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Buying a car is not like buying a radio; you cannot return it to the store for a refund if you do not like it, or if it has a manufacturing defect. In fact, for many years, if you purchased an automobile that came from the factory with defects, you were just stuck. You could try to get the dealer to repair the problem, but if the problem continued and the dealer could not repair it, you were out of luck.
In 1982, the luck of owners of so- called “lemons” changed for the better, as California and Connecticut passed the nation’s first “lemon laws.
These laws, spawned by consumers who had waged tireless battles against major auto companies, allowed owners of defective automobiles to seek compensation or replacement with the help of their respective states. These laws swept like wildfire throughout the country, and now all 50 states have some form of the lemon law.
The specifics of the lemon laws will vary from state to state, but in general, they define a “lemon” as a vehicle that:
Has a “nonconformity” that affects the safety, use, or value of the vehicle, and The nonconformity has not been successfully repaired after a “reasonable” number of attempts, and/or The vehicle has been out of service for a total of a certain number of days for repair of the nonconformity.
The length of the warranty period also varies; coverage typically runs anywhere from one year or 12,000 miles to two years or 24,000 miles. As previously stated, the specifics vary from state to state, particularly the number of repair attempts that constitute “reasonable” and the number of days that the vehicle must be out of service in order to qualify. In some states, repairs that affect the brakes or other safety equipment need only one repair attempt to qualify as “reasonable.
Restitution is fairly consistent from state to state; it usually requires the manufacturer to either replace the vehicle with one of comparable value, or refund the purchase price, along with taxes, registration and delivery fees. Some states leave the option of replacement or refund to the manufacturer, but most give the option to the consumer.
What should you do if you think you have a lemon? You should:
Make sure that you document everything elating to repairs of the vehicle, including when and where it was repaired, who signed the work order and what work was done. You should contact the manufacturer in writing, alerting them to the nature of the problem. You should consult with your state’s Attorney General’s office to learn how your state’s law affects you directly.
You may have to go through an arbitration process; this involves both you and a representative of the manufacturer explaining your respective situations to a panel that will then provide a ruling.
The arbitration ruling is usually binding on the manufacturer; they will have no recourse should the panel rule in your favor.
Generally, if you don’t agree with the panel’s ruling, you still have the option of filing a lawsuit in court.
You may wish to hire an attorney to represent you; there are plenty of lawyers who specialize in lemon law cases, and they can probably bring the case to a solution more quickly than if you handle the case yourself. Be sure to contact your state’s Attorney General’s office regarding the specifics of your own state’s lemon law. You don’t want to miss a deadline, or you could be stuck with your lemon for a long time.
About the author:
Charles Essmeier may be contacted at http://www.end-your-debt.com
. Click here to view more of their articles.
Charles Essmeier is the owner of Retro Marketing. Retro
Marketing, established in 1978, is a firm devoted to
informational Websites on topics such as Debt Consolidation, Home
Equity Loans, and automobile Lemon Laws .
Article Source: http://www.Free-Articles-Zone.com
Our affection for the BMW is no secret. We’ve awarded the sporty Bavarian cars enough
trophies to bow a 10-inch-thick oak mantel and likely enough comparison-test victories to swell the engineers’ heads to the size of beach balls. That is, after all, why we call them "benchmarks."
Messing with perfection is always a risky proposition. But that’s exactly what Active Autowerke in Miami has done with the very nearly perfect 3-series—in this case, a
model with a five-speed automatic (the kit is available for any E36 or E46 3-series with a manual or automatic transmission). To the AA guys, the best way to spice up the 330iA was, naturally, to give it more power—albeit in an unnatural way.
They bolted on a Rotrex SP30-94 centrifugal supercharger that forces a maximum of 7.5 psi of boost into the Bimmer’s 3.0-liter inline six-cylinder engine. AA went with the Rotrex unit because of its compact design and relative ease of installation—no moving or modifying the throttle body as with a Roots- or screw-type supercharger. This particular Rotrex features a self-contained oiling system.
AA estimates installation to be a 12-hour job, and it charges $1000 to install the $6500 supercharger kit. There’s no charge for voiding BMW’s factory warranty. The kit includes an installation guide on a CD, technical support, a front-mounted intercooler, higher-flow fuel injectors, a bypass valve, mandrel bent tubing, high-temperature hoses, and a K&N air filter.
According to AA, the kit bumps horsepower from 225 at 5900 rpm to 310 at 6500, and torque goes from 214 pound-feet at 3500 all the way up to 280 pound-feet at 4750. An M3 makes more horsepower (333) but at a stratospherically high rpm number (7900) and can’t match the AA’s torque, mustering just 262 pound-feet at 4900. AA further says you can add a nominal nudge of eight ponies if you purchase a $679 high-flow stainless-steel exhaust system that was fitted on our tester.
