Caddyinfo.com Discussion Board

[PAT38915]

yes, i owned up to a mistake...I BOUGHT THE CADDY, AND SOLD THE LINCOLN...do you understand..

and yes i did have another driver with me to check it out and ill admit and he did to that it drove wonderful...wonder what went wrong...oh i know the check coolant light came on and i decided to have it checked and fixed..now here i am , without a car to drive, and ill have a huge debt, when they get finished with it...ANYONE WANT TO BUY A USED CAR...IT WILL BE FOR SALE.....

[Scotty]

If you get a new engine it would be a shame to sell it. But given that these are very complicated cars, you dont have a warranty, and you are probably not mechanically inclined that may be the best decision. I hope this works out for you.

[Regis]

yes, i owned up to a mistake...I BOUGHT THE CADDY, AND SOLD THE LINCOLN...do you understand..

and yes i did have another driver with me to check it out and ill admit and he did to that it drove wonderful...wonder what went wrong...oh i know the check coolant light came on and i decided to have it checked and fixed..now here i am , without a car to drive, and ill have a huge debt, when they get finished with it...ANYONE WANT TO BUY A USED CAR...IT WILL BE FOR SALE.....

Pat,

Let's get this turned around. Did the car drive ok to the dealer? Other then the Check Coolant message did the car seem alright to you? If everything else was alright then i'm starting to think that the place you took your caddy is taking you for a ride so to speak. If it were me I would have them put everything back together.... like the way you first brought it to them and seek help and assistance here first. This group will help you out. You just have to know how to ask. Let's get started shall we?

[PAT38915]

thanks so much for offering help...im waiting until monday to see what the district rep has to say, but if its the engine, if they put it back together, like it was , can i drive it without it doing more damage..yes the car drove great when i took it in..im in the state of mississippi and i have to drive 60 miles one way to a cadillac dealer..so its not the most convienient place for this to happen if there is such a thing..thanks so much

[Regis]

Pat the caddy has an onboard diagnostic that will tell you what is wrong with the car. Once you learn to access the Driver Information Center (DIC) and retrieve the codes we'll tell you what the codes mean and what should be the next course of action. To put things into perspective.... it could be something as simple as adding more coolant and water. But of course It could be something more involved as well. let us know when the car is back in your possession. Accessing the codes will be the starting point but we'll get to that after you have the car back or in one piece.

[franey]

WOULD someone please explain , the difference in between a ' CRACKED BLOCK'

AND a 'CASTING FLAW' . IF you will page back not to long ago another member had a seam CRACK that went down the back last piston , underneath the intake manifold , that ended up at the starter housing hole. The recomendation , to fix was heliarc it and go on, I agree and that is what i would have done. IT seems to me that we also have had another individual with a CASTING FLAW, a friend on mine , with a 98 had a water leak , that turned out to be a hair line crack on the same cylinder as the first one i mentioned ,that also ended up dead ending at the hole for your starter housing. This one i looked at myself when the engine was pulled. He had bought the car new and maintained acording to MFG. recomendations. Now should he classifie his , as a cracked block or a casting flaw, either way he had a crack that went all the way through the block to the water jacket and when it got hot and pressure bilt up water would be forced through the crack , build up in the valley and drip out the starter hole down the flywheel and out at the bottom. Now i would imagine the lady was getting a low coolant ,light since it was losing water, and if it was coming down around the flywheel, i would guess that the dealer probably only removed the transmission after they were unable to locate the leak from the top or bottom. Now it is very hard to definately establish where a leak is with out sometimes removing parts of the motor to exactly identify where the water is coming from. With respect to service records , my experience has been that the majority of the cars out their have very few service records, and all they normally have are oil change records and where a few items have been changed. Also her car is under the guidelines for changing the DEX COOL , both in time and mileage. When i buy a used car , the first thing i look at is mileage and overall appearance of the car from top to bottom , driveabilty and look for any noticeable problems wheither it be body interior or drive train the last thing is any service records of the car. You know when you buy a CAdillac , i expect more than if i were buying a YUGO, and i do not think that if you are looking at time change items on a car , that any of us would ever consider the motor to be a time change item at 36,000 miles. I never buy a car and worry about a CASTING FLAW, whereby you need a whole new motor. Give the lady a break she bought what appeared to be a nice late model low mileage luxury car and through probably no fault of hers the block is leaking through a crack. I would be pissed too, if I were her i would take them up on the 50 percent deal only if they agree to bill the motor at dealer cost , not the full retail I think this would be fair all the way around.

