I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee claim

[stephen]

I'm taking delivery of my new California in a weeks time, I've  heard on the 'Facebook Californian club' some time back, that most of the problems people have these vehicles, are  people simply not knowing how to treat them, when you first get acquainted with them, and things start breaking off,  if you're not too careful, 
 Is this true?
and if so,
 what sort of things do you think I need to be careful of. Considering I have had no previous experience with these sorts of vehicles?
And my previous vehicle was a 'Landrover defender. 2.4 SX 90'.....

Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

 

[calikev]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

One of the most important things to remember is when lowering the roof make sure the air in the van can escape
ie open a window or the side door otherwise the roof bellows are forced out catching the canvas in the roof mechanism
I always just poke my head up to make sure the canvas bellows inwards. Oh and don't force anything.
Good luck

 

[KernowLad]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Welcome! Guess what we sold to part fund our California? A 2.4 110 defender xs! Ours was a bit of a pain to be honest.

I'd second the above - take care with the roof and also watch for the diesel particulate filter light. If it comes on, drive at least 15 mins at a decent speed to clear it. Ignore it and it will break expensively and its not covered under warranty.

 

[Californiaman]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

They're actually really well built and not all that delicate but they are complicated simply by the fact that everything is so tightly packed into the vehicle and there are so many features!

Try and get a decent handover from the dealer - try everything. Open the cupboard doors, move the seats, put the roof up, put the beds down etc. When you get home, read the manual.

There are some gotchas - the nasty ones are listed above. Read through the forum - lots of useful information here (other forums are also available ;-))

The roof is probably the thing that you can most make a mess of. If you do it wrong and the bellows "blow out" it can be an expensive fix, however if you follow the VERY SIMPLE rules, apply common sense and pay attention then you won't go wrong.

Be careful when rotating the front seats (especially the drivers) in order to avoid scrapes on the bottom of the 'B' pillar.

If you use the heater, don't leave stuff under the van by the door as the heaters hot exhaust gasses are vented there.

Not many items in the van require any force to operate so, if it doesn't seem to be opening, sliding, etc then don't force it, it probably wants a different approach.

Enjoy and don't worry to much!

 

[Martin]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Don't stand on the armrests when climbing upstairs like my daughter regularly does !! :headwall

 

[Chris]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Remember, the forum will mostly be about problems and people getting advice. So you get a feeling that things go wrong a lot.
I read a topic where a chap had used his roof a lot and not a single problem.
It's pot luck if you get a "Friday" built van. Treat them carefully and fingers crossed it will be reliable.

 

[Hammer]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

the flexible light in roof is easily broken, just had mine fixed under warranty and notice california on display in VW show room was hanging off!!

If using big frying pan on left ring watch you don't melt the sink bowl.

As all have said roof is big one, I do a quick walk around outside before closing last few inches.

 

[stephen]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Thanks you guys, and especially the swiftness of your replies, that's certainly refreshing, and extremely informative, I suppose it's like anything else, one needs to use a bit of common sense sometimes,
 
Landrover defenders can certainly be loads of trouble, when getting acquainted, and can be at the car dealers more then on the road!
It has a whole new meaning to "off road vehicle" in my opinion, 
having said all that, I've always had one, in one form or another, ever since I passed my car test in the early 80s when I actually took a land rover series III to the testing station, and pass my test in one.

 But over the years, in my opinion they have become quite unreliable....
As one can imagine I'm just slightly apprehensive over the California as it costs at least twice as much as the Landrover, of our hard earned money, and I do hope it will last the test of time,

 I also own  a Volkswagen golf blue motion, and have accumulated 50,000 miles so far, in the last two years, and that has been absolutely reliable.
 let's  hope the 'Cali' is just as well screwed together...

 As you can imagine Bev and I are rather excited, and we are going to see the cali for the first time tomorrow at the dealers, we are like children at Christmas....

 

[KernowLad]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Stephen - was exact model was it?

