67 Plate Jimny 3 - Heater Matrix has burst !

Hiya,

I have had my 67 plate Jimmy 3 from new, she's only done 35,000 miles but a month ago I lost a lot of engine
coolant into the drivers footwell and the engine started to overheat.
Had to do an emergency repair in a B&Q car park, cut the pipes from the engine heading to the heater matrix,
jointed them together with a small length of 15mm copper pipe & clips, then refilled with coolant.
Bingo, car working again just no heat from the heater.

 I have been down to my local Suzuki dealership, where I bought the car which is Colin Appleyard in Huddersfield.
They have checked out the car and confirmed that the heater matrix has burst and a new heat matrix, plus pipes are
required to fix this. The quote is an eye watering £1500 due to dash board being removed, plus the parts needed are just over £500.

 To me this is a defective part fitted into my Jimmy, no way a heater matrix should have burst in less than 6 years, plus it nothing
that I could have caused it to burst. The service rep did state that he'd not seen a burst heater matrix when I asked if this was a known fault.
When I asked if Suzuki might contribute to the cost of the repair as I felt it was a defective part, I was informed that because I was
not "Brand Loyal" and had the car service else where this would not happen !!!

I am going to take this further with Suzuki customer care but I'd really like to hear your thoughts on this.

BTW, I bought the Jimny in April 2018 for just over £14,000, so the quote for the repair is over 10% what I paid for there Jimny !!!!!!!

I'd love your thoughts on this - Cheers John.

Buy the parts and get someone else to fit them at a lower labour rate.  The car is well out of warranty and I don't think ypu'll have much luck arguing it is unfit for purpose at 6 years.

If it's any consolation, the same job on a Rolls-Royce was apparently £20,000.  30 years ago.

Taking the dashboard out isn't particularly difficult it's just time consuming and you need to remember or label all the connections for the loom. Also be aware that the pipes for the matrix are kinda crimped in not soldered and don't like being knocked.

You wouldn’t normally expect a heater matrix to go so quickly, I have never changed one in all of my years of motoring.

However, it will be out of warranty, so you are down to the good will of the garage if they will cut a deal and it doesn’t sound like they will. It’s worth a try contacting Suzuki, but at the end of the day you might have to either change it yourself of go to your local friendly independent garage.

If it was the summer you could play the long game with them, but they know it’s getting cold out there and you can’t easily live without a heater for long.

I replaced my heater matrix last year as it was blocked, in total it took me about a day to to it, that's including removal of the dashboard.

In my thread I removed the dashboard piece by piece, however you may be able to do it easier by removing the 4 bolts, steering column etc. in a sort of reverse manner to what they'd do on an assembly line.

Suzuki GB wanted just shy of £300 for the matrix! However I was able to find the part on Amayama  for nearly a third of that, still OEM too.