cavaliers are garbage.

This is the fun I've had with my 2001 CLX:
5 machining of the front brakes before 60,000k as the rotors warped every 3,000k (I had to threaten GM with taking them to court before they offered to help cover the cost of replacing the rotors)
struts were shot at 30k, two radios by 10k, seat screwed up, front and rear seal engine leaks by 50k, noise shifting from 1st to second from new... This ones a good one, even for GM.
Their advice to me was to "shift at a diffrent RPM".
not to mention a bad odor inside the car and a wiper blade that fell off with 23 kilometers on the car.
The car is a piece of crap.

This is the fun I've had with my 2001 CLX:


umm...CLX? that's not an avaliable model for cavaliers. come back when u get your cars right. till then, stop dissing- :loser:

sounds to me like whatever car hes talkin about, he ran the balls off of it...

VLX.
My apologys, but as you seem to believe these are good cars, your opinions become redundant to me anyway.
I have not "run the balls off it".

Its had regular maintenance since new, is detailed twice a year, is garage kept and has never been revved above 3800.

No people. Its not how its been treated.


It's a piece of garbage and my intent is not to get into a spitting match with people.

My hope is that someone who is thinking of spending 19,000 bucks on one of these pieces of crap will reconsider after reading this.
If you are serious about buying one, and you do doubt what I say, contact me at [email protected] and I will produce GM workorders done under warranty proving all that I state.

And we all know, manufacturers do not do warranty work unless they have to.

:loser: sounds like you rape your vehicle, start talking when you drive
normally, your warped rotors are probably caused by your foot always on the brake as hard as it is on the gas you foot is proubably black coverd in oil

The reason your rotar's are warping is either cause u break to hard whitch was allready said...or when your tires were put on ....whoever did it likely used a impact gun....That is a NO NO!!! :nono: Tighten the nut's by hand and torque the to spec's.

No Mustang69, I have explained in earlier posts how the car has been treated.
I know your a ford man, but even at that you should be able to read at a level enabling you to comprehend what I'm trying to do here.

As I have said before, I'm not here to diss the car or those who have bought one but rather to tell you guys what happened to me when I bought one.
I understand your annoyance at hearing something you do not want to hear.
Chances are, you bought one and are concerned I may be... just may be telling you the truth.

If you havn't bought one, and I mean bought a new one for 20k and not some 10 year year old beater for $1,500 then shut the hell up.

As that was your first post to this forum I have no alternative but to think you are yapping just to yap.

Again, let me say all I said was repaired was repaired on WARRANTY.
GM does not do anything for free.
GM does not do things for people when they do not have to.
If I abused the car GM would have told me to stuff it up my ass.
The point is the car is a piece of shit.

Fastz4u, excellent suggestion however the problem first showed itself even before the front tires were ever off it so I have to assume they were wrenched at the factory, but thanks for the time taken to offer some intelligent advice.

Again, I'm not trying to make friends here.
Frankly, I dont give a shit weather you guys like me or not...
But on this forum and other avenues I am making it clear to GM that I dont like being screwed over.

lil dog ... there are certain aspects of your gripe that ring true... i know for a fact that gm wont do anything that they dont have to do so im sure that there were troubles with your car. but to unilaterally diss all cavaliers is not fair based on your experience with one. i know guys with mustangs... brand new ones now... that have been in and out of the shops numerous times... i know others with the same cars that have never had a problem. i personally own 2 cavs. a 96 z-24 and a 99 z-24 i have never had any major problems with either and i have owned the 96 since brand new. my sister in law has one and she drives from north jersey to florida twice a month shes never had a problem with her 2003 cav... in 1985 i bought a chrylser lebaron gts turbo... had nothing but troubles with it... transmission.. head gaskets... brakes locking up.... battery going dead.... by friend at work bought the same model as mine different color.. he had no problems at all with his... what im trying to say is that in any car you could always get a lemon.... cars made in the afternoon on fridays and early on mondays have always been susceptible to problems... human nature .... i am sorry however that you have a bad taste in your mouth about cavaliers.... i think they are a great little car with all kinds of potential....

