2 year brake rotor waranty paid off!!
Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2017 2:36 amI scan/keep PDF files of just about everything I buy now a days. Mainly for warranty purposes. And I think I have just set a personal record for 'hahaha honor your warranty bitches!'. In August of 2015 we buy my wife a car.. 2006 Ford Taurus.. its a nice car, good on gas, easy to drive. Well the first thing I negotiated was $200 off for brakes. Which I install. Fast forward a little over a year and the front end has a wicked shimmy when applying the brakes. I figure that the rotors are warped because we live in the mountains and my wife isn't used to all the hills. So I let it go for a while and the problem get worse, Andi won't drive it (well, mostly because she loves the Toyota Camry) but even I start to get tired of the shimmy.. nay, violent vibrations.
Well, on a warm (45-ish) winter day I head out to the garage with a new rotor and get busy. Low an behold the the rotor isn't warped, but an honest to God manufacturing defect. I've never seen anything like it. Its like a casting 'cold' spot.
The pads grip the rotor find, then hit this area, lose grip, then grab the other side.. that's causing the vibrations.
So I go to my PC, print out the receipt (which I scanned) and head off to Advance Auto. I show the guy the rotor and the receipt and say it looks like a warranty covered issue. First thing he says was 'that's not our rotor'. I said prove it. Here's the receipt. He says 'It's in an AutoZone box'. I say (exactly) 'No shit, I bought a new rotor so I could drive my car here. This is the box it came in. I used it so I wouldn't get rust/dust all over my car seat'. Then he processes the return and refunds $42 and change to my debit card.
To say that I'm happy about the return is an understatement. I mean its 18 months past the purchase date and I get a full refund. One thing that does make me wonder is how, exactly, CAN THEY BE SURE that the rotor is the one I bought??? I mean its not like they are serialize or stamped in any meaningful way. Anyway, car brakes properly now and the cost of the new rotor was offset by the refund of the old rotor.. so technically it didn't even cost me anything. No, I didn't replace the pads as they were still almost new.
Well, on a warm (45-ish) winter day I head out to the garage with a new rotor and get busy. Low an behold the the rotor isn't warped, but an honest to God manufacturing defect. I've never seen anything like it. Its like a casting 'cold' spot.
- 20170220_172619.jpeg (120.83 KiB) Viewed 6330 times
The pads grip the rotor find, then hit this area, lose grip, then grab the other side.. that's causing the vibrations.
So I go to my PC, print out the receipt (which I scanned) and head off to Advance Auto. I show the guy the rotor and the receipt and say it looks like a warranty covered issue. First thing he says was 'that's not our rotor'. I said prove it. Here's the receipt. He says 'It's in an AutoZone box'. I say (exactly) 'No shit, I bought a new rotor so I could drive my car here. This is the box it came in. I used it so I wouldn't get rust/dust all over my car seat'. Then he processes the return and refunds $42 and change to my debit card.
To say that I'm happy about the return is an understatement. I mean its 18 months past the purchase date and I get a full refund. One thing that does make me wonder is how, exactly, CAN THEY BE SURE that the rotor is the one I bought??? I mean its not like they are serialize or stamped in any meaningful way. Anyway, car brakes properly now and the cost of the new rotor was offset by the refund of the old rotor.. so technically it didn't even cost me anything. No, I didn't replace the pads as they were still almost new.