Archives

Source Canadiandriver:


GM's defective intake manifold gaskets affects millions of vehicles, says Lemon-Aid author


Toronto, Ontario - General Motors has a serious engine defect affecting almost its entire car and minivan line-up for the past decade, says Lemon-Aid author Phil Edmonston.

"Vehicles with 3.4-litre and 3.8-litre V6 engines lose coolant and overheat because the automaker saved a few pennies installing a plastic intake manifold gasket, rather than a metal one. The plastic melts or cracks and owners are faced with a $1,000 to $3,000 repair bill."

Edmonston estimates that millions of 1996-2004 vehicles are affected and the total repair bill could easily reach $400 million (U. S.).

"Three months ago, Ford of Canada had a similar engine problem and, after prodding by Lemon-Aid and consumer groups like Car Help Canada, Ford announced that all intake manifold claims would be paid retroactively and that it would guarantee its engines up to seven years"

Edmonston says, unlike Ford, General Motors of Canada is using a secret warranty to "nickel and dime" customers. Owners are forced to pay the repairs out-of-pocket and then claim a refund in small claims court.

"If GM doesn't match Ford's repair refunds and extends the warranty to seven-years for all Canadian owners, we shall call for a national boycott of the company's vehicles until it does. In the early 70s, our first boycott was settled by Ford of Canada after it paid out $2.8 million for rust-cankered vehicles," said Edmonston.


who knew a few pennies can make such a difference? Man I think i'll pay the extra dollars thank you! :D And really shows that GM's engine technology (8 years?) with no improvement in design or quality. For shame :cool:

I don't count the number of years an engine is left alone against it - not the years alone, that is. The basic Honda SOHC engine which lived until the 2005 Civic traces its roots very directly back to the 1992 Civic's D-series, and indirectly all the way back to 1986 or so. That's a very long run for an engine to have with comparitively small changes. From 92 to '05 it managed to grow from 1.5 liters and 102hp to 1.7 liters and 115hp, but it was roughly the same engine the whole time, just with a longer cranshaft stroke. The difference of course is that Honda made a good engine to start, and GM rarely sets out to do more than make good enough engines.

thanks for the clarifcation, i thought when honda added vtec to their engines, they rebuilded it from scratch... now I Know a lot of systems are usually addons and not something rebuilded to operate on its own.

Hi Phil:

___Thanks for the story as it sounds about right. GM is getting nailed from every direction nowadays or so it would appear :(

___Good Luck

___Wayne