Showing results for tags 'vigo'.
I am trying to find out and share details of the problem and outcome from anyone who has suffered problems with an Alko chassis, particularly on a Bailey caravan. We currently have such a problem and are battling it out with Bailey I think that there is a problem which should be covered under warranty, but am being blamed for causing the problem. We were due to pick up our 2 year old Bailey Unicorn Vigo from its service last week. They called us to say it was ready, then called us 10 minutes later to say that it was unfit to drive!!!!! The word 'axle' was mentioned, as were the words 'overload' and 'probably your fault and not covered under warranty' although we had to wait for an Alko engineer to confirm that the arms on the axle are bent to double the angle that they should be, causing the suspension to sink. The good news is that they have discovered the cause of the caravan flooding when we towed in the rain. There is a huge hole in the wheel box caused by the tyre rubbing against it. A huge hole that they didn't find when they went over the caravan with a fine toothcomb to look for the source of the leak at the end of last year! Holes in the wheelbox caused by tyres rubbing is a problem that I found in a 10 minute web search that others have suffered. The dealer said they had never come accross it before. We stand accused of overloading the caravan. Funny, because we tow with a van to carry all the heavy items for the exact reason that we don't want to overload the caravan! But we also weighed every item, even teaspoons, and have a spreadsheet (I know!) which tells us the total weight of everything we originally put the caravan. We were very confident that it was not overloaded! Alko accused us of a 98kg overload. We have been back to the caravan today, emptied it and weighed every single item in it. Unsurprisingly, the payload was under the 1500kg permitted, but the dealer doesn't accept that our scales are accurate enough to account for the nearly 100kg discrepancy between what Alko weighed (caravan + contents) and our contents weight. My husband was formerly a senior fleet manager for an international haulage company and knows a thing or two about loading. It is worth noting that the margin of error on portable weighbridges is plus or minus 100kg! There is also a lot of red tape involved in the calibration of the area where they are used. We have asked for all the supporting documentation. One of Baileys own advertising photos shows a Bailey caravan with a car and a man standing on the roof, claiming a load of 1600kg. I know that the caravan is stationary and not being towed, but there must be a tolerance on the axle that means that it won't collapse if you pop in an extra teaspoon while you are towing! We spoke to an independent engineer who has dealt with several similar cases and he said that it was insulting to our intelligence to suggest that an overload of 98kg would cause the axle to collapse (even though we are now satisfied that it was NOT overloaded!) He suggested that we pursue it through the small claims court - the same advice that we got when we took some legal advice through our insurers. We are starting a warranty claim against Bailey. I believe that there is a problem with the axles that is being avoided by the manufacturer. From the research that I have done on the web, axle problems are not uncommon or unknown, but Bailey and Alko don't want to know. The only way to make them take responsibility is to prove that these are not isolated incidents caused by lots of irresponsible owners overloading their vans. My worst fear is that we will have the repair and be in the same position and accused of overloading this time next year.
Just had our Vigo go through it's 2nd service yesterday. No Damp found thankfully. Here's to another year of caravanning!
Well, back to square one it would seem. My U3 Vigo LED rear lights are playing up once again. I have the 'box' fitted and all was well for a time but now the dash repeater has failed. No issues with the car itself - a 'normal' trailer board with filament bulbs works fine and exactly as it should. Switch back to the 'van and whilst the lights works OK, the dash indicator doesn't. Have gone through several scenarios of disconnecting the box, adding resistor shunts (box in and box out) with no success so I guess I'm now going to have to give in and get the rear bumper units swapped out for the newer (but older in tech specs) units. Previous conversations with Bailey indicated that any units with ongoing problems would be replaced as a warranty item - fingers crossed.