KRAYZ308

This is one of the times I am glad I live in Kalifornia. The lemon law here means that if you file, the dealer will fix it ASAP with limited BS or eat it shortly there after. I love Amerika. This proves my post from 2004, Chevrolet can not deal with a 70K customer when their core business is 23K cars that they can only sell at a discount to John Q Public trailer park. Sad, but true. After reading about delaminating roofs, exploding half shafts/trannys sh*t brakes and getting jerked around by MP, maby it's back to Ferrari even at 75 less HP.
Carlos Gosen may not be a bad bet for GM. It is what it is after all, think about it.

sprite2005

The car did have CAGS installed at one point in time but it was never working properly and I did not even know about it being installed, the dealer removed it when they fixed my roof about 1000-1500 miles ago. The engine has never been over revved (ie hit over max RPM from a missed downshift, etc) however it may have touched upon the electronic rev limiter once or twice in its lifetime. As mentioned earlier the car broke down to traffic and GM is trying to void the warranty for no reason. One of the reasons this Vette is mod free is cause I wanted to retain warranty on it.

outnumbered

Actually sprite there may be more to this than you may think.By my memory you are in your 20's.It very well could be a common case of age discrimination.I hope I am wrong.However it would not surprise me to find that if you were in your 40's you would not be having this reaction.

I have a gut feeling that the dealer may be suggesting that due to your age that you have abused this car.Gm may simply be reacting to someones opinion.Or Gm may not have said anything and you are be fed

Either way you certainly need to stay cool as possible and demand a written explanation so you have the truth and something to go on.

Good luck.

sprite2005

Yeah I will stop by there tomorrow to get more information. I will fight this through the courts if I have to.

yell03

Some Service Dept Managers are just pr-cks.

I went to a local Service Dept and asked if I put Headers on my C6 would it void the warranty?

Without hesitation he said "YES, any mod will void your warranty"

I drove 3-4 miles up the road to another Service Dept and asked the same question?

Answer, Hell No, Not if it is not causing the problem.
Then he went on to tell me about a local 2006 Z06 that comes there and the HUGE burnout he did in their parking lot.
No, they are not voiding his warranty for abuse.

So, now after installing my Magnaflow catback with x-pipe and about to have my Vararam installed as soon as it gets here, I know who will be doing all my service work.

Howard

Ranger

This story sounds to me that the dealer found damage to the engine that GM judges to due to an over-rev condition. Because it has a rev-limiter, it cannot over-rev on an up-shift. It can only over-rev on a missed down-shift, that is a driver in 5th gear tries to grab 4th but gets second instead. Or a driver in 4th want 3d but garbs 1st instead.

On an unmodded car, a warranty invalidation is a serious step and alway relates to a strong indication of driver abuse. The only one that would occur on an unmodded car is an over-rev. If the car has bent push rods, that is the classic sign of over-rev.

I'd suggest getting the written details of the diagnosis of the issue with the original engine.

Good luck.

Ranger

lt1george

All this BS. This is why I HATE CHEVROLET DEALER SERVICE DEPARTMENTS ! These Z06's (like all other car animals have issuses and breakdowns). If you didn't buy this car new(which it seems you didn't)this dealer is going to make sure, because of this and your age is going to F**K You. Call Chevrolet at 800 222 1020.Start out nice and tell your side of story, forget about the cags issuse, just the facts. Motor bad. Hell, contact Tom Wallace at Chevrolet if you have too. End of story, yours has not been the first Z06 and won't be the last with problems. Good Luck, keep us informed.

TrackNoob

I'm sorry to put it this way, but that is one of those explanations that a blonde gives for a parking lot fender bender: "Oh, it wasn't my fault, the cell rang, and the sun, and the other driver and then POOF. So, see? It clearly could not have been *me* <shrugs>!"

The CAGS can fail in only a couple of basic ways:

* Never comes on. Result? Drives like a normal car ought to! Kinda hard to pin eating a valve on this scenario, no?

* Never turns off. Result? Our owner takes to dealer, because it goes from 1 to 4 every single time. Yawn. Not an engine endangering proposition.

* Intermittently activates. Result? Our owner can't even tell the difference - sometimes it grabs a CAGS-commanded 4th when the throttle/speed threshold is there (a very low percentage of driving scenarios, BTW, so the 'window' for failure and the duty cycle are both small), sometimes it does not function to INTERRUPT to FORCE it to 4th, so the driver gets 2nd gear just like he expected in the first place - another yawner.

There is simply no way I can envision that a CAGS solenoid problem can lead to valve train failure. Period. If a CAGS solenoid grenaded itself completely (could not be likely due to a faulty eliminator, because the eliminator is simply breaking the chain of "AND'ed" control inputs to the computer), maybe you get the box-of-rocks noise he complains about in the tranny, but how does that blow up the top end? No soap.

