Firestone forgot the oil

Sadly I have to agree with you here.... all too often this is exactly how the game is played. Seems a pity to me.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

................When , you negotiate from a position of strength , shouldn't you Always ask for , MORE , than you expect to receive ? After ALL , Fs has already admitted responsibility by their initial offer of a used engine ! , fordy

Which was a good, fair, and more than reasonable offer considering they were not the only ones with some responsibility here. What more should anyone ask for? Take their offer and go on with life, no "power negotiations" required, and certainly no lawyers needed. How much MORE than fair should anyone demand?

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

Hopefully you won't get too caught up in the "advice" here and shoot yourself in the foot. Any national engine REMANUFACTURER will offer a solid warranty, and be a perfectly acceptable engine for your van. I have used Jasper engines and a transmissions from Ford's official remanufacturer. In each case, they come with warranties that exceed the original, include labor to repair or replace defective parts, , towing and replacement rental car service, and are highly regarded by friends of ours that do this for a living.

If you follow some of these folks, and decide you have all the cards, you might get told to pound sand, and really learn exactly how much you REALLY control this deal. Wouldn't be the first time an insurance adjuster told a problem customer that they can take the deal, or hope a lawyer can find them a better one. After a year of battling, and 4-5K in legal fees, you may end up really teaching a giant soulless corporation a lesson, or not.........

With diagnostics which would show any possible danger signs, offering a replacement motor is an SYA move covered by insurance. It's a guarantee that anything bad that happens 10 years down the road isn't going to be blamed on it. Also, since it was apparently driven another 600 miles before something else went wrong, it wouldn't be worth the aggravation of claiming that the "wonky" lights may be something totally unrelated to the oil problem. Easiest thing for all is just swap motors and not make an issue of it.

Martin

Wait a minute ... clearly I missed something ... 600 miles? We drove 600 miles on a seized engine? I've got to work on my reading comprehension, or learn to not rely on just snippets of quoted text.

Um, Miss Paisley, that being the case, you're going to have a hard time proving at all that they did anything wrong. 600 miles is a lot of miles and time ... anything could have happened. 600 miles after the fact and they could have just laughed you out of the store.

If they'll give you a good warranty on a rebuilt engine, then I think you may just need to take the deal and run with it, sweetheart. Your leverage is kind of gone on this one.

I'd say full cost of the rebuilt engine and its installation, plus a 6 month or 100k warranty and you're coming out well ahead of the game.

And watch those dashboard gauges! Gets me too sometimes. I spend too much time fiddling with the radio and not enough time checking the gauges.

They came and put oil in it, OK she drove on as that was what they told her. Later the lights came on, went to the dealer, they say a rebuilt motor, Firestone agrees. Car manufactures have engines that don't make the grade, are pulled and torn down to fix the problem. Same warrantee as new, these are what are used in these situations. Used cars don't get a brand new engine unless it is a year or less old. My MIL got one of these engines when the top end went bad on her car at 60,000 miles, never had another problem with the engine in the 12 years since the replacement. Although, when she did get the car back, she drove it home and over the bump in the garage approach and the suspension bolt fell out and the car dropped on the concrete. The motor mount bolt holds the suspension together and they didn't use new bolts as were recommended and they didn't use locktite and the bolt came loose. Dealer was very embarrassed....James

Similar thing happened to me when I worked at a dealership. Didn't forget the oil though.

I worked at a GM/Caddy dealership and someone brought their Dodge Minivan to see Mr Quicklube (me). I put it up and drained the oil while I went to the parts window to get the filter/oil. There was some confusion over what filter to use (X-ref GM fitler to Dodge Filter) but they figured it out.

I went back, put the filter on filled it and sent them on their merry way in less than 29 minutes. Everyone was happy.

Until they called back later that afternoon and we sent the tow truck. They had parked at the convenince store and left the minivan running while they went in. When they came back out there was a huge puddle of oil and the engine was seized.

Turns out the filter they gave me was the wrong one of this one/or this one. The threads had lined up and it screwed on, but by chance the threads had barely sealed. The hole was too big and when the engine went through a couple of heat cycles the seal was gone.

I thought for sure I was gonna be fired, but my very cool boss realized it wasn't my fault. The garage carried insurance, as do all garages, that would pay for any damages. I broke a windshield once too, but that's another story.

We put in a rebuilt shortblock, which is basically the major parts of an engine. We reused a lot of the stuff from their old one.

They made out in the deal, but that's how life's lottery works sometimes. Their 29-minute guaranteed oil change got them a new engine in their 100K+ mile POS Dodge minivan.

Firestone's insurance should pay for everything, not a used engine.

A re-built engine is nothing to cry about as long as you have a nice long warrantee. Lots of people use them for a very long time with no problems at all.

Why did you take it to that dealership if you knew they were crooks? Is your vehicle still under warrantee? A dealership is the last place you normally want to take a car for anything other than warrantee and recall work.

I need to go by the dealership to get an OEM specific part tomorrow. Want to guess how many times they will try to sell me a new car?

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Avondale, AZ

Yep, even if the male is mechanically clueless it tends to cut down on the amount of BS thrown your way.

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Avondale, AZ

The lights didn't come on until Wednesday. And they lit up like a Christmas tree; there is no way I would have missed them being on before then. I'd never seen so many lights ....

Thanks for the help ....

Hey..........

Well you gotta point. We have to be good for something.

The dashboard in my wife's suburban (Chevy 97) has about a billion lights too. Something went wrong in it awhile back and it lit up like the cockpit of an F-16. Heck, I don't even know what half of those lights are supposed to mean. Still can't figure out what the one that looked like a caveman shaking a club was supposed to mean. Watch out for Neanderthals?

If you have anything in writing acknowledging their boo boo, then you should, at a minimum, be able to get an new engine at least as good as the one they ruined. All at their cost. You are not responsible for monitoring a situation where they put no oil back in your car. If they balk, start tossing around terms like "my lawyer" and "pain and suffering damages" and that will get the ball rolling. I am not a sue-happy type, but also, if one wrecks your property via negligence, they need to make things right.

Ah - pain and suffering - here's what really happened - see - I was driving the car and all of a sudden the motor seized up because they forgot to put oil back into it -see - the car stopped so suddenly with such a violent shake that I got severe whiplash - see - now I'm in terrible pain - can't move my head either - see- must have hurt my back too - can't hardly move - see - probably won't be able to work the rest of my life - see - ouch - it even hurts me when I type - a lawyer says we could get millions - all this because of some oil - see -

\

Wouldn't fly! When the computer shuts the motor down for any reason, the vehicle coasts to a stop.

Martin

I've had two engines get destroyed on me before (both due to oil situations) and both of them coasted to a stop. Both were in a 1966 Chevy C60 which had no computer system. One engine seized and the other threw a rod. Neither of them locked up the drive train (on a standard transmission).

We had a Nissan Pathfinder, it was about 2 years old. We were moving across country. We towed the car behind our motorhome. When we got to the end of the trip the Pathfinder started up, went about 2 blocks and the engine seized.
Turns out when it was inspected there were loose bolts inside the engine. During towing they shook around inside the engine and once started they ate the inside of the engine up. Toyota owned right up to it, replaced the entire engine with a brand new one and we had the car for about 9 more years. Ran great, never any problem.
Alice in Virginia

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There is nothing any worse than an angry little old lady, they've had a lifetime to learn all the dirty tricks and people get upset if you hit them!

Not that it matters much, but was it a Nissan or a Toyota?

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their fault. new engine AND lifetime oil changes and tire rotations
L