First Car - Have I been ripped off??

[Dead Eye]

Water pumps are very often driven by the cambelt and as mentioned would require the belt to be moved aside if the pump needed replacing - which is just a pain due to having to time the engine - so replacing the pump is normal. You also don't want an old pump to seize up and burn through a cambelt - this happened to an unfortunate person on the ZS forums.

Now, I'm not certain where the pump is on your engine, but if it's anything like mine, it is impossible to inspect without removing a lot of stuff. Mine is run by the cambelts behind a metal shroud that has all the ancillaries bolted to it as well as the fan belt (auxiliary belt). Not all pumps are at the bottom of the loop - mine is actually pretty near the top, so it's entirely possible that they didn't replace the fluid. Possibly a bit naughty of them, but unless they said they would do it... check the receipts - if they did do it then it should be billed item imo. Even then, in an old engine with a lot of miles, the fluid won't stay particularly clean very long so its entirely possible its just coincidence that it's dirty now.

Glow Plugs imo are a service item, but their life span is extremely long compared to other items. At 110k miles I'd be beginning to think about changing them as its about the right time and 95% of the time it will solve sluggish starting issues. As an interim, cycle the ignition twice - ign on, wait for glow plug light to go out, turn off, ign on, wait for glow plug light to go out, start car

Fan belt squeal. How old is the Van? My old Golf GTi ('91) had a manually adjusted tensioner for the fan / aux belt and the power steering pump would squeal constantly if it was too loose so that could explain the problem even with a new belt. Newer vehicles may use a spring loaded tensioner (like my ZS) but if the engine is old and well used it could require replacing or simply for the area to be cleaned and the some WD40 worked in to the tensioner.



All of my experience is from my own vehicles and completing my own maintenance. I have not personally swapped out glow plugs, but I have recently replaced the cam belts and water pump on my V6. As always, a good garage is always recommended over a cheap garage. It's difficult to do any sort of long distance diagnosis but it's possible the garage did everything, but just didn't spend extra time making sure it was perfect.

And finally, Your Mileage May Vary (YMMV)