02 Passat

Only one suggestion, find another dealer!

"about to fail", VW pays for parts which fail not normally for the ones about to fail. CV boots are one of them things that they are good or bad, bad being they are split and tossing grease al over everything. And... I can't remember if I ever replaced one with only 46k miles on, but then again it maybe different in your area depending the weather conditions, etc. Wondering, how did you figure the "about to fail" conclusion?

Woodchuck, A private, highly experienced, mechanic noticed it while changing my brakepads. The one boot was severely cracked but had not yet split. The mechanic had his own business for 10 years then went to work for Saturn as a field engineer. He currently works for GM on warranty issues for a region . He maintains his own business on a limited scale in addition to his GM job. He has a fair amount of VW experience. I rely on him to maintain both of our cars. He is reasonable and I can fully trust his opinion.

He said that they should be covered under the warranty. The main point is that the warranty was 2 weeks from expiring. VW should have been proactive, especially considering the problems and service hassles that we have had with this car. It took four dealer visits, and three incidents of overheating for VW dealers to fix a bad water pump. Then VW would not give me a component letter to extend the engine warranty. This is our fourth VW and very likely the last. Fun car, well designed, Fair reliability BUT bad service and little support from the US headquarters. My wife's 85 Jetta had the heater block replaced out of warranty. Now we go through this.