Hi all,

2 weeks ago ( Sat 1st Oct) I managed to "break" the DSG on my VRS. ( Flashing display - no gears except reverse etc etc). After recovery from London to Bath via Bristol the dealer (Platinum Skoda) plugged various gadgets in and diagnosed a faulty mechtronic unit ( Seen the print out - it does indeed say "MECHTRONIC UNIT FAULTY") This was wed 5th. Since then Skoda technical have requested more dignostic reports which were carried out promptly. So far so good. My problem is that at this point the dealer has still not been authorised to actually replace anything. Apparently there are 2 options - either replace the mechtronic unit ( hand built for my gearbox approx 2 week lead time) or replace the entire gear box. ( dealer reckons he could have one overnight). My concern is that if ( as the dealer and Skoda UK say) they have never had one of these units fail in this way why have they not dropped the gearbox out and sent it to "technical HQ" where someone with experience can pull it apart and play with it to their heart's content instead of relying on a technician with little experience to try and do the work by remote control. Their answer is that the technician is more than capable of carrying out the work. I reply that if that is the case ( and I think it is -the technician seems really clued up on the case) he has diagnosed a faulty mechtronic unit so why not replace it? Their reply - "I can't comment on that". I am starting to get slightly miffed - best case at the moment I MIGHT get my car back ( and get rid of a truely abysmal focus) at the end of next week. That would make it a 3 week wait for a fault that took 2 and a half working days to diagnose am I being unreasonable in thinking that to be unacceptable? And if that is un-acceptable what should I be asking for by way of compensation? Free service? New wheel to replace the one I crunched?

Any thoughts appreciated.

Sounds very similar to the fault that developed on a MkVI Golf 1.4TSI that we have at work. Car was only 2000 miles old when we accelerated out of a petrol station onto a busy dual carriageway, the car jumped out of gear and we had the flashing gear indication. Car was off the road for a while, but had a new gear box fitted.

I don't know that I would believe the "never seen one fail this way" either. I have seen a DSG gearbox sitting in the parts department of my local VW dealership waiting to be returned under warranty from a car with very low mileage too. When my colleague was waiting for his Golf to be repaired he did some research on the internet and discovered that the mechatronic units seemed to be less than 100% reliable and there were a lot of unhappy owners facing big bills as they were failing out of warranty.

However this may have been the earlier versions of the box. The Golf at work has now done over 60,000 miles and apart from one temporary glitch requiring a software upgrade it has been reliable since the new box was fitted.

not sure if you've done any digging but if vw are possibly issuing a re-call based on the large mechatronic failure rate I would be highly suspicious if Skoda have 'never' heard of the issue before.

http://forums.fourtitude.com/showthread.php?4465016-DSG-Mechatronic-Failure-Update

not sure if you've done any digging but if vw are possibly issuing a re-call based on the large mechatronic failure rate I would be highly suspicious if Skoda have 'never' heard of the issue before.

http://forums.fourtitude.com/showthread.php?4465016-DSG-Mechatronic-Failure-Update

indeed, I've heard of it before...

If they have to do a recall, VAG has to be careful and not end up having the public go to the press before they sort a recall out? Could it end up being a bit like the Toyota problem....

DSG - will it get you out of the way quick enough of a truck coming your way or something.....

I hope VAG sort themselves out, as it looks as if DSG has been a problem for a long time now.... and lots of customers don't like being let down with such a major issue on a vehicle...fair enough if its a switch or something but a gearbox to make a car immobile... thats not acceptable surely.

Hope its sorted swiftly for you:)

That article states the DSG box should last 50k-100k miles until commonl faults occur!

That doesn't seem like solid german engineering to me, least not comapared to same only 20yrs ago where when you bought a new Merc like my dads 1991yr 300E-24 Sportline when in the service book there was a little section that you got stamped when you hit the following mileages.

125,000 Stamp from dealer

250,000 certificate and another stamp

375,000 stamp

500,000 cert

750,000 stamp

1,000,000 Free Service and framed certificate

So if 20yrs ago Mercedes where designing cars that rewarded the owner for high mileages whereas now VAG can't make an auto box that can go 1/10thh of that distance without encountering problems and becoming unreliable.

tut tut VAG,

Edited 14 October, 201114 yr by Sonner