I am in the market for a used vette and have found a 2001 at a local corvette dealer. I am a little concerned about the piston ring problem and the fact the car is not under warranty at all. How wide spread of a problem was this and should I be worried?

 

My 2001 Auto had NO oil consumption issues. Some have. I think the 6 speeds had more issues than the autos. Tough call...............I would think that if you buy it from a dealer and it has issues later you may be covered under the bulletin to replace the rings. Ask first ofcourse. I don't think it is a universal problem with ALL 2001's IMO...........

 

I have a late '01 MN6 (build date of 5/30, and they only made them until the week of 6/21, thanks Sponge ), and I haven't had any problems at all. I've convinced myself that the only place any of my oil goes is into my PCV mod, and that's only about a teaspoon every two weeks.

If the car has under 50K miles you can still get an aftermarket warranty if you're that concerned. Check out WarrantyDirect.com to get an instant quote. I have until 7/26 to decide IF I want to extend my warranty, but I'm sure that's the place it would be from.

 

I would make sure that as a condition of sale, the dealership WILL replace the rings if excessive oil consumption is experienced. My oil usage depends upon the type of driving to which my car is subjected. Frequent downshifting results in higher usage, but I'll bet that is the cas with every C5 (with MN6).

 

Just keep a quart of Mobil One handy in one of your rear compartments.
That's what I do. Engine re-ring by the dealer...no way.

(a quart of Mobil One - $4.50 - is a lot cheaper than the all the problems a re-ring at the dealership might cost you in the long run)


[Modified by Mark S., 12:24 PM 7/1/2004]

 

I had my 2001 mn6 reringed by GM after burning a quart every 1600 miles. I use to leave a cloud after getting on it. Since then I have not oil consumption issues.

:flag

 

Cool, mine was built the same day!
However, my car used 1 quart every 900 miles. So heads/cam/pvc, and 2002 ZO6 related pvc swap resulted in 1/4-1/2 quart every 2500 miles now

However, I beat my car like you know what. If the car is taken car of and doesn't see redline every other shift it'll be fine. Plus you can always try an extended warranty if possible.

 

My 01 Z06 uses some oil but it is dependent on how I have been driving it. I'm undecided if I will get the rering yet or not. Enough oil comes out that my rear fascia and lic plate have little black dots on it after an autoX event.

Personally, I wouldn't let the oil use issue be a deal breaker one of these cars unless it would be on a high miler daily driver knowing you need to add 1 qt of $5.00 oil every 1000 miles.....

 

I had the ring problem on my '01 6sp. I can't tell you which one's have it and which ones don't because when they took my engine apart they found five cyl. with the ring gaps right in a row. So that means it wasn't just the ring design but the way they were installed. I will say that the Steve's at Byrner Chevy, outside of Phila. took care of me 100%. The car is back together now and I've put about 900 miles on it and the oil level is still full. Before the ring job it would have used a quart in 750-800 miles. If you want to pick up the '01 vette I would say talk to the dealer, get a good warranty and then drive worry free.

 

I have also heard it is a 6 speed problem, with that being said I use about 1 QT every 1000 miles. Not a big deal to me.

 

I have a '01 6 spd and I had the oil problem....1 qt. every 400 miles...and yes, it did depend on how I drove it. Keep the revs down under 2500 and no problem, rev it up over that and watch the oil fly. (Car only had 1600 miles on it.) It took me 3 oil consumption test and 15 months before Berglund (Chevy dealer here) would fix it. They wanted me to just live with it, and to drive the car easier. Anyway, the car was finally fixed and now the problem is solved. I've put over 13K miles on the car since the fix and everything is cool I would be very careful and have everything put in writing before I bought the car. This is not a CHEAP fix if you have to pay for it out of your own pocket. Good luck!

 

I also have a 01. I didn't have the oil use problem but I did have pistion slap. I had the pistons changed and at the same time put the new design oil ring on the pistions. Several other 01s in the area have piston slap also, and one other had the pistons canged out. For me, an 01 seems a little more prone to problems than an 02 or an 00.

JMTCW

 

My 2000 h/c m6 sucked down a lot of oil until I switched to 10-30, at which point the excessive oil sucking abruptly stopped. If you do a little research you will find that this makes a lot of sense.

 

[QUOTE]My 01 Z06 uses some oil but it is dependent on how I have been driving it. I'm undecided if I will get the rering yet or not. Enough oil comes out that my rear fascia and lic plate have little black dots on it after an autoX event.[QUOTE]
Goody...just thought I would share what I learned the hard way, since you mentioned the dreaded black dots(splatters), that I now, am oh so familiar with. Here's the scoop:

About 4000 miles after my H/C install, which was done at about 76,000 miles, I began to notice these black "dots" everywhere out back, as you pointed out above. The more miles I drove, the worse it got. Eventually, it was all over my garage floor, at the tail pipe location, and completely blackened the inside of all my Borla tips.

