Hey Scotty,
We bought my wife’s Fiat 500x Lounge edition last year summer from Carmax. The car had under 20k miles (now at 30k) on it and was still under factory warranty. Around September of last year, the check engine light turned on and showed two alerts, sound system unavailable and drive mode unavailable. I took it into the Fiat dealership closest to us to get it repaired. Needless to say, they’ve replaced the wiring harness, the entire sound system and then some. I’ve taken it to them 5 times for the same issue and the check engine light and drive mode unavailable are still on. One of those visits, my car was there for two months. Since the factory warranty ended in February, I’ve had to pay a deductible with my Carmax warranty and pay a daily rate for the loaner car. I was curious why they couldn’t fix it, so I took it to autozone and got a P0113 code from the OBD2 sensor. Which means either the intake air temp sensor is bad or the wiring for it is bad.
Am I getting duped? Should I contact the General Manager of the dealership to get my money back? Or should I just fix it myself and never take my car back to that shop?
Thanks for the entertaining and helpful videos!
- Ethan
Unfortunately this is all part of the Fiat ownership experience. The electrical systems on those things are pretty awful. You could try another dealership in the hopes their technicians are more adept at dealing with those issues.
Woof… are there any aftermarket solutions? Or am I stuck with Fiat only components?
The Fiat 500X is also a rare car outside of the US… get rid of it before 90k miles - that’s when the 9ZF transmission will go out
In general for modules and wiring harnesses it's got to be OEM, unless in this instance a Fiat mechanic knows differently. In the case of modules they are likely coded to the VIN of the car so you can't even install used ones from a junkyard.
@ChuckTobias I think that even fiat can’t change that part. I have never herd of a 1.3T engine from Fiat and neither does the internet have any information on its components…
It's going to be very difficult to fix a car like this that is so poorly designed and built that it can't be fixed, unless you make your own parts. The days of these Clown Cars are long gone.
