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2021 Silverado 1500 3.0 Duramax major issues

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37K views 7 replies 5 participants last post by  Frattinger  
#1 ·
Bought a new Silverado 1500 LT with the 3.0 Duramax in Alexandria, MN the end of March. Drove it pulling a car hauler trailer to central Florida a week ago. No issues, loved the truck got over 17 mpg with the trailer with a Rav 4 loaded on it. Only issue was loosing the radio memory presets from time to time. Took it to the Stealer ship in Florida for an oil change at approximately 4K miles. Truck through a service charging system and will stall shortly warning going through the lot. Went into the service bay and ask for a service writer to look now at this warning. Finally convinced someone to look at the truck. As soon as he set in the seat it died. They couldn’t get it to turn over with a jump box. I mentioned the radio preset issue and there was noise with the serpentine belt. These items needed attention too. They finally gave me a POS Traverse for a loaner. Next day they said it was fixed by replacing the battery. Drove it 2 blocks and the same service warning message came on. Took it back to the dealer telling them it wasn’t fixed. Next day they called and said it needed a new alternator and would be in their hands on Friday. Late that day they called and said the alternator was late getting there and they would work on it Saturday. Well today they called and said it needed a new serpentine belt tensioner that would take 3 weeks to get there. I am about livid at this point. What if I was broke down between Brainerd, MN and central Florida? I went to CarID and ordered the tensioner which will be in Florida on Tuesday. I called the dealership and said I’ll deliver you the tensioner Tuesday. I have been in touch with Chevrolet Corporate Customer Service reporting this dealership issue. I’m livid and ready to part ways with an otherwise great truck. Heck, I haven’t even made a payment yet and get to deal with this experience. Thoughts?
 
#6 ·
Don't blame the dealership on part shortage issues. They can only get sent what GM has in stock at their parts depots throughout the country and they will not go buying form some other reseller. There are parts shortages all over the place with all the manufacturers thanks in large part to COVID.

That being said- Electrical issues are going to be the biggest reliability issue on modern day vehicles. weak batteries (in your case, perhaps weak because of a bad serp belt which fried the alternator which fried the battery? who knows) will cause havoc on all kinds of systems, given how many computers and components are on today's vehicles. I am now sold on keeping a spare jump box in my truck as well as cars. They've already come in handy jumping other people's vehicles a few times, and it is strongly recommended to never use jumper cables to jump your vehicle from another vehicle due to the potential damage it can cause, even when connected properly. The voltage differences apparently can really screw some things up.

Let's see if the dealer service department gets the issue resolved with the serp belt, pulley, and new alternator and battery. If not, then I'd go ahead and start escalating with customer care.

Also- please don't go to your dealer service department for oil changes going forward- find a good independent repair facility that specializes in trucks and develop a good relationship with them. You'll be happy you did. Only time my vehicles see the dealer service department is for recall or warranty work. Some dealers will try to sell you into "free oil changes" and such, but don't sucker in for that crap. Dealers make very little money on the sale of a vehicle, they make more money by used vehicle sales, as well as what goes on in the service department and finance office and the extended warranties and goodies they can sell you.
 
#8 ·
Just so you know, in regards to the radio. Go onto your radio settings and do a factory radio reset. Then reset everything take your stations, treble, bass. He probably did not even realize that it was resetting your equalizer settings back to zero every time you turned your truck off and back on again. Did it to me for weeks, the dealership had no idea what to do and finally figured it out. Just do a reset