A problem faced by many Volkswagen TDI owners over the past several years has become a thornier issue ever since the company’s diesel debacle.
North of the border, several owners of 2.0-liter diesel models have turned to the media after high-pressure fuel pump failures turned their vehicles into Teutonic paperweights. The problem facing the owners was unique: to have the automaker buy back their vehicles as part of the emissions scandal settlement, the cars needed to be in running order. No longer covered by warranty, the cost to repair a fuel system contaminated by metal fragments was potentially more than the owners would receive in the buyback.
The burning anger is enough to melt snow.
From Global News comes a tale of two Vancouver cars — a 2010 Golf TDI and 2011 Jetta TDI — and two pissed-off owners, Danny Foster and Peter Gill. Already, the owners are in the awkward position of having bought “clean diesels” that turned out to be massive polluters.
Recently, both vehicles suffered a high-pressure fuel pump failure. Like other owners littering online comment boards, the men discovered a non-warranty repair to fix the pump’s debris-spraying fallout comes at a steep cost. After losing power on the road, both owners had their vehicles towed to a local VW dealership. Foster’s vehicle was 10,000 kilometers past its extended warranty, while Gill’s was 3,000 km past.
The prognosis for both vehicles? A minimum $8,000 repair.
“He says, ‘your high-pressure fuel pump has failed, there’s metal fragments throughout the fuel system and we are looking at a minimum of $8,000 to repair your car,’” Foster told Global News. Hoping to have his emissions-cheating vehicle bought back by the automaker, the owner contacted Volkswagen Canada for assistance.
“It’s just like talking to somebody who says, ‘Sorry, it sucks to be you,’” he explained.
For Gill, who followed the same process as Foster, the outcome was the same.
“I was just being moved around and around,” he told Global News. “Eventually there was a final decision and he said, ‘There is nothing we can do.’”
No repair, no buyback. And no cash. And no car. With nowhere else to turn, the men contacted the media, who then contacted Volkswagen Canada about the two cases. Before long, Foster’s phone rang. It was the automaker.
“I get this call that VW Canada will cover 90 per cent of the repair and the dealership will cover the other 10 per cent,” he explained.
Gill’s phone rang, too. “We’ve reconsidered your application and will cover you for 100 per cent of the cost,” a Volkswagen Canada representative told him.
When asked whether the automaker planned to extend the warranty on the fuel pump, given the circumstances surrounding the buyback, spokesperson Thomas Tetzlaff replied in the negative.
“In the case of the high-pressure fuel pump, we have not seen an unusual failure rate in Canada,” he told the news outlet. “In addition, we have found that the cause of failure is often attributable to outside factors. We will continue to evaluate claims for goodwill repair assistance on a case-by-case basis.”
In the U.S., an investigation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration into fuel pump failures in a number of TDI models ended in early 2015 with no recall. The agency fielded 713 complaints about the issue, but closed the book after deciding the matter wasn’t serious.
“Volkswagen believes that misfueling with gasoline is the primary cause of HPFP drivetrain failures in the field,” the NHTSA wrote.
After wrangling with their automaker to avoid a financial loss (to say nothing of the diesel scandal itself), both owners have had it. The final repair bill for Foster’s Golf, now covered by VW, reportedly came in $1,500 lower than when he was on the receiving end of it.
“That trust is broken between me and Volkswagen,” he said. “I’ll be giving them back their car and it will be my last Volkswagen.”
[Image: Volkswagen]
“Volkswagen believes that misfueling with gasoline is the primary cause of HPFP drivetrain failures in the field”
Well case closed then. VW’s honesty is beyond reproach after all.
Mercedes did the same thing to my parents. They had driven diesels for MANY years, and 1 week after buying a certified used W210 (1996 E320 turbo), it started having some sort of fuel related issues. It went into limp-home mode. First thing the tech said when he came to see the car (before even looking at it) was “You must have put gasoline in it”. After investigating it, they then tried to blame it on bad diesel (the state tested the pump they had got their last fuel from – which was fine). It is always a shell game with these car companies.
