Well i got my car serviced a couple weeks ago at Subaru of Gwinnett. The main thing being the oil change. Well a couple night ago i was driving back from Athens when i had a severe driving incident. The engine caught fire. I was driving on the 85 when i heard a pop and saw a load of shit coming from the back of me in my rear view mirror. I thought it was dust intially and i had gone over something. 2 seconds later it is still coming out (at this point i am in the second lane from center at about 930pm so decent amount of cars about). So i switch lanes asap and it is still coming out. Hit the hazards and get onto the hard shoulder as safely as i could. I stop and a huge amount of smoke is coming out of the hood with the hood still down, i hit the trunk release button but didnt lift it up because with my experiences, where there is smoke, there is fire. And me without an extinguisher, what benefit will opening up the hood and exposing myself to an unnecessary risk at the time serve me? I back off from the car and notice a flickering under the engine bay. Duck down... and i see fucking flames on the underside of the car. Called the firemen but they dont make it out for the best part of 10mins and by that point the fire has died out. There was oil everywhere, horrible smell, and people eyeing me up on the side of the highway lookin for trouble. I have never been so pissed off...ever Well i got it towed to SOG after a long wait. Get a call the next day and it turns out the oil plug and came out (that pop noise) and covered the underside with oil. The heat of my car from the long drive then ignited it and proceeded to burn. This was the oil cap that was not put on properly after having its oil changed a couple of weeks ago. It must have been cross threaded or something to allow for it to pop out. In fairness to SOG they admitted to their mistake and repaired it free of charge. All i am left with is the thought of how could one of the most reputable Subaru dealerships in the South fuck up something as simple as an oil change. It's a simple mistake that could have been avoided with time and care but instead my life was at risk. I am very lucky to be safe and i am even more lucky that Subaru make rock hard engines cos this bitch still runs. It got a refill of oil and it worked again. It's ok now but worrying if you ask me.
Damn that really sucks, I'd have them do a leakdown test too to make sure you didnt mess up any internals after spilling oil everywhere.
Ya see that's a problem i have. I'm not technically astute yet. I'm still learning (18) so when they say they fixed the problem and serviced it all again, i assume that they checked the internals. But i guess i can't be too sure and will get in touch.
don't assume it's been tested, get it checked. go through the engine bay your self too, check all hoses and wires to make sure nothing melted.
Something similar to this happen to brian's SK2000, only at a track day at roebling road. Ever since we have always changed our own oil.
yeah, for my s2000, I did all the oil changes except for 1, as I had a free coupon for a reputable honda shop, who was running a track day 2 days later that I was set to attend. During the first session of the track day, my oil filter loosened and my car left a nice line of oil down the front straight of Roebling. I immediately lifted when I saw smoke and pulled over at the end of the straight. Luckily, since we were at the track, the fire crew was at the car within 30 seconds, and put out a small engine fire. I had them tow it back to the paddock, where I looked it over. I put a new filter on the car, 5 quarts of oil, and I was back on the track for my next session. Nothing was ruined. I had the place reimburse me for the oil change, clean up the engine/underbody really good and replace the hood headliner. Their mistake was to use the incorrect oil filter for the car, and not torque it down tight. The bottom line is, try your best to do your own service, as you never know who will fuck it up if you take it somewhere else. In retrospect, I was lucky that it happened on the track, where a fire crew was standing by, and I happened to have an extra oil filter and 5 quarts of oil with me. As for the shop, it was simply an issue of the regular guy not being at work, and a new tech taking care of the oil change... Honda uses the same filter for almost all of their vehicles, except for the s2k, due to the increased oil pressure (9k redline). Best of luck with your car, I hope that nothing was seriously damaged. I would have them do a compression test, and make the engine bay really clean. You might want to have them replace the hood liner if it was burned at all, like mine was. -- Brian
wow, that is bad news. But they made good on it. anything can happen. I changed my own oil and left the filler cap loose once too.