[Scotty]

Give the lady a break she bought what appeared to be a nice late model low mileage luxury car and through probably no fault of hers the block is leaking through a crack. I would be pissed too,  if I were her i would take them up on the 50 percent deal only if they agree to bill the motor at dealer cost , not the full retail I think this would be fair all the way around.

What everyone seems to be missing here is that Pat does not have a WARRANTY, No Warranty, No repair, I don't care if its a casting flaw or if the block cracked from freezing. There is no grey area here, No Warranty, No repair, Period. She did not even buy the car from this dealer, and the dealer has offered to pick up 50% of the repair, I would say that's very generous!

Do I feel bad, yes I do, as so many others do here, but the fact remains that she does not have a warranty. Why do some of you think that it's GM's responsiblitity to replace her engine with no warranty? Low mileage? Yes that's a shame, but none of us, knows the history or circumstances. Suppose this block cracked from freezing temperatures, is this still GM's responsibility. Bbobynski himself said that a casting flaw would have shown up already. Kger2 suggested that maybe the dealer was taking advantage of her. Why isn't this clear. Read the ENTIRE history if you have not there is another thread >> http://caddyinfo.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5157 Something is not right with this dealer, they REMOVED the TRANNY for the coolant light!!

The bottom line is that she does not have a warranty and she is HAT in hand at their mercy hoping for the best. But the point is that GM has NO responsiblity! I STILL wish her good luck in a bad situation.

[adallak]

The fact the dealer (which has nothig to do with the car!) offered 50% is strange to say least. Why would they do that? I am afraid they found nothing serious happened to the engine, so they can repair it easily and sell someone else since it is a low mileage engine! They will get an engine at half the price and PLUS will charge her probably a lot for installation and this and that so that the final bill would be very impressive. I would steer clear from that stealership.

[tjtjwdad]

Scotty,

I hear what your're saying (No warranty) but hey, a cracked block (presumming it is through no fault of the owner(s)) "is not" normal. Cadillac has all the "engineering" on their side on whether to call BS or not. What a bizare story!

I do beleive the dealer is being quite generous and that if she goes the litigation route she's going to come up empty.

PAT38915,

It appears that this car has become a significant liability to you. Talk nice to the dealer, they may do a trade or something. If you insinuate/threaten them with litigation they probably won't give you the time of day ... something to consider, especially since you didn't purchase the vehicle from them.

Good Luck!

Jim

[Scotty]

Good advice Jim, I agree 100%. This is a terrible situation. I would be freaking out myself for sure. I am sure that GM will do whatever they can..

[Scotty]

The fact the dealer (which has nothig to do with the car!) offered 50% is strange to say least. Why would they do that? I am afraid they found nothing serious happened to the engine, so they can repair it easily and sell someone else since it is a low mileage engine! They will get an engine at half the price and PLUS will charge her probably a lot for installation and this and that so that the final bill would be very impressive. I would steer clear from that stealership.

Yes you bring up a good point. But if they found nothing serious, the regional manager will find that. It has to be something serious, a crack of some sort. I am sure that the dealer feels badly also, and they are finding a way to do the 50%, by probably charging it back to GM. Getting the regional manager involved may not be the best course of action, but we will see. Assuming that Pat relayed the information correctly, that they were removing the tranny to fix the coolant light, something is wrong, either Pat is receiving mis-information or their service department did not explain what they were doing clearly or they are incompetent (but we can't really say that can we because we don't know the details)...

[Ranger]

Mike,

You are looking at this as a black and white situation (no warranty, no repair). I agree that she has no warranty and is basically "hat in hand" and that is where a little diplomacy will go far. However we are talking about the one piece of the engine that should last forever. I am assuming of coarse that it is infact a bad casting. If not, my argument goes right out the window. My understanding is that GM, not the dealer offered the 50%. That seems to me to be an unwritten admission of fault. They won't pay a dime if it is out of warranty and they don't feel that it was a manufacturer defect. We all know that. Lets face it, this car is out of warranty on time only. I once bought an '85 Eldo that had a bad ring and pinion. It was out of warranty time wise but only had 17K on it and Cadillac bit the bullet on the job as "good will" and only charged me $100. GM has the opportunity (and I would say, moral responsibility) to make a life long customer or a life long enemy here. Again I reiterate, IF this is infact a flawed casting. I cannot believe that there is anyone on this board that would not be highly pissed if they found out that their engine was trashed at 35K because of a bad casting and was faced with the cost of a new engine, even at 50%.

[Scotty]

Only time will tell, lets hope for the best..