This was ours:

Bought a pretty worn out model (without realising - it was LR Used Approved) and had new driveshafts, clutch, vent blowers, rear hub, brake pump and loads of other bits done in the year of ownership, mostly under warranty. Big battle with the dealer (Harwoods, Croydon) then near threats from them for mentioning my issues on a LR forum! A pretty bad experience. It was great in many ways but the £460 RFL, the dire mpg and the constant need for attention (Waxoyling, re-spraying the rear bumper/crossmember and side bars, etc, etc) did get rather tiresome on a 3 year old vehicle.

The California is much more "us" and we love it! You will too!!

 

[Andy]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

As others have said treat things gently& if it does not feel right or does not work try a different approach (common sense). Or ask on here.

The window blinds can break/fail/get stuck, I always use two hands to operate them.

 

[Iain&Shani]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

When you have forked out a shedload, trepidation is often quick to follow! Alongside getting a good handover I'd suggest trying everything that you have been shown with your handover person. We watched it all open and close with ease and were then petrified to "force" anything!! Fate about to be tempted but so far so good. ops

Again; the info in here is wonderful. You can pose a question and often get the answer within the hour.

 

[Moggie Moo]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Have read through the posts and agree with everything, great advice so far. Am probably repeating a lot, but these are our experiences.

We always peer up into the roof when lowering. Just to check everything is folding inwards. Apparently it's best not to stop the process (i.e. let go of the button and restart mid lowering) as this can overheat the motor, but I'd definitely stop if it bellows out to pull the material in again. On windy days I've had to reach up before and pull the fabric in.

Our upstairs light broke too. We treated it gently but it still broke. We do not vecro it onto the upstairs mattress when closing everything up (we just fold it into position). That way, if you push the top bed up to the roof and forget to undo the velcro it won't pull the light off.

Get into a routine when turning the front seats around. We find it quite easy to leave the front handbrake off (you have to release it to turn the drivers seat around), just remember to put it back on. We have the dsg gearbox so it's not a disaster if we leave the handbrake off. If you are getting a manual though, it might be best to leave it in the appropriate gear to stop it rolling until you've turned the drivers seat around if on a slope.

As discussed before, don't force anything. Everything will slip into place with a bit of patience. Don't drop the fridge lid of cooker lid down, lower gently then put a bit of pressure on top to close the clasps.

We generally have cabin friendly stuff in the van (no sharp clasps on handbags etc) so we don't scratch the plastics and snag any upholstery. A bit anal and weird, but it's just to keep it looking good as we found it pretty easy to scratch the harder plastics. You can get Brandrup seat covers which are made from the same material as the seats, which are very easy to 'scotchgard' yourself if you want to protect it from spills and stains.

We lower and raise the window blinds very gently gripping both edges at the sides. Otherwise they seem to crease. The front window blind, which is a bit like two tent poles holding a fabric screen is a bit of a handful. It's best put together outside the van and put into place before turning the front seats around. We've given up on it and purchased one of the silver screens from Campervantastic as it's miles easier and much less hassle (think quite a few places sell them).

Otherwise it's surprisingly robust for a campervan. Good luck with your new purchase, I'm sure you'll love it.

 

[stephen]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

KernowLad
I can see you were rather disillusioned with your defender over the problems that you had experienced. The only consolation as far as I am Concerned in all other respects they are quite good vehicles,for their intended purpose, otherwise I don't think I would have Persisted with Them so Long?
As you can imagine over the 30 years or so that I have owned land Rovers I've had my fair share of problems,

Rust for me seems to be the biggest problem in long term ownership, the series models were no real problem of being pretty simple primitive devices, which for me was the main attraction, like a big Meccano set in a lot of ways, I've owned series IIA to series III and finally purchased my first new Land Rover in 1989, it was a turbo diesel 90 station wagon, basically a standard 2.5 with a turbo bolted on the side; completely unreliable! every time we went out in it we always got towed back by the AA ! we had that one for a year, to some lowlife set light to it, just outside our back door, and almost set the whole house alight, that was when we was living in east London.

