AA pre buy engineer inspection

ando

Hey all,

I'm looking at buying a car but I want to get it checked over by the AA first. I'm buying from a private seller. The problem is the AA said they need to look under the car and need the car to be on a ramp or elevator lift type thing to look under the car. What do I do here? do I have to rent out one of those things from a garage and ask the seller to turn up and meet the engineer? The car I'm buying is from Monaghan, Carrickmacross

any advice?

camarobill

kill two birds with one stone,find the nearest good garage and get them to look at it on there ramps,the aa man is only an ex garage man,more then likely

lomb

the aa arent even any good. i had a pretty bad experiance with them. he reakoned the respray paint that had visible blotches and dirt stuck (was really bad)in it was fine, after we had a car repaired in a simi garage. he took the side of the garage because the garage owner was an simi member and known in the trade even though verbally he told me it was totally unacceptable and when the written report came by post 2 days later everything was grand :mad:

never get a test done from the aa. tiotal cowboys and unprofessional to boot.

Mayshine

What ya buying mate?

DW

De Hipster

ando wrote:

Hey all,

I'm looking at buying a car but I want to get it checked over by the AA first. I'm buying from a private seller. The problem is the AA said they need to look under the car and need the car to be on a ramp or elevator lift type thing to look under the car. What do I do here? do I have to rent out one of those things from a garage and ask the seller to turn up and meet the engineer? The car I'm buying is from Monaghan, Carrickmacross

any advice?

Bring a mechanic with you...no real need for ramps & he/she'll be more reliable than the local guy who's been slipped a friendly €50.

ando

De Hipster wrote:

Bring a mechanic with you...

Yea thats what I ended up doing. I got a friendly mechanic in a Renault dealership to look at the car during his lunch break, turned out the car was fine except a spring was broke at the back of one of the headlights! The AA wanted, get this.... €350 to check the car!! Complete rip off

Mayshine wrote:

What ya buying mate?

Hey Dave, hows it going!

I'm buying a Seat Leon 1.9 TDI 110, the owner said she's chipped/remapped so I think she's putting out about 130Bhp and 173+ lbs torque. I'm gona get a dyno done on it to see exactly what the power is!



Well at least its a tad bit faster than the 1.4! I was seriously thinking bout the TdCI 115 Focus but their more rare than the Leon. I was playing with the idea of a 1.8 20V Turbo Leon (180BHP), chip it and they put out about 195, some even 200Bhp but the insurance quote was mental, they wanted €1500 on top of my current policy!! Think I'll wait for another yr before I can afford something that fast!

fletch

ando wrote:

That Leon looks mint! *me very jealous*

Mayshine

Lovely car, mate, love the colour and wheels too. Should haul very nicely low down.

Drove around in the BMW 320d for while and found it a nice drive once you get used to the noise

Enjoy it mate

Dave

DublinWriter

It's horses for courses. You put your finger on it there, they completely check under the car and you get a full engineer's report. Normally they'll come out and collect the car from the buyer, inspect it thrououghly for a few hours and return it. You don't need to be around.

Sure it's expensive, but to be honest, the AA saved me from buying two complete pigs in the past.

I've brought €50 mechanics out to look at cars before, and to be honest, they were just glorified tyre-kickers.

It's also important that you get a full service history with the car. Beware of any ex-UK registered cars that came in pre-2000 and were re-registered here. Most are MOT failures.

ando

Mayshine wrote:

Lovely car, mate, love the colour and wheels too. Should haul very nicely low down.

Drove around in the BMW 320d for while and found it a nice drive once you get used to the noise

Thanks m8, I'm thinking about upgrading the calipers cause the brakes are no were as good as yours, also thinking about Cupra R alloys! She's mighty in 2nd and 3rd, very nippy. Sure if your on the north side give us a shout and we can take a spin, if you can stand the noise

unkel

Good luck with the new car, ando. And there was me thinking you'd go Focus again

AA / RAC inspection is expensive, but you get full report and I'm not sure, but you might have some come back if they got something wrong

Got my car tested by my friendly trusted garage, including mechanicals and a test drive by the main engineer and a hook-up and read-out of ECU for €50 :eek:

It was a condition of me buying it (after sale was agreed but not completed) that I take the car to a garage of my choice (on my own) for a test. Probably the best €50 I've ever spent...

lomb

unkel wrote:

Got my car tested by my friendly trusted garage, including mechanicals and a test drive by the main engineer and a hook-up and read-out of ECU for €50 :eek:
.

can u pm me name of garage 50 euro is ridiculously cheap, seeing as the aa charge 300+, but u are right there might be some comeback with the AA....

unkel

lomb wrote:

can u pm me name of garage 50 euro is ridiculously cheap, seeing as the aa charge 300+, but u are right there might be some comeback with the AA....

It's based on a 4 year "relationship" between myself and the garage - no way would they only charge that for someone they don't know. The garage is a small family run business (father, son and 3 other mechanics - mother does the books) specialised in BMW and Merc but they do any car

Paul (MN)

I nearly bought a 96 (I think) 325 coupe once. I had the AA check it out for €350. I think there were a bit anal about some points but I guess they have to be thorough.

The car had a problem (I was told about) with the ABS light coming on intermittently and some sensors had been replaced and nothing could be found wrong, so I was pretty OK with it, but the AA guy poined out that if I was in a crash and it was found that the ABS wasn't functioning, that I wouldn't be covered.

So I decided to play safe and didn't buy it.
I still think €350 is kindof expensive. They did take the car for 4 hours though and the inspection was very very thorough.

ando

fair play Unkel, that was a great deal, €50! I remember the AA used to charge €200 for the check, thats what it cost on my last car but I dont think they have any competition at all doing this, that would explain the €350 costs, I dont even think the RAC do it

Ernie Ball

Informative thread. Here's a question for you all.

Would you pay to have a car independently checked out if you were buying from a dealer?

Paul (MN)

I would!

As far as I can tell, dealers just take cars in, valet them (sometimes) and stick a price on them. If there is a problem afterwards they try to fob you off and dodge you.

If they are unsuccessful they could take the car back and offload it somewhere else.

jhegarty

Paul (MN) wrote:

I would!

As far as I can tell, dealers just take cars in, valet them (sometimes) and stick a price on them. If there is a problem afterwards they try to fob you off and dodge you.

If they are unsuccessful they could take the car back and offload it somewhere else.

i got a 12 month warrenty with my 106 (from t&c waterford). The breaks failed a few months in , it was fixed next day no questions and not even the hint of a bill.

Paul (MN)

my point is, is that you were sold a car, by a dealer, with crap brakes. you would think a dealer woudl fix things like brakes before selling. if you end up with something more serious than brakes then the warranty might not cover it and you can bet they will dodge you.

jhegarty

Paul (MN) wrote:

my point is, is that you were sold a car, by a dealer, with crap brakes. you would think a dealer woudl fix things like brakes before selling. if you end up with something more serious than brakes then the warranty might not cover it and you can bet they will dodge you.

this was a leak that started to drain the break fluid.. started having a problem 4 or 5 months after getting it ... i can't imagine the problem were there the whole time...

ando

Ernie Ball wrote:

Would you pay to have a car independently checked out if you were buying from a dealer?

oh yea, I did that on my first car when buying from a Southside Ford dealer, also got the Reg checked out for any history. Turned out nothing was wrong with it so I bought it, but the first car I was interested in turned out to have been used in a robbery in Blanch, no tax paid, and was repossessed by Ford.... but the Ford dealer said to me it was owned by 1 careful lady middle aged owner and had no history... Liars!