THE PORTAL HUB - Pinzgauers, Haflingers, Volvo 303s and more!

Hello everyone! My name is Alan and I live in Denver, CO

Im new to your site, Ive been doing lots of reading and have found much helpful info. I tried looking up thru you search function but couldnt really find what the info Im looking for. Ive been a Jeep guy for about 7 years now but the family is growing and I cannot fit all of my gear in one anymore. I started looking at a Pinz and the prices here in Denver for one are not to bad, but Im worried about the maintenance on them. Since Im completely new to these type of vehicle I really dont know what kind of maintenance they require and how often is it needed. From what I was able to read already, the brakes need often adjustment ( might need to learn how to do it to save me some cash) but havent found anything else.

A big concern for me would be blowing an engine or a tranny? How much would I be looking at if that were to happen and how likely is it to happen. The use of the vehicle for me would be purely recreational family camping trips, some mild 4x4, fishing trips. Roughly around 400 miles a month during summer months and maybe one or two long 800 miles trips a year. I never really treated my Jeep pretty bad so I didnt have much expenses on it, except modification. If i can remember correctly I had to replace the clutch once ($800) and a manifold ($325), would I be looking at cost of repairs for a Pinz inthe thousands vs the hundreds?

What about a busted axle, how much would that set me back? Im sure this varies depending on where everyone lives, but what would be a someone reasonable figure?

Ive read the buyers check list you have posted on what to look for when purchasing one of these vehicles and hopefully I can have someone from the clubs here in Colorado give me more information/guidence when I decide to pull the triger on this.

Any other info would be greatly appreciated.

You'll buy a complete clutch kit for a 710/712 for around $500 and fit it yourself in a couple of hours.

Most Pinz stuff is rebuildable, tin work is expensive though if you need replacement parts...

First, consider that anything you break and replace on the Pinz is going to be expensive. Yes, a blown engine or tranny is going to be in the thousands not hundreds, maybe about 3.5k each for a drop in replacement; although I just don't see that as being likely to happen as long as you stick to the preventive maintenance and and use good judgment in your driving habits. Sure, blown engines and trannys, as well as broken axles are possible, but I don't think such occurrences are anywhere near as common as in the Jeeping world. In fact, I think they are pretty uncommon in the Pinz world. I wouldn't worry about the possibility of such things happening on a Pinz as long as you take care of it the way a Pinz owner is supposed to. This is just my opinion on the topic, I'm still a noob, the more veteran Pinz owners on here can give you much better info.

Hi there,

Like any foreign vehicle no longer in production, replacement components can be expensive, but it's all relative. Be ready to take care of her and she'll reciprocate.

When I was a younger lad, I didn't think much of common sense and the such. I bought a 98 Isuzu Trooper and long story short, blew the engine with only 80 000kms on it. That was a $9000 repair. If I had researched the product, I would have seen that the engines were prone to "vanishing" oil.

The point of my proverb is....as you've found out by doing some homework in advance, these "big" issues are not very common if you take care and buy a sensibly priced/maintained Pinzie.

Good luck making a choice, shopping is half the fun!

Dave

Thanks for the replies so far, looking forward to hear from more of you guys. From what Ive seen major work like that is not very common, just wanted to have an idea of how likely they are to doing so. Im pretty good about giving my vehicles maintenance, specially if I will need it to be dependeble in the backcountry or secluded areas. When you guys say preventive maintenance, what does that include, how often is it needed and how much does that usually run for the guys here in the US?

What about brake, filters, fluids work and the normal wear components of the vehicle?

I think I've heard of a total of something like two broken axles in the 11 years I've owned a Pinz! Once you get one "cleaned up" with any leaky seals fixed, preventative maintenance done, tune up, and fluids changed, you might have to adjust the brakes 1-2 times a year and do engine oil changes but not much else. I tend to leave alot of the maintenance for a good spring weekend and drive it the rest of the year. Of course you need to be observant of any noticable changes to sounds or feel and deal with those as they come up, but mostly they are very dependable. If anything, they are too tolerant of poor maintenance -- they seem to run much longer in poor condition then alot of vehicles.

I think that more people have had bad trail experiances due to "grenading the clutch" (which is purely an operator error) than any other failure on the trail.

Has anyone been able to get full coverage on theirs? I called my insurance agent today.... ( my wife hehehehe) and it seems SF does not provide full coverage for these vehicles. They are giving me a quote of $386 per six months but thats just liablility and they DO consider it a military vehicle.

SF does offer full coverage. They gave it to me in Virginia. They also revoked it 2 years later after learning of a driving mishap in Florida. (I loathe you Florida)

Im now with Nationwide.

My SF agent checked, there is (was) nothing that prohibited SF from full coverage (she specifically checked with the underwriters). I've had full coverage on both of mine for all 11 years and 8 years I've had them. Of course it helps to have a good driving history, and I've had SF for the last 34 years... I think I pay $250-300 every six months or so for full coverage and the high end liability.
Check with other agents; the agents decide how far they should go and they often take the easy way out and say "can't do it" because they don't want to. Find a better agent. I've been lucky, mine have been stellar.

And it is NOT a military vehicle, unless you are your own army! Now it is a CIVILIAN SUV (and don't even say civilian! Just say SUV, and if they ask further, just say it's made in Europe. You didn't purchase it from the Swiss army, or any other army for that matter, right? As far as you are concerned, you bought a used European SUV, end of story!!!!! Stick to this!!! It's history is of no importance!!!). Beat that through their heads, better still start afresh with a different agent.

Geico offers it as well. Just signed up last week for 600/year for full coverage (tickets bumped it 100$/yr) and I was not a customer of theirs.

The insurance aspect is what really perplexes me. I have full coverage with SF, pretty much everyone else said impossible. My Geico agent actually laughed and insulted me and implied I must be stupid to even ask if they would insure a Pinz. I am guessing that a lot of peoples differing experiences really boils down to the individual agent. My state farm agent thought the Pinz was the coolest thing he ever saw in his life and said so, so he was rather enthusiastic about getting it worked out with the underwriters.

I have been with Farmers for about 30 years. Had a very cool agent in San Diego...if I told him that I had another vehicle he would just ask for the vin, case closed.
As I moved to WA and then to CO the coolness factor seemed to decrease. But, still I am insured fully with them. It very much depends on the agent and their ability
to see past their individual shortcomings. Some just don't want to take the trouble. Lazy buggers.