Another senior manager gone - Gary Pearson

[Jeremy996]

Gary Pearson, my LinkedIn contact for a little while and helpful soul when my Grenadier was delivered has departed for pastures new at Andersen EV, suppliers of fancy EV chargers, sometime in February 2024. He is the Chief Operating Officer there.

That puts the idea of a retail parts website and the eventual release of the workshop manual back into the "nebulous" realm, as Gary has not updated the line that they were due at the end of Qtr1 2024. I think it may be time I consider going postal on the manual and parts book, as they were a core part of my purchase decision.

 

[dreamalaska]

I understand the frustration with Ineos still not releasing an official “Service Manual” either online or a printed hard copy for purchase. What I’d really like to know at this point is why? Is it concern of legal liability? Are Dealership’s getting upset over the dreaded concept of people actually doing their own repairs and maintenance? A few of us would like to know, and it’s a shady way to do business - making promises and not keeping them…

 

[Jackattack13]

I have never had easy access to any new vehicle service manual on previously owned new cars, and always had to find a manual to download from a forum member who worked at a dealership, etc. There are a couple things that strike a nerve and that is the misleading marketing, which I now can understand how frustrated owners are regarding this, and the parts availability. I think the parts will be in due time, but remember when they promised 24 hour emergency parts availability. It took 2 weeks for control module to get delivered to a dealership. So, needless to say they have missed their original mark in the marketing on both fronts.

 

[A sweaty Grenadier]

If you think about the process and how hard it is to create a new vehicle for different countries with different requirements. Than to create a service manual for the whole world, which probably needs many more factors and safety signs off, which would be different in countries and various states of said countries, than INEOS would have to take the responsibility of 'letting anyone' work on their own car as people would follow their work instructions, I would say they would have to wait till it's 100% done, for the whole world before releasing it. I'm guessing it's a slightly long process that we wouldn't understand, also as a company that needs to make profit, I would think there isn't a 'large' team working on it as they would not be making any positive financial services to INEOs. I've heard somewhere of. Q4 2024 RELEASE for the manual's but Ill believe it when I see it.

 

[Lars]

The lone service tech at my dealership mentioned in passing how good their digital service manual was, so repair/service information is already out there in English form anyway. Is there some proprietary information in there that owners aren't allowed to have? Is it some legal department issue? Do they want to control who services the Grenadier? Only Ineos knows, but the service information has already been written; it's just not available to us. If they ever do release it, I bet it will be expensive to own.

 

[Tazzieman]

Imagine translating such a manual into all the languages. Let alone the legalities of owner repair in various countries.
OH&S and all that.
I also suspect it's a complex task that none of us would enjoy working on ourselves.

 

[Lars]

Imagine translating such a manual into all the languages. Let alone the legalities of owner repair in various countries.
OH&S and all that.
I also suspect it's a complex task that none of us would enjoy working on ourselves.

OK, but my question about that would be: How many Grenadiers have been sold in English speaking countries, or non-English speaking countries that could figure it out? Maybe they should start with an English version.
Ethnocentric? Maybe, but God Bless the U.S.A.!!

 

[anand]

The lone service tech at my dealership mentioned in passing how good their digital service manual was, so repair/service information is already out there in English form anyway. Is there some proprietary information in there that owners aren't allowed to have? Is it some legal department issue? Do they want to control who services the Grenadier? Only Ineos knows, but the service information has already been written; it's just not available to us. If they ever do release it, I bet it will be expensive to own.

I think the hiccup (assuming they do want to release it) is licensing it to everyone and having the infrastructure in place for that massive influx of potential users at any given time to the system

 

[Max]

Can anyone help me with one question about Warranty Ownership...So the question would be, Do all the parts manufacturers [Engine Brakes Gearbox, etc.] take ownership and honour the warranty?


The reason I ask is when the Gren transfer case recall took place the agent was given clear instructions to remove and return it to Ineos...so where to then, back to the manufacturer?

 

[Tazzieman]

Maybe they should start with an English version.
Ethnocentric? Maybe, but God Bless the U.S.A.!!

He/she/they/it also blesses Africa

 

[NQ94]

Imagine translating such a manual into all the languages. Let alone the legalities of owner repair in various countries.
OH&S and all that.
I also suspect it's a complex task that none of us would enjoy working on ourselves.