Nitrodamus

I think this is a Holler Chevrolet service writer problem. I bought two Corvettes from Holler in Orlando.. their service department was marginal at best. In fact I've been to all the Orlando Chevrolet service centers... and they all really suck.

05C6spdvert

You should go get your car and tell those guys to get a life. If they were going to screw with your warranty they would have done it by now. It is not something they do retroactively. Take it to another dealer next time. If for any reason you have another problem and you find out at that time they flagged your car, then you can take some action. The CAGS eliminator, which is now off the car has no effect on overrev and they wouldn't have a leg to stand on.

The only issue I can see is if someone prior to you owning it did some damage in which case you should ask for a printout of the fault code showing the condition and proving to you there actually is an issue. My guess is that that will not happen.

Bottom line is that some of these service people are really stupid and you cannot rely on their level of competence when it comes to a serious matter. The law is on your side.

Colonel Z06

Ok time for me to chime in. I've read all the posts and I'm in agreement with 99% of you. However here in Florida he's got some other options that make the M&M Act look tame.

There are several points of attack here. One, you live in Orlando and just like here in Miami-Dade County they have a very consumer oriented municple code there complete with a consumer advocate. If you can't find out who it is pm me and I'll get you hooked up through the Consumer Advocate here whose name is Leonard Alias. Nice guy, I've know him since my early days as a prosecutor and although we've had a few legal tussles long before he was in his present position, (the guy likes Government work--go figure) he has a healthy respect for me and would be glad to help to the extent he can.

Two, we have a very nasty little statute here in Florida called the Unfair Trade Practices Act that is so broad it would cover your little brother trying to cheat you out of a piece of bubble gum!!! Of course there is an attorney's fee clause attendent thereto, which makes it very attractive to experienced litigators. (I once had a Ford dealership so crossed up with their "silk stocking" law firm on a case involving my own vehicle, that even the judge started to laugh and told them--"I think he has you in check-mate--settle it--he'll crush you in front of a jury"). It was very painfull and embarrasing for them to write that check so they made me agree to never bring my vehicle back to the dealership for warranty work--that wasn't hard to get me to agree to--Duhhh--and I put in a clause that prohibited them from soliciting me ever again with an agreed damage provision of $2,000 per violation. 6 months later, I was filing my motion for the first violation and promply received another 2k. Aren't mailing lists wonderful? After they spanked the computer, I never heard from them again.

Three, you probably transfered the remainder of the new car warranty into your name (did you pay the 100 bucks or so?) and you have a contract to sue on. Do you know how much money it's going to cost them to fight you in court? Attorney fees, witness fees, deposition costs, travel expenses, expert witness fees--I could go on and on. But the real harbanger is--Did they video the teardown of the engine and do they have all the parts properly cataloged for intoduction into evidence? I'll bet that they didn't, so all of this warranty voiding talk is a scare tactic, more commonly referred to as bull****! Tell them to put it in writing so that you can provide it to your counsel and send it to you certified mail return receipt requested. That's when the fun really begins. Ponder this theory for a moment. We were all sold a vehicle that was so heavily campaigned by GM that even long time Corvette owners were drooling to get this car and we were climbing all over one another to get one in spite of the fact that some of us were gouged by the dealers to satisfy our insatiable need for the new Z06!!! Sound like a drug dealer instead of a car dealer? Unfortunately, our little sweethearts who were touted as high performance exotics (read all the propoganda paid for by Chevrolet Marketing Division, all the write ups as well as the threads here and the service bulletins--I think there's a quote somewhere "we built a race car with street clothes") have had some very serious problems. Gm must have expected that it's target customers were going to drive these cars like we stole them, so I really don't think a jury would entertain a verdict based on some theory of severe buyer missuse (only available to them in a products liablity case-not one in contract) for a large well financed company like GM, or even you're nasty little incompetant dealership (they would be joined as a party too) against a poor schmuck (no offense intended) like you who was just trying to support his Corvette habit. Consider your venue, Orlando where 3 of your jurors will probably be women with Corvette convertibles! Damn, I'm starting to smell a class action with all these similarly situated plaintiffs, at least against GM. Certification of a class action in Florida is just a little different than most jurisdictions. It can be bifurcated, you have a trial on liabilty, and then individual trials for damages that each person suffered by the wrongful conduct. The Florida Supreme Court just made a similar ruling in the tobacco litigation.

