#4 cylinder spark plug electrode and tip broke off and some how made it past turbo to exhaust manifold, or so claimed my dealer.


From this diagnosis they gave me a quote of $1500 to fix it, and now that its "done" they still can not give me an itemized bill for labor. when I ask I am completely ignored. It is my actual belief that dealer mechanic broke off the plug removing it and they just felt like taking me for $1500 last week.


Car stuttered and stalled a week ago and began running rough. Next day car had flashing CEL so I had it towed to the dealer who have now done over $19000 in warranty and non warranty work on my car since April for similar stall and stumbles and misfires. I was told by my warranty co that I had to return the car to the dealer so they could repair it under their own service warranty, then when car got to dealer, warranty denied the claim.

 

$1500 to fix what exactly, a spark plug? Surely they told you what they needed to do... You don't hand someone $1500 and not know what is going to be done to your car without some explanation, so they said a spark plug broke, what exactly did that damage? I can only feel like there's a lot being left out because all I know is a spark plug broke apart and made it past the turbo compressor. No mention of any damages.

It sounds like the warranty company suspects that either this dealer is trying to milk the third party warranty company or that the warranty company feels as if they already paid money to the dealer to fix the car and now that the dealer was paid to correct the problem that it's on the dealer to fix the car now. What a typical Mini dealer experience that's all to common, Mini tech are poorly trained and should be diagnosing lawnmowers!

Even more interesting is when I purchased my 6 year third party extended warranty I had a choice to pay $150 deductible if I take it to Carmax or $200 deductible if I take it to the Mini deal, now they have completely changed their policy, they will not allow me to even take it to the Mini dealer anymore, they will deny all claims at $tealerships as most are black listed now because all they know how to do is aimlessly thow parts at the car in hopes that it fixes the problem. I'm sorry but that's not what a mechanic is supposed to do.

 

You hit the nail on the head brother.

AVOID STERLING MINI AT ALL COSTS

 

You never mentioned Sterling Mini, they have the worst reputation including Sterling BMW and Sterling Collision trails right behind those two! Talk about bad apples!

 

Running with a broken spark plugs will lead to misfires to cel codes. Ask them what code it is as well. Get them to send you photos of the broken spark plug. $1500 to remove head to remove plug sounds about right. Of course you could remove the plug with this method too which costs less but it's hard to determine anything unless there are pics.

 

the claim is the electrode broke inside the cylinder. I would at least ask to see that plug.
The only times ive seen that sort of plug damage it was caused by other more severe damage, (failed piston). You would be looking at more than 1500 if that was the case though.