This is old news in the USA. HPFP’s have been eating themselves on TDI’s ever since the common rail systems using the CP4 pump was introduced (2009). Despite several pump design revisions, they still fail. And as the article said – when they fail, they take out the entire fuel system because of a crummy system design that circulates metal shavings from the tank to the injectors. Lousy ULSD fuel plus a cheap pump design equals lots of pump failures.
Therefore: I took the buyback with great enthusiasm. The HPFP in my 2013 Jetta failed at 48,000 miles. VW initially saddled me with a $7,800 bill because they blamed it on misfueling with gasoline. After a few phone calls to VW Corporate they covered the repairs under warranty. Some folks in the US have been able to get it fixed out of warranty under “goodwill”, but they have since stopped extending that “goodwill” after the buybacks began.
McGrieves,
The US low sulphur diesel standard can allow for a more abrasive and lower cetane value fiel than the EU and in Australia.
This also made it harder for the Mazda SkyActive diesel to make it to the US market.
The SkyActive runs as low as 14:1 compression and US diesel with it cetane value can run around 15:1.
Right. The US standard is definitely inferior to other countries. On top of that – many station owners sell fuel that is contaminated with water, gasoline, algae… their customers are primarily large Diesel truck operators.
But – it would have been possible to engineer a robust pump to handle the lower quality fuel. Also, why no water separator? I suspect it would have raised the cost beyond what the accountants were shooting for. Another case of VW penny-pinching, which is more or less at the heart of the Diesel emissions scandal.
It’s the vehicle manufacturer’s responsibility to develop vehicles that will be reliable with the actual fuel in the country they intent to sell in.
So fine, US Diesel fuel is lower quality. A competent manufacturer selling in the US would accept this fact and account for it in their design.
I recall some BMW cars were bit this way. BMW replaced a bunch of engines under warranty….gas cars.
bike,
Yes and no to your response. Another way to look at it is “why doesn’t US diesel match EU (and most every other modern nation) standards”? Harmonise. Why would other nations want lower quality fuel?
The US exports lots of diesel to the EU, refined. The US already produces this fuel for export.
Bike, its USA bad, everywhere else is good. And VW is king, so it MUST be something else.
That’s why all diesel vehicles sold here have the same issue. Except they don’t, but the truth is irrelevant down unda.
I agree. Instead VW turned on us TDI “valued customers “ by saying that they would extend the warranty on the HPFP but then excluding us when the fuel pump fails and sends shards of metal through out the fuel system. My Passat is awaiting pending litigation on a out of pocket bill of $5680.00 at my local dealership.
The only thing they told me is that I failed the fuel sample test. .
My HPFP in my 2010 Jetta just failed at 87,000 miles with a similar bill $7,600. They also blame it on misfueling with gasoline, but I have the Misfueling Guard installed by VW and I go to stand alone diesel pumps. It’s still under the extended warranty and I can’t talk to anyone above Josh N in VW Corporate to find out what are the parameters for the test. After they find the metal shavings, they are required to do a series of tests, it’s a joke, the first test is a Specific Gravity test and it passed, the Second one tests for contamination, there are no parameters on the test, just a device that has a Smiley Face or a Frown Face, The dealer gave me a picture of the device with the Frown Face lit up; again, it does even say what it is reading or what the threshold is. They said I could try to get my insurance to cover it, VW is beyond, beyond reproach, it’s VW’s faulty HPFP.
I got the same exclusion from VW when I applied for the extended warranty of the HPFP. The FROWNY face and the specific gravity fail picture. I think they have them on file for guys like me who made a bad choice and went with the software upgrade instead of selling back my Passat TDI.
Could I send you a picture of the “Petro test” they gave you? I’d like to compare it with mine. I have a suspicion they have a stack of these on file at VW of A in Michigan.
