I’ve had no reply to this query. Perhaps the general feeling is that, after doing 152,000 miles in 12 years without any significant problem, my Jazz has now had its day?
As I mentioned in my original append, I have a new car on order but this is not due until September. But, in the meantime, my wife and I are due to take our Jazz to France for two weeks at the end of August. My primary concern therefore is whether the car is likely to breakdown completely while we are away. I can cope with a breakdown in the UK, but it would be highly inconvenient if it were to happen while we were on holiday in France even though I have breakdown insurance for Continental Europe. So, I am trying to assess whether it might be safer to hire a car for the holiday. Any advice would be welcome.
Two weeks on from my original append, the problem is still occasional and largely unpredictable, but some pattern is emerging.
A correction to my original append is that the problem does occur at speeds lower than 40 mph. At the lower speeds, the problem feels as if the CVT is changing “gear”. There is a definite jerk as if the engine momentarily loses power and then starts pulling again. At the higher speeds, the problem can manifest itself as a pronounced thud/thump from under the bonnet, which is quite frightening really.
The pattern that is emerging is that, when the problem occurs, more often than not, it is when the car has been travelling down an incline, has reached the bottom, and has just started to climb up again. At this point, my foot is still steady on the accelerator pedal - that is, I have not yet put my foot down to give the car more power to climb. It is as if the CVT detects that it needs to be in a lower “gear” in order to climb.
I strongly suspect that the problem is similar to that described by chrisdtwyman in the following append:
http://clubjazz.org/forum/index.php?topic=3020.msg25846#msg25846I quote from that append:
“Now the new problem. The Jazz is now exhibiting all the symptoms of the notorious judder problem. It judders a bit when pulling away and more disturbingly occasionally jerks/slips while running.”
It is the “… more disturbingly occasionally jerks/slips while running.” that I am referring to.
Does anyone have any more insight into what might be happening?
As I stated above, my primary concern now is reliability if we take the car to France. There is no way that I am going to spend any serious money on fixing the car. Someone ran into the back of the car in France last year and, although the damage is relatively slight, my insurance company deemed the repair to be uneconomical. Therefore the car is officially a Category C write-off. So, having received a good proportion of the market value of the car from my insurance company, the car now has only a salvage/scrap value.
