GWM Reviews

You’ve hit the nail on the head when you confirm that the vehicle is still within its warranty period (provided the vehicle has been serviced correctly). That means you need to make this Haval’s problem and not yours.

There are many, many things that can cause a transmission to behave like this, starting with low fluid level and ending with complete catastrophic failure. But if you ignore this problem, it could easily morph into a bigger, even more expensive fault. Take the car to the dealership you bought it from and give the service manager the full run-down on what’s going on and when. From there, it should be possible for Haval to identify the cause and fix it as a warranty issue.

Even if it’s not fixed immediately, the fact that you’ve reported it to Haval means it’s then a pre-existing condition and remains a warranty issue even if the warranty was to run out in the meantime.

This is a relatively common annoyance for many owners of different makes and models, not just Havals. It’s caused by the automatic shut-off mechanism on the bowser’s nozzle thinking that the tank is full and it need to shut off to avoid overfilling and a spill.

It’s not actually a fault with your car (although some makes and models do seem worse than other) and is actually more to do with the bowser.

To get around it, you can either fill very slowly (as you’ve discovered) but you can also try inserting the nozzle by a different amount until you find the sweet spot where the fuel flows freely into the tank. The other trick picked up over the years is to insert the nozzle and then give it a quarter of a turn so that the fuel is hitting a different part of the car’s filler neck (which may not cause the same problem). You could also try a different service station to see if its nozzles alleviate the problem to some degree.

I’m not sure the 'vents' you’re looking at in the luggage compartment are actually air vents. The five-seat Jolion has air vents in the rear of the centre console for back seat passengers, but since there’s no third row of seats, there’s no need for vents in the cargo area. Even if they were fitted, they’d direct air from the air-conditioning unit, not the outside where they could funnel rainwater inside.

A tail-light seal is a common source for boot leaks, though, so maybe it’s worth checking this again as the new seal may have been damaged when it was being fitted. But the real culprit is likely to be the rubber seal around the tailgate opening. This seal occupies a huge surface area, and even something is simple as a tiny scrap of fluff or a stray leaf or twig stuck to the rubber can cause a leak into the car.

The best way to chase a leak like this is to put somebody inside the cargo area with a torch, while you hose off the car’s exterior. Be sure to hose down the whole car (not just the area in question) as water leaks have a clever habit of starting in one spot and ending up in another. Hopefully, your observer will be able to spot where the water is entering the boot, and from there, you can home in on the leak.