All this talk about voided warranties takes me back to a true
experience. I had an '87 Dodge Daytona Shelby Z. Traded in my '83
Shelby Charger for it. During the four years that I had it, it was
autocrossed maybe five times - usually, when the Mini was broken.
But it was in and out of the service shop for the same recurring
problem - the front K-member would work itself loose and "clunk" under
acceleration. They even replaced the whole thing and it still started
clunking a few months later. To say the least, the service department
at Tait Shreveport Dodge and I didn't get along very well! (We'd
already had several previous run ins when I had my '83 Shelby
Charger)
So I spent a lot of time dealing with their "ombudsman" - a go-between
sort of guy who was supposed to work out problems between the service
department and their customers. We got to know each other pretty
well. He knew that I was active in the SCCA and that I did a lot of
autocrossing. He also knew that I'd autocrossed the Z few times, but
never said anything about it.
Fast forward to '91. I sold the car to a college kid who lived about
an hour down the interstate. I was up front with him about everything
that had been done to the car - about its history of K-member problems
- and about it being autocrossed a few times. I had an extended
warranty on it, and transferred that warranty to him when he bought
the car.
About a month later, the K-member problem resurfaced and he called
me. I told him to take it to the dealer there in Natchitoches and see
what they could do. I also told him that, if they couldn't fix it, he
should bring it back up here to Shreveport and let Tait work on it.
AND, I told him if he had any trouble with the service department
here, he needed to talk to Stan - the ombudsman. WELL, he followed
that sequence to the letter. When he got to Stan, the guy took one
look at the car and said, "That's John's old car, isn't it? That
car's been raced!" Then he proceeded to go straight to the computer
and void the warranty right there on the spot.
Go figure. He never said squat to me while I owned the car. But as
soon as I sold it, he canceled the warranty on this poor unsuspecting
college kid. And THAT was ten years ago!!!!
John (Old Fartz & TLS #37) Lieberman
|