Some car's that come out of the factory are not right from day one...It likely just so happened that u got stuck with it....I know what driving the shit out of car's is...I've raced in stock car races and demo's for year's....Your car is a Born Lemon...There's nothing u can do about it unless u wanted to rebuild the whole thing...The reason GM is screwing u around is cause they Know that that car is like that...they will have record's from the factory..Best advise....Insure the hell out of it...and burn it.. :evillol:

Thanks for the advice fast!
hhahaahahaha.
Yeah.
Believe me, its tempting.
Bigboo, what you say is true. I apologize if I come across as dissing the owners and now realize I coulda picked better wording for my thread name.
The whole deal of buying a new car should be a pleasant, enjoyable one. We bought this thing and it has been one dissapointment after another with various dealers trying to hose you on other items as you bring your car in for the never ending warranty work.
What really got my goat was how GM put me off five times in a row on my rotor problem (Machining them into nothingness) untill the 60k warranty was over and in their eyes it became my problem.
Actually, even worse then that, that time they wanted an additional $250 for a ABS harness that needed replacement as they told me my ABS light wouldnt come off... I had never seen that light stay on since I bought it so I told them to put it back together with the harness it came in with and I brought it to a independant garage to have the harness checked. They found nothing wrong with it.

Another thing I dont understand is why certain losers are emailing me with really ignorant shit. I understand electronically communicating enables the cowards out there to anonomously lash out at people that present ideas that are unpleasant to them but I got nothing to gain from this.
As a matter of fact, out of the 20 or so emails I got from Deutchbags, only one so far has been someone seriously thinking of buying a Cavalier and I paid the freakin' long distance bill to call him. So lay off, all right losers?

What got me hooked on Cavaliers was an old late 80's I used to have.
If I recall right, that car had over 300k before I sold it to a guy I worked with and he drove it into the ground. Still, it took him a year to kill it.
It WAS a good car, and thats why I bought one new.

Later.

Heres a thought... At 40k i had to buy a completely new transmission right after my warranty ran out at 36,000 miles.. Before that, on the warranty, i had two clutches replaced, twice the shift linkage broke and was fixed and replaced, not to mention the resale value is shit.. i want to trade it in and its only worth 2500 bucks!!! i still owe fuckin 8k on the pile... its a 2000 Z24 with only 50k... Yea i will never in my life time buy a gm vehicle again!! cheap piles of shit that break down constantly and have a terrible resale value causing ppl to get stuck with them... I'm not rolling over 5k on a new car payment just because i made a poor choice and bought a cavy... I'm gonna burn it and say it was stolen!! i rather have no car then this pile of shit that is about to break down for the tenth time, and now i have no warranty and no money left to fix it.. Fuck it, i've had enough... If i can't sell it it will burn and be thrown in a river and i will lie and say someone stole it.. Yea i know its fraud, but i don't give a shit! anyone that argues a cavalier is a great car is weak and must have low self esteem and is easliy pleased living in a bubble.. I'm with ya brother, cavy's suck!!

I'm sorry to hear that you had so much troubles with your cavalier. I own two of them and find them to be an excellent vehicle so far. Your warrenty issues that are present really do suck the big one. I am suprised that you dealer did not illustrate to you that GM has a lemon clause that if the vehicle is in for warranty for a unreasonable amount of time then they have a buy back program. What they do is take the initial cost of the vehicle and divide it by the number of km in the warranty this gives a cost per km of usage. They then take the km value and multiply it by the number of km that you have used and deduct it from the initial value of the vehicle and reimburse this difference.

Origonal price $20,000
Warranty km 100,000
$20,000 / 100,000 km = $0.20 per km
10,000 km of usage
10,000 km * $0.20 per km = $2000
$20,000 - $2000 = $18,000 reimbursment for the car.

This was illustrated by my dealer when I bought the car. Maybe talk to your dealer and see what they say.

See, i guess i am just very lucky, the only grip i have about cavaliers is the head gaskets, and well, the automatic transmission exploding, well, that was my falt, he he, one to many street races, but normaly gm's have great cars, this is coming from a chrysler fan, who just happens two own 2 GM's, and 85 Iroc Camaro, and a 90 Z24 Cavalier, it just seemes that you two gor royaly fucked, lol, must have been built on a friday. btw, what is the amaerican equal to the VLX lildog?

