The pictures you can see are taken of the rear suspension from a 2010 Octavia. We brought the car in late March this year from a garage. The garage had put the car through its MOT and had no advisories on the MOT.  Indeed, this was one of the key reasons we brought the car was its very clean bill of health. 

My wife phoned me on the way home from work last week noting the car was "all over the road". My initial thought was " perhaps the tyres are flat". It's only when she got home and I took the wheel off I found this.

 

My local and trusted garage ended up changing both suspension arms.

I can't believe that this much corrosion could occur in 8 months.  I welcome any comment. 

A weigh****chers membership for christmas?

 

Seriously that is shocking!

 

I am quite used to seeing lots of surface rust on the rear suspension of MK2 Octavias, composted brake backplates & discs etc but nothing structural, all the bolts etc came loose with a crack & the threads were clean.

 

I did however always have advisories for corrosion, thats the advantage of specialist CT (MOT) centres here in France that are not allowed to work on customers cars or sell vehicles, my pal in the UK who always did my MOT's was the same by choice.

 

That is scary!

Mind you, 10 years old might be nothing these days but I made my living when I was younger welding up 4 years old plus vehicles where the whole underbody was like that, a Mini rear subframe would never have lasted 10 years.

unless it has spent the last 8 months in a brine tank that is bad, I would consider reporting mot garage to vosa (or whatever they call themselves these days)

Yes you absolutely should given the circumstances, if they are not reactive I would confront the MOT test station and the selling garage, the former are more likely to worry than the latter.

 

Do a DVLA check to see if the vehicle was by any chance tested & failed elsewhere.

I would agree in reporting the garage, that is seriously rotten and no way that has happened in 8 months. I would be asking your local trusted garage to give it a full check over as you might not be so lucky next time.

My 2005 had a lot of surface rust with 250k on its under carriage. My view is years of up and down the motorway in all weathers has not helped the longevity of any suspension components. However with the exception of the NSF spring which split. It’s all original. That really is a scary situation and could have caused a nasty accident.  It’s a good thing it’s been rectified 

My 2006 had spent many years by the sea, lots of surface rust but front brake backplates aside it was all on the rear suspension & subframe, not a spec on the body, it looked like the only protection had been the thinnest coat of electrostatic black primer, it was a sheet of rust but very little deep pitting and no perforation, had I kept it I might have painted Owatrol over it to stabilise it and prevent any further rusting, I changed the springs so had dropped the wishbones, they were nothing like that, those images have really shocked me, its been at least 20 years since I have seen a dangerously rusted vehicle or components, I never would have believed it would be a VAG product.

 

I just renovated a 1975 mobile site hut trailer, it had never seen any maintenance in its life, made to a price with an intended life of 5 years max, it has been outside in all weathers all that time on damp and boggy ground, the tyres you could peel off like tissue paper but the suspension and chassis were a million times better than those wishbones.

Bloody hell, that's not good!

 

Makes me slightly more happy about having replaced all of my rear lower wishbones last year, they were 10 years old and done 200K mile but weren't worryingly rusty at all.

 

They were only changed as the camber adjusters were all seized up.

You can reduce your losses by selling the old ones on Ebay

 

You can write that they are believed to be in good servicable condition because they passed the MOT 8 months ago when Garage X sold the vehicle to you.

I find this interesting as I have had an advisory for rust on my 2007. Local village garage I have used for years (decades). They were surprised to find it but assure me that the car is roadworthy and may last another couple of years. It does look as if it is surface only and trust the garage to monitor it at the annual MOT. The car has done 170K so may be heading for the great breakers yard in the sky. 

Thank you everyone. I've contacted the DVLA over this and will keep you all updated with what they have to say. Anyone in the market for some "used" rear suspension arms?

All

I contacted DVSA and here is the key part of their reply:

"Thank you for your email enquiry dated 12 December 2020, concerning the MOT.

DVSA is concerned to receive any complaints where it is alleged that a test certificate has been improperly issued but in order that action can be taken it is essential that the matter should be reported as soon as possible after the test, and before repair work has been carried out.

I regret that the fact that the vehicle has had repair work carried out, precludes our taking any action in an appeal against the test result in this case.

However, your concerns regarding the MOT garage have been forwarded to the appropriate Regional Intelligence Unit for your area for further investigation."

 

I note from this that if you have concerns about the MOT then DO NOT fix the problem and leave everything as it is on the car. Obviously, thank is going to be difficult in many cases if that car is your main mode of transport.

 

Whilst I was paying the garage bill, their MOT section were being inspected by DVSA. The inspector was happy to talk about this incident and had these wise words (paraphrased).

1. MOT stations are not obliged to put advisories on the MOT certificate - they should do.

2. Take the MOT as quite a low bar as far as car condition is concerned. It only means it was good to be on the road the moment the inspector inspected the car.

