Hi all,
I’m sorry that I’ve not kept up with posting about my African trip as the lack of WiFi in most places is and has been rather hit and miss.
As some of you are aware at the moment I am stuck in Namibia as my Grenadier broke down.
Here’s how it all went down.
I have been travelling since the 3rd of January throughout South Africa Botswana and had just entered into Namibia last Tuesday, I stayed at a lodge in Tsumkwe just over the border of Botswana for one night and was leaving for a place called Grootfontein the following morning, I left for the 300 km trip first thing in the morning and after about two hours on the gravel corrugated roads my Gren temperature shot up to 130 and the warning said to stop the vehicle immediately which I did I checked for water and the water was non-existent…dry as a bone, I put lots of water in which made no difference to the vehicle whatsoever, I was on a road where there was literally no one and no passing vehicles, the heat was over 30° and after three hours started to panic and thankfully I had a satellite device on me where I could send a message and after a few hours there were four police forces looking for me and I was found by the owner of the lodge that I had stayed the previous night, I truly was so frightened as there were no vehicles passing and I was running out of water because I had put in over 60 L into the vehicle with no effect of cooling it down.
After nine hours, I had been found and returned to the lodge and Ineos in Windhoek was contacted and they arranged for a pick up truck to collect the vehicle and myself to drive to Ineos in Windhoek, a couple of days later I was on the pick up truck with my vehicle and endured a 15 1/2 hour drive to Ineos, I was put up in a hotel in the capital when my vehicle was dropped off and was told by the servicing manager not to worry about anything as long as I was safe that everything would be taken care of regarding my accommodation, warranty of the vehicle, and recovery of the vehicle.
So that was last Thursday that they received the vehicle at the garage and now it is late on Monday and Ineos South Africa who apparently have to authorise any work, warranty etc and accommodation costs have done in my opinion very little, after saying everything would be taken care of it seems that they want me to pay for my accommodation and recovery costs and get it back from INEOS in the UK, I don’t have the funds for this and also I have lost a whole week of travelling and my pre paid accommodations en route throughout Namibia.
So, what went wrong ?
The small radiator on the drivers side had become loose and detached on the corrugated gravel roads, on the early vehicles that radiator was not held in place by brackets, Logsplitter also had exactly the same problem with his Gren travelling through Africa on the same road, but he managed to mend his and then got it fixed at a later date, now in my opinion Ineos new that the earlier vehicles had this fault and I believe they should have been recalled to have that radiator rebuilt with a bracket around it to stop it falling out and apart, I don’t know how Ineos did their trials through Namibia, but I am as sure as sure can be that they certainly didn’t test them for hundreds of miles on those corrugated roads.
I have completely lost confidence in the vehicle and its capabilities certainly in Africa, I hopefully will get it back tomorrow and I can continue and salvage a little bit of my Namibian trip, I know people say that maybe I should travel with somebody else but that’s not the point. I don’t like to travel with anybody else, that’s why I’m travelling solo but I shouldn’t have found myself in a position with a vehicle not fit for what it was built for on these roads, stranded on my own fearing I would die alone.
Now I have had INEOS saying I should pay for my hotel etc when they initially said they’d sort it out (Ineos in Namibia) but they are just a sales team and service department and everything has to go through Ineos in Cape Town I found out, many emails were sent today and went unanswered, now Ineos in Cape Town have replied saying they have to get authorisation from the chief financial officer in the UK, it beggars belief !
I feel like selling my vehicle on return to the UK and going back to an old defender, Ineos customer service remains complete shit.
And this is a company that contacted me in the first instance when they found out I was bringing my Gren and doing a three month trip through Africa asking me if they could follow my journey and post it on their social media, strange how I’ve contacted them today on social media telling them all about what’s happening and my disappointment in the company and yet they haven’t replied not once.
Annee
