[cosmos_blue]

We are military stationed in Germany. This is my wife's daily driver. About a month ago my wife was leaving base and the Jeep died. She pulled over and restarted it okay. She gets about 50 feet and the check engine light comes on, transmission shifts into neutral and dies. She pulls over and tries to restart. This time it doesnt start but makes an awful sound and continues for awhile and shuts off. We call a tow truck and have it tired to nearest dealer. Note, no longer under warranty and about 50K miles. A week goes by before they are to look at it. They believe it's the fuel pump, which is going to cost 1800 euro + labor. Manager calls and thinks my wife may have put gas in it rather than diesel. My wife says she didn't. We confirmed with the base gas station. They order the fuel pump and install it. Jeep runs okay for about 10 mins and then the fuel pump goes out again. This time the manager calls my wife pissed because of wasted money, labor and insists that's it has to be gas in the tank.. calling my wife a liar. He said he's going to test the fuel to see if it's gas and if so then more damage done to the engine.

I don't know what to do if he comes back and says it's gas but the gas station tells us wife pumped diesel. No one else has complained of "bad" fuel. I see this becoming very expensive. I've already called my insurance and they won't cover it unless it was caused by an accident. I owe about $25K on it. Wonder if it would be covered under lemon law. Or push it down a hill...

I don't know.

 

[Brewster]

I've read a post about someone putting gas in by accident. !They should have checked this out before starting repairs! Basically everything will need drained - flushed w/diesel - and filters changed- and then cross your fingers. Do you have motor pool on base? Maybe they can do something for you 'under the table'.

 

[CaseyGV]

I really don't think that putting gasoline in a diesel engine would be covered by a lemon law. It isn't the fault of the manufacturer if a person put the wrong fuel in it.

Years and years ago, I bought a new car and traded in a diesel VW Jetta for it. The next day, the VW dealer called me to tell me my car had been towed to them and they wanted to know what was wrong. When I traded it in, it was at about 1/4 tank of fuel and I told the dealership that I had traded it in and my guess was that they filled it with gasoline. His reaction: "I really hope they didn't do that..."

With all that said, it should be obvious once they take the fuel out of the tank. Gasoline and diesel fuel look and smell very differently. I'm sure they'll chemically test it just to be 100% sure, but I think I would be able to tell immediately just by the color or smell.