I've still got one outside at the moment living here in Suffolk on our smallholding, being used as a scratching post by the pigs in one of the fields, and also used as a shared for straw, that one is a series IIA 1963 109 long wheel base Safari station wagon (18 mpg diesel!) it hasn't run since 2002, but more recent models are a TD 5 long wheelbase 110 double Truck cab, with a rear tilt, and then I purchased 3 short wheelbase 90s in succession; two XS TD 5 and finally a 90 2.4 XS (26 mpg), which was a nice vehicle especially with a engine chip, that one was new, on a 57 plate, one of the first of the new shape land Rovers, with the bonnet bulge, and the first 3 months of ownership were spent practically continuously in the dealers, with various major problems, from clutches oil pouring out of the brake server pump on at least 3 separate occasions even after they were replaced, a new fuel tank, rerouting of various fuel pipes, a new engine sump, new turbo, the roof and foot wells had various leaks, door seal leaks, and literally hundreds of other problems too numerous to mention over the 4 years that we kept that one, the 1st year being a nightmare of unreliability, and as you say wax oiling every year, to try and abate corrosion and rust. I've never been interested In any other Land Rover product though, I Just liked the Defenders simplicity in construction for a Off-Road Vehicle.

So I'm afraid after basically 30 years of masochism, we've decided to have a bit of luxury, and have a true multipurpose vehicle, also with four wheel drive ;The Volkswagen California. that we going to see today I can't imagine it being any more unreliable than our landys….. 'I will try to post some pictures of some of them If I can As I have still got a soft spot for them considering we've had them for so long!!!!. :headwall

 

[KernowLad]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Stephen - maybe a bit too negative. The Defender certainly found a way into our affections despite the issues. For some reason we weren't worried about spending money on it but looking back, we were probably being a bit daft!

It was utterly brilliant in last year snow and ice, made a good surf chariot, the heated screen was great and it attracted a lot of positive attention but the issues did start to grate. I lavished it with attention and quite enjoyed sorting issues but some of them shouldn't have happened.

My wife passed her test in a (new at the time) 90 pickup, I drove 110s a huge amount in a Geotech engineering job. I will always appreciate what they can do but TBH, we didn't really need to extreme off road capability and the other compromises (e.g. MASSIVE turning circle!) were a bit much. It also cost a fortune to run - double what our near 300bhp BM costs!

I do like hearing Landy tales though and my Mum's best friend even wrote two kids books on them - Landy and Fender. Wife's grandad still has an 09 plate 90 so we can still get our fix with that!

 

[stephen]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

All this seems like sound advice, especially the roof Bellows, thanks everyone for letting me have the heads up on that one, perhaps we will sleep downstairs with some sort of foldaway mattress? :roll: if anyone has any thoughts on this one please let us know.
Also the plastic bowl in the sink could be rather could be unfortunate if left unattended, cooking eggs and bacon for instance using a frying pan! we've ordered leather seats for practical reasons so perhaps we don't need seat covers, all so the silver screens for the front windows, seem a excellent idea,
the idea of the handbrake being released to make the seats swivel round at the front seems a bummer, perhaps VW should address this safety aspect, but I can live with that.

Chris, I think you are right about only seeing negatives of people's woes on the forum, as people are hardly going to comment too much about; when things go right, anyway that's what I'm hoping.

I just hope there no arguments among our selves when we finally get our very van! about treating things gently, as I myself will certainly try to do…..
Thanks again for all your comments they are extremely useful, not only to me but anyone looking on here. :clap

 

[KernowLad]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

I'm still USELESS at swivelling the driver seat! Just leave it in gear (if manual) and you'll be fine.

 

[Freeley]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

No it's not the easiest thing in the world to do is it?
I'm sure that once,early on,i managed to turn it right around in one go but have never managed it since!