With AA’s claim of 318 horsepower onboard, its car ripped from 0 to 60 mph in 5.5 seconds and clipped the quarter-mile in 13.9 at 102 mph. The numbers are quicker than those posted by the hottest 330i currently available—the 235-hp, six-speed-manual
, which hit 60 in 5.6 seconds and turned the quarter in 14.3 at 97 mph [
C/D,
September 2003]—but still slower than the last M3 we tested [" ," May 2003], which met those marks in 4.8 and 13.6 at 105, respectively. That M3, like the 330i with Performance, was equipped with a shift-it-yourself six-speed, and since we’ve never tested a current-gen 3-series with an automatic transmission, a direct comparison is impossible to make. Had AA been able to supply us with a manual example, we believe the car would chop about a half-second off 60-mph and quarter-mile times and be a lot closer to the M3′s. As they were, they came right on the heels of another supercharged ber-sedan, the 349-hp
, which recorded 0 to 60 in 5.2 and the quarter-mile in 13.6 [
C/D,
].
Nonetheless, the AA’s times are quick, and reflective of how the supercharger transforms the 330iA from a stellar stock sedan into the closest thing to a four-door
—not to mention one with a silky slushbox that makes it gridlock friendly. Furthermore, the Rotrex unit delivers its oomph with no unwanted surges or hiccups, but rather with the smoothness and refinement of the factory-installed unit of, say, a C32. Throttle response was excellent, and the Steptronic automatic always seemed to be in the desired gear. And whereas many centrifugal blowers tend to whistle like upset teakettles, the Rotrex kept a lid on the dissonance, emitting just enough sound to remind you where your money went.
Besides the supercharger kit and fancy exhaust system, the AA 330iA was left mostly stock. The only other modifications were harder-compound front brake pads and Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 rubber. The tire upgrade netted a sticky skidpad number of 0.91 g—better than the M3′s 0.87 and the 330i Performance’s 0.86—and together with the higher-performance pads achieved a fade-free 70-to-0-mph braking distance of 164 feet, an unexpected three and six feet longer, respectively, than the other BMWs’ lengths.
Our friends at Active Autowerke are already planning to bring a supercharged M3 to our upcoming supertuner shootout. If that car ups the ante over an M3 like the blown 330i did to its naturally aspirated counterpart, then AA might have a chance to bow its mantel with one of our trophies.
Active Autowerke, 9940 S.W. 168 Terrace, Miami, Florida 33157; 305-233-9300;
.
Article source: http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/car/04q3/active_autowerke_supercharged_bmw_330ia-specialty_file
This version of the story adds test numbers to our First Drive from October 2009.
BMW seems to be on a mission lately to offer something for everyone, no matter how nonsensical a certain consumer’s particular set of needs and wants may be. Case in point: the brilliant
and its mutant half-sister, the
. The latest in Bavaria’s barrage of the bizarre, the ActiveHybrid 7-series—a full-size “luxury performance” hybrid—seems to actually make sense relative to those two. It doesn’t hurt the argument for its existence that a competitor from Lexus, the
, has been on the road for three years now.
What makes the ActiveHybrid 7—available in both short- and long-wheelbase forms—strange is BMW’s boast that it is the quickest hybrid sedan on the market. If speed is the objective, we’re not sure why a hybrid is the answer. Likewise, if fuel economy is the end goal, tuning the twin-turbo V-8 gas engine for an additional 40 hp and 30 lb-ft of torque seems silly. However, if a 7-series customer believes he needs a car more powerful than the 750i but doesn’t want to step up to the 12-cylinder 760Li—which we think he should—and also wants 15 percent or so better fuel economy, BMW has just the model.
BMW’s engineers claim they set out to increase fuel economy, and the performance gains are a secondary benefit they hadn’t intended, but that sounds like PR script to us. No dim bulbs, they
probably had a hunch that adding a bunch of extra power and torque would make the car quicker. Regardless of whether or not they had that hunch, we did, and we were right: In our testing, the 750Li ActiveHybrid went from 0 to 60 mph in 4.5 seconds and through the quarter-mile in 12.8 at 112 mph. That’s 0.7 second quicker to 60 and 0.9 quicker through the quarter than the last non-hybrid 750Li to wear our test gear. More (un)importantly, it’s 0.9 second quicker to 60 than the last LS600hL we tested. A brief blast around the high-speed oval confirms that the hybrid 7 rockets to its 147-mph governor without any of the lethargy commonly associated with hybrids. Later on, driving more like downtrodden suburban Americans, we saw 21 mpg.
