General Major problem with 1.1 engine?

[Shunter]

Piston slap is when one or more pistons are too small for the cylinder bore either through incorrect fitting during manufacture or due to excesive wear for whatever reason (oil level too low, wrong grade of oil, etc) and instead of travelling up and down the cylinder in a parallel manner, because the piston diameter is smaller than the cylinder then the piston tends to tilt on the downstroke and the noise is generated when the direction of piston travel changes to the upstroke and the piston is tilted in the opposite plane and the piston skirt "slaps" the cylinder wall.

This is why over a period of time that the excesive wear is generated at the bottom of the cylinder bore.

This used to be a common problem in high mileage cars in the 60' and 70's but is relatively rare in modern engines unless like probably in this case it is a manufacturing fault.

 

[mark1962]

it would be funny but ..mileage 1015!!!!

 

[mark1962]

been trying to get hold of the said mr chris smith...not answering messages left here and not able to get answer on his phone... want to know what lunatic told the dealer to strip my engine instead of just replacing it and sending it to slough for them to diagnose

 

[Creamola]

Fiat employees worldwide seem to have email addresses of the form [email protected].

I therefore reckon that Chris Smiths email address is [email protected] - or something similar.

 

[mark1962]

Hi creamola , well i gave that email a whirl ...it didn't bounce back so it may have gone to right destination...no reply tho and still can't get him on the phone....could be on annual leave as many cram their leave into last week in march

 

[mark1962]

Spoken to dealer today, my engine in bits couple of pistons loose in bore , bores intact so ....oversize/graded pistons ordered by dealer supposed to arrive hopefully by saturday so i hope that another week should see my car back running

 

[custard]

about f*cking time.hope theres some free servicing or the likes coming your way

 

[AppleSei]

At least there is light at the end of the tunnel

Been following this thread with interest. Really makes you realise how bad dealerships are

 

[mark1962]

Most of my trobles have been with fiat customer care and fiat technical, both dealers involved were waiting for long times for instructions/communication from slough.....and even now i am still amazed of their wastefullness.... surely cheapest fix would have been a quick replacement engine with the faulty unit sent back in exchange to fiat technical for them to have sussed its problems...this would have saved
1 dealers labour charges
2 massive amounts of wasted time for me and dealer
3 its cost me a fortune in phone calls
4 my wasted costs ie monthly finance road tax insurance (its now 5 weeks)
5 cost of hire car (that should have been more as i have only had the car 1 week)

Toatally wasteful in my opinion plus there is no guarentee the car will be trouble free once its re assembled

 

[AppleSei]

There is no guarantee but you would have thought the engine would get a good inspection before fitting to stop this happening again

 

[mark1962]

custardboy......last time i had a go at chris smith he muttered something about compensation....assume it will be on the lines of sevicing...but not holding my breath...

 

[mark1962]

Well i hope to hear something soon, the pistons should have arrived today so i hope the dealer is getting the engine rebuilt ASAP,i am getting fond of the hire car (corsa sxi).
I heard today what happened re the cardiff dealer i expected the car to go to after the first dealer mishaps....seems cardiff got ticked off by fiat, dealer felt fiat dragging him down reputation wise (they also deal with Mazda)

 

[mark1962]

UNBELIEVABLE!!!!! get a phone call from the dealer to say car is repaired and then hire car is snatched back before i can make arrangements to fetch it!!! damn cheek considering i didn't have a car for 1 month, now i am even more angry as
1 i have to take day off work to go fetch car
2 have to find somebody to take me to swansea to get it
Fiat SUCK

 

[custard]

why the hell did they take the car back?surely you would leave that at the dealers on collection?

 

[mark1962]

Hire car don't forget, but when i collected it they said drop the hire car off at dealers.....didn't give me chance....dealer won't bring it back so i have to find transport for 30 miles....wings perhaps...
probably ask my mum to come with me use her car to get there then she can follow me home...assuming she doesn't have alternate arrangements.
All this because fiat won't pay for extra days hire car to give me chance to pick mine up despite them not even giving me any form of transport for a month....like i said FIAT SUCK

 

[Creamola]

Fiat paid for the AA to transport the car to Swansea.

Can't they pay the AA to transport it back to you?

If not, take a taxi and send the bill to Chris Smith. If he doesn't pay - Small Claims Court.

 

[mark1962]

chris smith who? he has vanished...can't get answer on phone...hasn't contacted or posted,
rely on good ole mum get this sorry assed car back.....wait a few more weeks till i got money coming thru then dump this fiat organisation by exchanging the car for something else with real dealers n management

 

[mark1962]

ok it back home , 30 mile trip and so far no leaks that i can see and engine appeared quiet from cold start sooooo...hopefully things ok
while waiting to be seen i stood amoungst the new grand puntos etc...and didn't even twitch to look closely...lol i wonder why!!!

 

[Nuova500]

glad you got it back TBH you wont get much better service anywhere else, all new car dealers suck not just Fiat! your Pandas fixed now, just keep it and service it yourself.

 

[Jai]

not wishing to jinx you but, dare i ask for an update mark?