Ill be the first one to call someone out when they screw something up. However.... SHIT HAPPENS I mean seriously, whether it was a loose oil cap or drain plug it doesn't matter, its just human error. I'm not saying I wouldn't be pissed because you have every right to be. Matt
i know u must be upset... problems like these shouldnt happen... but i'm glad they admitted their mistake and fixed it for u free of charge... other dealerships could have said that since the oil was changed a few weeks ago, it wasnt their fault... i have heard of worse stories coming from people who did their oil change at corner shops... they ended up draining their transmission fuild instead
in all fairness to our shop, we did make a mistake and it looks like the drain plug wan't tightened down as much as it needed to be. but we did check out the car for damage (no compression test, but visually and mechanically tested) and the threads on the oil pan were not damaged. we changed the oil filter, put a new plug in it, and filled it with oil. after the bottom was cleaned, i drove the vehicle myself to check it out. everything was/is fine. everyone knows that if there is a problem that comes up due to our mistake, we'll take care of it. we totally dig the business that wrxatlanta.com members bring us and do not want to upset the good relationship that we have.
very true to that statement, and the only reason I still bring my car there...that and every other dealer's service sucks
Just having trouble seeing how it could happen. I mean... there's torque specs right? I know I don't torque it down when I change my own but I would think the dealership would(hell, I would if I had a torque wrench), it takes 2 seconds... I would expect it from jiffy lube but not SOG. Just glad they made it right 4 u...
7wolf, so would you say there is any chance of problems with the internals and compression? also for my troubles can i get any subaru/prodrive stuff? Or discounts if i try to order anything through you?
Yeah, I mean that says alot about them. It doesn't sound like they tried to hassle you at all or deny responsibility.
Don't get me started on Jiffy Lube:evil: ....lets just say from my experience, my filter would never be coming off...:squint:
Good thing your ok and double good that sog did the right thing. I always have taken my car there for oil changes cause I have yet to trust anyone else to do it. most of the time after they check/change on my car I'm on my way out of town so that could have easily happened to me also. "to err is human to make it right is devine"
Yeah, Scotty B...I finally got that damn oil filter off for ya...what a pain....LOL...They must have used super glue on it... Mark
We do apologize for that situation. I think they did make sure that it got all cleaned up, if not, please let us know and we will make sure that it is much cleaner than when it came to us in the first place I personally would rather a technician do everything on my car because the chances of him screwing up are WAY lower than me (on wrenching, not tuning ) One advantage of having the oil changed here is that if it had caused damage to the motor, we would have fixed it... if you change it yourself, and something happens, then what... I hope that this doesn't shake people's confidence too much. We do a LOT of work here and our number of "come-backs" is REALLY REALLY low. Again I apologize that it happened in the first place, and please know that we will always stand behind our work. SS
I hate hearing you went through all that hassle with your car, but even the better auto repair shops/people can make the occasional mistake due to human error. For a while I have heard mostly positive thing's about Subaru of Gwinett's service department, and my personal experiences with their service department have been great. It's reassuring to me hearing that SoG accepted responsibility and took steps to fix the issue. -Jerald
If you pulled over right after you saw the oil or smoke then you should be fine, you would be amazed how long a motor will run with no oil in it. Matt
I just want to state, for the record, that I have NOTHING todo with this situation. I do not have come-backs. :banana: Sorry about the issue....I remember the car comming in for service, and then comming back in rather soon. I had no idea what was going on either time as I was not the technician working on it. However, I will be much more involved than ever before come the end of August.... more like...score the bearings.... block cracking happens when your drive around on blown headgaskets.
As far as his profile shows, he is driving a naturally aspirated 2.5RS... What is happening at the end of August, if you dont mind me asking? Either way, it should be a good thing for the SoG service dept.
sorry, late to this thread... was this related to this TSB? 04V473000 SAFETY RECALL - OIL FLOW CONTROL VALVE COVER BOLTS 2004-10-08 anyway, at least the dealer admitted it and offered to take steps to fix it. this was for a 2004 impreza.
No, not related to that. it was related to....WARNING!!!!!! OIL PAN DRAIN PLUG TIGHTENING SPECIFICATIONS: TIGHT not LOOSE :lol:
sorry to get back to you so late, but like i said i think that the engine should be fine. if you get anything installed here then i'll throw a 10% discount at ya. sound cool?
We do FULL swaps only. If you swap motor, wiring harness, ecu, and dash, it all bolts in. If not you have to splice in the engine harness to the body harness. The splice job is 30+ hours... SS