Auxilliary Belt Failure

[unhappyskoda]

My car broke down in France: The auxilliary belt had broken. I had a new timing belt fitted 6000 miles earlier in line with Skoda recommendadtion. I was told by the Skoda main dealer in France who replaced the broken auxilliary belt that the old auxilliary belt should never have been refitted as it would have only cost £25 to fit a new belt when changing the timing belt. Instead it cost me £300. They also said that this was a recommendation of Skoda France.

Skoda UK and the Skoda main dealer tell me that they would never change a belt unless a visual inspection showed that it needed changing. A local Audi specialist said the same as the French Skoda main dealer, i.e. that they would always change the auxilliary belt if it had to have been removed because of the difference in cost if it had to be replaced separately.

Can anybody let me know if there is any agreed wisdom of when to change a component if the difference between refitting an old compnent versus the cost of waiting for a component to fail is so great as in this case.

My car is a five year old Skoda Superb Elegance it had done 46000 miles when the breakdown occurred.

[Crasher]

So the replies on Briskoda didn't satisfy you?

[unhappyskoda]

"So the replies on Briskoda didn't satisfy you?".

I am sorry if I should have spooted something elsewhere but I have only joined this morning. I tried doing a search on Briskoda but got no match. Perhaps you could guide me further?

[unhappyskoda]

I finnally realised that Briskoda is a Skoda forum. Surprise surprise, for my car, I could only find one reply and that was one posted by my son when we were in france, so I have not got any further anyway, but thank you for telling me of the other forum! I guess my son had told me but I didn't know where to go!!

Still, if any body does have any further information I wouldstillbe grateful.

[Crasher]

I thought I replied, I will check.

[mluton]

What engine do you have ?

Nearly all of the pre 2005 Skoda & VAG cars now have 4 year, 60K cambelt interval IIRC.

[unhappyskoda]

According to my Service Book it is, as you say, a 60k cambelt internal but the dealer said that Skoda had recently changed this to 40000. It does not, however, change my situation as I was at 40000 and 4 years anyway!

[onzarob]

It common practise for dealers and independents to change all belts when doing the timing belt, due to the work involved, most dealers suggest changing the water pump as well.

An inspection is OK, but no gaurantee that the belt is OK, that why the charge intervals have been reduced as belts were failing too often.

[unhappyskoda]

Many thanks for your very helpful reply. I have since found that the cost of a new auxilliary belt is about £40 and the cost of fitting a new belt due to failure would bring the total to about £120. This is not very good but what had got me worked up was the amount I had been charged to do the job when I had broken down. The amount was 474 Euro's or £332. As you might guess, this was not an English garage but one in France. I feel that I considerably overcharged and I would caution anybody against getting work done in France unless there is no alternative and in that case make sure you check the price with your normal UK garage. One garage in the UK tells me that this overcharging is quite common.

I would be happy to give further details if anybody is interested.

[MalcQV]

Had my timing belt changed at the beginning of the year when the water pump failed. Work done was under warranty but they did not do my aux belts. They said they were cracked (which one was) when servicing the car a couple of months ago.

Point being they did not change the belts at the time. Mind you they wanted in excess of £100 to do it at the service.

[markieboy]

Hi There...I am new to this forum and I have a Skoda Superb (04) Elegance 130PD and also a '99 VW Bora Sport 2.0 (115bhp) Auto.

With respect to the belt changes...every time I have the cambelt done I have a new aux belt fitted. The cost of the aux belt (£6) from GSF is punny compared to the cost of having it fitted at a later date.

So far...in 42 months my Superb has covered 176k miles...yes 176k miles. The Bora has 125k. Oil and fliter monthly and shes still on the original clutch...but soon to be done. Why such such high mileage...private and exec hire car. My previous car to the Superb was a Passat 110bhp of 98 vintage. When I sold that car it had just under 500k miles on the clock!!!!!

YeI believe in VW engineering. Oh and the other thing is that the Superb as well as the old Passat run on recycled chip oil!!!!!!!