We need a new water pump for the Tiguan. Nice lady at the garage said it would be around 1 000€.
So of course I checked online. I found that, had it been a US car, we’d be reimbursed 100%. There was a class action.
Any ideas how I’d find out if there’s been anything similar in EU or UK? I haven’t found anything yet.
Can’t answer your question, but following a fairly recent change in the law French garages are obliged to offer the option of generic or reconditioned components. The estimated labour time is 6-8 hours. If nothing else, you should be able to bring the cost down by shopping around.
We had two Tiguans, a MK 1 from 2013 to 2017 and a MK 2 from 2017 to 2022 but I never heard of any water pump problems. What’s I’d try is to get the dealer to make an appeal to VW, on occasion with a known issue the manufacturer provides the part FOC and the owner pays for the fitting.
Good luck 
We had to replace the waterpump on our Karoq at 3 years old - warranty just expired - but I understand it’s a ‘standard failure’.
Is this a problem with VW’s / Skoda / Audi’s ?
I’m thinking of buying a small SUV, Audi / Skoda / VW…
6-8 hours to change a water pump? Does it have to be done in zero G or something?
VW, Audi, SEAT, Škoda, Cupra….. They are all the same car. VW’s badge engineering would make British Leyland blush IMHO it’ll be the death of them, but they’ve no way out.
It’s a bit of a bummer nevertheless buying a Porsche or a Bentley and having Polo switchgear 
You should have negotiated, especially if you knew it was a “standard failure”. We bought ours new with three year warranty and never had a problem, but had I done so even after the warranty expired i would have “had words”. That said our local dealer was very good and I’m sure they would have sorted out some sort of arrangement with Wolfsburg.
I like and generally buy German cars, but probably for reliability you’re better off with a Toyota. I think German reliability has become a bit of a myth. Our i4 has had several significant issues. I still love the car but BMW needs to pull its socks up.
Doctor Google…
“VW Tiguan water pump failure,
often due to plastic housing degrading or gasket issues, commonly causescoolant leaks(especially near the thermostat housing),engine overheating, and can triggercheck engine lights with codes like P00B7, with potential whining noises from bad bearings; it’s a known weak point, especially on 2.0L TSI engines, often best replaced preventatively with the timing belt using upgraded metal pumps for longevity. “
Is it a TSI @Porridge ? Ours were diesels.
Thanks, gents. It is indeed a TSFI, 2.0 petrol.
I’ll encourage Madame P to make enquiries but I doubt she will want to. She knows less about cars than I do, so she’s well into negative figures (I’m just nul), and it’s an area where her fluency won’t help.
It’s a 6.5-yo car, but - after the very first Golf, and the Avensis - it’s the best car we’ve ever had. In fact, it’s probably equal with the Avensis, though faster.
I’ll shop around.
Thanks again.
I have had no issues with VW water pumps, but the auto gearbox on my Passat Estate developed a fault (the flywheel came apart) which made the car uneconomic to repair. OK it was quite old but had done fewer than 100k miles.
Its electronic parking brake switch was another cause of grievance - it would fail intermittently and lock the rear brakes in the on position - not great when you need to drive home late at night!
Despite it being a simple switch replacement two garages (including a VW main dealer!) failed to carry it out correctly. The main dealer wanted to charge me an extra £130 for “diagnosing the problem” when all they had done was take out the old switch, place it next to the new one on the passenger seat, and then mistakenly reinstall the old switch again.
So no, anecdotally VWs are not what they were, but neither are their dealers, in the UK at least.
I now drive a Honda Accord Estate which has been very reliable and only needed bits due to wear and tear and accidents (e.g. driving into a huge pothole which removed the plastic undertray from the engine).
The snag with the Accord (which is a 2009 model) has been that aftermarket parts are not commonly available, so you need more expensive genuine Honda bits, which sometimes have to come from Belgium, with the attendant fun of UK import duty.
I am looking forward to having a brand new electric car in a few years which should need far less mechanical jiggery-pokery.
Just after it was out of warranty we brought out last Tiguan to Dublin for Christmas. One day the dashboard lit up, very appropriately, like a Christmas tree. A few of the “assist” things stopped working, ABS, traction control, Lane Assist, etc. but I wasn’t too bothered and decided to get it sorted in January before returning home. Over the ensuing week thngs gradually returned to normal so I decided it was a short circuit caused by the Irish damp weather that was the culprit and just drove back home to France.
The following year exactly the same happened but this time I took her in to the main VW dealer for diagnosis, which cost €130. The report came back with no electrical issues but with a “suspect” rear wheel bearing. I realised at that stage I was dealing with compete idiots, not even worth discussing the matter with, paid and left. The electrics dried out, as they had the year before, we drove back home and never had so much as rumble from the perfect rear wheel bearing, ever.
What it did teach me is that the electronic diagnosis for cars (I would assume all manufacturers are the same) is rubbish. While it is presented as a unified system, it is, because of the way it has evolved, really little more than islands of automation loosely strung together. So getting to the root of which contact was causing my Christmas tree was going to be hit and miss, possibly very expensive and possibly impossible.
So, being charitable, maybe the garage thought telling the old fart in the French reg car he’s a wheel bearing problem, reset the electronics and he’ll be thousands of KM from us when it goes again. Which in drier weather at home it never did.
BTW, BMW have sort of admitted my “islands of automation” theory by advertising their Neue Klasse platform has only one central processing unit which handles the whole works. Which as a mainframe man is music to my ears
Why not just rip out all the wiring and pop a second-hand DEC PDP-10 in the boot? 
Much as I admired Ken Olsen and DEC, I really saw them as midrange and clustery. Though I never worked on the VAX or VMS I liked the architecture and had pals in DEC and one of their timeshare bureaus. I would have liked to have had a fiddle with a PDP-10 too. Four more bit word than my own toys had.
I’m sorry to hear a mere DEC is not upmarket enough for you, John.
Can I interest you in a lightly used El Capitan from Lawrence Livermore?
Long time since I looked at Cray architecture (decades and decades) but it was weird. They just seemed to have added instructions that didn’t really make any sense, maybe would never, ever be used, but they were easy to slip in . A sort of shift left logical, backwards with a reverse flip… wowee, find a use for that then Mr. dude programmer 
@Porridge look online for a user group of the manufacturer that has a forum. Good chance there’s a thread or category for your car model and if you’re really lucky a thread on this very problem. There may well be French forums if lots sold and for sure there will be huge German forums.
The car I’m looking at has an engine type 35 TFSI 150 S tronic 7, first reg’d in 2024, it’s petrol with an automatic gearbox.
Have any of you got one or any knowledge of, I’d appreciate any feedback. I’ve researched en ligne, It seems the major problems were ironed out sometime around 2015-16.
Depending on the distance the vehicle has covered, if the water pump is being replaced then hopefully the job will also include a new timing belt and associated bits.
Thanks.
It has done only 53.000km but the low mileage probably hasn’t helped (or the fact that it has never been garaged).
