I had a problem fixed recently with my truck, was the egr unit in my MAN anyway collected it, went of to re-load, and then smoke started belching from the exhaust, thick black smoke, so bad you couldnt see the carriageway behind…anyway managed to park , revved the guts out of it…no smoke…pulled onto the carriageway…black smoke…so eventually it went to the garage, man thurrock…they diagnosed a faulty exhaust…after a road test with a loaded trailer…now here is the crunch, they phoned yesterday to give me the news…when i asked how much…they said £8500…i said can you repeat that please…yes but i must tell you no one has the job done after we tell them the price…it is EIGHT THOUSAND, FIVE HUNDRED POUNDS…WHAT !!..i can buy another truck for that…well i messaged the boss and he hasnt woken from his coma yet…and maybe he will let me know what he intends to do…do you guys think this is excessive, or is this the going rate.Personally i think its taking the ■■■■ cos we`re on foreign plates.
if anyone know where its a lot cheaper…its a MAN TGX 26/400 euro 5…thanks.
my own experiences of main dealers are they are all robbers, Iveco had thousands upon thousands from us after my old mans eurotech had had over 30k spend under warranty.
so yes I would say 8,500 is expensive.
Will you get a breakdown of bill and list exactly what they are saying they are going to do, what parts, and they’re diagnosis, I’d love to hear what ■■■■ they will spat 
truckyboy:
I had a problem fixed recently with my truck, was the egr unit in my MAN anyway collected it, went of to re-load, and then smoke started belching from the exhaust, thick black smoke, so bad you couldnt see the carriageway behind…anyway managed to park , revved the guts out of it…no smoke…pulled onto the carriageway…black smoke…so eventually it went to the garage, man thurrock…they diagnosed a faulty exhaust…after a road test with a loaded trailer…now here is the crunch, they phoned yesterday to give me the news…when i asked how much…they said £8500…i said can you repeat that please…yes but i must tell you no one has the job done after we tell them the price…it is EIGHT THOUSAND, FIVE HUNDRED POUNDS…WHAT !!..i can buy another truck for that…well i messaged the boss and he hasnt woken from his coma yet…and maybe he will let me know what he intends to do…do you guys think this is excessive, or is this the going rate.Personally i think its taking the ■■■■ cos we`re on foreign plates.
if anyone know where its a lot cheaper…its a MAN TGX 26/400 euro 5…thanks.
what do they exactly mean by “Faulty Exhaust” ? I can’t think what could go wrong with the exhaust to create black smoke, DPFs block up, and I’m sure adblue systems fail but can’t imagine it creating black smoke.
Hi all.Trucky.Surely your boss must know some small garage that can fix it.Alternatively can you not get it bypassed or disconnected then get a load home to BG where they must be able to fix it.
firstly thanks for your responses…secondly its not on ad-blue…its an 08 originally but on euro 5…i thought that the exhaust couldnt create that kind of a problem, especially since it never happened before it went in for the EGR, now that seems more likely, but i asked them if they were sure that it was the exhaust, for if it was, why didnt it smoke when running unit only, and after it started smoking under pressure, i pull;ed into a layby, and used the cruise control to give it more revs, and revved the guts out of it…but no smoke…my boss seems to think it had a new exhaust last November anyway, if one is not such an expert on these things, we have to generally believe the dealers, but must admit that thurrock m.a.n. are not a very good service provider, and often vehicles come out with more faults than when they went in ( like now )
I so think that maybe the CAT is not functioning, which is why they think its the exhaust !! and cats are expensive ( i know, my wifes got two my boss is in Turkey at the moment so i`m trying to help him, and the vehicle cannot be driven with a load on…it really is excessive black smoke that fills both carriageways…if anyone was on the A12 last thursday, they could tell you how bad it is. It is puzzling that there is no smoke running unit only or with an empty trailer, its only when its under pressure…The EGR only runs air and water through it, so dont think its that, the reason it was changed was excessive coolant loss, where the water was escaping into the hot air pipe, and vapourising which is why it wasnt showing any water leaks…anyhow that was hopefully fixed… still looking for solutions without costing the earth.
euro 5 MAN if its not ad blue then it has a special exhaust for emmisions which is suppose to be really expensive lol.
i presume with having a water cooled EGR it has a DPF. May be water leaking into the system when the EGR was faulty has somehow buggered the DPF, still don’t see how a damaged DPF would cause black smoke in the way you describe. And the EGR shouldn’t be active when the engine is working hard. Black smoke when the engine is full power sounds like it is injecting too much fuel in to me.
may be someone has fitted a rolling coal device.
youtube.com/watch?v=JGYc0wCP7oQ
truckyboy:
.The EGR only runs air and water through it, so dont think its that, the reason it was changed was excessive coolant loss, where the water was escaping into the hot air pipe, and vapourising which is why it wasnt showing any water leaks…anyhow that was hopefully fixed… still looking for solutions without costing the earth.
