.

Actually, the fact that the wiper arm is aluminum and the shaft steel means they can come loose and be retightened several times before the arm won't grab anymore. We see loose wiper arms all the time up here, generally from people who are too lazy to clear the snow off their windsheild before they hit the switch. Put them back in place, snug up the nut, you are good to go till next winter.

Not quite the same thing, but had the wiper arms off my 1st Integra so I could paint them. Then drove from Tn. to Pa. in what turned into a snowstorm. (Bad weather hadn't really been predicted.) About 300 miles from Pa. after about an hour or so of use, the wipers started getting a little flaky. I was afraid of stripping the arms or the motor/shaft so I hadn't got the painted arms on tight enough. Had to stop at a shopping mall and find some tools (my Hondas have been reliable enough that I don't keep tools in the car). STILL, couldn't hit the right balance of tightness, so after 10 minutes wipers are loose.

The splines on wiper arms are purposely weak. That way if the wipers are frozen to the windshield or in some other way the wipers get jammed the wiper motor won't smoke itself. Many times I have simply snugged the nut up for Mr or Mrs Consumer, explained the deal, and advised them if it happens again it's probably time to replace the wiper arm. The 'transmission' (splined shaft) should not require replacement. And yes we replaced them under warranty even though it wasn;t really necessary.

The tiburon I had.. I fried the control box for the wipers in the snow. I had a clear windshield and turned them on.. not knowing they had frozen after use.

When I got them working, they stopped parking.. they would just stop where ever until I found a replacement modual. I would have preferred to just replace the arms

Dealer warranty work is paid by corporate so you'd think the service manager would want to get as much work for his dealership as possible. I had a Saabaru with a factory warranty and the service manager at the GM dealership I went to was very good. Every time I took that car in he would end up having several other things fixed that looked suspect. Everybody won. Sounds like you're dealing with a bum.

sachilles, any updates? Just being curious.

In reply to BoxheadTim: I'm going back tomorrow and showing the service manager, by his invitation. I'll give them the opportunity to make it right.

sachilles wrote: In reply to BoxheadTim: I'm going back tomorrow and showing the service manager, by his invitation. I'll give them the opportunity to make it right.

Good call. Some times you get Tech's in a bad mood or whatever the reason that either overlook the problem, or half ass it like this. Whatever the reason, the Service Manager should make it right and slap the tech around for making him look bad.

I will often punch service writers in the temple with a hammer for replacing the arms first before seeing if they can be tightened. We have gone through many less writers since I started doing this because the first twelve got my point across.

To repair a wiper arm involves removing it, inspecting it, cleaning the debris from the wiper transmission, replacing it and testing it. IF it passes the "Start the wipers and try to stop the wiper with your hand" test it will be fine. If it does not then I replace the arm. I never just tighten them but I rarely warrant one. Also I have gotten my lube techs to check the tightness on the repeat offenders to reduce the chances of this happening as well.

Sincerely, Disgruntled and underpaid Dealer Service Manager

I've got my replacement parts. Aside from the wasting of my time, I'm happy.

Don't forget to remove all the aluminum from the splines or it will slip again.

I wonder if some locktight might not be a good idea?

sachilles wrote: I've got my replacement parts. Aside from the wasting of my time, I'm happy.

What are you going to do next time they loosen up? Really. They are designed that way for a pretty good reason- its way cheaper to tighten the nut than it is to replace a torn up wiper mechanism...

I'm an ex-long time foreign car mechanic and may be able to provide a little insight on this problem. Subarus are supposed to go through a Pre-Delivery Inspection before sale. The car is checked over from front to back for any potential problems, fluid levels, tire pressures, etc, etc. The vast majority of dealers do not have the mechanics in the shop perform this service; they leave it to the washroom guys who may check the oil and tires and call it good.

Inspection of the wiper blade hold down nuts is part of the PDI and I have found a great many loose ones over the years. More loose than tight actually.

Warranty work for car dealers, and the mechanic, is a losing proposition as it really doesn't pay anything.

The sticky part, and possible dirty secret, is that if the blade strips you have a warrantable problem. If the nut comes loose you may not. At one time Subaru used to have a 1000 miles inspection that was free to the car owner and would include rechecking wiper blade retainer nuts. Unless their policy has changed, if the nuts came loose after a 1000 miles then it's not a warrantable problem and the customer pays for it. The same policy applied to door and glass adjustments, etc. Subaru's "adjustment period" may be extended now compared to what it once was. Hope that helps to clarify some of it.

Streetwiseguy wrote:

sachilles wrote: I've got my replacement parts. Aside from the wasting of my time, I'm happy.

What are you going to do next time they loosen up? Really. They are designed that way for a pretty good reason- its way cheaper to tighten the nut than it is to replace a torn up wiper mechanism...

I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. Considering in my personal fleet, I have 3 subarus with over 150k miles a piece, and I've yet to encounter this before, I'm not going to lose much sleep over it happening again. As mentioned above, I'm sure the nut wasn't tight when we received the car. Parts are replaced, and everything is tight. And for the record, the break away spline thing is hog wash. I have had my wipers frozen to the windshield in my personal subaru's. The motor won't overwhelm the splines. The motor trips. You free up your wipers, turn them off and on, and away they go. It is part of the wiper motor controller located in the steering column. Now on my 95 dodge ram, they do it differently. It has those clip on style wipers. They'll pop off if you look at them wrong. Yet you can still freeze them to the windshield, and you can burn out the motor because there is nothing in the electrical to trip. Been there, done that.