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2011 GMC 2500 Duramax engine stalls and finally dead on road, dealer can't resolve

3.3K views 2 replies 3 participants last post by  GoBlowSnow  
#1 ·
I am having really distressing problems with my truck.

1st off it's a 2011 GMC turbo diesel/allison 4x4 crew cab.

For the last 6 months it has been consistently stalling while driving, but immediately recovers, without completely dying. It does leave me in awkward positions sometimes with on coming traffic. When this happens in a second or two the truck will take off again.

The dealer was unable to find anything because it would not throw codes.

Finally it dies completely. By completely I mean it would not even crank. I rolled off the road, then had it towed to the dealer. I had sat in the truck for 3 hours starting at 10pm in the bitter cold, waiting for a tow. I tried cranking a number of times.

I had it towed back to the dealer, and the next morning they went out and got a power module code, which they said is generic. It also showed the dash codes for battery system service, stabiltrack service, and traction control service.

Unfortunately it cranked right up. Which had me devastated as I was sure they would not be able to find the problem now. My truck is 100% unreliable, actually useless.

A week later I call them and they are still working on it, with no idea what is happening.

Any and all advice is greatly appreciated. We have snow coming in our hilltop community, and I need my truck.
 
#2 ·
I had an '08 gasser that died a couple of times on the road. Sometimes it would start right back up, sometimes not. I don't remember how I discovered it, but the negative battery cable clamp was not making good contact. I heated it up, dropped a little flux in around the cable and sweated in a little solder. Never had a problem again. Something to check...

Edit to add: The cable clamp was not making contact with the cable. Nothing to do with the battery.
 
#3 ·
I too had a truck doing similar things, only it was a 07 Sierra 1500 with the 5.3L. But in my case the engine didn't die but everything else shut off while I was driving. If it happened when the truck was off then I couldn't start it, it was dead, no lights or anything. One time it happened to me where I couldn't start it, so I called up the dealer, they sent a to truck and when they pulled it off of the tow truck at the dealer the thing started up just fine and they could not duplicate the issue and I got stuck with the tow bill! I traded in that truck before it was fully diagnosed, but come to find out, it ended up being a semi-common issue where it was a bad ground wire from the battery back somewhere.. so that is what I would do, start looking over the cables and connections closely.