Corrosion of the front roof panel and roof

[Vantastic2]

Many years ago starting before 2013 Cali's, Someone on here spotted corrosion on the front roof panel. There was also paint bubbling of the aluminium roof too.
Mine was one and the Cali's that had to go to a so called specialist nominated by VW. Was told VW was paying out over 4K for ever Cali to have the repair. After VW so called 'specialists' failed on first type of repair, they then fitted a polyurethane cap over the top of the panel, mine failed and lifted during heat after the one yr warranty ran out but again thanks to being with VWcaliforniaclub a member helped me finding an adhesive that he tried himself and worked which I did and no more panel uplift, no more water coming in.
So was wondering seeing new cali's local if VW sorted out that problem where they had steel making contact with aluminium causing a reaction to lift the paint off (starting with bubbling) and owners not knowing if they bought over 70K's worth of rubbish?

 

[WelshGas]

Many years ago starting before 2013 Cali's, Someone on here spotted corrosion on the front roof panel. There was also paint bubbling of the aluminium roof too.
Mine was one and the Cali's that had to go to a so called specialist nominated by VW. Was told VW was paying out over 4K for ever Cali to have the repair. After VW so called 'specialists' failed on first type of repair, they then fitted a polyurethane cap over the top of the panel, mine failed and lifted during heat after the one yr warranty ran out but again thanks to being with VWcaliforniaclub a member helped me finding an adhesive that he tried himself and worked which I did and no more panel uplift, no more water coming in.
So was wondering seeing new cali's local if VW sorted out that problem where they had steel making contact with aluminium causing a reaction to lift the paint off (starting with bubbling) and owners not knowing if they bought over 70K's worth of rubbish?

The front cap Galvanic Corrosion was addressed by a change in the Alloy used for Model Year 2015, so from about.July 2014 .
My late 2014 California had no problems when I sold it at the end of 2024.

 

[Meoncoast]

Our 1st van 2012 the issue of paint bubbles on the front cap and had the full repair fully cut off new replacement not the plastic cap stuck over when it was 18months old about. We sold it at the end of 2016 and remained as good as new. Our late 2016 showed no issues when we sold it at the end 2024.

 

[owen_h]

My 2012 also had the full front spoiler section replaced ( not the plastic cap ‘fix’). I’ve still got the van and have had no issues with that part of the repair. So for that section the issue was quickly identified and solved for new vehicles. This fix was very expensive and time consuming and only 4 or 5 bodyshops could do the work hence the move to cover with a plastic cap.
The elevating section took longer to identify the root cause I would say. Here the bubbles were smaller and confined mainly to under the rubber seal. In my case the repair was only to treat & repaint the edge of the roof up to roof rack track. After a few years this painted section was noticeably duller than the rest of the roof and bubbling had returned in a few places . There was then a campaign to fit an isolation tape to the edge of the roof ( rubbing back and repainting any bubbles first ) . For me this wasn’t done well at all and a year later it all looked worse with big areas of lacquer peel. I ended up having the whole elevating section repainted at my own expense.
In some respects I’m impressed that Vw are / were still prepared to fix older vehicles. But I suspect the shops doing the work were on a low fixed price so did the bare minimum and fitted the work around other better paying jobs.


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