So It’s Fast. Now Drive It Like a Hybrid
Okay, so you really care about the hybrid bits? This hybrid won’t glide about on electric power and smugness alone. You want motion, you’re going to have to choke the planet with the internal-combustion engine. There’s an electric motor sandwiched between the gas engine and the torque converter in the eight-speed automatic transmission. It contributes an additional 20 hp and 155 lb-ft—combined powertrain output is 455 hp and 515 lb-ft—and allows the engine to sit quiet at stops, as it powers the accessories. Although it isn’t a completely seamless stop and start, the transition doesn’t call attention to itself.
Our larger complaint is that, although the engine fires up as soon as you lift your foot from the brake, if you snooze at a light or are inching through a left-turn lane waiting for a break in traffic, a quick leap from brake to gas beats the re-ignition process and results in a herky jerk forward. However, if you plan on a quick dive for the gas, you can disable the stop/start feature by putting the shifter into Sport mode.
Braking with Convention This 7’s hybridity also is inconspicuous under braking, which the car manages extremely well, screeching to a halt from 70 mph in just 160 feet—better by 7 feet than the last Audi S4 we tested. Although the mere mention of regenerative braking usually erodes the feel of the stop pedal in question, the ActiveHybrid 7’s brakes remain firm and linear. The car lurches slightly under deceleration, but it is the fault of the transmission downshifting. We noticed the same thing in our
. Of course, the fact that the transmission is causing the disruptions and not the brakes doesn’t lessen the obnoxiousness or somehow make it more welcome in an otherwise serene car.
A hybrid setup like this car’s requires a smaller battery than more-advanced systems, and the 7 hides its lithium-ion pack under the trunk floor. It deals a meager one-cubic-foot blow to trunk volume—dropping it from 14 to 13—leaving BMW with a one-cube advantage over the LS600hL. BMW engineers tell us trunk space is the reason the hybrid 7-series and ActiveHybrid X6—which launched simultaneously—use different systems. Although the X6’s full-hybrid setup allows for greater gains in fuel economy, its larger battery would have consumed more of the already-tight trunk space. Also, BMW is quick to point out that the battery in the trunk helps preserve the 7’s weight distribution, which is the same 51.5/48.5-percent front/rear for the long-wheelbase car as it is for the non-hybrid version, while the stubbier model pushes a bit more rearward for 51.3/48.7. Weight increases by about 250 pounds from the hybrid components and the beefier rear axle borrowed from the V-12 7-series, necessitated by the increased torque load.
Look, Ma, Fewer Emissions!
Like other hybrids based on plain old polluters, the hybrid 7-series relies on badging to convey its uniqueness, although it’s not so subtle compared with other 7s. “ActiveHybrid 7” badges adorn the trunklid and C-pillars, and there’s also a unique 19-inch wheel design and a bespoke Bluewater Metallic color. (We’d have gone with a nice peaceful gray and called it “Blackwater Metallic.”)
Interior cues are limited to some tweaks to the instrumentation—an instant fuel-economy meter and the battery-charging monitor live in the lower part of the tach—and additional displays in the vehicle-information screen. One, a bar graph, shows how active the hybrid system has been for the past 15 minutes, and the other shows the usual hybrid energy flow in beautiful high definition. Otherwise, it’s the same old 7-series, which is to say it is attractive, spacious, and comfortable (especially in long-wheelbase form).
How Much Did Captain Planet’s Costume Cost?
It is not, however, the same old pricing. Like the ActiveHybrid’s acceleration, its sticker price gets a little electronic boost. Short-wheelbase cars start at $103,175, nearly 20 grand higher than the $83,375 commanded by the non-hybrid 750i. A long-wheelbase car like the one tested here starts at $107,075, a similar leap over its regular counterpart. The hybrid at least includes a few extras, like an upgraded stereo and head-up display, that bring the pricing difference down a few grand. Of course, there’s also that
to think about. It offers nearly equivalent fuel economy (EPA ratings of 17/25 mpg, and 20 in our hands), is just a touch slower off the line (0–60 in 5.1 seconds), and starts about
$32,000
less than the hybrid.
If you think you need a hybrid badge to save the world, you’re wrong. But now there are two ways to spend $100,000 on a full-size luxury hybrid sedan. (We’re not counting the Mercedes-Benz S400 hybrid because it only uses a V-6 and its base price of only $91,875 would get you laughed at by your neighbors.) We’d buy this one. Then again, if BMW and Lexus were buying retired tugboats, lining them in leather, and putting wheels on them for street use, we’d have an opinion on which of those to buy, too. But that wouldn’t make it any less of a goofy purchase.
Article source: http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/car/09q4/2011_bmw_activehybrid_750li-short_take_road_test