2011 5.3 Lifter tick / dealer experience

joshrt24 · April 3, 2012

I purchased a 2011 Silverado new from Reeder Chevrolet in December of 2011 and on February 22nd at 3,226 miles I took it to the dealer for an internal engine noise. On the first attempt they replaced the oil pump and had me come pick it up.on On the 24th I started it up at the dealer and it made the same noise so I went in and told them that it still did it. They told me to drive it for a day or so and see if it continued.I then took it back for a second time on February 27th at 3,346 miles and they replaced 16 lifters , test drove it and tore it down again and replaced 2 additional lifters and had me come to pick it up on March 1st. Still making the noise.

On March 6th, I brought it back again for the same noise. They replaced the camshaft, bearings, an additional 16 lifters, and an additional oil pump. I came to pick up the vehicle on March 28th, and it still made the noise.

From day 1 I was telling them they needed to replace my engine and how unsatisfied I was with this entire situation. I had been asking for add ons and incentives as well and was told I would be fairly compensated.

On the 14th I was called and told to come pick up my truck and sit down and discuss the situation.

I arrived and the mechanic took me to my truck and started it for me to show me that it was still making the noise and that GM wanted him to replace the rocker arms and push rods. They told me to drive it over the weekend and bring it back monday the 19th and drop it off for the repairs.

On the 4th drop off on the 19th I arrived and asked for Jerry Mcdaniel's which is the fixed operations director for reeder chevrolet. He informed me that he spoke to the GM rep about an incentive package and they were working on it and that my engine would not get the repairs instead I would get a new motor all together. He told me to bring it back wednesday the 21st and drop it off for the engine replacement.

So the truck was dropped off on the 21st to be worked on.

I called Jerry on the morning of the 28th to discuss my incentive package. He was irritable and acted like I was bothering him. He complained to me that I left reeder bad online surveys from my experiences ( 4 total surveys that they sent TO ME) and treated me as if this whole time he has been bending over backwards doing favor after favor for me, when my truck is not only under factory warranty but I also purchased an additional $1700 extended warranty. I told him I was not happy at all and that I wanted add ons. He told me he was getting with the rep again to create an incentive package.

I got a call on the 28th asking me to come get the truck and bring a copy of my monthly bill from my vehicle.

I met with Jerry again and asked a bout the add ons / incentive package and he told me there wasn't one. Went on to tell me he would try to get me one months payment. I told him that was not good enough and asked for a remote starter plus the payment and he told me he would try to get that as well.

I was a little dis satisfied with him so I went home and called GM Customer Service. I spoke with a women named Deb which informed me that sometimes they reimburse customers one months bill or offer to reimburse if you purchased an extended warranty. I told her I would take the warranty reimbursement or 3 months car payments. So she said she would fill out all the stuff and forward it to her supervisor which ended up being Anna.

Anna spoke with someone at reeder which I assume to be Jerry and he informed her that I did not deserve any more than one months payment and that is the only offer from him and Reeder. GM offered me zero compensation.

I forgot to add in that the reason I needed the compensation is because while I was without my truck for a total of 17 days ( non consecutive ) I calculated a total loss on my tile jobs to be $1200 and a total of $100 on yards that I mow. Also my car note is $531 and I calculated around $300 in car payment where I didn't even have the truck in my possession as it was in the shop at reeder.

As of today the 2nd of April I have not received a call or a check from Reeder Chevrolet as I was told by GM that I would.

I really feel that my faith in Reeder and GM has been compromised and they have left me completely unsatisfied with my purchase.

Also I noticed on the paperwork between where I had the last bit of work done on the 3rd drop off on the 6th of march and the motor swap drop off on the 21st of march the paper work did not change although I did receive two invoices, the mileage on the sheet and the dates did not change. I don't know if this was an attempt to keep the visits down to 3 keeping it under the lemon law quota or if it was merely a typo on the computer.

brainpause · April 3, 2012

Sounds to me like you have a case of righteous indignation. As long as you didn't cop an attitude with Jerry or someone else. The tone of your post gives me the impression that you didn't cop an attitude.

Hang in there.

Morgan1986 · April 3, 2012

What was the noise ?

joshrt24 · April 3, 2012

They never identified the problem. They kept calling it lifter noise or just valve train noise but after replacing all that stuff it still occured.

No I kept my cool the entire time, Jerry was extremely mad over the bad reviews and I said well what do you expect me to rate them, I rated them honestly. I didn't give them " bad " reviews.. but they were not 100% satisfactory so that reflects on them.

I reported this to my local tv station.

