So my car wouldn't start intermittently....Everything pointed to the ignition switch as I could start the car by jumping the relay. I see the OEM at $90 and the Chinese aftermarket at $39.....The picture of the OEM has the green back half just like the one I removed. The part received is all black but in a GM box. I install it and it starts a couple of times and then no crank.....My mechanic troubleshot it down to the switch, and opened it up to find almost no spring tension on the contacts and re-springs them........Now it's perfect, but I am in disbelief that a brand new part that I installed was bad, and acted the same as my 17 year old switch, which threw me off. Looks like GM is supplying the Chinese switches.

 

More like the same Chinese warehouse is supplying the switches to AC Delco. AC Delco is just a brand name. They don't manufacture anything.

Still sucks though. Hard to find good reliable parts anymore. My rule is, if it's a failure prone item that's easy enough to replace - buy the parts store one with the lifetime warranty. It's probably the same part but you'll never have to pay for a second one.

 

OP doesn't work on his car much if you got this mad about an electrical switch not working out of the box LOL. Also, maybe living under a rock if you are surprised about this?

 

Where did you buy it from? Lots of fake OEM parts out there.

 

The fact that AC/Delco no longer manufactures things is what really sucks! Most people don't realize what AC stands for, or means. The letters AC are the initials of-SURPRISE-Albert Champion! YES-THAT Champion, the one time owner, and inventor, of Champion spark plugs!!! He once had a fistfight with William C. Durant, founder of General Motors. At some point in time afterwards, probably in the 19 teens, or early 20s, GM bought him out, and his spark plugs were rebranded AC-Albert Champion-spark plugs! Delco-Remy used to manufacture automotive generators, starters, etc.. The "Remy" has been gone for decades, same as "body by Fisher". Sad AC is nothing but a "middle man", distributing products manufactured by others, but not before they slap on AC/Delco and GM part# stickers on the box. When a good friend of mine retired from GM, he said he was buying a new car, and hitting the road, traveling. I asked what he was buying. He said a Lexus or Toyota!! I said why not buy American made. He said there's no such thing in the auto industry any more. Parts come from all over the world. After 40+ years of brand loyalty, he jumped ship!!!!

 

I was fooled as the symptom of intermittent start was exactly the same with the original switch and the new OEM one.

 

CARID on Ebay

 

While that statement is true, I will only buy cars made in America. Support your fellow Americans and not the Koreans or Japanese.

 

By American even if it costs more

 

A lot of those cars are assembled right here in the USA. Subaru, Kia, Toyota, Honda, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, all have manufacturing right here in the US (and probably more but those are just the ones I could think of off the top of my head).

We live in a global economy now, for better or for worse.

 

And those US plants export to other countries - including both Europe and Japan.

Meanwhile a good portion of the "Big 3" vehicles come from Canada or Mexico. And some brands are "hybrid" - powertrain from country A and body and assembly from country B.

 

Usually to the disadvantage of customer C!!

 

When I was a kid, my parents used to talk about planned obsolescence, which I was too young to understand at that time. It used to be the bodies and frames that rusted out. Then came rustproofing, then overseas competition, which forced everyone to make better all around vehicles. As a C5 owner, it's pretty obvious to me that planned obsolescence still exists, but today it's not about rusting out, it's more about electronics, and the 'no longer in production' part that is essential to keep the car safe while on the road. With steering position sensors, and EBCMs no longer available new from the manufacturer, unless someone starts reproducing these 2 critical parts, eventually the C5s will be obsolete due to the unavailability of these essential safety items. The EBCM is probably the most likely component who's unavailability will get our cars parked, as a lot of the early C5s didn't have Active Handling. But all years had antilock brakes.....

 

When my EBCM takes a dump and I can no longer get one I will just bypass it with a setup like this...
https://finishing-lines.com/products...ake-line-kit-1

 

Or an MK60 conversion.

 

It certainly is a PITA to buy a new part and have it fail in a short period of time.

 

With the electronic.parts it's not there were designed to go obsolete it's that the technology dramatically changed. You can't expect car manufacturers to continue use TTL logic circuits that were designed 20 years ago in a modern car. The military goes through this all the time with their old aircraft that they keep flying. Eventually the whole electronic sets are replaced with completely new designs. This costs 10s of millions of dollars to design and certify. Nobody is going to do that for the C5 electronic boxes.

 

I'd expect the majority of the design work is still done here, but if like my industry, outsourcing as much as possible to india

 

Look at the myriad of parts that aftermarket already supplies, I expect they will continue to add new repro parts as they drop out of OEM production and the need for the parts remains.