Jones Racing Inc

I brought my 2001 VW Beelte into Jones Racing describing the following issue:

"The car is shifting heavily, jerking into first and second gear, and the low coolant light comes on despite the fact that there is coolant in the reservoir".

All of my interactions have been with the owner. After keeping the car for two days without working on it, he called to say the problem is a broken seal on the transmission with a loss of fluid and two broken CV joints. $350 parts plus labor. We authorize the repair, and two days after this we get another call from him saying:

He assumed to the problems were separate (coolant light and shifting). Without checking the cooling system he fixed the transmission seals and CV joints, refilled the transmission with fluid, and test drove the car. The car seemed to drive perfectly. When he checked the cooling system he saw a "Frothy milkshake" of coolant and transmission fluid. Checking the transmission again he saw that this mess was now worked completely into the transmission. He claimed that I should have told him that there was transmission fluid in the coolant (I'm not a mechanic and would have no way of telling one brown liquid from another) and because of -my- over sight the car is essentially dead. It will cost more to fix the car than it is worth. If I wanted to fix it anyway it would cost us -at least- $2500. 

I took some time to look into the problem. A broken intercooler can cause the transmission fluid to back up into the cooling system. While an irritant, the cooling system can be flushed and brought back to normal. Apparently the opposite almost never happens. Because of the pressure on the transmission side, coolant rarely back tracks into the transmission. While it can, in very usual situations, mix on both sides the serious problem with the transmission was most likely caused by Jerry refilling the transmission and driving the car without first checking the intercooler and the cooling system.

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