Mysterious Dents & Crinkles Along Bed Fender

[JamGear]

Yesterday the service manager from Hawthorne Chevrolet here in New Jersey advised that the regional Chevy rep looked at the dents. They called engineering, looked some things up, etc. The result, thus far, is they do not know how these dents could have been produced by any defect. Nevertheless, they decided to give me the benefit of the doubt and offered to repair the dents, as a one time fix, at no charge. By "one-time" I think they mean that if the issue arises again I will likely have to wait until a causality is found and an official remedy is formulated.

 

For those of you in this thread that seem to have the same issue, I suggest going into your local dealer. Have the service manager look at it. If the service manager looks at you like you have three heads when you tell him you believe this is a manufacturing defect, ask him to contact the service manager at Hawthorne Chevy in New Jersey. If your truck does indeed have the same condition as mine, I am sure they will help you in one way or another.

 

By the way, I am very pleased to advise that the dents are all gone and the panel looks great. The dent guy found even more very small creases around the fender flare. Which lead him to believe the panel on my truck may not have been stamped properly.

 

Good luck to any and all that have this issue. It's certainly a crazy one! I will, of course, post here if the problem comes back.

[Jmcruce]

I've got dents in my roof!! Different shapes and sizes. And now I'm seeing on line it's becoming a more common issue.

[WildWilt15]

Its a problem with the stamping of the boxside.. My guess is the first operation, Could be caused by numerous things but I would think something along the lines of pieces of scrap metal caught in between a Die and bolster or a Die and riser causing one side of the die to hit harder in the forming process. Or it could have been a problem with the cushion pressure causing a deformed part that made it through GM's notorious QC team........

[WildWilt15]

Yesterday the service manager from Hawthorne Chevrolet here in New Jersey advised that the regional Chevy rep looked at the dents. They called engineering, looked some things up, etc. The result, thus far, is they do not know how these dents could have been produced by any defect. Nevertheless, they decided to give me the benefit of the doubt and offered to repair the dents, as a one time fix, at no charge. By "one-time" I think they mean that if the issue arises again I will likely have to wait until a causality is found and an official remedy is formulated.

 

For those of you in this thread that seem to have the same issue, I suggest going into your local dealer. Have the service manager look at it. If the service manager looks at you like you have three heads when you tell him you believe this is a manufacturing defect, ask him to contact the service manager at Hawthorne Chevy in New Jersey. If your truck does indeed have the same condition as mine, I am sure they will help you in one way or another.

 

By the way, I am very pleased to advise that the dents are all gone and the panel looks great. The dent guy found even more very small creases around the fender flare. Which lead him to believe the panel on my truck may not have been stamped properly.

 

Good luck to any and all that have this issue. It's certainly a crazy one! I will, of course, post here if the problem comes back.

 

They don't pump panels out for trucks one at a time, they run mass productions on different parts and assemble from there, So the fact that your roof has dents in it has nothing to do with the creases in your fender. Either way the fact they are taking care of it is good and I'm glad everything has worked out.

[JamGear]

UPDATE: The dents are back with a vengeance! I ran the truck all fall and winter (post paintless dent repair by Chevy) with no reoccurrence. Then all of a sudden May 2015 one crease came back. Then in June, a second. Now a third crinkle along the rear quarter panel up by the bed rail has appeared. This problem is definitely a defective metallurgy of the body panel. The problem seems to correlate with the change of seasons.

 

Yesterday I saw a new gen Silvy 2500HD with the same crinkles and dents along the driver side bed rail as mine. Now I see yet another thread on this ailment http://www.gm-trucks.com/forums/topic/165709-mysterious-small-dents-appearing-on-new-truck-weird/?hl=mysterious

 

I have begun the laborious process of pushing the dealer to now escalate this matter to the factory. My truck is still under factory warranty and this is definitely a manufacturer defect.

 

There's a commercial out there where Chevy touts "made of high strength steel" likely to give a poke at Ford that now uses aluminum body panels on their next gen F series. Let's see if Chevy will actually stand behind that claim?

 

I will keep you all posted as I work to get final remedy.