A lot of folks have been telling me it must have been the crank. but IDK

adamjeeps · April 3, 2012

Lemon Law - get a new truck.

jro909 · April 3, 2012

not all states have lemon law...honestly i would of called GM directly after the first failed attempt at fixing the issue...second my 5.3 with 130k on it makes noise when its cold, whoopy it always has..

gmtech4 · April 4, 2012

i was a gm tech for along time ,

that dam survey is what the dealer relys on ,it called a CSI Customer Satifaction Index

i can fix a customers warranty concern 100% and if the service advisor is abit (off) that day ,the customer may not check off "compltely satified"

the cashier up north had a bad day and was crying about some dam thing and the customer see's that as their last impression and then cant find their car because of a bad car locating system,how do you think the survey after i again fix their car and complaints

its a whole store survey with a bunch of questions and techs are linked in with advisors ,it BS

dataspng · April 4, 2012

i was a gm tech for along time ,

that dam survey is what the dealer relys on ,it called a CSI Customer Satifaction Index

i can fix a customers warranty concern 100% and if the service advisor is abit (off) that day ,the customer may not check off "compltely satified"

the cashier up north had a bad day and was crying about some dam thing and the customer see's that as their last impression and then cant find their car because of a bad car locating system,how do you think the survey after i again fix their car and complaints

its a whole store survey with a bunch of questions and techs are linked in with advisors ,it BS

GM should re-think the surveys.... I find them off-topic or ill-timed... If a customers truck is in the shop of course he/she is not happy until its fixed...So sending a survey for each visit is pretty much usesless until its fixed right. What I found with the many surveys I have filled out with GM is they seem to be very dealer oriented, but doesnt seem to address the fact that someone a GM may have built the thing wrong and now the dealer is stuck fixing what should be caught by the QC at the plant.

dewfpo · April 4, 2012

I try to be as honest I can on surveys and sometimes they earn a 4 out of 5 in on a particular question and the folks at the dealership get pissed at you because you didn't give them a 5. They say a 4 is the same as a 1 to the manufacturer so it's 5's or they don't want to hear from you (as in ... just don't fill it out). One service rep. at the local Chevy dealership offered me a free oil change if I gave him all 5's on the survey.

DEWFPO

slimjim2525 · April 4, 2012

I tell you, I fill out the surveys honestly. I had chevy dealers tell me to put 5's down because everything else is a failure. Well that's their problem, if it's a 3, then it's a 3, that's the way it goes.

joshrt24 · April 5, 2012

Lemon Law - get a new truck.

Lemon law only applies after 3 failed attempts to repair and at that point I have to send in a certified letter to gm and then gm has 10 days to fix the vehicle, after that or 30 consecutive days of inoperable automobile you can return it or exchange it. thats the TN lemon law anyway

not all states have lemon law...honestly i would of called GM directly after the first failed attempt at fixing the issue...second my 5.3 with 130k on it makes noise when its cold, whoopy it always has..

Well that's good for you, I paid for a new vehicle, not a rattling POS. I would expect noises after so many miles but not before my first oil change.

I was really blindsided by this whole thing. I really thought the first repair would have done it. I think the biggest problem is that GM doesn't allow the tech to diagnose the vehicle. From what I was told the tech was only aloud to find out where the noise is coming from then follow a list of things that GM automatically wants them to replace. The part that mad me mad was when they told the tech to tear down my motor piece by piece and figure it out.. at that point the motor should have been shipped back to GM for an engineer to inspect and send me a new one.

I build boats for a living so I am quite familiar with production and warranty and replacements, we deal with them every single day. We replace more than we ' fix ' . We usually take the old part and let the engineers test and find out the cause so we can keep from having that issue in the future. Not to mention our goal is 100% customer satisfaction no matter what.

joshrt24 · April 5, 2012

i was a gm tech for along time , that dam survey is what the dealer relys on ,it called a CSI Customer Satifaction Index i can fix a customers warranty concern 100% and if the service advisor is abit (off) that day ,the customer may not check off "compltely satified" the cashier up north had a bad day and was crying about some dam thing and the customer see's that as their last impression and then cant find their car because of a bad car locating system,how do you think the survey after i again fix their car and complaints its a whole store survey with a bunch of questions and techs are linked in with advisors ,it BS

When I filled it out I gave them good feedback, just not 100% satisfied. I did personally say that my service person and mechanic were top notch and I clarified that I was not happy with how GM handled it. I kept it honest.

dataspng · April 5, 2012

Lemon Law - get a new truck.

Lemon law only applies after 3 failed attempts to repair

I was really blindsided by this whole thing. I really thought the first repair would have done it. I think the biggest problem is that GM doesn't allow the tech to diagnose the vehicle. From what I was told the tech was only aloud to find out where the noise is coming from then follow a list of things that GM automatically wants them to replace. The part that mad me mad was when they told the tech to tear down my motor piece by piece and figure it out.. at that point the motor should have been shipped back to GM for an engineer to inspect and send me a new one.

