Dont EVER go to Gerald Jones Subaru in Augusta

Discussion in 'Product & Service Reviews' started by ~The_Duke~, Aug 6, 2009.

  1. ~The_Duke~

    ~The_Duke~ Member

    EVER!!!!

    So my story starts... I find an STi on their website, I like it I buy it cas it is a good price and the car is in good shape (or so I thought). I buy the Subaru certified used car warranty, all is well.

    I drive around Augusta visit a couple places, it gets to be about 6pm on saturday. My GF gets a little tired of riding with the windows down so I turn on the air, it gets cold for a couple mins then starts blowing warm...

    Problem #1 is found: the AC failed ~4 hours after buying the car.

    So... the reason why the AC failed was because of some dry rotted AC lines, and it needed a recharge cas it all leaked out.

    So the AC doesnt work, that is a simple quick fix no big deal so I go ahead and drive home because the dealership is already closed. I drive around alil more and I am having trouble finding 4th gear (or so I thought). I was having trouble finding\getting into 4th gear smooth, I thought it was because the gear box was spaced out ALOT more than my sentra was. It didnt concern me at the time, but it was the first warning sign of what was to come. I drive 3 hours home to gainesville, right before I get there I decide I am going to get on it alil bit on a back road. I run it up to about 10psi in 3rd at about 75% throttle then granny shift to 4th, I let the clutch out and give it alil gas again. Car pops out of gear all of a sudden, I try to put it back into 4th and it wont go at all.

    Problem #2 is found: 4th syncro and gear fork are broke 1 day after buying the car.

    All the other gears work fine so I drive it around for 3 days while the dealership is trying to figure out what as*hole to shove their heads' up. They say they are bring me a loaner car to drive til they can fix the car. During these 3 days I am listening to the radio, I go over a bump. The radio cuts in and out, I am PISSED. Then I fade the stereo all the way to all 4 speakers to check to make sure they work, 3\4 work. Then I ride around some more, hit some more bumps, and then the stereo putting out sound to the speakers all together.

    Problem #3 is found: Sh*tty wiring that was missed in the check over.

    So the come pick up the car, and start fixing it. The 2nd day my KIA optima loaner car is with me, the check engine light comes on in it... yes ANOTHER car they are trying to sell has an check engine light. It is running ok, so I let them know and keep driving it for 10.5 WEEKS. That is right almost 3 months...

    I get national customer service involved and they pay for 1.5 months of my car payment and they poke the dealership so they move faster and communicate better. The entire time they had the car I had to pull teeth and light fires under people's a*ses to even find out what the progress on my car was. They only returned 2 or 3 phone calls the ENTIRE 3 month period.

    Since it is under warranty of course I was not charged for the work, that was the 1 good thing about this whole story.

    Now for the stuff that prompted me to type this novel cas I am so PISSED about the quality of their work.

    I Auto-X, so I checked my car out before leaving for the Auto-X and everything was fine. I get the Auto-X and the battery tie down is lose for no apparent reason when I am checked for tech. I fix it, and move on. So I pop my hood tonight when I got home to let the car cool off for an oil change, and look at the battery tie down again. Given the cluster f*ck of wiring by the back tie down bar it was very hard to see until I moved some of it around. Yup they have a tie down bar on there that doesnt even fit into the hook hole thing that keep the bar put so you can screw down the top, and for those are you that have your mouth open it gets BETTER.

    I start digging around in there to see if I can get this hook thing in the hole without modding the tie down bar. I find multiple parts of the original battery tie down stuff that had fallen down under the battery amongst the wires. The reason why they were down there is one of the dealership trained monkeys with learning problems has crossthreaded the sh*t out of the top threads of the bars. This helped me fix the new\wrong ones to work properly, but christ do it right the first time. It is a battery tie down... my 5 year old daughter could figure out how to work it properly given 5 minutes and a package of gummie snacks.

    Then I start taking off the scrub tray, they broke part of my scrub tray taking it off, 1 of my pop clips is missing, and 2 out of the 3 bolts holding the front part have the heads broken off cas someone with a TQ gun got trigger happy.

