I have a 4-year-old VW Touran TDI that I bought new. Recently, after 62,000 carefully driven miles and no rough motoring, the car fractured a rear coil spring, about one wind up from the base. The engineer who fixed it recognised the problem immediately because he said he’d seen exactly the same thing before. Unfortunately my one-year extended warranty had run out. The job was done quickly and efficiently but cost of £167.57. I wrote to VW at Milton Keynes to complain because I did not believe a coil spring should fail. Given the engineer’s comments, I felt there was a probable design or manufacturing fault somewhere. After a long delay, I finally got a brush-off. It seems to me that under the Sale of Goods Act, this component was not fit for purpose and should have been replaced free, warranty or not.