[franey]

The GM zone manager does have the authority to warranty an item after the warranty has run out and it is usually for CUSTOMER GOOD WILL, and you are looking at an unusual situation. I think this would classifie as an unusual situation. AS for what Guru, said regarding casting flaws showing up early, I doubt that this is a 100 percent rule. My friends car had close to 98000 on it , and had never been without the proper anti freeze mixture, so the freezing is not an issue with his block. I also found it interesting that his line crack was on the same piston wall as a fellow board member and ran to the same place. If we all stop and think about it how many of us have ever known anyone with a frozen block, I bet it is very few, and if it is not cracked due to freezing, then i do not know of anything else that would cause a crack in the normal course of use rather than a casting flaw, now before anyone says anything , i am of course not talking about any type of sudden blow to the engine for whatever the reason is . IF you rule out freezing , i have yet to hear anyone give another reason , other than casting flaw, for the crack.

[Marika]

When that new engine comes in, Pat, tell the dealership you want to SEE it AND you want to record any serial number that's on it. After they do the installation, make sure you actually got the NEW engine by checking for that serial number.

Do you guys think that GM might just give Pat a new block only? is that possible?

[Regis]

I think the cracked block issue might be getting to much time in the spotlight. Could it be true? Sure it could be. Are the chances of it being a cracked block minute? According to the resident expert bbobynski, yes. Don't you find it amusing how everyone else is all of a sudden a block expert? Who is the smart money on? Hmmm let me guess.

I don't think knowing people that supposedly took perfect care of their car is all that relevant either.....unless you follow them around 24/7. I have two friends that are religious about the upkeep of their cars. Both of them seized an engine because ONE time they neglected maintenance. It only takes one time. And remember folks that Pat said other then the Check Coolant light the caddy drove fine. She drove that caddy with a "cracked" block 60 miles to the dealer..... and it drove fine. I don't know about you but i don't think we're helping her by going on and on about a catastrophic problem that may not even exist. This is starting to take on the tone that James(Mr. Headgasket) revels in.

The warranty issue nags me. It irks me when people want to give away someone elses money, time, or resources. And they use wonderful reasoning like "it's the right thing to do", "it's good business" or "they can afford it". To me that's a very nice liberal gesture and I'd like to take that one step further. I think that you should give or donate half or better yet 2/3 of everything you own to help "good" causes. Doesn't really matter which cause because "it'll be the right thing to do". And "it'll be better for everyone" right? Right? It's always easy to offer up someone elses things.... until it hits your own wallet.

[Ranger]

Let me rephrase this. I guess what I am saying is, IF it is a bad block casting, and that may slim as I am sure GM has pretty good quality control over this, then the block WAS bad while under warranty but wasn't discovered til now as opposed to breaking after warranty and therefore should be covered.

[adallak]

im in the state of mississippi

Look she is in Mississipi and perhaps the first owner was somewhere close. The probability to get the block damaged because od freezing is really low unless someone used pure water. It is Mississipi not Canada.

[Scotty]

im in the state of mississippi

Look she is in Mississipi and perhaps the first owner was somewhere close. The probability to get the block damaged because od freezing is really low unless someone used pure water. It is Mississipi not Canada.

Very good point adallak! Thats using your noggin!

[tjtjwdad]

kger2 Posted on Feb 27 2005, 06:49 AM

The warranty issue nags me. It irks me when people want to give away someone elses money, time, or resources. And they use wonderful reasoning like "it's the right thing to do", "it's good business" or "they can afford it". To me that's a very nice liberal gesture and I'd like to take that one step further. I think that you should give or donate half or better yet 2/3 of everything you own to help "good" causes. Doesn't really matter which cause because "it'll be the right thing to do". And "it'll be better for everyone" right? Right? It's always easy to offer up someone elses things.... until it hits your own wallet.

I agree with you. You should hear me constantly defending yours (and mine) position at work. The conversation gets pretty sporty & I don't back down at all.

Futhermore:

And they use wonderful reasoning like "it's the right thing to do", "it's good business" or "they can afford it".

and in the very next conversation they're bitching because they don't have enough money to do the things they want to do. Oh ... and happily I remind them of their stance in the previous conversation

However, there is something called negaleance and "IF" a "FLAWED" (not abused on the part of the owners) engine block was installed due to neglect (poor quality control be it testing , inspecting, workmanship (GM's determination ) that should have been detected at the factory/manufacturer) then the manufacturer should eat the cost. If these blocks are second sourced, GM can pass the buck on down the line.