Well, I fell like I should thow in my two cents. First of all I just purchaced a brand new 04 cav for just over 10,000. Heck, fully loaded sport package was only 16,000. Sounds like not only did you get a lemon of a car but over paid slighty for it as well. (sorry)This is my second cavalier my first one was a 1994, which I purchaced off lease with just under 28k on the od. I traded it in after driving it for five years and the od read well over 125,000 on it and the only major thing to go wrong was the head gasket. My wife owns a 2000 cav and she bought it new as well and has not had a lick of problems with it other than the freaking door freezing shut on cold days here in PA. My mother in law also owns a 1994 cav and her car like mine had a problem with the headgasket. Although GM would replace the head gasket on all 90-93 cavaliers free of charge they stopped at the 94's and we were left to pay the approx 500 dollor repair bill for the head gasket. But, both her and my old 1994 cav did and does get great gas millage. The day I traded in my old cavalier for my new 04 it was still getting 26mpg. They can't be beat in the snow either. I can't tell you how many times I have passed by four wheel drive iggets stuck in the snow in my cavalier(laughing all the way and pointing too). Put four snows on a cav (even thow it's a front wheel drive car, better handling) and it will take you anyplace you want to go. My brothers G/F also owns a cav and she loves hers as well.
There are a few things that I wish gm hadden't done to "compeat" such as makeing anti-locking breaks an option on the cavalier. In a panic breaking situation it was nice to know all someone would had to do to stop was hold their foot down on the peddle and let the abs do the rest. Now, if you don't spend the extra grand for the antilock breaks you not only have to react to a panic breaking situation but remember to "pump" your breaks when doing so to keep them from locking up. I blame neon's and honda's for this change. They don't come standard with abs either and that is why they were able to sell their cars for so much less than a "well equiped" cavalier. All, in all I love my cavaliers. And the feeling of blowing away any stock civic and neon off the line in my 04 cavalier is a sweet feeling.

we had a 99......b4 we got rid of it....we had 2 window motors go out....another was on the was out and changed the tranny fluid at Precision tune and a couple months later the tranny died.....car had about 110k miles on it when we got rid or it.....i was happy when we did :)

I dont believe Cavaliers are Garbage. It all dends on how you run and maintane them. I have also heard if you stop at the last minute..sure you will go through brakes like nothing and warp them. So..stop soonder and not at the last minute HA! i learned this the hard way and had to replace mine and never had problem since..
My Cavalier has 118,000 miles on it and still running strong. Only thing i need replaced right now is a TCC solenoid which is no major biggie. Other than that i LOVE my cavalier. Still wish i would have gotten the Z24 but hey..it's a good little car. I would buy another cavalier but not liking the new design of the cavaliers...the front i can live with but what's with the frickin one tail light? HA! uni-light its like a uni-brow or something HA!..but you have to admit they do grow on you and they are a bit stylish. But all in all..i love cavaliers.

If I would have listened to the advice of people talking of which cars not to buy, I would not be driving as there is no car clear of at least one persons hatred. This is why I say we have to trust our own experiences and perhaps learn the hard way. I had a 80 cutlass with a 455 on propane with a billion miles on it...it ran like shit, I treated it like shit, but it never broke down on me and left me stranded. Other than initial repairs to get it to pass an inspection, I didn't spend a cent on it. I drove it for a year and I don't think I changed the oil on it...I was young and stupid. I then got a 80 chev half ton and it cost me more than the monthly payments on a new cav to fix it every month. Then I traded it in for 300 bucks and got a 2000 2.2l sohc 2 door cav. I love the car and it treats me well. I have had some work done on it due to abs wiring problem which was fixed on used vehicle warranty from GM Optimum. That works for me, but not everyone will have the same luck with the same vehicles. Not every car is the same even if it has the same name.
Also my girlfriend's 95 cavalier with 280K on it still runs better than most cars out there...so is there any one car that is perfect? No.

djabyan....glad to hear the comment about your girls 95!!! I am actually looking at a 95 at the moment. I'm new here but I still have to comment. Forums like this is just to vent and make others aware. If you come into it trying to deter someone from getting a certain vehicle...everyone would ride mopeds. In the last few days I have researched about 20 different cars and every one has its loyal following of bashers....and of praisers. EVERY car can have issues. I had a 95 mustang GT convertable that I LOVED...but it had problems. Heads, harmonic balancer busted (talk about a vibrator), and after all that was fixed the throwout bearing dumped. Everyone I ever knew bashed the neons. I had a 96....BEST car I ever owned. I had one problem when the tranny fluid line up front popped off and that was it. So stay calm folks and don't get to rude when bashing someones ride.....your friend may pull up with one and prove you wrong. Every car I have researched has normal any car problems (ok so early dodge stratus' are just crazy with the head gaskets). If you like the car, and it runs good and drives good for you...don't be afraid to get it cause you read that someone hates it. I am sitting here reading problems with the cav and after tomorrow I will prolly own one :)

One thing ive learned with gm cars in general. Do not depress the clutch all the way to the floor. It make the clutch wear faster and shift worse. Depress the clutch to just when it dis engages and shift and then let it back out. And voiala a smooth shift.

Hi Boots3 sorry it took a while to answer you.
Been workin' like a dog trying to pay off all the repairs on the Cavalier.

Just kidding.

This is from GM's website describing the VLX.

