Complete brake failure

[peteski2022]

Hello all,

New to this forum and unfortunately my first post isn’t a great one.

I’ve had an MK8 for about four months now and yesterday suffered a total failure of the brakes resulting in a very near accident. Thankfully On a quiet road and not at high speed. Utterly terrifying. Applied the brakes to come to lights and felt something ping under my feet and the pedal go flat to the floor. Pumped the pedal in panic and managed to slow the car to a stop with what little braking remained. VW assist came to check the vehicle and found that one of the brake lines appeared to have suffered rubbing to the point that the line had ruptured. Massive pool of brake fluid under the car. Report from the mechanic states ‘brake line rubbing fitment issue?’ Question is has something caused the brake line to drop (a clip failing) and start to rub or was it not in place when it left the factory. Spit has occurred at top of wheel well on front right I think (I’m not a mechanic but that’s where the mechanic was looking and checking and where the fluid has leaked out).

Has anyone any knowledge of any other examples of this happening? Car has been towed to the dealership for assessment and repair. Where do I stand on this? Had this been on the motorway the outcome could have been a lot different. To say I’m angry is an understatement. Where does responsibility lie for checking the car is safe to be handed over to a customer? Surely if this had happened at the factory quality control would have spotted it? Should I demand the dealer make a report and keep hold of the parts they remove? Are they obliged to find out what went wrong and report to VW? Could this be a one off, or the start of a potential wider problem for cars built at the time mine was?

Having never in my life experienced anything like this I’d appreciate your thoughts on this.

Thank you in advance

[Cyberacc]

I can understand it would be terrifying. My only car accident (touch wood) was when I was a teenager working for a used car dealer. I had to collect an old car from a wholesaler. The brakes failed, despite braking a longer than normal time from some traffic lights, using the gears to slow down as much as it could, but I sailed into the back of a car.

From that experience I learned I should have used the handbrake (but didn't think of it in the moment). Not sure how that works with the electronic parking brake of modern Golfs.
The other thing I would be prepared to do these days is using the auto transmission's manual gear control to slow down the car.
I suspect the "P"ark option in the automatic mk8 Golfs would refuse to engage until at a complete stop.

[johnsimcox]

I can understand it would be terrifying. My only car accident (touch wood) was when I was a teenager working for a used car dealer. I had to collect an old car from a wholesaler. The brakes failed, despite braking a longer than normal time from some traffic lights, using the gears to slow down as much as it could, but I sailed into the back of a car.

From that experience I learned I should have used the handbrake (but didn't think of it in the moment). Not sure how that works with the electronic parking brake of modern Golfs.
The other thing I would be prepared to do these days is using the auto transmission's manual gear control to slow down the car.
I suspect the "P"ark option in the automatic mk8 Golfs would refuse to engage until at a complete stop.

On a car with an electric handbrake you pull up hold the switch in the centre console. It has the same effect as pulling up the handbrake lever in a car with a traditional handbrake.

[Crasher]

As I said on another forum, it is a shame it could not have been independently examined as I fear the fault will "get lost" and whitewashed but it is out here now and I know VW UK look at this and the other forum.