    Then I look toward the transmission and center diff area... I dont know the answer to this right now cas I just cleaned it a couple mins ago, it is COVERED in oily looking grim sh*t that is common with a fluid leak. Most likely, and my fingers crossed it is just the old stuff they didnt clean off. So I cleaned off a spot, so tomorrow I am going to check to see if it is leaking or are they just sloppy.

    This dealership has done some of the sh*ttist once over inspection jobs I have EVER come across since I have been working with and around cars, not to mention bad customer service and straight up lying to me. They WILL not be getting my business EVER again, and I urge EVERYONE that reads this to do this same.
     
  2. Ben@TTR

    Ben@TTR Member

    damn dude!... Good luck getting everything straightened out.
     
  3. SonicBoom

    SonicBoom Active Member

    Pretty crappy story man... sorry to hear it...
     
  4. ~The_Duke~

    ~The_Duke~ Member

    Most of it is already cleared up, I am just worried about the possible tranny fluid leak. If it is leaking, I guess I need to pay a visit to mr. king.

    The little stuff with the scrape tray and battery tie down is less than $20 to get stuff to fix.
     
  5. Jake

    Jake Active Member

    Yeah I've been following this on 4touge, just be glad you haven't paid for it. Take it to king and make sure you continue to not pay a dime. Any and everything should be on mr Gerald jones.
     
  6. ~The_Duke~

    ~The_Duke~ Member

    So I drove it around alil bit last night and let it sit this morning the spot on the seal that I clean is still clean and still dry, so I dont think it is leaking.

    It is still running great, so I am not worried.

    I just need to get some bolts and pop clips for the scrape tray.
     
  7. Matt

    Matt Think before you post Staff Member Supporting Member

    what did they do about 4th gear?
     
  8. ~The_Duke~

    ~The_Duke~ Member

    They rebuilt the transmission replacing all the parts that were broke.

    They had to shim it, replace the gear fork, syncros, and the tech damaged a drive shaft so a got a new one of those.
     
  9. DiRtYHyEnA

    DiRtYHyEnA New Member

    wow that sucks.Gerald Jones is the worst. trust me there are way more horror stories.

    being that im from disgusta :(
     
  10. Wow.. that's awful... we just bought our 2nd 04 wrx from Troncalli.... so far so good... no warranty on it.. that scared me a little but the hubs checked everything out.. looks ok...

    I would definitely notify Subaru directly of what happened... that type of dealership shouldn't be allowed to sell Subies...
     
  11. RoMe

    RoMe Active Member

    Hey Duke this might suck but what about giving that thing back to them and getting your money back? I dont know how much you paid for it but there are plenty other STI's out there maybe at the same price that are in way better shape.
     
  12. oneiguy

    oneiguy Active Member

    true. sok can pretty much find what ever sti you want in a few days.
     
  13. gotsol

    gotsol Active Member

    the 6 Speed is a pretty sophisticated transmission and it takes some special tools. You need a pretty good tec to put it back together correctly
     
  14. ~The_Duke~

    ~The_Duke~ Member

    They know what happened, they were paying my car payments for 1.5 months during the whole deal.
     
  15. ~The_Duke~

    ~The_Duke~ Member

    They offered that the first 2 weeks, then they stopped offering that cas they broke my Sentra some how after that.
     
  16. RoMe

    RoMe Active Member

    Wow that dealership for the MFTL then
     
  17. Mike@TTR

    Mike@TTR Active Member

    Wow, sorry to hear about all the issues you had with this car. We actually had a great experience there with a certified pre-owned. I guess it just depends on how well the car was maintained previously. I always try to check the car over myself as the pre-owned stuff is usually a worthless inspection.
     
  18. FACE

    FACE Active Member


    I would make them show you the certifications of the tech to work on 6MT's Duke ;)

    sorry to hear this man...lord knows I have dealt with my share of problems with these cars :(
     

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