VW owners stripping their cars before returning them due to Dieselgate

Jean Ralphio

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May 28, 2008
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Part of Volkswagen’s $14.7 billion Dieselgate settlement requires the company to offer buybacks to nearly half a million owners whose cars cheated emissions tests. But that settlement does not stipulate that those bought-back cars have to be in good shape, so some owners are stripping their vehicles down.

According to the buyback terms specified in the EPA’s Consent Decree, the only requirement related to vehicle condition is that the car has to be “operable,” a word defined by the court as:

“Operable” means that a vehicle so described can be driven under its own 2.0-liter TDI engine power. A vehicle is not Operable if it had a branded title of “Assembled,” “Dismantled,” “Flood,” “Junk,” “Rebuilt,” “Reconstructed,” or “Salvaged” as of September 18, 2015, and was acquired by any person or entity from a junkyard or salvaged after September 18, 2015.

Operable could mean a lot of things.

I called Volkswagen’s settlement hotline, and the representative told me the same thing. Basically, it seems like you can strip every damn part off of your Volkswagen TDI and still get your buyback money, as long as the car can still drive under its own power.

Quite a few Volkswagen owners, many of whom I’d place squarely in the “disgruntled” category, see this as an opportunity to get back at Volkswagen by turning in a fully-gutted shitbox, while others just see it as a way to make some extra cash.

You’ll find threads from TDI owners all over the internet, from Reddit to the TDI Owners Club, about this topic. There’s threads like “Will anyone be stripping salvaging parts before selling back?,” “Has anyone returned a stripped TDI yet?,” “Stripping the Turn Ins,” and “Cannibalizing TDI,” all of which eventually turn into discussions on ethics, since VW is compensating owners handsomely, and stripping a vehicle would theoretically make it more difficult for the company to sell the cars if they eventually devise a fix.

Owners in these threads have discussed removing mirrors, jacks, headlights, floor mats, visors, radios, seats, and all sorts of other easily-pulled parts. Then there are people like rotts4u, a member of the TDI Club Forum, who got a bit more imaginative, saying:

Carpet, airbags, battery if yours is better/newer, drain the oil and replace it with even more used oil drain the coolant and replace it with water from the storm drain, empty the fuel tank, DEF tank, take off the glove box door, the inner door panels I guess you could pull the steering wheel and just clamp a vise grip on the stem to drive it to the dealer, pull the air filter oil filter,drain most of the brake fluid, power steering fluid, windshield washer fluid,, spare tire, jack, first aid kit, maybe even the trunk deck could come off and meet the rules, who know can you drive legally without doors?

To be sure, most people seem happy with their buyback offer, and at most, they remove a few aftermarket parts they installed and a floor mat or two.

But some of them actually have stripped their cars down, like Reddit-user Tacoboutnachos, who turned in a total junker after literally stripping his Golf’s front fascia off (that’s his car in the top photo).

Even the rear end was also messed up from an accident:

JQ4UgvL.png


I chatted with Tacoboutnachos over Reddit, asking him if he had intentionally removed the fascia, or if it had been torn off after a collision, and he said:

Yes the front end I took off for my friend and then the back was in an accident. I guess you can say everything’s happened to this car lol.

Despite the janky shape of the car, Tacoboutnachos told me he “still got paid with no issues.” So seems like VW will buy back your car even if the thing’s in terrible shape. Will they buy back just the carcass with the powertrain in it? I’m not sure, but the terms in the settlement definitely don’t rule out the possibility.

If more owners do what this person did, you can expect lots of cheap used Jetta and Golf parts to flood Ebay and Craigslist in the near future.
 

Chester Copperpot

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Damn. I'd strip out everything I could. Radio, seats, bumpers, exhaust system, headlights, windows and wheels.

I'd drive it to the dealer on the brake rotors.

Ask to buy/be given the spares from other cars, drive that bitch in on four donuts if you had the premium wheel upgrade and sell those.
 

Dasfinc

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Sep 28, 2007
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Posts on the forums state that the picture above was the first case, and the buyers have been instructed to decline those cars now.