I drive a 60 plate man. about 6 weeks ago I was getting , coolant level too low warnings. 2 mechanics said EGR unit .truck had new engine about 2 years ago, so went to MAN under warranty. new EGR fitted but still getting low coolant warning. has been back twice, no coolant warnings so far but header tank is empty every morning. only difference now is ive noticed a leek on the ground in the morning. so its a case of let it develop and see what happens.
DPFS are the thick end of 9 grand for a DAF. WE got told I our induction that if we ignored regens and it got to the point it was at stage 4 (knackered ),not to bother coming in to work the following week.
There was a thread about MAN exhausts and their amazing prices some time ago here, possibly on the Owner Drivers forum.
From what i recall, you’ve already been quoted the discount price @ £8.5k, the initial quote from that thread was a cool £11k.
I’m no help to you, but as i’m a gobby sod i will make a general comment.
These euro makes have the operator by the ■■■■■■■■, quite why operators fell for it in the first place i don’t know, because in the 80’s and 90’s British lorries were every bit as good as the foreign stuff (apart from the badge which really is important to some people) and had a massive advantage, most of the parts were easily obtainable and generally common stuff ie Winguard standard mud wings ERF/SedAck @ about £35 a shot instead of F90 MAN wings @ £200 apiece…other price differences comparable.
A ■■■■■■■ 14 litre was a ■■■■■■■ 14 litre whatever chassis it went in, same as an Eaton/Fuller box, perfectly good robust products that would work for years with a decent bit of regular servicing.
WTF did operators get sucked in to the fashion for foreign for, bad as bloody company car bods who simply must have an Aldi darling nothing less will do for my image.
Well sucked in they got and now they’re buggered, cos the Brit makers have dwindled away during the years of plenty 
so they’re stuck with the standard euro fodder unless they’re brave enough to try a Hino and see how that fares for durability and parts.
The foreigners were ok for a while, but their products have become so bloody wretched and stuffed with electronics that in many cases they’re now longer a working vehicle fit for purpose IMHO.
What the hell is a lorry doing with an electric parking brake and hill hold for instance its utter ■■■■■■■■, and don’t get me started on arsetronic gearboxes, just something else that going to prove bloody expensive to put right when its out of R&M timeline.
Its a lorry for crying out loud, its an industrial tool for a job being used in harsh environments by utter clots, it needs to be tough simple robust and durable, and easy and cheap to fix, it doesn’t need festooning with tat.
Those with cars made after about 2004/5 are finding similar nightmares cropping up on the vehicle, with huge bills to put the things right, but where do you draw the line, it’s built in obsolescence, and i humbly submit that increasingly lorries are reaching this point too.
The vehicle in question proof enough?
I suggest the latest cars have an economic life expectancy of about 7/8 years if you’re lucky, and the latest lorries probably the same before things like this accumulate to end their economic worth.
and breathe… 
Juddian:
There was a thread about MAN exhausts and their amazing prices some time ago here, possibly on the Owner Drivers forum.
From what i recall, you’ve already been quoted the discount price @ £8.5k, the initial quote from that thread was a cool £11k.I’m no help to you, but as i’m a gobby sod i will make a general comment.
These euro makes have the operator by the ■■■■■■■■, quite why operators fell for it in the first place i don’t know, because in the 80’s and 90’s British lorries were every bit as good as the foreign stuff (apart from the badge which really is important to some people) and had a massive advantage, most of the parts were easily obtainable and generally common stuff ie Winguard standard mud wings ERF/SedAck @ about £35 a shot instead of F90 MAN wings @ £200 apiece…other price differences comparable.
A ■■■■■■■ 14 litre was a ■■■■■■■ 14 litre whatever chassis it went in, same as an Eaton/Fuller box, perfectly good robust products that would work for years with a decent bit of regular servicing.
WTF did operators get sucked in to the fashion for foreign for, bad as bloody company car bods who simply must have an Aldi darling nothing less will do for my image.
Well sucked in they got and now they’re buggered, cos the Brit makers have dwindled away during the years of plenty
The foreigners were ok for a while, but their products have become so bloody wretched and stuffed with electronics that in many cases they’re now longer a working vehicle fit for purpose IMHO.
What the hell is a lorry doing with an electric parking brake and hill hold for instance its utter ■■■■■■■■, and don’t get me started on arsetronic gearboxes, just something else that going to prove bloody expensive to put right when its out of R&M timeline.
