Thread: problems with a mechanic

hey folks
recently i took my 300tdi disco to a certain "diesel Centre" here on the gold coast to have the injector pump rebuilt and the timing belt done after the pump started leaking quite badly. paid $2000 for their "service"
i got the disco back and from the onset i had problems with it. no power, had to really rev it to get even up the smallest hill. rang and spoke to them about it and they said "its normal that's how it is sposed to be" when i told them it wasnt like it before they basically said that it was because the pump was leaking ??
after about a week and a half of having it back the revs at idle became increasingly high. it got to the point where at idle in park and Neutral it would hold 3500-4000 rpm and when stopped at lights etc in gear it would drop to 1500 rpm and want to "pull" itself through the brakes (which I had to really hold down to stop it creeping, short of turning it off at the lights and restarting it the revs wouldnt drop). it got to the point where the vehicle nedded to be revved out even to get up the smallest hill. on a certain day (it was a thursday) i was driving it home down Pitcairn way (if anyone know pacific pines) and it started to get hot i was fortunately outside my complex so i pulled into my complex and turned the vehicle off just as steam and all sorts of smoke started to come out of the passenger side of the engine bay (the temp gauge went up to hot as it started to steam). I immediately called the "Diesel Centre" and spoke to them about it and explained to them about what had been happening to it and that it had overheated.
The owner said that no one could come out to look at it that day but might be able to in the next few days. the next day their mechanic rang me to tell me he was coming out to look at it. he came and looked at it and said "yep our mistake when they have bench tested the injector pump they haven't done up the throttle adjust and the idle adjust on the pump properly before they put it back on the car it's vibrated loose and caused the revs to go up, which caused it to overheat" so he readjusted it and got it running right (but it never reached Normal temp) i asked him about the overheating and showed him where it was leaking water quite badly from under the inlet manifold and he said "oh its nothing to worry about, they all leak abit". (i have had the car since November last year and NEVER had a drama with the cooling system, even when going off road). so i checked the water level put a bit more water back into it and bled the air out of the cooling system.
i didnt drive it again until the next day (in the afternoon) and as soon as i get onto the highway it started revving out again and it bloody overheated again and started ****ing out steam and smoke everywhere from the passenger side of the engine bay again. i pulled over asap and turned the ignition off but it self dieseled for about a minute after turning the ignition off. i could see in the engine bay where the steam was coming from and it was plain as day to see that the head gasket was gone as well as the water pump gasket.
i tried to ring the "diesel Centre" but the phones all rang out. it wasnt until the following monday that i managed to get a hold of someone. they asked to get the car towed into the shop. I did this and they had a look at it, i got a phone call from them stating the obvious that the head gasket and the water pump gasket had both gone. i asked them how they were going to help me with it due to the fact the mechanic that came out and acknowledged that it was their fault in the first place that it had overheated. they said they would get back to me about it. about 2 days later i got another call from them saying that if i done the work in their workshop they would help me with advice etc but i would have to pay for the parts etc as well as the head to be looked at by the engineers. i told them that this wasn't on especially when one of their staff had claimed that they WERE responsible for it. After paying for the injector pump i have no money left to pay for anything.
it has now gotten to the point now where I have informed them i will be talking to Fair trading about this. The business owner has somehow contacted my parents and had a whinge about it to them!! I'm 28 FFS and its my vehicle not theirs.
basically I am asking for advice about what to do as fellow landy owners.
I'm on the gold coast.

All I can say is