McGrieves and all, My HPFP in my 2010 Jetta failed at 87,000 miles with a similar bill $7,600. They also blame it on misfueling with gasoline, but I have the Misfueling Guard installed by VW and I only go to diesel pumps. It’s still under the extended warranty and Josh, the Regional Case Manager, says I can’t talk to anyone above him in VW Corporate to find out what the parameters are for the test. After they find the metal shavings, they are required to do a series of tests, it’s a joke, the first test is a Specific Gravity test and it passed, the Second one tests for contamination, there are no parameters on the test, just a device that has a Smiley Face or a Frown Face, The dealer gave me a picture of the device with the Frown Face lit up; again, it doesn’t even say what it is reading or what the threshold is. They said I could try to get my INSURANCE to cover it, VW is beyond reproach, it’s VW’s faulty HPFP.
Stilwell, can you send me or post a picture of the frowny face Fuel failure report? I’d like to compare it to the one I got. Probably the same picture. I have a pending law suit against VW.
Stilwell, can you send me or post a picture of the frowny face Fuel failure report? I’d like to compare it to the one I got. Probably the same picture. I have a pending law suit against VW.
“The final repair bill for Foster’s Golf, now covered by VW, reportedly came in $1,500 lower than when he was on the receiving end of it.”
Not really surprising, that is just difference between warranty time and customer pay time that is found at all mfgs. ~20% seems about right for that.
If I recall, this is not exclusive to VW TDI, but pretty much all vehicles with a high pressure fuel pump (or at least European cars). Audi/BMW/GM had issues too. My preference was the rotary unit injection system from the 98-2003 TDI. Those seemed bulletproof, though some needed new gaskets after 250K miles.
I had an IP fail on my 2003 Jetta TDI at 111000 miles. Cost about $1200 when everything was done to get a rebuilt unit installed. While it wasn’t an $8000 unexpected repair, it was still an unexpected repair. And then I bought a CR TDI, but at least I’m covered until 120K if this one screws up and VW is going to pay me a lot of money at buyback time.
Welcome to my world, My 2011 TDI wagon’s HPFP grenades for the 2 time at 120,000 miles first was at 70,000 and VW covered the bill 100% , I had every receipt for fuel so no issue there, when the second went I was on my own dime, and I planned to turn the car back to VW < I was gonna drive it 2 more years before that, this made my decision to part with the car settled, I really liked the car , it was a great high mileage cruiser w enough room, I put mine back together for about $1,000 bucks and most of that was labor, I had another TDI driver give me for free his used pump, he replaced it as a precaution, and got a few other donated parts, I had my indie do it when he had the time so it took awhile, I was lucky I had a third car, drive it to the closet VW dealer, 22 miles IIRC and prayed the pump would last that long. It did thank the Lord, as others had said it occurs in about 3-5% of the cars and also is a BMW issue as well, shame because the TDI wagon was a very good car for my needs. Some TDI drivers replace their pumps and add screens to both sides so it the Fuel pump dies you just have to replace that pump , about a grand and no damage is done to everything downstream from the pump.
VW extended the HPFP warranty to 120000 miles on certain cars (up until 2012 MY) in the USA. It’s not like they installed different pumps on Canadian models.
VW knows that it’s a design failure, but their lack of extended warranty for Canadian TDI owners is upsetting. Good that Global TV at least got 2 people covered.
I’m relatively certain that any money TDi owners save on fuel, they spend on maintenance.
You are correct. CR TDIs are supposed to be economical. But with the complicated emissions system along with DSG changes every 40K, fuel filter changes every 20K and the chance of the HPFP going, it can be an expensive car to run unless you can do a lot of the work yourself. They’re fun cars to drive, however.
Yes.
Nice piece Steph.
