In November 2002, we purchased a new VW Passat GLS wagon. We experienced no major problems with this vehicle until recently. In March of this year, VW issued a safety recall of our original fuel pump. On May 8, May 12, and June 21 of this year, our fuel pump failed and had to be replaced each time. Each of the three incidents left a pregnant mother stranded with her 2 and 3-year-old children.

Initially, the service manager at Seacoast Volkswagen in Greenland, NH, blamed Volkswagen of America for sending them more faulty fuel pumps to replace the original faulty fuel pumps that had been recalled. After the third failed and replaced fuel pump, VW changed their story and began to blame the ethanol content in this region’s gasoline. The Volkswagen of America representative I spoke with blamed the “”German engineers”" for designing a fuel pump that isn’t compatible with our fuel.

The dealership’s service advisor handed us a written list of “”safe”" local gas stations that they have “”personally tested for ethanol content.”" What if we drive out of the local area? Good question! We refuse to be Volkswagen’s guinea pigs any longer, hoping that they figured it out this time; that if we go to the specific local gas stations on their list, we should be okay. We have always used gasoline from reputable distributors.
We are not risking the lives of our family and other motorists by driving this unstable and unsafe vehicle. We had it towed from the dealership after the last repair and it has been sitting in our driveway for three weeks. We have begun the arbitration process under the lemon law and are demanding a full refund for this vehicle. After reading the other fifty-one complaints on the NHTSA database about 2003 VW Passat fuel pumps, we know we made the right decision.

Edited by tanteshell on 08/25/06 at 6:58 AM

Edited by tanteshell on 08/25/06 at 6:58 AM

Thanks, Paul, for the long overdue upgrade and redesign. But is it all for naught? Recent angry contributions to the site have been almost exclusively written by folks who don’t even own the brand anymore (Hi, Chombi & VWVictim!). Sure, the occasional oil sludge issue or window complaint finds its way here, but the legions of angry, dissatisfied owners have, largely, evaporated like spilled 92 octane on the fender of a black GTI. In Barstow. In July.

Has VW finally dragged its very recently unreliable ass out of the ditch? Have those of us who owned VWs during their darkest hours finally worked the bugs out of our cars? Looks like it might be so. On both counts.

To this day planning a 300 mile drive causes me to consider renting a car rather than driving the VW. I still don’t entirely trust it, but I still love it.

I fully expect, someday soon, to type in vwsucks.com and instead get “”Server Not Found.”"

Edited by Motorrad on 08/24/06 at 10:42 PM

Edited by Motorrad on 08/24/06 at 10:44 PM

Over a year ago I recoded this site from rick’s original ASP/Access to PHP/MySql. At the time, I simply ported it with very few changes in design and added a few new features. I did it pretty quickly, though, so there were quite a few problems, particularly with search functionality.

Here’s your new redesign, with a far more important upgrade in the engine behind it. But being a one-man shop doing this outside company time, you can imagine that no matter how well I try to test the software, a few bugs will always manage to sneak through.

For the moment, the core of the site is up. I have taken down the resources pages while I overhaul it. The dealership experiences page I’ve taken down permanently. It was a nice idea, but seeing as only seven people used it in year it was up it obviously was not what people intended to view when visiting this site. Actually, now that the search is much more robust, there really isn’t a need for either page in their previous incarnation.

Anyway, that’s that. If there are any issues please use the contact form to let me know.

I got this by email and am relaying the text:

I am not usually one to complain, but after sven years of Beetle
headaches, I am prompted to let fly- I purchased my Beetle 1.9 TDI new in
January ‘99, and soon discovered what I had gottn myself into-3 major
engine repairs, five window regulator replacements, too many window
switches to count, numerous AC repairs, truck locks/door locks falling apart,
excessive oil leaks and comsumption, interior trim breaking, and more.
All repair work has been performed at VW dealerships, and the
collection of repair records looks like a long novel. Currently the driver’s
window regulator is broken again, the fuel door switch is bad again, and
the AC doesn’t work. The dealer wants $1500 to fix it this time… For
a car nobody wants in trade. VW SUCKS