The General Motors family of large four cylinder engines, being the 2.0L turbo and 2.5L models in just about everything from the Chevrolet Malibu to the Cadillac CTS, are reportedly hindered by faulty connecting rods, though General Motors can’t do much in the case of issuing a recall.
Car & Driver has reported that three cases involving GM vehicles featuring a variant of these engines they were testing themselves experienced connecting rod failure. Multiple consumer cases have also been cited. Though GM isn’t issuing a recall, the engines are replaced in accordance with GM’s five-year, 100,000 mile Powertrain warranty.
The main reason GM isn’t issuing a recall is that there really isn’t any way to track which bearings are installed in each engine. An affected motor with bad rods should emit a highly noticeable metal-on-metal knocking noise within the vehicle’s first few thousand miles of life, and seems to occur every “one or two per 1,000 cars.”
Comments
I have the 2.0L Turbo I4 in my Malibu that now has 1,050 miles on it! It hasn’t given me any problems so far whatsoever! I feel confident knowing that I have a very generous range of GM Warranties. . .
I have a malibu also with almost 30k on it and there are no problems!
I’m glad GM is not having a recall just let the engines break then repair the motor
In cased like this they may only have a handful of bad ones and literally millions of good engines so all you can do is let them go and just replace them when and if they go.
It sounds as if there is going to be an issue it will easily happen in the first part of the engines life.
Is this because a batch of bad bearings?
That is what the story says. Bearing fails and takes out the rod then. I have a Small Block Chevy H beam forged rod on my desk at work that looks like a burnt/smashed pretzel from a failed bearing. It also took the crank and block out
What are they using Chinese bearings? They should buy American Canadian or German.
Because us made rod bearings never fail
I see plenty of USA rods and bearings fail daily. It is time for people to get a grip and understand most parts are the same no matter where they are made and when you make a billion of them a year you will get a handful of failures. In this case it looks to be small.
The Turbo engine uses a rod that is much like the Chevy V8 Pink performance rods but they too can fail.
I will be surprised if we even hear anymore about this as it will be such a small issues it will vanish into the big picture.
This is why I’m glad GM decided to not issue a recall for bad engines! It would be over blown by the media!
Just let the bad one fail one at a time
I agree with you 100%, but do you think that people who own one of these engines (the problematic ones) will get angry at GM for not issuing a recall?
Not at all evan! Why, they haven’t broke yet. When they do break it’s not like their cars are going to explode like a nascar in the middle of the straight away!
When they go 99% of the time they are going to still be able to be driven, there will be a noticeable bad noise coming from the engine, and unless you drove it hundreds of miles after the noise started you should have zero issues getting to the dealership!
They give you a rental and the engine gets replaced! What’s to get mad about!
Well that might be true for some, what about the new customers who just switched to American cars from foreign cars? That sets out a good example and gives them fuel to add to the fire why not to buy an American car again. They will question themselves: “Well, if the engine breaks within the first 5K miles, how will the whole car hold up at 50K?”
I totally get what you are saying, I just believe that some people will react differently than expected!
My wife had a Saab. No problems, but old. Sold it an bought her the ATS. About 2 years old and the pistons go. Reading online. Is it hydrolock? Is it pre-ignition? No idea, but I’m not impressed with the quality. Let’s say they replace the pistons, but don’t fix route cause. What happens once it goes again after warranty is over? Maybe next time it is the whole block. Very tempted to move to trade car in once fixed and move to another brand. Alternative will be to buy extended warranty.
There is a greater issue with the Equinox engines and the rings scoring the cylinders. It is not every engine but a larger number affected than you would like.
Generally some are pissed off but the dealers in general are replacing the engines free and once they get it back most are satisfied that GM took care of it. Most of the pissed ones are the people dealing with dealers that are not up to par.
What’s not to be on part with, what’s to argue about? The car is under warranty it’s making a loud knocking sound and needs to be fixed!
What are dealerships trying to get out of?
So long as the don’t jerk owners around when they need their damaged car repaired. Why do a recall on this when they got away with NOT recalling the Series II 3800 V6 that was GUARANTEED to have gaskets on its upper and/or lower intake manifold fail and dump coolant into the cylinders or crankcase. Lots of folks learned the term “hydrolock” and likely never bought GM again.
All of the Fireball 3800 V6’s I’ve owned have been awesome, regardless of Series ll or Series lll! The only problem on my 2001 GP GTP SP ED Coupe’s V6 known (not really a problem, just a concern) was the engine compartment fire recall (which I got fixed). . .
GM never recalled those intake gaskets cuz a lot of those cars made it passed the warranty!
If customers got mad because a part failed after the warranty is up then they don’t really have a good idea of what a warranty is!
I would have hoped they’d correct a known issue with an engine that they had in production for so long and in so many models. How many potential customers did they sour on GM products when hit with a four-figure repair bill on their car due to something that was not related to lack of maintenance on their part nor would it be classified as normal wear and tear.
I did think the 3800 was a wonderful engine, and I still do. Still driving and wrenching on GM products Doesn’t stop me from pointing out when the bean-counters are screwing up the product. Be nice if “Mark of Excellence” starts to mean something again.