When I would get on it, I could see some smoke out the back in my rearview mirror. That steadily got worse as well!
Well, finally, after driving another 4000 miles while this was progressively getting worse, I decide I better get the car down to the shop I deal with, and see what the problem is.
So, at the shop, I explain my problem, but tell them the car still pulls like a mean ****, and so don't think it could be that serious. They dyno the car to see if it's down on power...and it's actually down 60-70 rwhp!!!
Even they were surprised, because they could see that the car was pulling great, during a test drive they conducted beforehand!

So, the next step was to do a leak down test, to see where the HP was disappearing at. Cylinders #4, #5, & #8 were below what is acceptable. By now, I'm just depressed, and saying to myself, oh crap...just 8,000 miles into my H/C, I gotta rebuild this engine??? Well, I wasn't savvy enough to know, it's not a good thing to be doing a H/C install at 76,000 miles!
Oh well, live and learn,...but this is why I'm sharing this info with the forum.

Well..my options were to do a ring job for about $3,000+, and retain the same block, or drop in another low mileage engine, and in doing so, freshen up the whole bottom end.

Well, I end up dropping a low mileage 2002 LS6 engine in there, which was real nice! Transferred all my stuff,(H/C, etc) into the new block, and headed back to the dyn. Sounds pretty good right? The car's still down over 20 rwhp!!!...after all that!!!

To make a long story longer(sorry about the length here, but if I can save somebody else the grief I went through, it's gonna be worth it!), it turns out the heads, which were transferred over to the new engine, were so bugared up with "blow-by" passing the rings, that the valves would no longer seat properly, and so there goes my 11.2:1 compression!!! Crap!!! :mad

So, off come the heads...send them back to LPE where they were ported and polished the first time, rework the heads and replace all the valves...send 'em back...reinstall...redyno...20+ rwhp reappears, and the car is stronger than ever before!!! :bb

PEOPLE!...don't make my mistake!! ...take those black "dots" VERY seriously!!!

(Sorry for the length!!! )

 

Nightmare, thanks for the heads up. I guess I will have to go whine to the dealer and get the oil consumption job done. At least I got my extended warranty to cover this episode. I would rather pay the $100 deductible and get it fixed then deal with all the extra oil and wax I have to use to clean her up all the time. Since I do autocross pretty regular I need to get it done. Wonder if the wife will let me have some new AFR heads installed while it's down??

 

Ihad mine on watch before I sold it. I was using about 1 qrt. per 1500 - 1700 miles. Not a big deal, I would not have had the engine torn down for that. It ran great. I also had the rear end leak, that was a relitivly easy fix for the dealer. I recomend a simple check of the service records via the VIN at any dealer will tell you what has beeen already fixed under warrenty.

 

I have a 2001 and went through the consumption watch as well. The consumption was around 1 qt every 1500 miles one time 1 qt after a thousand miles. My car was built in June of 01. So anyway, after I got 12k on the car the consumption settled down to about 1/2 qt in 1500 miles with mixed driving. I had mods installed recently so while the engine was apart I had Cartek re-ring the engine since they were already in there so it was done more as a update than a necessity. And, as a result no oil consuption to speak of. So the Car your looking at may be fine, you may want to check date of MFG to see where it stands with the Engine update done in April of that year. As well as what work was done under warranty. If the car was MFG after 4/01 you should have the first generation coated pistons that GM starting using for the piston slap complaint. So research before you buy so you know where you stand. Good luck


[Modified by Tsab, 3:19 PM 7/3/2004]

 

Mine used a quart every 800 miles. Had it reringed. Word is the 6-speeds were the problem becasue the rings fluttered above 3000 rpm at light load which is a shifting area for 6 speeds. The A4s tend to shift at a lower rpm.

 

Here's an idea. I just bought my '00 this spring and put a GM extended warranty on it (36/36). It's a little more pricey but a friend who is a used car dealer, said with a Vette, it is better to go GM than after-market if you want to avoid extended warranty hassles. Here's the good part. To get a GM extended warranty, it is my understanding that a GM dealer has to do the inspection. (that is who did mine) If you are willing to buy a GM warranty, then the dealer either has to pass it as okay to warranty... which means then any engine problems would be covered later... or.... he will turn it down, which would send you shopping for a different car. Good luck.

MFH4

 

good luck i am going through the oil comsupmtion process as we speak.. about a quart every 800 miles.. and.. doing it under the factory warranty .. before i end up buying teh GMAPP .. the main difference. which i was told form the dealer on the type of service / warranty rep[air is that on major repairs.. such as oil consumption reing.. or .. tranies.. under GMAPP you have to have a GM adjuster come look at the repair and authorize it.. so dont think just cause you have the GMAPP .. im sure there are night mare stories about these adjusters .. no honoring.. the repair.. either doue to .. engine mods.. Just my .02 and something to look into.. and think about...