In sum, don't take any crap, be polite and just don't take no for an answer. Most importantly, keep very good notes on the dates,times, persons you've spoken with, what they said and what you said. And always follow the condensed version of the 10 Commandments--don't be an *******! But don't get hoodwinked either. Pm me with your telephone number and I'll return the call. Colonel Z06

boosted_z06

Incorrect CAG bypass ( being he says bypass was nto working correctly ) can harm the hardware on the ECM and then when CAG is put back in it MIGHT now not be fully retracting and causing shift issues or delays, try that at high RPMs and see what it might do to the engine.

As to suing, GM has already paid a battery of lawyers that just sit around waiting for lawsuits and judges tend to side with vendors but owner first may have to sue the dealer and then maybe GM.

I'd get the car out of that dealer and try another one, have a GM zoning office guy meet you there.

TrackNoob

Look, I really don't want to bust your stones. I don't. But I am an engineer, have done failure investigations on technical matters for about 25 years, and have a reasonable understanding of electromechanical devices (such as solenoids) as well as electronics (such as computers, microprocessors, and control electronics) so, I just can't bear to leave your statements unchallenged, because some one might take them to heart. I taught young kids logical troubleshooting methods for about eight years in a military technical school, and the first thing they have to learn is to get the symptoms, extract the circuit of interest, take parameters around that circuit, and then come up with an analysis that directly explains how their parameters lead to the failure, knowing the theory of operation. If they haven't done that, they haven't found the problem. We don't just let 'em wave their arms all around in big general circles, and say :"Sumthin' in that-there musta went catty-whumpas"

1. Statement: "Incorrect CAG bypass... can harm the hardware on the ECM". Please defend, because this is completely incorrect. The CAGS eliminator plug is a single fixed resistor. It can't 'invent' voltage or current, so it's interface to the ECM, under all modes - correct, failing, or totally failed, is limited to three domains being presented to the ECM: VCC, ground, or some voltage in between. Since this value is going into a high impedance INPUT via whatever buffers the ECM internals, in what theory does this damage the ECM, no matter what it's value? The circuit is DESIGNED to see the entire range of voltages the plug can allow - broken or working.

2. You say: "when CAG is put back in it MIGHT now not be fully retracting and causing shift issues or delays, try that at high RPMs and see what it might do to the engine."

I have to take this in two parts:
a) The CAGs solenoid might indeed fail. A solenoid is a piece of electromechanical gear that converts electrical energy to physical movement. Do you have a theory on how the CAGs eliminator resistor can cause such a solenoid failure? I have already explained in a prior post that the duty cycle of the solenoid is limited by at least two AND functions: the speed of the car AND the throttle position (I have the parameters for these, but it is immaterial). This forms a window-switch, beyond which the ECM will not engage the solenoid, either for speed or for throttle position.

b) So presuming the ECM has gone completely mad --
but only with respect to the CAGs...
and without throwing a MIL code...
and the mode of malfunction is somehow related to the eliminator... (Whew.)

If I concede you all of that (and I don't), you STILL have to come up with a theory of how the solenoid for forcing a gate to fourth instead of second gear being ON (or OFF, or somewhere in between) has a dad gummed thing to do with affecting over- RPM?



I am always interested in learning, and I certainly don't know it all by a long shot, so I am genuinely interested in the answers to the questions I pose, to make the CAGs-plug-blows-motor theory plausible somehow.

sprite2005

The car did not have any shift issues and has never been over revved. I have NEVER missed a shift in the Z.

Ranger

Does the dealer claim than any of the push rods are bent? If so, how many?

Ranger

sprite2005

They said rocker arm, pushrod, and a valve spring was broken. The engine had been running fine all day and suddenly started acting up in traffic about 10 minutes away from where I live.

TrackNoob

Please be precise (if you know): they said pushrod was broken, or bent or replaced? This is critical.

sprite2005

Not sure, this is what they told me over the phone when I was down in Mexico last week, I will know today heading over there soon, hopefully their lead service rep is in today.

Edit: I'm 99% sure they said pushrod was BROKEN

sprite2005

Should I be able to get a copy of the blackbox data from when the CEL occured as well?

Ranger

Black box is there to collect data immediately preceeding an air bag deployment. Last time I researched that (C5s) it collected the last 20 second of data...on a continuous loop that over-writes the previous 20 sec.

In order for Chevy to void the power train warranty, they need to be able to establish the car was abused.

Failure of a single rocker, spring, valve, and pushrod would not be a conclusive indication of anything. Could well represent a simple parts failure.

On the other hand, if several pushrods are bent or the valve train parts of more than one cylinder are damaged, they may conclude that the engine was subject of over-rev.

This is why you need to get a copy of the written diagnosis. Oral representations are useless in pursuing follow-on action.

I'd also get pictures of any parts they claim are damaged.

Ranger