Thread: Warranty and Australian Consumer Law

Originally Posted by Laurie

Drivesafe just for peace of mind, I would forward the details of your Rangies problems to the ACCC and see what they say.
Laurie

Hi again Laurie and just a followup.

After your suggestion, I decided to get some legal advice as to whether I was wasting my time or could something come of it.

I have been advised that I have more than a reasonable case and to make a submission and see what comes of it.

But I have also been advised to include anything that, while not specifically relating to how I have been treated, but events that have occurred relating to other peoples treatment by LRA.

Over the years I have been battling with LRA, I have received heaps of data relating to the way LRA shows nothing but contempt for it's customers and I will be supplying this additional information with my submission.

Thanks again for your suggestion.

Originally Posted by speleomike

But if you are in legal proceedings do be careful what you post here. Assume LRA's legal persons are also reading this thread. Your legal rep would probably suggest not to post details until its all over.

Hi Mike and thanks for the caution, if it gets to a legal challenge, I will need to watch what I post up, but in the meantime, I will post up info including some that may be reinvent to others.


For example, the danger posed by the poor safety design of the alternators in the RR, RRS and many D4s, where because of the poor design of the alternator monitoring system, and it’s failure warning ( or lack of any warning of a failure ) system, these vehicles are literally turned into a coffin on wheels by something as simple as an alternator failure.


I first time I became aware of the outright danger of this design incompetence was when it happened to my wife.


I won’ go into full details as it has been covered in a thread some years back, but my wife had just turned on to a busy country road, right on dusk and in the middle of peak period, when the alternator failed.


As she accelerated away from the intersection, when the motor stopped, the steering LOCK, the brake booster no longer worked ( no motor ) the headlights failed. The were no Stop lights, and the hazard lights didn’t work.


What we didn’t know at the time, the safety air bag system had also failed. Right at the time when it could have been needed.


We were to find out over the next few weeks, that this is a common occurrence on these vehicles.


There is a thread on here about an alternator failing and as an attempt was to be made, where the owner fully charged the battery over night and then set off hoping to get a few hundred kilometres closer to home before the battery went flat.


It is not uncommon for most vehicle to get one to two hours of driving after the alternator light comes on, but before battery goes flat.


This RR owner got just 11kms before he noticed the voltage dropping rapidly and he had just enough time to pull off the road but his motor actually shut down before he had a chance to turn the ignition off.


And here is one that will stand the hair up on the back of your neck if you own an L494 Range Rover Sport.


When they were first released at Christmas time in 2013, the first arrivals were shipped to different dealers and the dealers had notified their new owners that the vehicle were nearly ready to pick up.


Then the dealers got notification from LRA, that under no circumstances were they to release these vehicles to their new owners and they were told to keep them till further notice.


The hold went on for weeks and weeks.


The story goes, that some Land Rover technicians were testing a new RRS in England and as they were driving around a test track, they started to notice a burning plasticy spell and took the RRS to the workshops.


At the workshops, they discovered the contractor who made the air conditioning wire loom, had use a 1.5mm2 earth return “WIRE” instead of the 4mm2 cable as required.


Because this is an earth wire, like all vehicles, there is no protection on this wire. So in this case, it can simply be overloaded to the point where it will catch fire.


The fix. The dealers were eventually supplied with a replacement cable, and had to remove the dangerous wire and fit the proper sized cable, and only then could they hand the vehicle over to their new owners.


Now common sense and a need for safety, would dictate that Land Rover back in England, would then fix all the dangerous looms with the correct size cable.


This is Land Rover and they did nothing of the kind.


They just continued to ship the new RRSs with the dangerous wrong wire and when the RRS got to their respective dealerships, the deal would find a small plastic satchel with the correct cable in it.


They had to remove the dangerous wire, replace it with the correct cable and then the wire was placed in the satchel, and it was set back to the UK.


Supposedly, back in the UK, they then tested this wire to see if the A/C had been used while the thin wire was in place. I have no idea what was to happen if it was proved that the A/C had been used.


NOTE this was not an immediate fix, this “FIX” went on for at least the next two years, and may still be going on.


There are heaps more of these incidents of incompetent and dangerous practices of LRA and LR, that I will be including in my submission.