I recently bought a 2006 3LT/z51 from a forum member (pmarone) and I have absolutely loved it for the last 2.5 weeks. Tonight I went out and hopped in it to go get dinner, and noticed several problems.

First off, my seat didn't move forward like it normally does, so I tried pressing the [1] button and the system just beeped at me (3-4 times) and flashed the seat belt light. I tried latching and unlatching my seat belt, but it didn't make any difference, although the light went off with it latched and back on when unlatched. I tried resetting the memory thinking maybe it had somehow just forgotten the place. I turned the car off, got out (after for some reason having to manually unlock the door), got back in, and again my seat didn't move forward. When I go to get out, it does move my seat back for the easy exit feature.

second, All of a sudden I had a check engine light on [my heart sank at the sight of this]. I connected to onstar and I was told that the light came on because of a communication problem with the transmission control module.

When I last drove it (yesterday) I hadn't had any issues at all; this all just started.

I'm 25 years old and I am very proud of the fact that I've gotten to the point in my life that I can buy myself a toy like this, I just pray to god I didn't do all this work to get a lemon.

 

have a local dealer service dept. run your vin #. you will be able to see any warranty, etc. work that has been done on the car. that will tell you if there have been eariler issues. it is a good idea to do this before you buy . good luck.

 

What happens when you program the second memory button?

 

Is your car a stick or auto? This is probably to ask. And does it still move even though it has a TCM communication problem. Also since I never have used onstar, how do you go about using them for diagnostic problem solving? And how many miles are on the car?

 

 

It's the auto.

Car still drives seemingly fine, I went up to the store about an hour after my post and it didn't feel any different, plus the memory seat just happened to work when I went to come back.

As for onstar, I wasn't even signed up for it, I pressed the button, said "adviser" and immediately got a real person that set everything up and transferred me to a diag technician who ran the check and told me the problem, some ideas to try (drive the car a few times to see if it was a fluke), and that I should see a dealer in the next few days if it doesn't turn off.

 

Seat adjustments cant be done under certain circumstanmces for safety reasons. For example, pushing the memory functions while the car isnt in the park position will not work. On manual transmissions you cant use this function without the emergency brake on with the engine running.

additionally, the car can have irratic functions with the electrical system if the battery is run down either from age or a deep cycle discharge such as running the stereo for an hour while cleaning it. Strage behavior is often eradicated by powering down the car by disconnecting the positive terminal for 30 seconds and then powering back up and resetting the various settings.

Good luck with your purchase and rest assured that buyers of this car new also have issues and I doubt you were sold a lemon. 99% of the time it returns 'miles of smiles' as GM's lead engineer called it.

 

I've had this issue with my '05. Perhaps 1 time out of 50, I'll get in and the memory fails to work. I assumed it's just one of those things I learn to live with.

 

I had my cruise control go out last week. Disconnected the negative battery terminal for a few minutes and all is well. First thing, Don't panic!!! It is probably nothing.
Just think this way: How often do you have to reboot a PC your working on because the software brain farted? I guess it is the same thing since there are a bunch of computers in the Corvettes these days. I just wished they put in a "reboot" switch instead of having to go through the trouble of the battery cable disconnect.

Good luck and enjoy your car.

 

Besides, the cost and design of a vette is off the scale compared to a laptop or desktop computer.

Get the dealer, a good one, to check it.

FWIW

 

Oh well

 

May not pertain here but if the seat is all the way in the down position it will not move forward or in reverse. The seat has to be up a bit. Mine is down so it doesn't rock!!

 

Here is the thread where I posted about problem with my memory seat. Take a look and see if you have the same problem.

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show...509&highlight=

 

My problem with my seats sounds like the exact same thing, but I think it was because of the transmission control module communications issue. After my last post I went to run to the store up the street, and when i got to the bottom of my drive way in reverse, i realized i had no power, even though the car was in reverse. I put it in drive, pulled back in, and then reverse again and everything was fine. When I went to leave the store a few minutes later, I noticed my memory seats had started working, and this morning when I went to go to the gym it was fine, and the check engine light was off, and I haven't had any issues since then.

As far as the battery run-down idea goes, I use this car as a daily driver so I doubt it got low overnight.

I think the problem stemmed from the TCM and the car thinking it was in gear or in neutral when it was parked, so the memory seat wouldn't work. After cycling through the positions and it started working again, the memory seats started working right away. Does this make any sense?

Thanks a lot for all the help guys,
Dan

 

if its an 06 then its still under warranty. Take it to the dealer and let them sort it out

 

 

Do you happen to know anything about transferring the warranty? There's only a month left since the car was originally delivered in Sep 05. Aslo, have any of you looked into extending the warranty? I may be interested in doing that after this happened.