"BUT" if it was caused by negaleance on the part of the owners, then GM/Cadillac doesn't owe them him/her the time of day.

Let's face it; engine blocks just don't fail. Could anyone imagine if one of the camshafts suddenly let go and broke in half wiped out their Northstar that was 5 years old and had 35,000 miles on the clock? Granted, it's rare but it has happen (may be not to a Northstar). "I" and probably some others would not be happy.

An open question to everyone having knowledge: Does GM perform any type of radiography (x-ray if you will) on the "high stress" (i.e. ... engine blocks, heads, crank shafts, trans axle cases) parts of the car? If so do they keep records of each one? If yes, it should be an open/shut case for GM to determine any responsibility at all. I believe as engineered as cars are these days they're certainly QA'd, the question is; are records kept on each individual component and further can they be broken down by a serial number of some sort?

I'm not in the litigating or legislating business nor (from what I've read here) can I say for certain where the fault lies for this. But there are some facts:

1. Engine blocks don't just suddenly crack.

2. The burden of proof is on the current owner.

3. If you get attorneys involved the current owner is in all likelihood going to spend more money to make a point than if she would by accepting their offer. Hopefully he/she should realize (again from what I’ve read here) the dealer is not the issue, instead they can be their best friend and perhaps they can come to something where both parties are happy.

Jim

[ted tcb]

I've read this thread for days now, and the voice of reason has consistantly been Scotty.

I couldn't possibly agree with him more.

We live in a society where blame must be placed via litigation for all that befalls us. I've had engines blow on used cars purchased privately, and pursuing recourse against Nissan or Honda never crossed my mind .

I pinched my pennies and purchased used rather than new. I saved 50% of the purchase price, waved all mfg warranties, rolled the dice and lost.

Misfortune occurs in life, you dig deep, suck it up, and go on. Hopefully, you still have your health and wits about you, and can recover from your misfortune.

If a mechanical misfortune becomes the focus of your life, then walk away from used Cadillacs and purchase a new, warrantied Cavalier or Hyundai.

If you feel there is fault or misrepresentation, then you pursue the vendor, the individual who directly profited from the transaction with you ... oh, the vendor was a friend, so let's go after the deep pockets of the manufacturer, who neither sold nor profited from the transaction with Pat.

Fix the car, take GM's charity, 'cause that's another name for goodwill, and never purchase another used car.

My .02cents.

[PAT38915]

OUCH..... that was plain spoken...lol im not trying to take advantage of anyone

im not hurting for $$$, its just the fact im not at fault here...

[mike5514]

Dang! I had a service engine light come on a few days ago (I will put the outcome in another post.) I saved a lot of money on researching it my self and I thought codes are good for us and bad for shops and then I thought maybe not, and it came to me that a person could take their perfect running car in for repair and the people doing the repair might or might not be honest and the mil might be a boon for repair shops. The malfuntion indicator lamp is not the final word checks still have to be made, test have to be performed and the use of the scan tool with readout should be made and results giving to the car owner along with results of leakdown checks and samples of the oil and coolant etc. even though the car was purchased from a someone you know I would get a carfax and a readout of the history of the car from the dealer. Transmissions being removed for inspection is not a good idea in this case. We may have be fighting among ourselves because of a dishonest repair shop. Mike P.S. What we have here is a perfect running car in parts on the repair shop floor because of a light!

[PAT38915]

mike, watch those lights that is how mine started..i have a friend that had the same thing, and they had to get a new engine also..seems lots of people are having this happen..hope yours turns out to be something simple and not like mine...

[JasonA]

Hopefully we'll get some more clarification today from Pat's area rep. What hasn't been disclosed so far, and what this discussion really teeters on, is PAT, HAVE YOU PERSONALLY WITNESSED THE CRACK, AND WHAT DOES IT LOOK LIKE? It's no secret that some dealers are scrupulous. Let's get the facts straight before we jump to conclusions.

In addition, the CAUSE OF THE BREACH has got to be determined, and I think this can probably only be done by looking at the breach. I'd say you could tell a difference between a "damaged" block and a mis-formed block.

Again, Pat, has anyone MEASURED THE CONCENTRATION OF THE COOLANT?

Assuming it can be shown that the block was bad from the factory, although Cadillac has no legal liability in the case, it would be nice for them to chip in. And guess what, they're offering half. If it can be shown that the block was damaged due to owner neglect, or some other unforseen event (bullet hole, road debris, ANYTHING), Cadillac *really* has no reason to help you out, but hey, they're offering 50% of the repair cost regardless of the actual problem. Great customer service in my opinion.