Great Wall Problems

Believe it or not, Steven, this is not a fault with the vehicle at all and something it’s actually designed to do. The theory is that by automatically swinging the exterior mirrors close into the car when parked, there’s less chance of a passing car or truck smashing the mirror.

This technology has its origins in Europe where roads are narrow and parking is a bit more relaxed than it is in Australia. Even so, it’s no bad thing to have happen when you leave the car unattended.

So, while there will be a fuse that controls this circuit, our advice is to leave it alone and let the mirrors do their thing. Replacing an exterior mirror on a late-model car is never cheap. As long as the mirrors fold out to their normal position each time you start the car, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with your Great Wall.

You’re dead right that this is a serious problem. Not being able to accelerate briskly when pulling out in traffic (for instance) is a huge risk to you and other road users.

The problem could be a simple adjustment issue, an electronic glitch or a major mechanical issue, but whatever it is, it needs to be fixed before you try to drive anywhere else. But here’s the good news: This is definitely a warranty issue, so make sure it becomes Great Wall’s problem, and not yours.

It's not uncommon for diesel engines to give a little shiver as they start up. There's a fair bit going on inside a diesel engine, with some heavy bits and pieces moving around inside it that can cause vibrations. This is why – along with the way either engine ignites its fuel - a diesel engine is, typically, not as smooth as a petrol engine.

But the sensation should last only a second before the engine settles to an even, relatively smooth idle. You may also find that as you put more kilometres on the car, the engine will smooth out a little.

But if you're still concerned, log this behaviour with the dealership. Your GWM has a seven-year/unlimited kilometre warranty, so if there really is a problem down the track to do with this vibration, you'll be covered as you've recorded a pre-existing condition.

Like a lot of relatively modern vehicles, the X200 doesn't use a throttle cable, but is instead what's known as throttle-by-wire. That means that the accelerator pedal tells the car's computer what position the driver has placed it in, then the computer tells the throttle to respond accordingly.

It all works on electronics and position sensors and if anything goes wrong with that arrangement, you can get erroneous messages being sent to the throttle with the symptoms you've mentioned. An electronic scan of the vehicle should reveal what's wrong as the computer will have recorded fault codes with any of this electronic gear.

Beyond that, it could also be something rather more mechanical such as a sticky stepper motor (that physically opens the throttle) or even a vacuum leak. It could even be a fault with the electronic protocols that tell the engine to increase its idle speed when, for instance, the air-conditioning it turned on. Again, though, a scan at a workshop should reveal all.

Parts and service supply has been a bit of an ongoing problem for some owners of these earlier Chinese-made Great Wall commercial vehicles. Some were sidelined for extended periods after some service parts were hard to locate and it’s doubtful that Covid and its attendant supply-chain problems have helped in that regard.

I’m a bit surprised, however, to learn that a Great Wall dealership lacks the tools and techniques necessary to carry out just about any maintenance task, including electrical jobs. Perhaps a call to Great Wall’s Australian customer service number might do the trick. If your nearest dealers don’t have the necessary equipment, perhaps there’s another dealer a little farther away that does. Failing that, try one of the many online forums for a solution. Chances are your vehicle won’t be the only one with this specific problem, and other owners may be able to offer advice on who can carry out the work.

Oil filter part numbers differ according to which brand your use. But in the case of the most widely known brand, Ryco, the engine in your Great Wall will use an oil filter with part number Z516. If you use an AC Delco oil filter, the part number is AC084. Other brands can be cross-referenced (with the part numbers listed above) online at a variety of websites or in the parts manuals kept by automotive parts stores.

It’s possible that your car has a windscreen that was manufactured with this defect. In some cases, automotive glass can either be manufactured with a lamination fault or can delaminate sometime after that due to a variety of factors.

It could also be that you’re dealing with a windscreen that has been damaged by flying debris. This can be caused when the vehicle is transported from the docks or warehouse to a dealership on the back of a truck. If the debris was the right size, it could virtually `sand-blast’ the windscreen, leading to the problem you’re seeing in particular lighting conditions. You might have noticed cars being transported by truck where the new vehicle at the front of the semi-trailer will have its glass taped over. This is why.

The first step is to have a windscreen specialist look at the vehicle to determine what the problem is. If it’s a manufacturing or transporting fault, you should be covered by the vehicle’s new-car warranty.

There are a couple of alarm bells being set off here. The first is that the engine, if driven through water deep enough, may have ingested some of that water which has caused what’s called hydraulic-lock. This is usually terminal and involves the (non-compressible) water, bending or breaking the engine’s internal bits and pieces such as the crankshaft and connecting rods. If the engine won’t turn over at all, this could be why.

The second possibility is a little less scary and involves the flood-waters entering a part of the car’s electronic or ignition systems, leading to a short-circuit. If that’s the case, the parts can sometimes be dried out and the engine will restart. In modern cars, however, once the computers and other electronics have been wet, they corrode internally and will need to be replaced over time.

This is part of the reason that insurance companies tend to write off flood-damaged cars, even if there’s no other damage. Insurers know that a car that has been under water will come back to haunt them in the longer term as all sorts of electronically-controlled components go belly up.

If you mean that the engine refuses to be turned over either by the starter motor or by physically pushing the vehicle in gear and then letting out the clutch, then there’s potentially something seriously wrong. As in a seized engine. Has it been overheated? Has it been run without oil? Both those things can seize an engine to the point where it is locked solid.

You stand to do more damage by persisting with this, so the smart move would be to present the vehicle at a Great Wall dealership as your Steed is still well and truly covered by the five-year factory warranty (assuming it has a complete service record and hasn’t travelled more than 150,000km. I can see that you’re from the Northern Territory, so perhaps the nearest dealership is a long way away, but if the drivetrain doesn’t want to turn at all, then a dealer is the solution.

If, however, you mean that the engine won’t fire up (but is physically turning over) even after push-starting the vehicle, then the problem might not be so catastrophic. A modern engine needs the correct input signal from literally dozens of sensors before it will run properly (or at all), and if you have a single dud sensor, that could produce the no-start condition you’re seeing.

But here’s the first thing to try: Turn the ignition on and listen for the faint buzzing sound of the electric fuel pump. If you can’t hear it, chances are the pump has failed. It’s very common and one of the typical ways fuel-injected vehicles cease to function. Even so, in a vehicle so young, involving the Great Wall dealership network should be your first step.

A common cause of this fault is failure of what’s known as the clock-spring which lives inside the steering column. But it’s not a spring at all, it’s actually the electrical connector that joins the air-bag (and steering wheel controls if your car has them) to the rest of the car’s electrical systems. It’s called a clock-spring because it’s wound in a spiral shape to allow the steering wheel to turn from lock to lock without the connecting wiring binding or bunching up. Eventually, fatigue gets the better of a clock-spring and it snaps, allowing the connection to fail. And that’s very probably what’s causing the air-bag light on your dashboard.

But don’t ignore it, as the clock-spring is also responsible for sending the correct signal to the air-bag in the case of a crash where the bag needs to deploy. And driving with an air-bag that may not go off when it should is a terrible idea.