If you've poured money into preventative maintenance and then had the scandal happen, I can see doing some pretty sketchy shit to get every penny back out that I could.
 

sickmint79

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Mar 2, 2008
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Carpet, airbags, battery if yours is better/newer, drain the oil and replace it with even more used oil drain the coolant and replace it with water from the storm drain, empty the fuel tank, DEF tank, take off the glove box door, the inner door panels I guess you could pull the steering wheel and just clamp a vise grip on the stem to drive it to the dealer, pull the air filter oil filter,drain most of the brake fluid, power steering fluid, windshield washer fluid,, spare tire, jack, first aid kit, maybe even the trunk deck could come off and meet the rules, who know can you drive legally without doors?

this person is a real scumbag
 

Outlaw

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Aside from say premium wheels if you could find a set of steelies, you're an asshole for doing this. Disgruntled or not you can always keep the car and not have it fixed if you like it how it is and have painstakingly maintained it. The whole "cheat" in and of itself was to provide consumers with greater mileage than reported. I got consistently 8-10 MPG over EPA estimates in my 2015 TDI
 

DanJ

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I see a lot of vaping and flat brim hat types driving VW's on those wheels with the camber way off.

I can see all those wankers doing this...

You just pop up in all these VW threads, and I think I take a lot of offense to it because I quit smoking and use an e cig. My camber is stock spec and I don't wear hats so i guess I'm alright.
 
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Chet Donnelly

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You just pop up in all these VW threads, and I think I take a lot of offense to it because I quit smoking and use an e cig. My camber is stock spec and I don't wear hats so i guess I'm alright.
Yeah...nothing wrong with that.

I'm talking about the ones that look like the wheels are going to fall off, I don't know why but it seems like the people that want the wrong camber buy VW's. Then...whenever I see the VW, or any car, with the wheels looking like they are about to cave in, it's almost always being driven by someone with a flat brimmed hat, and not just vaping because they quit smoking, im talking about plume after plume of vape smoke pouring out of the car.
 

Dasfinc

Ready for the EVlution
Sep 28, 2007
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I would want 5 minutes with the twat waffles that cheat and try take advantage of this situation.

Gee, our car won't pass emissions. Let's gut the car and ring the dealer back a shell, which isn't what the person bought in the first place. Fucking cunts.

Not all apples are bad; but like I was saying a few posts ago, I can see some people having been wronged past just the restitution money that are getting screwed due to the wording in the by back.

Ex: So you have 60,000 miles on your TDI, and you replace your tires, and do a bunch of other dealer recommended service (Maybe Brakes too?)to the tune of say $2,000 because you plan on keeping the car for a long time.

The scandal 'drops', and suddenly your car is worthless, and you spent 2 grand on it effectively putting you pretty far into the 'hole'. You are still making payments on the car, and could be easily thousands and thousands upside down now.

The buyback finally happens, and yes you get some restitution money out of it, but that $2,000 you spent you will never see again (and you wouldn't have spent on the car had you known what was about to go down), and you can't exactly 'get back out' of the car.
 

Grabber

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Dec 11, 2007
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Not all apples are bad; but like I was saying a few posts ago, I can see some people having been wronged past just the restitution money that are getting screwed due to the wording in the by back.

Ex: So you have 60,000 miles on your TDI, and you replace your tires, and do a bunch of other dealer recommended service (Maybe Brakes too?)to the tune of say $2,000 because you plan on keeping the car for a long time.

The scandal 'drops', and suddenly your car is worthless, and you spent 2 grand on it effectively putting you pretty far into the 'hole'. You are still making payments on the car, and could be easily thousands and thousands upside down now.

The buyback finally happens, and yes you get some restitution money out of it, but that $2,000 you spent you will never see again (and you wouldn't have spent on the car had you known what was about to go down), and you can't exactly 'get back out' of the car.

You still bought the car with a front bumper, wheels, etc. They are paying for that in the buy back. A lot of people, years into their loans want to get out of it. Chances are, they are getting out of thousands of dollars of interest and are able to buy a new car since their old loan was paid off.

You bought a car as is, you sell it the same way. Same goes for private party. You have a car for 3 years, spend $3,000 in maintenance. Do you ask the buyer to pay for that in addition to the fair market value? No, you do not.

Same point with selling the car back to the manufacturer.
 
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