A Garda operation has uncovered a quantity of potentially dangerous counterfeit brake pads. The brake pads, branded as Volkswagen, Seat, Skoda and Audi were seized at properties in Dublin, Galway, Mayo, Donegal, Belfast and Armagh.
The pads are not believe to have been sold through official Volkswagen Group dealerships, but may have reached independent retailers or repairers and subsequently consumers.
When examined the pads were found to have 30 per cent less braking efficiency than genuine pads and under extreme or emergency braking conditions, while the body of the pad was found to detach or break away from the backing plate.
The implication of this could result in the loss of the vehicles braking system.
Alan Bateson, aftersales manager for Volkswagen Ireland, said that it was rare for counterfeit items to be safety related.
“In the past, counterfeit car parts were mainly non-safety related items such as windscreen wipers and interior car accessories, more recently we have seen safety-related items such as brake pads, brake shoes and steering linkages coming available. We had become aware that counterfeit brake pads had come on to the market and we involved the Gardai who seized the items,” he said.
According to Bates, there were many ways that these products could be identified. “The fake box label indicates that the product is a Wasserpumpe and not brake pads.”
Wasserpumpe is German for water pump and the backing plate of the fake pads are engraved with TAXTE or TEXTA, whereas the genuine product are engraved with TEXTAR,” said Bateson.
He added that there would be no fitting instructions with these counterfeit brake pads and that the tamper-proof box seal is missing and there would be no batch code and production date on the product.
Volkswagen said that if anyone is worried that they may have these products fitted to their cars that their dealers across the group, including Volkswagen, Audi, Seat and Skoda dealers would be offering a free visual inspection for customers.
However Irish aftermarket parts suppliers are eager to point out that not all aftermarket brake pads and discs available today are either counterfeit or inferior.
In many instances independent garages sell spare parts from the company that originally manufactured them for the car firm. Parts from manufacturers such as Bosch can in some cases be bought cheaper than if they were branded by the car manufacturer, so it is not always astute to avoid these.
Where potential dangers arise is if customers seeking savings buy parts which do not meet EU regulations in terms of performance. There may also be issues with using non-branded parts in relation to the car’s warranty.