So you expect GM to fix a problem with a car that makes it pass the factory warranty?
How can a customer be mad at GM if a car breaks down after the warranty expires?
When they continue to pump out thousands of engines with known problems which could be and should be addressed at the factory when the things are built. They decided instead to continue to use a poor design which they could easily have corrected once they learned of the problem. Google for 3800 faulty intake manifold gaskets and see. How many potential customers GM ‘s short sighted bean counters have lost. It wasn’t a defect in manufacturing , it was a crappy design and it took them far too long to correct it.
I’m not talking about any and every issue an out of warranty car may experience, my example is a known issue with series II. 3800 engines . Like above where GM knows they installed faulty bearings in some of their engines and that they bearings will fail early. I would expect that once they lerned of the problem they would correct it, not use up the remaining batch of bad bearings and hope for the best.
I understand why they are not recalling ALL the 4 cyl. engines produced that might be affected since they are confident that the majority of the engines will not be experience a problem – fixing the ones that break, standing behind the product, makes sense…which is what they should have done with the Series II engine. That is how you keep customers, which is something GM really needs to do, now more than ever.
I think that depend on what happens when a customer comes in with their car on the end of a tow hook. If the owner doesn’t have to fight with the dealer or GM to get the car fixed quickly and correctly the first time, heck, GM ought to pay for a loaner while the owners car is out of service since this is a known manufacturing problem, it could end up being great for GM customer loyalty “my car broke, and GM fixed it quick without a fight” that would be far better PR than a group of irate owners deciding to sue GM over this.
I HAVE A 2013 MALIBU LTZ 2.0 TURBO. I JUST FOUND FROM THE DEALER I HAVE A CRACKED PISTON. ( 25,000 MILES). I WONDER IF WHEN THEY TEAR IT DOWN THEY WILL FIND BAD ROD BEARINGS.
I had my 2013 Malibu LTZ 2.0 Turbo at the dealership 3 times now because it kept leaking oil. The first time they change front and rear seal and a month later leaking oil. The second time they had it a month for service and said they had to clean the pcv valve and they said that would correct my problem. Three days later I notice it’s leaking oil again. I take it back in and now the dealership calls me and tells me my two pistons needs to be replaced. Only 27.000 miles on it when this all began. .Thinking we got a bad motor
Hey there! This is my first comment here so I just wanted to give a quick shout out and say I really enjoy reading through your posts.
Can you recommend any other blogs/websites/forums that
deal with the same subjects? Appreciate it!
lost compression in 1 cyclinder. need to replace the pistons due to pre-ignition. 2 days later got a recall notice in the mail. Hopefully GM is going to fix this issue and the next guy won’t have this problem. A little worried about the new tune that comes with the fix. Reading that sometimes turbo pressure is turned down. Don’t want to sacrafice power.
I have one such Equinox. The problem started just after the first few months. I complained of a knocking noise in the engine and I even likened it to rods knocking… Well, update you until 2 weeks ago. I was having an oil consumption test on my engine and, behold, no oil after 2,000 miles. The dealer needed to replace the gaskets, harness and various engine parts. I drove it 3 blocks from the dealer and the engine blew. Dealer replaced with a remanufactured engine. I’m not too happy about that, also getting only a 12,000 mile warranty on it. Hmmmm.
***They stated it was a piston problem one shattered and fragmented. Sounds like the many problems with this engine as in the above story.
Read more: http://gmauthority.com/blog/2013/12/faulty-connecting-rod-bearing-issued-with-gm-four-cylinder-engines-wont-be-recalled/#ixzz3W1blCgQ8
I have a 2014 Buick Encore that has had 3 repairs since January: 1. Piston cylinder cracked and was told GM won’t replace the engine so they did a repair of the piston/cylinder (2 weeks). 2. Piston cylinder cracked AGAIN and GM Customer Care said GM just doesn’t replace engines. The dealership worked with GM and a new engine was installed (5 weeks later) 3. I just picked up the car last Friday and within 5 minutes of driving it from the service dept, the engine light went back on (catalytic converter failed per the 2 previous incidents). 4. I express my lack of confidence in the repairs and vehicle safety to GM Customer Care and am told Michigan Lemon Law requires 4 failures before they will buyback the vehicle, the GM district service manager confirms this and tells me the car is fully repaired as is and will honor the warranty if it fails again (I am supposed to feel confident with this statement? After 3 failures?)
The dealership is trying to find me a replacement vehicle but I will lose over $6,000 of what I have invested in my current purchase agreement. Eye opening experience and I regret buying GM. I would expect the type of repairs on a vehicle with close to 100,000 miles on it, not 8,000.
I have had my 2013 Malibu for about 30days with about 30k miles on it, and it threw a rod already out of nowhere right after i got an oil change. I am a little annoyed being that my first car payment isn’t even due yet and it is already in the shop for extensive repairs. GM has replaced it free of charge and my dealership loaned me a car until it is finished. I hope this won’t be a continuous issue.
2013 equinox just turned 100k and threw a rod and of course I missed the 100k warranty