"features like power windows, power mirrors, power door locks, adjustable tilt steering wheel, CD player and remote keyless entry system. And that's just for starters. Body-colour side mouldings add to the sporty appearance.'

Dunno what the Yank equivalant would be though...

ScoobyDoo2003, After fighting with GM and contacting a company called "CAMVAP" Gm put new rotors on my car and the problem hasnt recurred.
Same Driver, same route, same car and driving habits... no problem.
As I thought all along, the problem was in the rotors.

MikeyBart, I wish I would of known that earlier.
GM or any of their representitives never once mentioned the buy back option to me. As a matter of fact, around 40k, I called the dealer aware of all its problems and asked what could be done for me to getout of it.

His suggestion was to put it on the used car lot or 'Try to sell it in the paper'.

04cav, I paid $17,700 for it on one of those real low intrest deals.
Thats just another of GM's scams... like the constant extra charges when you bring your car in for warranty. They will charge you 0.9% intrest but unbeknowst to you, you pay an additional $1,500 - $1,800 bucks.

cya.

you got ripped off dawg... that's not GM's fault that's your fault for paying that at a dealership.

I bought my Grand Am for $11000 brand new because I knew how to haggle at the end of the model year.

one thing that will warp the rotors is hitting them with cold water while washing the car if the rotors havent cooled down yet.

you got ripped off dawg... that's not GM's fault that's your fault for paying that at a dealership.

I bought my Grand Am for $11000 brand new because I knew how to haggle at the end of the model year.

Good point Spyhunter... Being overcharged was just one of my greifs with the car however.
GM's indifference to my requests to correct the faults on a brand new car, then try to loop me into paying more every time they were in possesion of my car has been and still is the reason why I continue on this and other threads.
The dealer charging to much for the car was just the beggining of GM's cycle of lies and cash-grabbing.
Read this thread in its entirety.

Ebritt, that as well is an excellent suggestion but as I said, GM replaced the rotors under warranty and the problem has not recurred. allow me to cut and paste here...

'After fighting with GM and contacting a company called "CAMVAP" Gm put new rotors on my car and the problem hasnt recurred.
Same Driver, same route, same car and driving habits... no problem.
As I thought all along, the problem was in the rotors.'


Just a heads up guys. I see you guys love your 'Cavs'. I do not mean to insult you. All I'm trying to do here is warn you that if you need help from GM, you will not get it.

I just bought a 2004 Cav 3 days ago for 10,500 with 6yr/100,000 warranty. I got the warranty because now a days to make cars lighter, they also got crappier. I had a Honda that had trans problem before 100k, a Ford Mustang that blew its heads twice in 68,000 miles. First one was recalled. Olds Alero which is already showing major repair signs before 55,000. My cars in the 80's didn't think of major problems till well into the 100k miles. I hope this cav gives me some hope for any new cars. All cars before were well kept and used. This new one will let me know if maybe I'm doing something wrong. Now I need to disable the DRL's.

Yeah, sometimes shit happens rklesla.

My point isn't weather or not the Cavalier is built well ...I have my own thoughts on that and have made clear... But rather how GM dealt with these problems when they were presented to them. If you do have recurrant problems with them I mentioned an outfit in an earlier post called 'CAMVAP' at www.camvap.ca that stepped in and helped out.

You and everyone reading this should be warned though, CAMVAP is an arbitration outfit that is funded by the automobile industry.

When you call them in to help, the dealer/mfg you have made the complaint about has 10 days to respond. This was great for me because they had been blowing me off for over 18 months up to that point however the bad side is you have to decide to use CAMVAP or small claims court. Not both.

I took a gamble and used CAMVAP, and shortly after they became involved received a phone call from GM. This quickly turned into just another round of GM trying to weasel out of the many problems I had with simplistic, self serving answers. In this case, by saying 5 brake jobs in a year is simple 'maintenance'. At least the women on the other end of the phone this time was a kind 'Grandmotherly' person and not the rude, controlling and condescending women I had been dealing with up to this point.

Anyway, I told her I'd see her at the CAMVAP hearing and a day later got a call saying GM was going to 'help me' with a 'goodwill gesture' that 'in no way admits they were in the wrong'.

One more time GM tried to weasel out of making their problem right and some supervisor probably thought it was cheaper to replace my rotors then to fly a lawyer in to shithole, Alberta to fight this. Interestingly enough, when I brought the car in to have this done no mention was made to have the ABS harness replaced. (This was in an earlier post)


So stay on them rklesla. And if anything go's wrong, anything at all, DO NOT give them the benefit of the doubt.

03 cav... i love it....