Ah... you hit the nail on the head... It seems GM does not care how many trips the customer has to make to fix the same problem (even in Lemon Law states) and will have the techs tear you motor apart multiple times to fix one GM dictated thing at a time. I personally dont know how its profitable to tear the same customers motor apart 4 or 5 times to fix the same thing instead of just shipping a new motor, let alone the lack of concern for the customer satisfaction on a new truck having to make a dozen trips to the dealer. But it must be somewhere in the bean counting world of GM.

Not just picking on GM... Ford tried the same thing on one of our other trucks... the crank snapped at 5K miles and they wanted to just ship a new crank and swap all the old parts over... yea right.. took 20 days of phone calls with a dozen folks to get them to finally ship a create motor (which was Reman not new!). Profit rules!

dataspng · April 5, 2012

I try to be as honest I can on surveys and sometimes they earn a 4 out of 5 in on a particular question and the folks at the dealership get pissed at you because you didn't give them a 5. They say a 4 is the same as a 1 to the manufacturer so it's 5's or they don't want to hear from you (as in ... just don't fill it out). One service rep. at the local Chevy dealership offered me a free oil change if I gave him all 5's on the survey.

DEWFPO

I am also honest... and also had the dealership PO'ed at me several times for 3 or 4's... Typical conversation goes like this:

" Do you still have my truck?" Yes... "Is it fixed?" No... "Can I have a rental truck instead of a little Cobalt (hard to haul hay and tow tractors in such a little car)?"... No GM wont let us "When will it be fixed?"... We are waiting on GM blah,, blah, blah... escalate this and ask corprate to approve that... fix this... days, maybe a week..

Then I'm not happy... and get a survey while paying for a work truck thats in the shop and driving a sub compact... If GM and dealerships wants all 5's then stop fighting amoung themselfs... Customers dont like to get caught in the middle of GM vs the dealership crap.

ChevyTech77 · April 5, 2012

Well that's good for you, I paid for a new vehicle, not a rattling POS. I would expect noises after so many miles but not before my first oil change.

I was really blindsided by this whole thing. I really thought the first repair would have done it. I think the biggest problem is that GM doesn't allow the tech to diagnose the vehicle. From what I was told the tech was only aloud to find out where the noise is coming from then follow a list of things that GM automatically wants them to replace. The part that mad me mad was when they told the tech to tear down my motor piece by piece and figure it out.. at that point the motor should have been shipped back to GM for an engineer to inspect and send me a new one.

I build boats for a living so I am quite familiar with production and warranty and replacements, we deal with them every single day. We replace more than we ' fix ' . We usually take the old part and let the engineers test and find out the cause so we can keep from having that issue in the future. Not to mention our goal is 100% customer satisfaction no matter what.

O.K. I really, really should stay out of this but I've gotta clarify a few things here,

1. 110% wrong. GM does NOT, tell the dealer tech to NOT diagnose the vehicle. Hell, that is 110% the tech's job. What you have here is a tech that is trying to fix a PART problem and has gotten GM involved because no matter how many lifters he installs in the vehicle, or engines that he replaces there is still a HIGH probability, the rattle noise on start up is still going to be there. Trust me, I know how the repair process works in a GM dealership from top to bottom. I am deeply entrenched in it, everyday.

2. A well trained, intellegent technician should be more than capable of disassembling and diagnosing an engine noise issue. Engine mechanical repair has been, and continues to be, a well taught and rehearsed repair area in the automotive field. It is basic auto repair 101 really and if you can't trust a well trained tech to tear an engine down and diagnose a noise concern well then I'd take my truck elsewhere or walk because complete engine replacement is rarely ever needed and rarely ever cost effective over a partial repair. Being a trained GM technician I can certainly tell you that I PRIDE myself in knowing how to "fix it". While complete replacement is necessary in certain repairs, it is not always the case either.

3. Blindsided? Did someone lie to you somewhere along the way or?? Did you not buy a mechanical device, that is mass produced, without the knowledge that it may break?

4. I'm sure you, as do I, always strive for 100% customer satisfaction in our work but it doesn't always happen. With a post like this I'd be willing to bet that maybe somebody "beat up" on you in a satisfaction survey somewhere along the line and if they haven't, they will someday, trust me. You can be 110% perfect at all times in everything you do and somewhere, someone will STILL not be happy with your work, it's a fact of life. Remember that next time you start a bitch thread such as this on an internet website and stomp your feet DEMANDING shit that NO ONE is INTITLED TO just because they bought a brand new vehicle and are having problems. Matter of fact, no one is intitled to ANYTHING in this life, period but hey, some of us get it and some don't.