Sunday, January 13, 2008

1/366 - Plum Island, MA

I’m about a week away from using New Hamster’s lemon law… Martin the Merry Mazdamobile the 2nd has decided he doesn’t like to keep his wheels balanced.  I got him in March and he was at the dealer in September and October to get balanced.  Then this week I spent $100 to have my favorite tire place look at them… the guy told me that if it’s the 3rd time they’ve been that out of balance I should really have the dealership take the car and keep it until they find out what’s wrong with it.

I was all set to just let it go as long as the car stayed in balance.  Until Friday morning.  I was getting onto 95, just about to shift gears when my steering wheel jerked to the right.  Like someone just gave it a good yank. I called the dealer I bought the car from and they were giving me a hard time scheduling an appointment.  Then the guy was like, oh you just drove through a puddle and lost control.  Yeah, it was raining, but do I LOOK like that kind of moron?  There was no puddle on the road.

I brought it to the dealership I almost bought the car from* and dealt with the owner today. I know he can’t replicate the jerk, I don’t even know if it’s related and I have no idea if the car will go out of balance while they have it, but he promised me they would do everything he could to repair it.  His dealership has never had a problem they couldn’t fix. While I’m not keen on the idea of yet another new car, I’m starting to look around.  If they can’t fix it, I don’t want another Mazda. I think I’ll go back to driving a Subaru.

*sigh*

* I didn’t buy the car from this dealership because the sales guy was a complete jerk and wouldn’t budge on the price or my trade in.  I got a better model for the same price plus a couple of grand extra on my trade in… at this rate, it probably would have evened itself out, though.

While I’m thinking about it, I still wouldn’t recommend them.  The owner’s attitude about the other dealership, while understandable, was a turn off. That was before he flipped the bird.  Yeah.  Exactly.  If they can fix it, great. But it still won’t change my mind about them.