Find Out About The Bus Which Destroyed My Business
In common with all PCV operators, I have a great respect for not allowing a diesel engine to run dry. I had had it happen previously with an LDV minibus and the whole system had to be drained and re-primed.
It is surprising therefore that the instruction manual makes little mention of it and certainly does not provide any dire warnings about running out of fuel.
Salvador Caetano's advice to us after we ran low (not out) was that the diesel pump had to be removed, taken over 400 miles to a company called Midland Battery Specialists in Northampton, recalibrated and then refitted. The cost of this was in excess of £1,000 when it happened to us. Midland Battery Specialists also told us the pump was a write-off and would need over £2,000 of parts to put it back into working order.
We were later told by Rob Keith of Toyota technical services that there was nothing wrong with that pump except that Midland Battery Specialists had reassembled it incorrectly.
This begs the question "WHY give this advice?".
Why did the dashboard not provide
warnings that diesel was running low with a light and even an intermittent audible alarm?
There was also no warning in the instruction manual that running low of diesel could cause thousands of pounds
worth of damage to the fuel pump or require that it be removed, recalibrated and
reset at great expense.
At one point while our Toyota Salvador Caetano Optimo V was off the road with an engine light software problem, we hired an LDV minibus and saw this warning in the window.
If LDV can bother emphasising the danger of running low, why did Salvador Caetano not do the same?