Fyda Freightliner of Columbus Ohio & Freightliner Corp Tony Appolonio-sales manager Fyda Sold us a $115,000. new Friehtliner truck that broke down over 100 times in first 3 months of trucking, Columbus, Ohio

Purchased Freightliner M102 business class Expedited truck from Fyda Freightliner of Columbus, Ohio May 16, 2008. We were contracted with Fed-Ex (Custom Critical) to haul their expedited freight.

Started 1st load on July 2nd, 2008. Truck was in repair shop twice before we even took our first load. By August 19th, 2008 the batteries had to be replaced because they wouldn't take charge.

This is where the issues started, unknown to us, Fyda of Columbus already had replaced the batteries before we purchased it (apparently already having battery problems). Repair shop in Reno, NV replaced batteries for us and told us our warranty was voided because Fyda replaced batteries with discount store batteries and not Freightliner certified batteries.

Also voided any future electrical warranty work which were many, from headlights going out at night to the cruise control changing speeds, to the ignition turning off by itself, to the air conditioning not working, to engine running rough causing fuel mileage to be very low - throwing thousands of dollars out the window.

We suspected early on their was an electrical dead short, because we could smell hot electrical that kept us from staying in 8 ft sleeper on down times which we were told  by several Freightliner repair shops and Freightliner rep Barry Bledsoe if it didn't get fixed it was going to catch on fire. Well in December 2008 the truck caught fire and was a total loss.

Well Guess what - the fire investigators found a dead short in battery cable but 16 months later there has not been a word from Fyda or Freightliner about getting us a new truck or reimbursing us for $12,000. down payment and all our losses. Fyda received their money from the insurance company for all of the truck and more.

Pretty difficult to haul time-sensitive freight when you can't keep the truck running or sitting in the mountains hauling hazardous materials at night with the headlights going out. Engine would stall with an automatic transmission you do not have any power steering which made it very dangerous also. Pretty scary.

We even purchased a 5 yr - 750,000 mile extended warranty but truck didn't make it 46,000 miles and 8 months.

We have tried to get a loan for a new truck but because of the truck fire we are technically unemployed and because we were not in business long enough we didn't qualify for a new loan. With us being husband and wife team drivers this was an opportunity for Ron to work some being a disabled equipment operator. We made good money and had a blast but truck failed us causing us to lose many load opportunties and thousands of dollars in motel bills, fuel, and repair bills.

We would like Fyda Freightliner to be accountable for selling us a lemon truck and abandoning us.