WARNING - Do NOT put a pen in the Car manual compartment in the glovebox!

[ricksterrr]

Hey everyone,

About a month and a half ago, I found that the climatronic system in my GTI had stopped working all of a sudden (no air at all from any of the vents) and figured that it must have been some sort of electrical gremlin that caused it to fail.

Took it in to get it fixed today and lo and behold, it turned out that a pen had made its way into one of the aircon vents and had apparently jammed up the main blower fans, causing the failure of the entire air con system. Of course this got me confused initially since I don't have any kids and I certainly would not have deliberately stuck a pen into one of the vents (nor would it have fit)

After trying to think as to how a pen could have possibly made it into the aircon unit in the first place, I suddenly remembered that I had left a pen in the compartment in the glovebox that holds the car manual (for convenience reasons, obviously). This pen must have found its way into the venting system after driving around on bumpy roads. I later confirmed this by checking out the glovebox of the courtesy Mk6 Golf TDI that was loaned to me by the dealership... turns out there are significantly sized gaps at the back of the compartment that holds the car manual that could have easily swallowed pens. Obviously I had not noticed these gaps before I put the pen there. Since it is a fault of my own, I will have to pay for the replacement unit... and it's not cheap .

Moral of the story - don't put ANY objects in this compartment besides the car manual! I hope that by documenting my unfortunate experience here due to my own carelessness will prevent others from making the same mistake.

[ConR]

Oh man..that sucks bud! My opinion is that you shouldn't have to pay a thing though. I didn't know there was a clause in VW warranty that says do not leave a pen in your glove box. The glove box is meant to hold items, and it's expected that ALOT of people will keep pens in there (get into an accident, write down info, etc.).

I would complain to VW on that one.

[team_v]

Hey everyone,

About a month and a half ago, I found that the climatronic system in my GTI had stopped working all of a sudden (no air at all from any of the vents) and figured that it must have been some sort of electrical gremlin that caused it to fail.

Took it in to get it fixed today and lo and behold, it turned out that a pen had made its way into one of the aircon vents and had apparently jammed up the main blower fans, causing the failure of the entire air con system. Of course this got me confused initially since I don't have any kids and I certainly would not have deliberately stuck a pen into one of the vents (nor would it have fit)

After trying to think as to how a pen could have possibly made it into the aircon unit in the first place, I suddenly remembered that I had left a pen in the compartment in the glovebox that holds the car manual (for convenience reasons, obviously). This pen must have found its way into the venting system after driving around on bumpy roads. I later confirmed this by checking out the glovebox of the courtesy Mk6 Golf TDI that was loaned to me by the dealership... turns out there are significantly sized gaps at the back of the compartment that holds the car manual that could have easily swallowed pens. Obviously I had not noticed these gaps before I put the pen there. Since it is a fault of my own, I will have to pay for the replacement unit... and it's not cheap .

Moral of the story - don't put ANY objects in this compartment besides the car manual! I hope that by documenting my unfortunate experience here due to my own carelessness will prevent others from making the same mistake.

Jesus, that sounds pretty vicious.
Hopefully it all gets sorted out for you.

Will be checking out my glovebovebox to find said gaps before i put anything in there.

[booya]

A glove box which you can't keep anything resembling a pen in (doesn't matter if its in the area for the book), it should be under warranty. Hope you win this one.

[ricksterrr]

Oh man..that sucks bud! My opinion is that you shouldn't have to pay a thing though. I didn't know there was a clause in VW warranty that says do not leave a pen in your glove box. The glove box is meant to hold items, and it's expected that ALOT of people will keep pens in there (get into an accident, write down info, etc.).

I would complain to VW on that one.

Yup I tried to get them to pull some strings, but to no avail. Apparently I am the first one to have had a pen stuck in the aircon system in a mk 6. Not exactly something I wanted to be a pioneer at but alas...

Actually it would have been completely fine for pens to be in the glovebox itself...but in my case I had chosen to place the pen in the car manual compartment instead.

I just took a photo of the car manual compartment and as you can see, there is a massive hole there that can easily swallow a couple of pens.

imgur: The Simple Image Sharer

[phantomcamel]

Oh man..that sucks bud! My opinion is that you shouldn't have to pay a thing though. I didn't know there was a clause in VW warranty that says do not leave a pen in your glove box. The glove box is meant to hold items, and it's expected that ALOT of people will keep pens in there (get into an accident, write down info, etc.).

I would complain to VW on that one.

warranty covers damage caused due to a manufracturers fault, not damage caused by the driver or their passenger(s). You can't hold the manufracturer liable for foreign objects entering the a/c duct.
You certainly wonder how it could have gotten in there that easy though...

[Guest1306]

Oh man..that sucks bud! My opinion is that you shouldn't have to pay a thing though. I didn't know there was a clause in VW warranty that says do not leave a pen in your glove box. The glove box is meant to hold items, and it's expected that ALOT of people will keep pens in there (get into an accident, write down info, etc.).

I would complain to VW on that one.

Owners Manual, Page 100, Seats & Stowage:

In some vehicle models, the glove compartment contains apertures, for example behind the compartment for the vehicle wallet. Small items could fall through the apertures and become trapped behind the trim. This could cause unusual noises and damage to the vehicle. For this reason you should not store small items in the glove box.

[logger]

Owners Manual, Page 100, Seats & Stowage:
In some vehicle models, the glove compartment contains apertures, for example behind the compartment for the vehicle wallet. Small items could fall through the apertures and become trapped behind the trim. This could cause unusual noises and damage to the vehicle. For this reason you should not store small items in the glove box.

Apart from that statement covering VW RRRRs, it shows that VW are aware of what could be argued as a design fault. Would be better if they placed a warning label on the poorly designed stowage.

[Corey_R]

Hmm. Not sure I'd be really happy with that. Although it does say not to put small things in the glovebox in the manual, I'm sure that most people would consider the glovebox the obviousl place TO put a pen. To me it makes more sense that VW should just cover that hole which is large enough for a pen to go through... but then again, I'm not a car designer

[Syd118TSI]

Sounds like the manual is pretty clear about this, though it's bloody unfortunate for the OP and you'd think that perhaps VW could come to the party a little on this and perhaps only charge for parts.

It's not something that you expect to have to allow for, it seems a perfectly logical place to keep a pen without having meticulously read through the manual before operating the vehicle.