Force A Recall

[fiberglasscivic]

Honestly, I'm not impressed with my Malibu but I'm also a Honda guy. It's hard to go from the reliability, and excellence of Honda's time tested reputation to the Malibu but from what I can tell, with proper routine maintanance, the Malibu isn't that bad of a car. I've had loads of trouble with my Malibu so far due to the fact that the people that owned it before didn't take car of their car. They're the kind of people who only have work done to the car when something goes wrong. For instance, a little over a year ago the car started misfiring and had a major loss in power. Turned out they had to have the coil cover replaced along with the spark plugs and the catalytic converter. They had owned the car for about 3 years and had never done a tune up. Well about a year later (this past November) it has the same problem. The coil cover that was put on had gone faulty and wasn't transfering spark to the #3 cylinder. So rather than fix the car they sold it to me for $300. Now that I'm in the midst of fixing the car I've discovered that the brakes have never been replaced (they lived in the mountains for 2 years), they changed the oil about once every 7 -8 months (about 20,000 miles for them) and the air filter had never been changed. I'm still trying to sift out how much maintanance hasn't been done but the car is obviously suffering for it. I'm in the middle of replacing my catylitic converter and I've noticed that during acceleration, when my gas is lower than half a tank or when I'm using low grade gas, that the car shudders. This could be caused by problems in the transmission, faulty ignition components, a backed up exhaust system, or low fuel pressure but the bottom line is the car wasn't taken care of and now it's suffering because of it. I try to do all the maintanance required so that I know what's changed and if everything that needed to be done was finished. I will agree that it would appear that is a large number of repetitive problems with the 98 generation Malibus but I'll also say that even the best of mechanics miss something now and again and most people aren't as good about keeping their car as well maintained as they should be. So before we go pushing a recall that appears to be the fault of GM, maybe we should take a step back and look at ourselves and see if we may have more to contribute to the problem than we may realize.

By the way, yes Dex-Cool may be used in other engines and other vehicles besides GM, but just because they use Dex-Cool doesn't mean that the gasket types affected in the Malibu are made of the same material that's used in other vehicles. The focus shouldn't be on the effect of the Dex-Cool but rather the gasket/s that are being affected. I personally haven't had to replace the intake manifold gasket nor have I had to replace the head gasket, but then again I haven't had my Malibu for very long and maybe it needs to be done.

Also I would like to get this cleared up, is the usual problematic gasket the intake manifold gasket or the head gasket and if it's the manifold gasket, how is it affected by the Dex-Cool. They should never come in contact with each other.

[SPRaYeD9]

just crash your car, get the insurance money, and buy a first generation isuzu trooper

[slls]

Originally Posted by SPRaYeD9

just crash your car, get the insurance money, and buy a first generation isuzu trooper

Change your user name to crash, seems to be your fix for everything.

[SPRaYeD9]

all things that are chevy malibu's and please tell me if you think i am wrong with that diagnosis on those cars

[Malibu_Newbie]

I just bought my 98 a few weeks ago. So far the biggest problem we have had is the TCC needs to be replaced. Other than that the theft system thing needs to be fixed (Which I will be doing next week). So far its a good car. And the other poster hit the nail on the head....If you are buying this car (or any car) used you are at the mercy of whatever the other owner did or didn't do for their car. If they never did any routine maintance on the car you are gonna have problems when you buy it. And you will be the new one paying the price for the things the other person did not do.

[HyperFox]

I have a theory for ya SPRaYeD9,

Yes. Malibus break down. So do hondas, toyotas and dodges. It is a man-made machine and there is only one guaruntee with something made by man. Sooner or later, it will break down.

And thats one of the things this forum helps everyone with. When it breaks, we provide colective advice to help a person in need of assistance.

"just crash your car, get the insurance money, and buy a first generation isuzu trooper"

Yeah.. Great advice. You opinion isnt going to help this person out at all. Yes the Isuzu trooper is a good little truck. But the person doesnt have an Isuzu with a problem.

Now if you would like to rave on how your good the Isuzu is, there is a seperate forum for the isuzu trooper. Go post there. Im sure they will agree with you, otherwise if you dont have anything worthwhile to contibute...

Dont.

If you do, then feel free.

[bcopeland]

Can we kill this one ? ? ?

[CRASH IT]

Originally Posted by slls

Change your user name to crash, seems to be your fix for everything.

DONE!

[shadow5599]

Originally Posted by HyperFox

I have a theory for ya SPRaYeD9,

Yes. Malibus break down. So do hondas, toyotas and dodges. It is a man-made machine and there is only one guaruntee with something made by man. Sooner or later, it will break down.

No kidding, it gets so tiresome hearing how Hondas never break, like they're made by God or something. When I was recently looking for cheap 2nd car mainly for my kids I checked out some Hondas. There's no way in hell I was going to pay the over inflated and ridiculous prices some were asking for a beat up old Honda. And one of those had a leaking head gasket! I just looked at the guy like he was nuts, and then bought a Ford/Mazda for half the price.

[fiberglasscivic]

If you've heard it so much then maybe there is some truth to it.

Just because you found a couple of ricers who know that if they keep the price on their civic more than it's actual value to the normal person that some 16 year old kid who just watched the Fast and the Furious and has bottemless pockets will buy the thing just because it's a Honda Civic.

Yeah I'll agree that there are several people who will (and do) attempt to overprice Hondas that haven't been well taken care of. I'll challenge you though to go to the Honda threads (and not just the Civics but any Honda) and ask how dependable their cars are. Yeah Honda's have their problems just like any other car, the difference is that usually there aren't nearly as many of them.

I won't continue to jack this thread over my Honda loyalty but if you would like to continue this discussion elsewhere, start a new thread here or in the honda forums. I'll respond either way.

Would a mod please close this thread. I think the point about the recall has been proven.

[shadow5599]

I didnt really want to start a rice vs north american argument. The prices I found to be over the top while looking were across the board, not kids selling off their dead race cars. This was private and dealer sales, Accords mostly.
I drove a few and quickly decided it wasnt worth it so bought another GM, of which I've had fantastic luck with. I'm not really loyal to any brand, I simply look for current needs and good value.

I've been driving for 30 years and have purchased a few cars, none of them imports and sure, if you like I'm willing to list my cost of ownership on any one of em as a comparison. Let me know where to post the info. From what I can recall here's the list of my vehicles in order of ownership which began in 1975. I didnt replace any motors, head or intake gaskets, axles, rear ends on any of em. 2 transmissions were replaced on 2 vehicles which was directly related to abuse (another story).
74 Comet
76 Cordoba
67 Cougar
74 Nova
71 Duster
85 Tempo
81 Century
82 GMC Beauville van
83 Malibu
03 Malibu
05 Malibu
96 Escort LX
96 Escort LX (#2)

I think the mod is capable of deciding when to close a thread.

[fiberglasscivic]

I've started a new thread to relocate this discussion.