To any potential new owners i've found the following method the best way:

1. Handbrake off (mine's auto so no worries about rolling away)
2. Release steering wheel lock, push steering wheel in and as far up as it will go.
3. Wind seat back forward a reasonable amount.
4. pull down right hand armrest.
5. Slide seat forward (but not too far!).
6. Pull swivel lock and turn seat.
7. Reapply handbrake.

I should probably add 5.5 Pull the seat backwards and forwards about 4 times til you get it right and the seat gets past the steering wheel and you rub the B pillar even though you're trying really hard not to.

If anyone has a better method i'd love to hear it!

 

[MickyBlue]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

If anyone has a better method i'd love to hear it!

So would I :doh

It's the worst bit of 'design', or lack thereof in the vehicle

What us novices need is someone to upload a YouTube vid on how to do it properly :idea:

 

[KernowLad]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

I imagine there's some super slick way to do it. I sometimes do it in one fairly smooth action - then I can't put it back again! Totally random.

But the van is pretty compact so I guess it's compromise worthing having.

At least the passenger side is very easy to rotate!

 

[Ewan]

What us novices need is someone to upload a YouTube vid on how to do it properly :idea:[/quote]

Yup, this was done about 18 months ago on the Facebook site. Since the forum has disappeared I can't find it - and I can't locate it on YouTube.

And he made it look so easy too ..!

 

[Californiaman]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

We have leather and it is very hard wearing. Don't worry about the roof - it becomes second nature real quick.

I find the trick with the rotation of the drivers seat to be to put the seatback as far forward as it will go and then to move the seat forward until the back of the armrest lines up with the door pillar. At that position, the seat rotates with no clashes...

 

[calikev]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

I just open the door a little if it's not raining I get out if it is I open it slightly from inside
I find this helps.

 

[stephen]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

I put 30mm wheel spacers on mine, which not only made the handling around corners incredible! and made side slopes much less terrifying, but also made the turning circle i infinitely better then bevs Mini 1.6D Cooper? but not forgetting this was only short wheel base 90. not the significantly longer 110, but had no real carrying capacity inside mine so we fitted a patriot roof rack which made it far more adaptable.
Another big difference were the off-road tyres which were very good on the road in the wet even compared to the original fitment by the manufacturers, which were total utter crap off-road,and on! (compared to the goodrich muds,) considering the vehicles potential off-road in my opinion, so the much more complicated range Rovers and discoveries didn't look so bad against the defender, with their incredible amount of electronic gizmos to bump up the cost, for no real apparent reason other than keeping up with the Joneses X5s most likely,( I tend to like keeping things simple, especially for a off-road vehicle), but I upped the diameter a inch or so by fitting 255x85x16 which smoothed out the ride, as well as giving better ground clearance, and fuel economy, these vehicles are all about adapting them to the job in hand, every one of them tends to be slightly different, and individual. and I also would tow a large 4 ton trailer on occasion collecting wood, with no real problems at all, considering they supposed to carrie 3500 kg maximum. I still think it's a shame about the rust problem myself, but it does seem to affect what these things seemed to fetch in the second-hand market which is surprising considering they're one of the least depreciating vehicles out there?
I would be interesting to know how good the Cali is? at towing, of course I don't expect it to carry anywhere near the amount the defender can, considering there's no transfer box, but at 2800 kg, that isn't bad for a van.

I've just seen our California today for the first time at the Volkswagen dealers to make sure all the parts we ordered were present and correct, we are picking her up next Friday, I took a few snaps if anyone's interested but I'm afraid its not PDI ed and still has its wrappings on.

 

[stephen]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

I'm new to all this stuff something seems to be wrong with the pics? perhaps I've pushed the buttons too many times, to submit, it didn't seem like anything was happening, sorry. :new here posting.php?mode=reply&f=5&t=754#

 

[KernowLad]

Re: I don't want my new 'Cali' to be another VW guarantee cl

Very nice Defender!

We had one almost identical for a week when ours was being fixed (AGAIN!) on MTR tyres - grippy but VERY noisy! We couldn't really fit in it properly though. Not easy to access the back of a 90!