24th Jul 2007, 15:30
We had a 52 plate low trim model that has not suffered most of the above listed faults, but has it's own set of oddities... part of the suspension wore out rather fast (the big castings / swing arm things under the front end... what the main dealer called track rod ends) - MOT failures by 60,000 miles and most worryingly, the driver's side door's weld to the upper hinge failed (cheap repair by non FIAT garage). Oh, the rear boot trim cracked, but they all seem to do that?
The car also failed it's first MOT because it had planed the inside edge off both tyres - turned out the car had been delivered with some serious misalignment of the front end. Problem was not spotted by the main dealers that had serviced it regularly - it started as a lease car and we bought it at the end of the lease as we were so impressed by the flexibility of the design.
Replaced the '52 plate with an 03 plate JTD ELX... we wanted the air-con. It also had a broken boot trim, same place and looks like a designed in weakness.
Generally our opinion after 5 years... superbly flexible layout, superbly practical car, mediocre build quality and a lot of the main dealers are worse than back street garages. No names, no pack drill, but our local main dealer appear to have messed up the rear brakes on the multipla and a month later messed up the rear brakes on my marea. If you find a good Fiat dealer you're lucky! We've now found one who know what they are doing.
Won't put location to protect the innocent... or not so competent dealer as they could be identified easily! Unfortunately that means no identification of the good dealer we found as well.
16th Jan 2009, 15:40
We have just bought an 03 JTD and so far only one electrical problem; the indicators have stopped working. They stopped once and after switching on the hazard warning lights the indicators started working again, then about a week later they again stopped working and now won't work at all. Switching on and off the hazards doesn't do the trick and may have been a coincidence when It 'worked' the first time. Has anyone experienced this problem before or have any suggestions? Any advice will be welcome robinf@media-lincs.com.
19th Jan 2009, 12:57
Just brought a 2001 110 ELX JTD. Just one bug is a whine from the rear (no it's not the kids!).
No other faults, certainly none of the above, and mine is now 7 years old. Overall very pleased - not had any dealings with Fiat dealership (yet).
15th Apr 2009, 08:38
Hi, I have a 03 reg... having problems with the engine management light... have got both a back street mechanic and also a Fiat dealership to look at this, and they can't seem to find the problem. It's very annoying..
I also have the leaking sunroofs and had the whine in the rear of car... Brakes given a lot of trouble as well.. overall I don't think I would buy another FIAT car as they are more hassle than they're worth.
If anyone has any suggestions about above problems, please email me amsutts@hotmail.com. I am at my wits end as the MOT is due and I have a feeling it's not going to pass!!!
3rd Aug 2009, 05:08
Bought Multipla 03 plate in April this year. We wanted to downsize from the 7 seater to a 6 seater. We bought the 1.6 SX. It had 40k on clock FSH.
Put it through an MOT; it failed on handbrake cables snapped, brakes completely worn and wheel bearing had gone in 1 wheel. Bill £800.
2 weeks later coil packs packed up (we had just had coil packs done on our Scenic as well), that cost £120.
Started squealing after all the brakes were done, and we thought they were perhaps bedding in and we had the mini heatwave... no it's the brake calipers, they are being done this week.
Our repairs have cost as much as we spent on the car. Saying that I do love the car.
The trims comes off the door, but I gather it's a common problem, and the seat trims have cracked and are broken from the seatbelts not retracting.
For me, I can get my 3 children in the back all in their car seats, can't do that with the Scenic and we couldn't do it in our 7 seater (well not in 1 row).
The car drives well and corners nicely, and I do feel safe in it.
The test is coming up, we are off to the South of France for our holidays at the end of August, let's hope it's trouble free... she's going for service this week, and I've got breakdown cover, so fingers crossed.
6th Sep 2005, 06:38
It's amazing - I could have written all the above comments myself having experienced pretty much everything mentioned. My car is a JTD 110 ELX.
You might all like to know that the leaking sun-roof (my current problem, which looks expensive) may be the front one instead of or as well as the rear one. Although the water pours through the central inspection port when you move off, remember that the water is sitting in the roof cavity and may have come from either sun-roof. My local dealer has offered a leak test for about £70 which should give a firm diagnosis, but the fix is likely to mean removal of the sun-roof (s) which is very expensive (£500 - £600). Bear in mind that my car was fine for the first 3 years and has only developed the fault in year 4 so although one dealer suggested a warped sun-roof, I think it is likely to be the rubber seals breaking down where they fit onto the metal rim where the hole for the sun-roof has been cut, or it may be the hard plastic trim on the outside.
The intermittent rear-wipe issue is easily fixed if you go to the Multipla Owners web site where a guy is offering a D.I.Y. kit to provide that for about £20. They also offer a D.I.Y. kit to allow the courtesy light to stay on for 30 seconds after the door has shut - very useful!
I have also heard through such web sites that "engine faulty" warnings when you start are common and are sometimes erroneous (i.e. there's nothing really wrong or there is no fix for the warning so you may have to live with it). Not much good, but the dealership should be able to check it out on a service and put your mind at rest. I usually find the Diesel Filter warning goes away after each service.
Other common faults you can expect are the fold-in door mirrors failing (£120 each to replace, though it's a D.I.Y. job if you want to try it), rear courtesy light switch failure (easily replaced and cheap), loss of power on acceleration and hill climbs and particularly noticeable if you are overtaking, especially up hill. This is probably the Air mass/flow sensor (£100 and can be a D.I.Y. job, but my dealer fitted it for free when I queried how you take the hose clip off), or it could be the throttle potentiometer (a dealer job really though I've not had that problem). To diagnose, I suggest you disconnect the Air mass/flow sensor temporarily and see if the car suddenly regains it's original performance under acceleration, particularly below 2000 rpm before the turbo comes in). Remember to reconnect the sensor after the test, otherwise the engine management system has no way of monitoring air flow. I don't know if that's a problem but better safe than sorry.
Otherwise a great car, let down by poor manufacturing and QA. I would have another one though the new ones are uglier. If only it was made by the Japanese!
Anyone else with some useful, helpful information and hints?