I married into a '96 Jetta with 75k miles. It's given us nothing but trouble since then. Last month, I had all the belts, the water pump, and the front strut mounts replaced to the tune of $900. Now it won't start, and the dealer says both the ignition switch AND the starter need to be replaced ($750). It has a lot of miscellaneous electrical problems, too. Does anyone know of a good VW mechanic in San Antonio? I'm thinking of fixing it and selling it.
Sorry to hear this. I have a 95 Jetta and its a garbage can too, but I was dumb enough to buy it used. My biggest problems are the crappy electric windows that fall down because their plastic retaining clips have cracked and broken. The other problem includes the little dashboard light showing an engine with a lightning bolt through it which turns on whenever there is a lot of humidity around or its raining somewhere in the state of Texas. I was going to replace the spark plug wires (there are only 4 of them), then the Napa salesperson quoted me a price of $134 + tax!!!!!!!! For FOUR spark plug wires???!!!
If you really want to get rid of the thing and make money, I think good strategy might be to dissasemble the car and start selling the parts on eBay. Judging from the VW fanatics that post on this newsgroup, there will be enough suckers to buy used, disfunctional, VW parts for whatever your asking price is.
I'm in San Antonio too. Another misguided fellow here at work purchased a
2002 VW Beatle which he constantly has in the shop at the Rod East dealership. He seems real happy with the loaner car that they give him to drive...God, next time I'm getting a Ford Focus and I bet the 4 spark plug wires will cost $30 at Wal Mart. German engineers built good concentration camps, but they really design lousy, mass-produced cars.
You can get wires at germanautoparts.com for $57, which is still expensive, but not quite so rediculous as that NAPA price. VW also just extended the warranty on the plastic window regulators, and you can probably get yours replaced for free at any dealership.
An eight year old car in need of ignition wires doesn't sound too much like a garbage can to me.
-ekk
I forgot to mention those damned $180Cnd wire set and $50 silver spark plug. After totally more than $2500 repairing, it still junk over there.
John
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