For the 05 I picked up, I have the option of a one or two year warranty, bumper to bumper.
One year is $5600, two years is $8200.

Car has 48k miles and does show an accident on the Carfax. What would you experienced owners recommend I do? I plan keeping the car for only three years... and don't have money in reserve for any serious repairs, i.e. over4k

 

I guess it can't hurt to mention that:
A) front bushing needs replacement
B) parking brake sensor is on and not sure why..

I also want to mention that I was told that its a bbumper to bumper warranty, but I have yet to read the fine print of all that is excluded.

 

I think the key question is whether if you expect your repair cost for 1 year will exceed $5600 or not plus the ease of warranty payout.

If your repair cost is going to be less than $5600 or the warranty underwriter is sketchy, you might be better off putting $500 into a saving account each month to write your own insurance.

 

the parking brake light is due to the edu,so you will need a new one of those which i think are about $600 plus an hour to fit,bushings if they just do upper then about 1800 with an alignment.(these are dealer prices),why don't you insist they repair these before you buy car ?before they replace ecu for park brake make sure they have done the service action issued by Bentley for this issue.

 

already bought the car and the price i got was so low, it was understood that as is = as is.

so the parking brake needs a replaced ecu?
also - what service action? The recall that was issued?

 

the ecu has an issue with memory so we were given a program to update it,if that did not work we replaced ecu. it was not a recall but a service action.

 

I had my bentley guy check it out today and he said that someone had changed the brake pads in the rear sometime in the past couple of years but did not do so properly, with the computer, etc.
As such, he mentioned we would need to get the computer thing installed on each back wheel at about $400/ea+labor.
Thanks to a comment from REDNOSEGT, I simply said that if we are in south Florida and I know ill never need a P Brake, let's DISABLE IT! He said unlikely but tried anyways. Lo and Behold! He disabled the P Brake notice in the computer and I finally now have my Cluster Display back again!!!!

interestingly enough, i had him try to disable the TPMS (per REDNOSEGT), but he said he was unable to with the Bentley controller in his hand - and perhaps it could only be done with the VAG-COM.

happy that i dodged that $800-$1k bullet... phew.

 

Also - and I know this may shock a few - but my 05s 3rd brake light was out. He was able to install a rig he made to trick the computer into thinking all was good. That was another light succesfully eliminated today!

 

Gotta love doing work arounds to patch dash lights

 

glad you got it sorted.

 

Who is the warranty through?

 

i have extended warranty. private 3rd party. they always pay out.
just read the fine print, follow the maintenance schedule and use a company that is not a fly by night and uses good shops to do the work.

they are usually never bumper to bumper, but they are pretty good at covering all the main stuff.

 

Yup, on Ferarichat we had a 3rd-party insurance scammer who stole plenty of $$$ and rarely, if ever, paid out. Frankly, insurance is a numbers game and with the Bentley I see no reason to bother 'rolling the dice' and buying insurance... unless you bought a cheap, improperly cared for Bentley thinking you got a deal. These 'great deals', well, usually in the long run there are no 'deals'.

 

Parking brake light came back on. Celebration has ended.

Anyone know of a work around on the p brake light?

 

How much are those sensors? Will one from a phaeton work?