Are you a VW diesel owner impacted by their duplicitous emissions game? Me, too! In fact, I wrote this piece about it, as Car Talk’s Senior Web Lackey:
It’s not a pretty situation for us VW owners. And, it’s likely to only get more complex. We’ll face choices about joining class action suits, whether to take a settlement offer— if it comes from VW— and whether to dump our diesels and cut our losses… or hang in there.
I hope that this discussion will become a useful home to share resources and ideas for next steps for other VW diesel owners.
For the moment, I’m being patient, and watching the situation unfold. I’ll be curious to see what the geniuses in Wolfsburg offer us.
Share what your plans are, right here!
Thanks-- from me, and for every other VW diesel owner out there.
I’m not defending VW on this but I could make the following point.
What makes an altered VW any worse than any one of the countless other diesels of other makes running around out there that may have issues or the countless number of gasoline fueled vehicles that motor around for years with the CEL on and/or burning oil to the tune of a quart per 600-1000 miles under the claim of normalcy?
There was a poster on this forum a few years ago asking a question about the CEL on his car and which had been illuminated “for several years”.
This poster (a college student) also stated that “all of my friends have been driving around forever with their CELs on”.
Ken - what if you had to for car registration (CA will do that)?
What if you had to for compensation from VW (I bet that would be a condition of getting a check)?
What makes an altered VW any worse than any one of the countless other diesels of other makes running around out there that may have issues or the countless number of gasoline fueled vehicles that motor around for years with the CEL on and/or burning oil to the tune of a quart per 600-1000 miles under the claim of normalcy?
MAJOR DIFFERENCE…One was intentional…the other wasn’t.
I keep repeating; this is not a minor issue. Diesel fumes contribute to cancer risk, esp lung cancer risk. As more people are going the non-smoking route, air pollution (& ambient radiation) is a more significant risk factor. I bet most if not all VW buyers, would have opted for something different if they knew they are exposing themselves and their passengers/family to pollutants much higher than what is considered standard today.
VW doing this as a big corporation is different than some no-name driver, letting their CEL go for a year or two. Would you tolerate an antifreeze recycling plant that is just dumping the coolant in your drinking water? I am sure there are still a few that might let a bit of antifreeze leak out on the street, but the impacts are different.
Wow! Can you imagine the problems that this has created? How will you get your vehicle inspected for emissions? In what state? Some states vary by county and area, some by metropolitan vs rural. How can an inspector pass a vehicle knowing that the software is designed to cheat when the testing equipment is attached? And multiply that by the number of different countries VW sells in, they probably have similar issues. And who would agree to have a recall/retrofit to your vehicle which would decrease mileage and performance? Whew! The CEO quit! No kidding, he was running in front of the avalanche! And to think that I have considered buying a VW diesel, holy crap! Good luck with this one folks! Rocketman
@MikeinNH, the issue first brought up is asthma and breathing.
A fraudulent VW diesel and a (fill in the blank) used diesel or one being operated with a problem all produce the same end result.
Some years back Honda intentionally altered the PCMs so misfires would be ignored and the CEL would not illuminate.
What’s the difference between what Honda did and what VW has done. Nothing other than Honda being fined a few hundred million dollars.
Here’s a difference: EVERY VW diesel does this, I doubt every Honda had misfires. Same type of problem, but the VW one is way bigger in scope, to me.
As for all the cars driving around with their CELs lit, true, but VW just added half a million in the US, 11 million world-wide intentionally. Again, way bigger in scope. No simple way to solve the CEL problem, but VW could have simply made diesels that meet the regs, or, if unable to do that, no diesels.
My buddy Ralph Nader helped me finance a car. After he wrote the book “Unsafe At Any Speed”, it knocked the resale value out from under the Corvair. We were in need of a second car, and I could buy a newer Corvair for less than an older car of another make. I also fixed the problem with a $12.50 camber compensator for the rear swing axles that I installed in 10 minutes.
Now I am sure that the resale value of the diesel equipped VWs has plummeted. However, I wouldn’t buy one at any price. Back in the 1980s when GM had its diesel engine fiasco, I knew people that bought up the diesel powered cars and retrofitted GM 350 gasoline engines from the salvage yard and made a good car at a bargain price. However, I think it would be a real problem today to convert the VW diesel to a gasoline car.
“I haven’t seen their “clean diesel” ads since Wednesday. They probably pulled them.”
Same here! (I am exactly mid-way between NYC & Philly.)
However, I did see a brand-new VW ad that ballyhoos “$1,200.00 off the price of a new VW!”.
This could be the usual effort to unload leftovers from last year, or it could be a demonstration of desperation on their part. If we see the discount rising in the ensuing weeks and months, then I think it will be obvious as to the reason for those ads.
Honda issue saved my wife from paying $2000 in repair bills as she ignored a Cel for 50k miles. Finally at 149k car started to stall after highway speed. Turned out two o2 sensors and cat converter was bad on 96 civic along with unchanged plugs and wires.
Honda paid for it all under forced 8yr/150k emmisons warranty forced on them.
Tdi thing is a bummer as wife and I interested in golf sportwagen since manual transmission and affordable. I don’t trust vw.
“Some Mitsubishi executives actually went to jail for shortcuts on safety items. This happened about 10 years ago, and was a Japanese first.”
IIRC, the case was actually about an organized corporate effort to deny valid warranty claims on defective engines and transmissions.
Mitsubishi was already hemorrhaging red ink at that point, and this was their ill-conceived attempt to cut expenditures by making owners of their cars pay huge repair bills on their own. However, it backfired on Mitsubishi…big time.
The Japanese culture looks unfavorably on those who act “dishonorably”, and this was widely interpreted in their home country as being dishonorable.
Some Mitsubishi executives actually went to jail for shortcuts on safety items. This happened about 10 years ago, and was a Japanese first.
Other countries are much quicker to put executives in jail…then the US is. The US has a history of allowing FELONY acts by corporations to go unpunished. Those same criminal acts in other countries would result in a beheading. Maybe we should start adopting other countries punishments.
@galant, when did doing wrong just a little make it alright? People leaking antifreeze is more than just a pollution hazard. Dogs and cats that lap that sweet stuff up can die, and it seems to me that the owner of the leaking radiator should be held responsible for the death of the animal. And the penalties for doing just a little wrong are a lot lower than doing a whole lotta wrong. The last time I checked my moral compass, wrong is wrong whether it is small or large and whether it is discovered or not.