I think I'm being royally screwed by the dealership that I purchased my car from in January. I bought a new Mustang Mach 1 and it had problems/issues almost immediately:
1 ) Passenger side rear wheel made a intermittent "rubbing" noise (as if the pad was hitting the disc on part of the revolution) 2 ) The paint (which I hadn't notice until I first washed it) had stranged "caked-on" chips in the seams between the rear/forward bumper where it meets the rest of the case - as if the car had been repainted. 3 ) On my first trip with the car from Houston to Dallas the ABS dummy light would come on intermittently (related to the rear wheel issue? 4 ) Passenger side door has is dropped by about 1/8 to 1/2 an inch. 5 ) Missing mud guard from the inside of the front bumper... 6 ) A/C is not working (clutch would cut off just as soon as it started) 7 ) and, various other issues that may not be related to my question...Even though these problems were noticed all within the first week due to a very, very busy work schedule I havn't had time until this week to take the car back to have it looked at (okay...I had some free time but I was having too much fun driving it despite the problems to put it in immediately - besides nothing appeared to be urgent). The next day, the service department calls me and asks if I had replaced the passenger-side rear tire since it did not come from the same lot as the other three tires which, of course, I hadn't replaced. Two days after that I call them to get an update and am told that:
1 ) The right rear axle is bent (not covered by the warranty since it's "damaged" and will cost over $500 to fix) 2 ) The strut is leaking severely 3) They've ordered a new rear bumper for the car - they said they had ordered a Mach 1 rear bumper but when they got it in it was the wrong one and they discovered that the Mach 1 took the GT rear bumper instead (I thought this was weird since they make a Mach 1 bumper and it doesn't fit a Mach 1) 3 ) and, various other fixes/etc. (AC compressor has a leak, no history in chip about the ABS light)Obviously, what stuck out most to me was the bent axle. Seems strange to me that this car has only 4200 miles (with about 3500 of them shuttling between Houston and Dallas along I45 which is very smooth) and is babied on the road would have a bent axle - and is bent on the right which apparently had the tire replaced at some point.
So, now I'm in a disagreement with this dealership - they are claiming that I most likely bent the axle in some sort of accident, replaced the tire that was damaged, and am trying to pass the car back to try to get it fixed for free. My claim is that something happened to the car on the lot prior to my purchasing it and someone (or the dealership in general) covered it up/didn't keep the records. Regardless, I'm apparently just out of luck since they can't see in there records of any work or damge on the car and since their records don't show anything - then it couldn't of been them.
I'm hoping that someone can clear up some of my questions and maybe offer me some guidance:
1) I know pot holes, curbs, off-roading could cause a bent-axle. But, wouldn't any incident that results in a bent-axle be a pretty memorable experience? It's not possible that I could of hit an innocuous looking pot-hole that caused it? From the research I've done just tonight almost every case of a bent axle was from an accident...could I be wrong?2) The dealership keeps saying that the tire came from a different lot than the other three tires. This tells me that there is a number or other identification on the tire itself that shows what lot it came from. Is this true? If so, then couldn't the dealership just check that number and find out where it came from and, more importantly, who put the tire on (such as another dealership, the factory, etc...). I don't know enough about tires and the "lot" information to make a guess on this subject. Can someone enlighten me, please?
3) Besides the dealership, who else could of have done work on the car and how could I retrieve this information? If the car is damaged in-route to the dealership does the transport company repair the vehicle and just transport the car at a later date or is the car just scrapped when that occurs? Do dealerships swap cars in/out periodically (the dealership in question is Champion Ford HWY 6 in Houston, TX which is a part of Auto Nation) with other dealerships? If they are swapped, then would work/damage on the car at one dealership show up on the records at the other dealership? Again, I don't know how all that works - I'm curious about how I can trace the car's history (I've already done a Carfax report and it showed nothing)...4) My biggest concern is that it's starting to look like I bought a car that was damaged and wasn't informed as I am assuming I should have been. How do I go about getting this car inspected for damage that was covered up (or is it possible)? Do I just hunt down some ASE certified mechanic, tell him/her the story, and see what they dig up? Or, is it better to take it to a body-repair shop since I would think they know about covering up wrecks and have them inspect it?
5) Any other information that anyone can provide me would be extremely helpful. Similiar experiences, dealership/factory/transport processes and how they keep records on service/damage/tires, how do dealerships loan out cars to their dealers, etc... *Anything* would be be appreciated as I'm a little out of league in dealing with all this....