I purchased an 06 Fiat Doblo 1.3 multijet just over 3 months ago currently has 40000 on the clock, the timing chain broke and is now in a garage awaiting repair. I am not impressed does anyone know what the timing chain intervals are on this model? The car has been regularly service by the previous owner and by me.

Is this just another case of the legendary FIAT reliabilty

Surely their must be some responsibility taken by FIAT for this woeful situation

Frank:bang:

Shouldn't go at that mileage. Usually they get rattly, which is an indication they need replacing. My last engine (a Fiat Uno) with a chain went to 90 thou before the noise got worrying and I had it changed.

Is this just another case of the legendary FIAT reliabilty

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You may not believe it, but Fiat are the third most reliable maker as measured by the leading German assessor. I'm speaking breakdowns and mechanical bits here, not trim squeaks or dealer hopelessness. You have been unlucky, but there must be a reason for this.

Just be pleased you don't own a Toyota...

Supposedly there have been a few problems with the tensioner, if you hunt around the web there are a few stories around.

I think the chain is meant to last about 160000miles which is the design life of the engine.
I saw a 120000 1.3 Doblo 7seater taxi the other day that hadnt seen a spanner other than normal service and it started and ran better than our 45000mile Panda.

A chain broke?
That's got to take a hell of a beating before it'll break surely?

first post...car out of warranty,i'd be knocking on sellers door rather than moaning on a public forum.

frankellul said:

I purchased an 06 Fiat Doblo 1.3 multijet just over 3 months ago currently has 40000 on the clock, the timing chain broke and is now in a garage awaiting repair. I am not impressed does anyone know what the timing chain intervals are on this model? The car has been regularly service by the previous owner and by me.

Is this just another case of the legendary FIAT reliabilty

Surely their must be some responsibility taken by FIAT for this woeful situation

Frank:bang:

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I presume the previous owner had it serviced at a dealer so the book is stamped? You also say you have serviced it - but you've only had it 3 months

ive also had this problem.the tensioner is a weakness on this engine,I wouldnt buy a 1.3 m-jet again as there are alot of issues with the engine!

antama said:

ive also had this problem.the tensioner is a weakness on this engine,I wouldnt buy a 1.3 m-jet again as there are alot of issues with the engine!

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well its a fairly popular engine and we havent seem masses of reports?
what was the mileage/service history on yours?

i'd be interested to hear what oil has been used in it previously

134.000, dealer maintained tensioner went and destroyed the top end but i have had a lot of warantry issues,fuel pump,clutch, ive now had a new engine fitted and after 21,000 miles this is giving problems. fiat stopped production of this engine in early 2008 for two months to address quality issues!

Not sure if the story went quite like that as the design hasnt been changed. Wasnt there a supplier issue?

Mine hasnt been too bad yet but it only has to drag a Panda round. I think its a bit small for a loaded Doblo and long maintenance schedules.

I am coming upto the 4th service that I have done myself and havent been given the same oil twice, and I have bought the parts from Fiat dealers..

antama said:

fiat stopped production of this engine in early 2008 for two months to address quality issues!

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yes well you obviously dont know the correct story....however if its such a poor engine (which it isn't and you will expect a percentage of failures considering the huge number of units sold) why are other manufactures using it?

I work on these engines daily and they are great little engines.......unless your trying to get to the EGR!

T14086 said:

I work on these engines daily[/U] and they are great little engines.......unless your trying to get to the EGR!

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Nice to know - thanks

We bought our 2005 Doblo 7 seat Family in 2009, fully serviced by main dealer and the chain 'slipped' over the sprockets and the engine was destroyed. No rattle prior to the event. The main dealer in Nuneaton did not check under the rocker box to see if there was a valve issue as the rockers are made to break rather than the valve's, but instead removed the engine/gearbox-virtually everything really and wanted £2600 to fix, could not remove the car because it was immoveable and other garages would not take on half a job. Car had done 49,000 miles but was out age warranty. Did get some help from Fiat UK, but only because they had sympathy for our predicament. Repaired the car but heard of several with the same problem.

Would not go to this main dealer in Nuneaton if my life depended on it. Now have repair warranty on the car.Love the doblo but terrified when driving it. All my other cars did 200,000+ with no problems-Cortina's and Carlton/Omega's.

Great shame, fiat used a chain on the 1.3 to be lower maintenance than belts. Have heard of other makes that have had automatic gearbox failures that cost 7k to fix! Most cars are scrapped these days because the repair costs are so high. Chin up theyre great when they work!

The main problem is not the chain but the tensioner bolts working loose..:bang:

My 1.3 doblo has just hit 200 thousand miles first cam chain needed replacing at 80 thou ! Then since then it's had four each one about 15 thousand miles !! We couldn't work out why ? My garage was using blue point kits and would replace them under warrantee each time ! I never got too the bottom of the problem but I insisted they used genuine chain on the last one and so far so good !! Also replaced all the rockers as recommended by fiat !! Only because if one failed it would break the chain I guess ! But it's still going strong apart from normal servicing items nothing else has gone wrong ! I look forward to anouther 50 k I hope !!

Our chain has just broke at 90k and cost a grand to fix. Reliable my arse, this has been the most unreliable vehicle our company has owned since 1972!!! It has more problems in the first year than our previous TWO sukuki's has in 8 years daily use.

Clutch ate itself when new.
Gear shifter broke off.
Turbo actuator stuck.
Ignition barrel eats £250 keys wearing them out every few years.
Front tracking became 4k tyres wear after arm bushes all wore out in 60k
Cam Chain snapped

etc etc thats just the major stuff

Apparently the hydraulic tensioner on the timing chain is sensitive to incorrect oils, dirty oil and incorrect spec oil etc and bump starting in reverse a big no no.

Local engine services rebuilds 5 engines a week!
FIATS are a joke as far as I'm concerned and We'll NEVER have another.

Spec from factory is 5/40 but have been advised to use 5/30 C2 low SAPS by both the main dealer AND engine services, so looking into this despite FIAT originally supplying us with non low sap universal 5/40 as I believe is stated in the service book.

I'll post how I got on.

I have worked on loads of these engines on the doblo and the Vauxhall combo and in my opinion they are a great engine . They do have a hydrolic tensioner and the reason they fail is the timing chain is not heavy enough and poor maintenance . The timing chain has to drive 16 valves , hi pressure pump and the vacum pump and its not much bigger than a bycle chain .

abarth130tc said:

I have worked on loads of these engines on the doblo and the Vauxhall combo and in my opinion they are a great engine .

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Yep, loads of big companies use them, post office for example, so can't be all that bad