Re:Re: a little help if you have the time

[Alex Kowalski (audial@aol.com) (Law Guest Account) <lawguest@wppost.depaul.edu>]

Paul R. Anderson wrote:

>Alex,
> 
> Don't be so quick to blame an American for your radiator fitting coming 
> apart on you.

I didn't know I'd said anything anti-patriotic or un-American in my post. 
The shoulder of my radiator inlet  was _sawed off_ and then the hose
was put back on and the clamp overtightened.   It didn't come that way
from the factory.  

And I have posted in the past that aspects of the cooling system on
these cars have or had debatable design features and materials. 
Sometimes, in fact, I've gone too far in the other direction, as when I
accused Audi of not redesigning the radiator expansion tank which is
prone to cracking quite some time ago. .

I posted about three weeks ago, also, about how I tried to get my inlet
repaired and met with a lot of conflicting information from radiator repair
companies, who disagreed widely on whether the plastic end tanks can
be fixed, largely owing to the material they're made of.  One shop flatly
repaired to look at _any_ plastic end-tanks that had been overheated. 
Which is why I bought a used radiator from the (very nice American
guys) at VW Parts.

The original intent of Phil's post was to ask if anyone had something
happen to them after a used car was bought that could be instructive for
future purchasers and was not obvious or was overlooked.  Maybe I
should have been a little less speculative about the cause of my failure,
but my overall message was the same:  be careful of your hot coolant
system until you've inspected it thoroughly.

Best Wishes,
Alex