View Poll Results: Have you had a valve spring failure?
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Valve spring failure prevalence
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Valve spring failure prevalence
I'm looking to better understand the magnitude of this valve spring failure issue in the C8. I know it affects other cars, but I'm mainly interested in the C8.
I see some people claiming that it's rare, but I'm seeing more and more cases every day, and given that there really aren't that many C8's out there, it's sort of alarming. I know, the car has a warranty, but I'm still not exactly thrilled about the idea of my brand new $80k car leaving me stranded after a couple hundred miles.
Some will say that you only hear about the failure cases and never the non-failures, but on the other hand, I'm sure there are failures that go unreported and just get fixed without publicity.
So, this is a simple poll: Have you had a failure or not?
Feel free to post the last 4/5 digits of your VIN so we can get an idea of affected dates.
I see some people claiming that it's rare, but I'm seeing more and more cases every day, and given that there really aren't that many C8's out there, it's sort of alarming. I know, the car has a warranty, but I'm still not exactly thrilled about the idea of my brand new $80k car leaving me stranded after a couple hundred miles.
Some will say that you only hear about the failure cases and never the non-failures, but on the other hand, I'm sure there are failures that go unreported and just get fixed without publicity.
So, this is a simple poll: Have you had a failure or not?
Feel free to post the last 4/5 digits of your VIN so we can get an idea of affected dates.
Popular Reply
Oct 4, 2020, 11:07 PM
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From: Central Illinois
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From: Early 2020 Z51 Coupe, Original Owner, Ahwatukee Foothills, AZ
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It's really ridiculous. These cars are ticking time bombs. GM needs to do a ******* formal recall.
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From: Central Illinois
Not going to happen. They will not spend millions of dollars to "fix" 10,000 cars that don't have a problem. From 1999 to 2005 Porsche had OVER 10% of every standard 911 engine go BOOM at various miles some as low as a few thousand all the way to tens of thousands of miles and they never recalled them. Those were 100% catastrophic failures that took a $20k of THE EXACT SAME DESIGN that was just as likely to go BOOM as what just came out! Put in a new motor and wait for the next one to let go.
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Not going to happen. They will not spend millions of dollars to "fix" 10,000 cars that don't have a problem. From 1999 to 2005 Porsche had OVER 10% of every standard 911 engine go BOOM at various miles some as low as a few thousand all the way to tens of thousands of miles and they never recalled them. Those were 100% catastrophic failures that took a $20k of THE EXACT SAME DESIGN that was just as likely to go BOOM as what just came out! Put in a new motor and wait for the next one to let go.
BMW did a recall for the defective VANOS bolts on the N55 engine, and the failure rate of that was much lower than with these valve springs and usually occurred after the warranty period. There are anecdotes to be found either way.
There's also a chance that the cost of preventative replacement will be somewhat dampened when you consider the fact that most of these failures occur early on - well within warranty period, which means that if the valve spring _does_ fail and the keepers happen to pop out, the engine is totally trashed and will be replaced on GM's dime.
A set of valve springs probably costs GM on the order $15 plus a couple hours of labor to swap them out (it's not hard to do on these motors). Much cheaper and easier than replacing an engine.
It all comes down to whether they can really identify the bad batch or not, or how widespread the issue really is.
Le Mans Master
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From: New England
Yes, the Porsche IMS thing from 15 years ago was bad...but we're talking about brand new cars having a potentially catastrophic engine failure with less than 100 miles here. One guy had his fail while he was at the dealership taking delivery of the car.
BMW did a recall for the defective VANOS bolts on the N55 engine, and the failure rate of that was much lower than with these valve springs and usually occurred after the warranty period. There are anecdotes to be found either way.
There's also a chance that the cost of preventative replacement will be somewhat dampened when you consider the fact that most of these failures occur early on - well within warranty period, which means that if the valve spring _does_ fail and the keepers happen to pop out, the engine is totally trashed and will be replaced on GM's dime.
A set of valve springs probably costs GM on the order $15 plus a couple hours of labor to swap them out (it's not hard to do on these motors). Much cheaper and easier than replacing an engine.
It all comes down to whether they can really identify the bad batch or not, or how widespread the issue really is.
BMW did a recall for the defective VANOS bolts on the N55 engine, and the failure rate of that was much lower than with these valve springs and usually occurred after the warranty period. There are anecdotes to be found either way.
There's also a chance that the cost of preventative replacement will be somewhat dampened when you consider the fact that most of these failures occur early on - well within warranty period, which means that if the valve spring _does_ fail and the keepers happen to pop out, the engine is totally trashed and will be replaced on GM's dime.
A set of valve springs probably costs GM on the order $15 plus a couple hours of labor to swap them out (it's not hard to do on these motors). Much cheaper and easier than replacing an engine.
It all comes down to whether they can really identify the bad batch or not, or how widespread the issue really is.
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From: Central Illinois
) it into the shop, swap the springs from above, and send them on their way. When the IMS failed, the chains went slack, cams jumped time, valves smashed into pistons, and those motors were junk on the spot. Not one of these had that happen yet. Sorry but it seems like an over reaction to the problem. There is no way GM would spend millions for no reason, neither would you.