Sorry if you read this on FB, but I thought I'd see what I could find here too...
Oh boy am I pissed at my local dealership...
So, I've been having issues with the traction light and red BRAKE light coming on if I turn my car on and off a few times in a short period of time, like what you'd do when running a few errands. My buddy, who is a FCA mechanic for a local Fiat, scanned my car when all this started and the computer said my ABS control module was bad (hence my other post about that). I bought the module, but wasn't able to install it right away due to my buddy going on a long vacation.
In the mean time, I took my car in my some recall work at my local Dodge dealer. While I looking up the recalls, I saw one, M10, that was inspected but never fixed on my car. Well, this M10 has to do with the fuse box getting too hot for the #14 mini fuse and killing the ABS and traction control as a result. I specifically asked my local dealer to look into it, but when I got my car back, nothing on the paperwork said they they did. I asked about it and was told it was "all good".
Fast forward to this week and installing the new ABS control module... We get it all done, initialized, calibrated and married to the PCM. Done, right? Nope.... The damn lights come back on after a few run cycles in a row. But like last time, if the car sits overnight and cools off, all is well. I go to his dealership and he scans my car, I'm getting a low voltage to the ABS code and it's saying to replace the ABS control module. My buddy knows this new one works because it's new and it accepted all the initial programming. He checks all the connections, the voltage throughout the car with his voltage meter and all is good. I then ask him about the M10 recall and if that may have something to do with it.
My buddy looks up the recall and it only shows "inspected" however, not "completed" in his program also, which is why he never saw any red flags the first time he scanned my car because of it being something other than "not complete". So we look up the 11 page repair manual (I've attached two pages) and it says that if the car does not have a fuse cartridge in slot 6, the switch over from mini slot 14 to cartridge slot 6 MUST BE DONE. Well guess what?? My car only has the old mini fuse.... His best guess is that because the cover page is vague about checking the ABS fuse and it isn't until page 3 that specifically says where to look, that the techs are only pulling the old fuse, seeing that it's not blown and sending me in my way. The kicker is, the repair kit from Mopar is only 8 bucks and the repair manual says it's was than an hour's worth of work.
BTW, in the pics, the green circles are where the new fuse should go (which I don't have) and the red circles are the old fuse that needs to be removed (which is still in my car).
Sooooo, now I am going in the morning with this repair manual to show the service department exactly what's going on. If they brush me off again, I'm going remind them that the recall packet instructs the owner of the car to call the NHTSB if the dealer can't resolve this SAFETY RECALL. I hoping that they'll set up an appointment to get this fixed under recall finally.
Now if this fixes my issue, do I contact corporate directly about all of this? Because now I'm out $560 on a part that can't be returned due to a mandatory recall from 2012 never being done. Or is this just a "sucks to be me" because the scanning and part replacement was never officially done through FCA?
Sorry for the looooong post, but I had to vent. Why am I the one doing their job?? Ugh....
Oh boy am I pissed at my local dealership...
So, I've been having issues with the traction light and red BRAKE light coming on if I turn my car on and off a few times in a short period of time, like what you'd do when running a few errands. My buddy, who is a FCA mechanic for a local Fiat, scanned my car when all this started and the computer said my ABS control module was bad (hence my other post about that). I bought the module, but wasn't able to install it right away due to my buddy going on a long vacation.
In the mean time, I took my car in my some recall work at my local Dodge dealer. While I looking up the recalls, I saw one, M10, that was inspected but never fixed on my car. Well, this M10 has to do with the fuse box getting too hot for the #14 mini fuse and killing the ABS and traction control as a result. I specifically asked my local dealer to look into it, but when I got my car back, nothing on the paperwork said they they did. I asked about it and was told it was "all good".
Fast forward to this week and installing the new ABS control module... We get it all done, initialized, calibrated and married to the PCM. Done, right? Nope.... The damn lights come back on after a few run cycles in a row. But like last time, if the car sits overnight and cools off, all is well. I go to his dealership and he scans my car, I'm getting a low voltage to the ABS code and it's saying to replace the ABS control module. My buddy knows this new one works because it's new and it accepted all the initial programming. He checks all the connections, the voltage throughout the car with his voltage meter and all is good. I then ask him about the M10 recall and if that may have something to do with it.
My buddy looks up the recall and it only shows "inspected" however, not "completed" in his program also, which is why he never saw any red flags the first time he scanned my car because of it being something other than "not complete". So we look up the 11 page repair manual (I've attached two pages) and it says that if the car does not have a fuse cartridge in slot 6, the switch over from mini slot 14 to cartridge slot 6 MUST BE DONE. Well guess what?? My car only has the old mini fuse.... His best guess is that because the cover page is vague about checking the ABS fuse and it isn't until page 3 that specifically says where to look, that the techs are only pulling the old fuse, seeing that it's not blown and sending me in my way. The kicker is, the repair kit from Mopar is only 8 bucks and the repair manual says it's was than an hour's worth of work.
BTW, in the pics, the green circles are where the new fuse should go (which I don't have) and the red circles are the old fuse that needs to be removed (which is still in my car).
Sooooo, now I am going in the morning with this repair manual to show the service department exactly what's going on. If they brush me off again, I'm going remind them that the recall packet instructs the owner of the car to call the NHTSB if the dealer can't resolve this SAFETY RECALL. I hoping that they'll set up an appointment to get this fixed under recall finally.
Now if this fixes my issue, do I contact corporate directly about all of this? Because now I'm out $560 on a part that can't be returned due to a mandatory recall from 2012 never being done. Or is this just a "sucks to be me" because the scanning and part replacement was never officially done through FCA?
Sorry for the looooong post, but I had to vent. Why am I the one doing their job?? Ugh....