Steering Rack / Suspension Squeak

[mk7gti]

My car is finally going in on Tuesday to have the shock mounts and two bearings replaced. The parts where on back order for over a week. Fingers crossed all goes to plan...

[monkeyhanger]

After a few days of crawling over my workplace's speedbumps coming in and going out, it seems that my front drivers side suspension is the source of my squeaky rattle that remains, although it is far less frequent than when the suspension stop pucks were left on the fronts. Mine will need to go in to get it sorted soon, and to do the buzzy dash rattle that seems to happen when you hold 1500rpm in 2nd to 4th gear.

My dad's GTD has a few minor issues too - the 2 stage window switches seem to have stopped working on a 2 stage basis (the 1 push window drop has stopped working), and the spring/push on his fuel filler flap has stopped being springy.

[MJ-GTI]

After a few days of crawling over my workplace's speedbumps coming in and going out, it seems that my front drivers side suspension is the source of my squeaky rattle that remains, although it is far less frequent than when the suspension stop pucks were left on the fronts. Mine will need to go in to get it sorted soon, and to do the buzzy dash rattle that seems to happen when you hold 1500rpm in 2nd to 4th gear.

My dad's GTD has a few minor issues too - the 2 stage window switches seem to have stopped working on a 2 stage basis (the 1 push window drop has stopped working), and the spring/push on his fuel filler flap has stopped being springy.

So many issues with this model already, might as well cancel my order  . What happened to quality?

[CraigW]

That's lousy MH. Where is VW quality control when these cars are leaving the factory? Got my VW customer survey in the other day, I'm preparing to write War & Peace

[monkeyhanger]

That's lousy MH. Where is VW quality control when these cars are leaving the factory? Got my VW customer survey in the other day, I'm preparing to write War & Peace

I am wondering whether the transport puck has done some damage to the shock. If that's the case then the dealer is at fault rather than VW. The puck was a tight fit onto the shock strut - wondering whether it did a good job of scraping oil from the strut or scratched the surface itself.

My mpg is appalling right now too. Was getting an indicated 46.5mpg which equated to an actual 42.4mpg for my first full tankful. My indicated mpg for my commutes to and from work are just under 43mpg indicated (probably 39mpg actual) for the last few days with the temperature dip. My Scirocco 170TDI (with no eco tech) was far better than this from day one, even in the coldest depths of winter.

I don't think anything untoward is happening as poor fuelling from an injector leak etc would result in lots of DPF regens.

[Sootchucker]

OK guys, lets put this into perspective. Whilst it would pi55 me off no end if my car had niggly faults (so I'm not saying it doesn't matter, of course it does), the Golf is VW's main profit maker and sells in vast numbers worldwide.

I don't know what the sales of the MK7 are since launch worldwide, but I bet it's well in the hundreds of thousands already (if not more). Even taking UK GTI's / GTD's, I'm quite sure this forum only accounts for a very small percentage of owners, and within that base currently 3 or 4 members have had issues, so it's not like the world is crashing down.

Does VW need to improve it's QA control, yes of course, but then so does every manufacture. Would you potentially get issues if you purchased a BMW, Mercedes, Nissan, Porsche, Lexus etc - of course you would. Modern cars are made from thousands of parts and a great deal of them are not made by the brand manufacturer but by hundreds of suppliers, (Panasonic, Blaupunkt, Valeo, Hella, Siemens, VDO etc), so it's inevitable, even with modern robotic processes, that some parts will fail or don't meet spec.

If VW issued a recall for all MK7's then I would be concerned, and like I said, for those having issues, I would no doubt be a fed up as they are, but it's now down to VW (dealer and HQ), to sort these issues for these cars ASAP and with the minimum of fuss. Some could well be teething problems, some could be more related to dealer errors (such as the tranportation pucks being left in causing damage).

[monkeyhanger]

I’m not worried about the issues I’m facing right now. The car drives and I will get the issues resolved at my convenience and at VWs expense – my issues seem easily resolved. I have never had a new VW that has had a fault which has caused it to break down (touch wood), so I feel pretty lucky in that respect.

With 10,000 parts going into the average car and what a car has to go through every day (perform well in a wide range of temperatures, stresses and vibrations) , if 2 or 3 of those components go wrong I don’t consider myself that badly off.

Apart from my last Scirocco, every one of my previous 6 VWs has had a bit of warranty work. The first owner of the car always has a wrinkle or 2 to iron out, if you’ve only ever previously owned nearly new, with no issues cropping up then they might seem disturbing to you.

Poor mpg and the possibility it won’t appreciably improve in the future is my main worry right now. A true 39mpg on my commute just isn’t good enough, even at this early stage (580 miles).

[Nick87]

I'm in Belgium and had the exact same problem with my left front wheel after 2 weeks of owning the car.
I went to the dealer and they quite quickly replaced some kind of "cap" that's on top of the spring. The dealer received it from the importer the day after and was replaced very quickly. I just had to leave the car at the dealer for half a day.

After owning the car for 6 weeks now my right front wheel has the same problem, so Monday I'm going again to have the same "cap" replaced.

I started noticing it when turning my steering wheel, even when not driving. Also when I drove over bumps
I started hearing it. It also squeaks more when you drive over bumps with the wheels turned.

Must be a well known problem as they replaced it very quickly.

I presume this happens sometimes with early models...if this is the only issue that arises then I'll be happy.
Apart from that issue, what a car!

[Rob916]

Having similar issues with my 3 day old gti, I trust the dealer to resolve the problem ASAP and it hasn't spoilt my first impressions at all, it's an absolutely fantastic car !

[mk7gti]

Id say guys its important that we mention this issue on the main VW survey when it arrives. Independent of the delivery blocks mishap it would appear there is a high enough percentage of owners with squeaky suspension and steering...