It would be like every other electronic workshop manual that are now all translated by AI with less reviewing by humans. There are some phrases and explanations that are interesting from translated foreign languages to English manuals and probably vise versa. A lot of older word cartridge type human reviewed factory manuals are better edited then the new manuals. Ineos may say they're held up buy legal obligations but most factory manuals now have the standard form letter legal disclaimers about the manuals being intended and written for trained and competent technicians, environmental warnings, safety and ppe warnings, everything in the vehicle will give you cancer warnings and the company has no liability if the document is misused, misinterpreted or modified.
The likely two reason Ineos is trying to hold its intellectual property as long as possible to recoup development costs that can't be spread over multiple products or large sales numbers. The second is to limit the availability to generic online technical information companies for technicians that have been trained in the product that leave to go out on their own as an independent Ineos tech taking revenue while Ineos continues to establish itself. Once the car is sold there is no more income generated unless Ineos can keep the dealer licence fees and the owner buying parts and service from them.

 

[DaveB]

Imagine translating such a manual into all the languages. Let alone the legalities of owner repair in various countries.
OH&S and all that.
I also suspect it's a complex task that none of us would enjoy working on ourselves.

Not to mention the software license rules in different countries and the file sizes would be huge.
I can imagine that the files would be online, possibly downloadable, so a server would need to be able to handle potentially hundreds of simultaneous users concurrently.

 

[NQ94]

Can anyone help me with one question about Warranty Ownership...So the question would be, Do all the parts manufacturers [Engine Brakes Gearbox, etc.] take ownership and honour the warranty?

Not generally in the car industry. There normally is an agreement between the component manufacturers and the car makers and the car company takes on the warranty liability then the rest is worked out with internal procedures between the two parties. So you can't turn up to company that supplies the cars engine and ask for warranty work. The only time this may be different and is common is between bus, truck and machinery companies and the engine, transmission manufacturers mainly because most of these products are purpose built. I worked for an engine OEM we only looked after what between the fan and the flywheel for warranty, this made for some interesting discussions with customers.

 

[Tazzieman]

The only "crime" as I see it is the initial promise to make these manuals available.
Like everyone interested (a very small proportion of IG owners worldwide) I'd like some movement on this issue , but I'm prepared to cut IA some slack.
i.e. I'm not about to lawyer up

 

[Lars]

He/she/they/it also blesses Africa

Donald Trump (current Republican god) doesn't agree with that...

 

[jlglr4]

Germany’s website still seems to say a service manual will be available. Other country’s websites do not. I think that’s a pretty clear message. We’re not getting a manual here.

I don’t believe there is any legal issue that prevents them from releasing the manual, and there is no problem translating it (it is available to dealers already to my understanding). But dealers in the US don’t want service manuals released. 50% of their profits come from service. Right now, in the US, there is a battle over whether dealers will need to provide repair information at all because they say it puts security at risk. It’s my understanding that the nat auto dealers association is behind the opposition more so than the automakers. Ineos knew they were going to have this problem in the US market but were touting that manual anyway - I was really hoping they’d have the balls to see it through, but I’ve lost all hope of that happening at this point.

 

[NQ94]

Can anyone help me with one question about Warranty Ownership...So the question would be, Do all the parts manufacturers [Engine Brakes Gearbox, etc.] take ownership and honour the warranty?


The reason I ask is when the Gren transfer case recall took place the agent was given clear instructions to remove and return it to Ineos...so where to then, back to the manufacturer?

The t/case may be sent back to the manufacture for analysis but like a lot of companies in Australia a warranty claim and description will be lodged with photos the parts quarantined and possibly sent back to the national parts warehouse to prevent warranty fraud. Unless the component can be transported and rebuilt cost effectively it will be scrapped. In Archerfield where the Mack Trucks factory was and Scania, Volvo etc it was a common occurrence for the OEMs to quarantine warranty parts both superseded new and changed used parts to send to a metal recycler with an observer or get in an excavator with shears and destroy the parts including engines, transmissions and axles to prevent use and theft (mechanics will scavenge to further income) and scrap the metal because it was cheaper then sending back to the US or Europe.

 

[Tazzieman]

Donald Trump (current Republican god) doesn't agree with that...

I believe in voodoo dolls I need to order some more pins.

 

[DaveB]

Donald Trump (current Republican god) doesn't agree with that...

You are not allowed to discuss politics on here so please don't bring that moronic clown up.
Some people will get offended.

Wait for it................................................

 

[DaveB]

The t/case may be sent back to the manufacture for analysis but like a lot of companies in Australia a warranty claim and description will be lodged with photos the parts quarantined and possibly sent back to the national parts warehouse to prevent warranty fraud. Unless the component can be transported and rebuilt cost effectively it will be scrapped. In Archerfield where the Mack Trucks factory was and Scania, Volvo etc it was a common occurrence for the OEMs to quarantine warranty parts both new and used to send to a metal recycler with an observer or get in an excavator with shears and destroy the parts including engines, transmissions and axles to prevent use and theft (mechanics will scavenge to further income) and scrap the metal because it was cheaper then sending back to the US or Europe.

I am pretty sure my dealer said early on that they had a few transfer cases in stock so they could do warranty repairs quickly