Edited August 7, 2015 by JamGear

[argus]

I don't have any doubt that your truck will haul that 5th wheel with authority. If you're exceeding any of the capacity ratings associated with your truck, though, you may be stressing the frame (and attached body/bed panels) beyond what it was engineered to handle. As an example, when calculating your payload, you are to include passengers and cargo, and cargo includes tongue/king pin weight. You stated your payload rating is 1860 lbs and your pin weight is 1660 lbs. That would leave only 200 lbs for driver/passengers and anything else you throw in your truck. That alone has potential to be the cause of your tweaked truck bed panel. And we haven't even addressed what you're packing in the 5th wheel and how much you may be exceeding your truck's GCWR.

You might indeed have a defective bed panel. If I were in your shoes, though, I'd trade that truck in for an HD model ASAP. Best of luck on this issue and future travels, regardless!

[JamGear]

 

I don't have any doubt that your truck will haul that 5th wheel with authority. If you're exceeding any of the capacity ratings associated with your truck, though, you may be stressing the frame (and attached body/bed panels) beyond what it was engineered to handle. As an example, when calculating your payload, you are to include passengers and cargo, and cargo includes tongue/king pin weight. You stated your payload rating is 1860 lbs and your pin weight is 1660 lbs. That would leave only 200 lbs for driver/passengers and anything else you throw in your truck. That alone has potential to be the cause of your tweaked truck bed panel. And we haven't even addressed what you're packing in the 5th wheel and how much you may be exceeding your truck's GCWR.

You might indeed have a defective bed panel. If I were in your shoes, though, I'd trade that truck in for an HD model ASAP. Best of luck on this issue and future travels, regardless!

 

These dents and crinkles started showing up before I started towing the 5th wheel. After they repaired the dents in September I towed all October and November with no issue, I remained dent less until May of 2015 when the dents started reappearing. I had not yet started towing the trailer. While I agree they can indeed be stress related. Whatever stress is causing them is not payload related.

[Uncle Frank]

My new 2015 Silverado 1500 had the same dents which I noticed three days after taking delivery. The dealer where I purchased the vehicle is over three hours away but they reimbursed me the cost of removing the dents at my local paintless dent removal facility. I've seen the same phenomena on several other Silverados and Sierras since noticing it on mine.

[Conky Conky]

So let me get this straight. You have a 5th wheel on a half ton? Forgive me if I am wrong but I'd at least have a 2500 or heavier for that..

 

 

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These new half tons handle the weight very well I pull a heavier 5th wheel trailer with my 13 1500 and it does just fine. My 2013 bedsides have them mysterious wringles on the bed skins as well looks like shit nothing I can do about it.

[scowart]

I took my truck into the shop today. I have a Chevrolet 1500 Z71, Tungsten Metallic color

I noticed a little rippling 6 mths ago on the right side bed panel. Now the ripples are multiplying really bad.

Explained this my service manager and he acted like He's never heard of such problems. .He explained He would have a service manager look at it, then send it to a paint and body shop because they dont do body work.

 

Im not getting a good feeling about this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My truck has 13,000 miles, never pulled a trailer, Never hauled anything in the back more than 200 pds.

 

JAMGEAR, what was your outcome? Please respond, thank you.

[15_silverado]

My 2015 had mystery dents along the top side of the bed as well.

 

When I traded in for my 2017 I looked real close, inspecting for any dents; all was clear. So far all has been clear, free of any dents. This leads me to believe this was/is a problem during manufacturing or shipping, and not just appearing later on but who knows.

 

I don't think this is the problem any of us have had but I found this brief link that is similar to our problem that I wanted to share... Check it out... Interesting...

 

http://gm.oemdtc.com/923/dentripple-appearance-around-wheel-well-opening-2007-2015-chevrolet-silverado-gmc-sierra

[bearcat1945]

the small dents are from the way gm uses the clamps to mount the bed on the truck.they were probably there when you purchased the truck new..they are hard to notice when new.

[harrisonhunter]

I have the same dent on the drivers side wheel well about 2 inches from the bed rail.

Mine is a 2017 with 4k on it. Haven't been to the dealer yet.

[sdeeter19555]

These can also appear when a truck is suspended on a hoist where the frame is bowed. I've seen it happen on three Dodge 2500s, all were on a lift that supported the frame just behind the cab allowing a lot of weight to hang from that point t to the rear.

 

I've been adamant about not having a truck put on a smaller post lift since that point.

 

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[jerseytaylor]

i am getting the exact same here/have been for quite some time now.

i had a pretty decent one show up on the passenger side front fender dead center on the wheel well arch.

this is pretty annoying to say the least.