3. If you can't fully inspect the car yourself then as soon as you get the car home take it to a garage (you trust) and get them to look over it.

4. DVSA won't entertain looking at corrosion problems after 3 months from the MOT.

5. If the car has less than 100,000 miles on the clock you might be able to go back to the manufacturer. After 100,000 miles - no chance.

 

So, a learning experience. I hope it can help others not make the mistakes I made...

 

A bit of a cop out really.  I understand the thrust of what they are saying but really, this is a pretty severe case of corossion that has occurred over a lot of years and must have shown signs of comprising those arms 8 months ago.

 

I would also be having a little chat about the garage about whether the car was fit for purpose when sold.  Unless it was a bargain too cheap to be true I'd be asking them to cover your repair costs. Maybe get someone competent to have a good look over or under the vehicle too.

I have already contacted the garage and they are claiming the "too much time passed" argument. I suspect that I would need a Materials Science expert with knowledge of corrosion in cars to give a sworn "expert verdict" in order to move this forward. Yep, the law has a lot of wriggle room in cases like this. Anyone know an "Expert Witness" willing to make a statement?

Possibly, this is what I need: https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/consumer/buying-or-repairing-a-car/problems-with-a-used-car/ Quote:

If you can prove the car was faulty when you bought it, the trader must pay for a repair.

You have legal rights for up to 6 years (5 years if you bought the car in Scotland), but only if you can show that you didn’t cause the fault. The longer you’ve had the car, the harder it will be to prove that the problem was there when the trader sold it to you.

Plus, you’ll only have legal rights if the car is not:

• ‘of satisfactory quality’ - it should do what you’d expect for its age, mileage, price and type
• ‘fit for purpose’ - eg if you asked for a car that would pull a caravan, it has to be able to do that
• ‘as described’ - it has to match the advert or the description the trader gave you

 

So, I just have to prove the car was in this state when I brought it. Comes back to the "Expert Witness".

On 11/12/2020 at 23:17, J.R. said:

My 2006 had spent many years by the sea, lots of surface rust but front brake backplates aside it was all on the rear suspension & subframe, not a spec on the body, it looked like the only protection had been the thinnest coat of electrostatic black primer, it was a sheet of rust but very little deep pitting and no perforation

 

My old 2010 Scout was from a rural area up north near the coast.  I was aware of unusually high levels of corrsion when I purchased but 2 years on it looked pretty much the same other than a snapped spring.  That is awful.  

 

More critically how many miles have you done since purchase - that may give leverage on the situation if its low

Miles when brought: 107,200 24th March.

Miles when my trusted garage fixed 113,514 ~10th December . 6314 miles.

We live in deepest Derbyshire. There is no salt water anywhere near us. It wasn't a particularly cold Spring so the roads weren't being gritted very much.

I think you will find that is is 3 months from date of test for corrosion.

If you think your car has passed when it should not have

You’ll need to complain to DVSA if you do not think your car should have passed its MOT. Fill in the complaint form and send it to DVSA within the time limits below.

DVSA will contact you within 5 days to discuss your complaint.

If DVSA decides to recheck your vehicle, you’ll need to arrange a date. You will not need to pay the test fee again. They’ll send you an inspection report listing any vehicle defects.

Time limits

If your vehicle passed, you need to complain within:

• within 3 months of the MOT if it’s a corrosion-related problem
• within 28 days has passed for other defect

 

taken from https://www.gov.uk/getting-an-mot/problems-with-your-test-result

3 hours ago, jverdicchio said:

I have already contacted the garage and they are claiming the "too much time passed" argument. I suspect that I would need a Materials Science expert with knowledge of corrosion in cars to give a sworn "expert verdict" in order to move this forward. Yep, the law has a lot of wriggle room in cases like this. Anyone know an "Expert Witness" willing to make a statement?

 Even when you obviously have right on your side you sometimes have to decide if pursuing an injustice is going to be worth the time and effort involved, this may be one of those cases but only you can decide that. 

Small claims court? Probably better chance than a bet on the 2:30 at Cheltenham given the photos and a statement from the repairing garage and the possible reputational damage to the business that sold you the car. Still a bet and a lot of aggro.

 

5 hours ago, jverdicchio said:

I have already contacted the garage and they are claiming the "too much time passed" argument. I suspect that I would need a Materials Science expert with knowledge of corrosion in cars to give a sworn "expert verdict" in order to move this forward. Yep, the law has a lot of wriggle room in cases like this. Anyone know an "Expert Witness" willing to make a statement?

I hope you told the garage you had already been in touch with the DVSA.

 

If they'd any sense, you can be sure they won't pass another similarly corroded vehicle in the near future.