An unnamed government official in Germany has reportedly revealed that Volkswagen, Porsche, Audi, Opel and Mercedes-Benz will be recalling a total of 630,000 diesel-powered vehicles in the country to rectify their emissions management software.
According to Automotive News, it was said that after stringent investigations, only Volkswagen-owned car brands were found to be equipped with illegal defeat devices, while other manufacturers were believed to be to be taking advantage of a legal loophole in the system. The legal workaround is said to involve car makers “throttling down emissions treatments under certain circumstances,” such as to protect its diesel engines from wear and tear.
However, a strict clampdown by the German authorities on vehicles with high levels of harmful exhaust emissions has led to the the Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA) questioning if the exploitation of this loophole by car makers was justifiable and necessary. The report added that BMW was not involved.
“The question is whether this number is just the start or if there will be more,” said Stefan Bratzel, director of the Centre of Automotive Management at the University of Applied Sciences in Bergisch, Germany. “What’s clear is that there are legal tricks the whole industry is using. That might be legal, but it’s not a legitimate thing to do, and shines a negative light on the industry as a whole.”
To clarify, only Volkswagen-owned car brands are known to feature illegal defeat devices that manipulate the results of official emissions tests. This is by the company’s own admission, with legal proceedings already resulting in the millions of recalls around the world.
What’s new here is that Mercedes-Benz and Opel will reportedly issue recalls for its diesel-powered vehicles — not because they are equipped with emissions manipulating devices, but for taking advantage of a legal loophole in the system. The total number of vehicles involved specific to each brand was not mentioned.
In a separate but similar issue, Daimler, the parent company of Mercedes-Benz, released an official statement last week saying that the US Department of Justice had requested it to conduct an internal investigation regarding its certification process related to exhaust emissions in the United States. The car maker complied. “Daimler is cooperating fully with the authorities. Daimler will consequently investigate possible indications of irregularities and of course take all necessary actions,” it said.
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Only BMW is real !!!
The others are cheater!!!
Don’t know about the other brands but I know VGM in Malaysia should pay customers compensation for their faulty DSGs.
And more importantly VGM in Malaysia should give owners a buy back programme like what US judge is considering. For now, VW has to pay each VW owner US$5000 as compensation.
In Malaysia, VW owners want 3 things
1) 10 year Warranty on DSG
2) Fixed Resale Value after 7 year Loan finished
3) Free Courtesy Car and Tow Truck 8x a year.
VW owners are still facing problems with their DSG in Malaysia despite using mineral oil. Cars are juddering and breaking down. People buy RM200k car but have to stand in the hot sun waiting for the tow truck to come every other month.
How is VGM going to compensate the 21 anual leave that VW customers completely use to repair and fix problems?
In would be good if VGM also give a fixed trade in value after 7 years cause now, even used car salesman don’t want to touch our cars. Our 2nd hand value has become a joke. Passat 2014 used car dealers are offering RM70k or below. Some are even taking Rm60k.
What a whiny crybaby.
And of course it’s not yet 100% certain. With the fact that Bosch may has detailed out about the issue, those who are not caught now might be real non cheater.
If P1 was still associated with VW, the bash count wud reach over 9000, even if P1 not using their diesel engines.
They are all devious bull shitters, my Vauxhall Mokka 1.7 diesel is supposed to do around 50 mpg according to the fuel figures, all I can get out of it is 39.4 and to get that I have to drive it like a nun.
Without cheating Porsche, Audi and Mercedes will be far behind compare to BMW.
Maybe not even in the same league as Lexus and Volvo.
UK Autocar also reported Fiat was the most recent to be put under scrutiny.