““He says, ‘your high-pressure fuel pump has failed, there’s metal fragments throughout the fuel system and we are looking at a minimum of $8,000 to repair your car,’” Foster told Global News. Hoping to have his emissions-cheating vehicle bought back by the automaker, the owner contacted Volkswagen Canada for assistance.”
This is par for the course in my experience with VAG, and I know I have heard of this problem before with TDIs. IF VAG had not gone through a scandal these guys would have been screwed just as every other TDI owner would have been prior to two years ago.
Direct injection gas engines must use similar pumps. Does anybody know if they’re any more durable than the diesel pumps?
Great question, I’d also like to know.
Yup. Fuel pump failures are the possible consequence of many, if not all, direct injection engines. It has nothing to do with type of fuel. In fact there are several manufacturers using that exact same fuel pump, but bc vw has a vocal owner group and was, by far, the company that offered the tech across the widest price range we hear about it mostly on their products.
In vw’s defense they’ve substantially revised their pumps now and no longer use a cam follower design. It seems like that failure type has subsided since then. It was that design change, along with a better oil vapor separator, the convinced me to give the mk7 gti a shot.
When I first purchased my gas Sportwagen in 2010 I felt like quite the astute consumer–I knew that 2.0 TDi engine was far more complicated than its predecessor and didn’t trust VW to engineer such complexity for the long term. I saved $4500 up front and HPFP issues began surfacing in the news soon after. Then the diesel scandal broke.
I’m a genius! I’m a genius!
Until the very generous buyback offers were released. Due to dumb luck, those who believed the hype and made the foolish engine choice were now better off financially. Figures.
What I simply cannot understand is the contingent still holding on to their TDIs. Why not run before the long-identified bomb under your hood goes off and does nearly five figures of damage?
So right! I made a bad choice of accepting a 6k “I’m sorry” check and letting the replace my emissions software. Now I’m asked to give it all back to replace my HPFP and every other component the comes in contact with the metal shavings throughout my whole damn fuel system. Thanks VW.
After some help from my local dealer, I got my settlement from VW. VW Claims didn’t make it easy, though, but at least I’m finally whole from my Diesel Particulate Filter debacle, $2600 of which half was not covered by “goodwill”.
I always used Amsoil cetane boost in my diesel-it ran better and clattered less with the fuel treatment. The HPFP had no issues, but I sometimes wonder if that, along with my habit of running all my cars hard up one mountain pass, contributed to the DPF cracking.
I wouldn’t buy another diesel car in the US, because the fuel isn’t up to euro standards.
There was some discovery from a class action suit on the web. There were internal VW documents, and they call your car dying “DTF”, meaning Drivetrain Failure. Of the cars tested, some had water, a very few had traces of gas; for which there was a recall and installaion of a flap so you could not put a gas nozzle in. This lead to good times when the station you found after searching on Empty had a gas nozzle for the diesel pump…more common that you could imagine. I bought a Truck Sized to Car Sized diesel funnel after this. (Included in Audi cars but not VW…$30 on line, and they even tossed in latex gloves for that eau du Diesel)
The real problem is that US Diesel is designed for less mission critical things, like bulldozers……Imagine buying a C7 Corvette and having to use only low octane regular from the shady no-name station. Shell, Mobil and BP diesel were tolerable, Exxon and Gulf not so much. None were good-and we don’t get premium diesel in the US market, at least that I could ever find in the NY Metro area.
Did you know that high quality Diesel fuel was not available in the US when you bought a Diesel car?
If so, why did you decide buy a vehicle for which suitable fuel could not easily be purchased in the country where you live?
A fair question-I knew you could not get premium, but not that regular was so bad…which was why I used cetane boost. I’d not buy another diesel car in the US….even though my experiences in Europe with BMW, VW and Peugeot diesels was good. There was a learning curve :-)
It took me a couple of moments to understand why ultra-pricey pumps would issue plague. It sounds very plausible for pumps to issue plague, given that it’s Volkswagen we’re discussing.