Its a lorry for crying out loud, its an industrial tool for a job being used in harsh environments by utter clots, it needs to be tough simple robust and durable, and easy and cheap to fix, it doesn’t need festooning with tat.Those with cars made after about 2004/5 are finding similar nightmares cropping up on the vehicle, with huge bills to put the things right, but where do you draw the line, it’s built in obsolescence, and i humbly submit that increasingly lorries are reaching this point too.
The vehicle in question proof enough?I suggest the latest cars have an economic life expectancy of about 7/8 years if you’re lucky, and the latest lorries probably the same before things like this accumulate to end their economic worth.
and breathe…
I think hemeans older stuff was more reliable as the modern trucks cant handle it
I had almost identical symptoms with my 07 plate non adblue Euro 5 TGA 440…problems started when he was 10 weeks old… Long story short… 16 weeks later, after a holiday in MAN Swindon via lowloader, it turned out to be the CAT, and all in all had cost over £12k to repair (they had replaced injectors, exhaust system (but not the cat at that point), and multiple other things)… fortunately for us it was done under warranty…
Remember this was back on 2007 and the CAT alone was £3k.
Dazza1980:
euro 5 MAN if its not ad blue then it has a special exhaust for emmisions which is suppose to be really expensive lol.
MAN PM-KAT…
Lambda sensors and catalytic converters really, really don’t like coming into contact with antifreeze. So leaking water cooled EGR valve and then there’s a potential problem.
I agree with Juddian (again ) I used to run British motors, ERFs, Sed Atks, …even a couple of Ford Cargos. 
I was offered a two yr old Iveco Eurostar cheap, lovely motor, well ahead of it’s time in the 80s, elec mirrors, elec blinds, heated seats etc, all the refinements. Compared to the ERFs it was like comparing a Transit van with a Lexus.
The price of parts compared to the Brit motors was astronomical, I remember paying about 50 quid then for a headlamp dip switch, the same Lucas part for the Sed Atk was about a tenner, one of the lads broke a rear light, I priced one up and ended up putting standard Rubbolite sets on for an absolute fraction.
As already said the Dealer agents have the operator by the gools, glad I’m just a common lowly driver these days, miss having my own motors like toothache.
That exhaust job sounds like a complete ■■■■ take, I bought second hand motors in the past for less than 8 grand
Edit: I meant Turbostar not Eurostar, yeh I know…nobody cares
robroy:
I agree with Juddian (again
I was offered a two yr old Iveco Eurostar cheap, lovely motor, well ahead of it’s time in the 80s, elec mirrors, elec blinds, heated seats etc, all the refinements. Compared to the ERFs it was like comparing a Transit van with a Lexus.
The price of parts compared to the Brit motors was astronomical, I remember paying about 50 quid then for a headlamp dip switch, the same Lucas part for the Sed Atk was about a tenner, one of the lads broke a rear light, I priced one up and ended up putting standard Rubbolite sets on for an absolute fraction.
As already said the Dealer agents have the operator by the gools, glad I’m just a common lowly driver these days, miss having my own motors like toothache.
That exhaust job sounds like a complete ■■■■ take, I bought second hand motors in the past for less than 8 grand
Nothing on Euro 6 is cheap ,I feel sorry if anyone takes them on as second hand trucks unless they have some sort of maintainance contract …They will no likley put people out of business,and Euro 7 is just a couple of years away 
Hi guys/gals…thanks for all of your replies, one in particular caught my eye, that was the one about the egr leaking, maybe the pipe cracked and thats where the water was going, but it does seem logical that the exhaust is the culprit, i have told my boss ( if he goes ahead ) to get some kind of warranty from m.a.n. that If the problem continues, they will put the old system back on and not charge him or give a refund. i dont think he has recovered yet i dont know about the possibility is of locating a second hand unit from a breaker, and what the reliability would be ( dont hold out much hope ) as the cat could be knackered too… I noticed Kate you call your truck a HE …not surprising as us men call ours a she.
norb:
I think hemeans older stuff was more reliable as the modern trucks cant handle it
But it wasn’t though. I remember breaking down at Southwaite services in a new Scania 93 P cab 8 legger that developed a gearbox fault at just 6,000 miles. I remember getting an Iveco with 10,000 on the clock and the clutch let go.
I remember driving endless trucks with 300-400,000km on which were absolutely knackered. Sure the engines were OK although many drank oil and you couldn’t see for the first 10 minutes after starting up on a cold winter morning but various in cab stuff was shafted, there were endless knocks on bumps from various worn out bushes, pins, cab mounts and cab rust was a real problem.
Dazza1980:
euro 5 MAN if its not ad blue then it has a special exhaust for emmisions which is suppose to be really expensive lol.
What on earth is laugh out loud funny about an expensive repair?
Are you a bit…special?