That sucks. I had a 92 cav, 98 and now a 04. I have had no problems with any of them. The 92 and 98 I drove the crap out of them. The 04 I'm going to be more gently as I don't plan on replacing any time soon. I had a Ranger that would accelerrat all on its own. I had it in the shop a few times. They were never able to verify the problem. They fought me on it and that was that I got rid of it. My cousin had an explorer that would shut off when ever you stopped unless you put it in nuetral. The dealer said they had no idea what was wrong and adviced her to trade it in. Because no one they talked to could figure out what was wrong. So she traded it in on a contour. People deal with dissapointment in different ways. Some say oh well shrug their shoulders and move on. And some go out screaming. Do what you must. But if all Cavaliers and gm dealers were that bad they would be out of business. Same holds true for any business. I would like to wish you better luck in the future.

I just bought a 91 RS wagon for a hundred bucks and I knew that all it needed was freeze plugs( I even told the guy that before he decided to get rid of it). I have dealt with Cavaliers for a long time and have had good luck with the 4 banger versions but have had lots of trouble from the V6 3.1 and Z-24's.
As far as buying anything from GM "Never Again!" Not because of quality issues but because I work in the automotive industry and know for a fact that GM is working towards closing as many plants in the US as possible. If you want to support American Workers buy an American Made Nissan ,Toyota or other "import" built by an American.

[email protected]

Have a 96 and a 94. Previously owned an 89 and an 84. Although I have had a few problems and am currently tearing my hair out on the 96 problem, you can't beat them for cheap transportation. My experience is if you can't get at least 200K mi out of one then it was either a lemon or was abused. Even then, my 84 was bought for $300 with 120K on it and I drove it another 100K before I wore the Transaxle out and I dogged it.
By keeping my transportation costs low, I was able to pay my house off last year.
I'm sold even with known problems.

Just a quick update;
Just got my hands on a copy of Consumer reports 2001 car issue.

Cavaliers are noted in it for having rotor problems.

sparky, i agree with u on the fact that a good cavy can carry u 200k miles w/o much problems. every model of car can have certain problems. i bought my 94 cav 7 yrs ago and have put almost 180k miles on it(granted the new 27K miles on a replaced Corsica motor). i have played around with the idea of getting another car, but whenever i think i've found something i like just as good, i look at my car and i'm reminded of just how much i love that damm car. the body styling, not to mention modification possiblilities are what keeps me hooked

I'm just an old guy who's had experience with a lot of different car makes Angel. Ford, Volkswagon, Chevy, Olds, Buick, Chrysler, Honda, and Jeep just to mention a few. I've done my share of work on all of them and the only ones that I would own again are the Jeep and the Cavaliers. The Jeep is easy to work on, but I can't beat the low cost of the Cav's even with the aggravation of changing heater cores (a hateful job), head gaskets (two days of misery), and figuring out whether the timing chain has jumped or not (currently working on). There's plenty of them on the road, you can pick them up cheap used and the parts are generally interchangeable from year to year for a range of years making them relatively cheap too. Oh yeah, I pass a lot of expensive, fancy cars that are broke down on the side of the road.

Just posting to keep this thread alive....

I have had too many cars to count, all of them have been no better or worse than my Cavalier. I have had Mazdas, Toyotas, and even Fords, even an old AMC.

I had a new Camaro back in 95, two months after purchase, it needed a fuel pump. IN fact there were so many things wrong with the car including it needing a transmission before 100,000 miles, that I just had to do the bankruptcy thing and let them have the car back.

Since then, I have had two more Cavaliers (the latest is my third). My only complaint is that my new Cavalier is only two months old and the dash makes noise already. I do wish that Chevy wasn't discontuing the Cav after 2005 but oh well.

I've had my RS 9 years and 109,000 miles and she still has all the original parts including the break pads, the only thing i've needed to replace is the alternator and a battery. she's cheaper on gas and has out live 3 other cars i've bought. she only costs me around $300.00 a year to run including gas.

I've had my RS 9 years and 109,000 miles and she still has all the original parts including the break pads, the only thing i've needed to replace is the alternator and a battery. she's cheaper on gas and has out live 3 other cars i've bought. she only costs me around $300.00 a year to run including gas.

personally i htink cavaliers are great cars... My friend has a 2002 cavalier that he bought after it was in a major collision and it is one of the best running cavalies iahev ever seen. I personally am going to buy a 1999 z24 from him that was in a rollover becuz i beleive they are such good little cars. To each his own.

Every car has problems. Just because yours has more because you treat it like shit doesn't mean all Cavys are bad cars.

Go troll somewhere else.