Should I buy a used Pontiac Montana?

brett13

I'm in the process of buying a 2000 Pontiac Montana. It has over 137,000 miles. However after test driving the van, I found it to be in very good condition. To the point , if you were to cover up the milage indicator, and tell me to guess. I would say it has 10,000 miles. Really, it feels and drives like a brand new one. Solid, know rattles, thumps, or dings. All the power is there and then some. It has the 3.4L, The inside is like new as well. My question is, should I worry about the 137,000 miles? Are they dependable with high milage?

tickleman

I'm going to be honest. I've owned 2 2000 Montana's. I enjoyed both of them until they started having problems. The first one the electrical system fried on. It had a faulty ground and evidently that isn't covered under warranty for some reason. I figured that that one must have been a fluke so I decided to go ahead and trade it in on a second one. Within' 3 months I had it in the dealership 3 times. The motor for the sliding door went out, then my 4 yo son had 3 bones broken in the back of his hand because the automatic door closed on it (they take significant force to stop, I weigh 200lbs and was sliding on gravel and had the door push me about 3 inches before it decided to open back up) The dealer told me this is something they are looking into fixing, but no one has been seriously injured, so they don't forsee this getting fixed anytime soon, if at all. Then at 49K miles I had to have the transmission pressure solenoid replaced. Now at 73K miles, I have replaced in my garage: head gaskets, ignition coils, voltage regulator (twice), and the auto leveling compressor. After all that money and time, the transmission is making a weird rumbling sound. Between this and my numerous problems with my 98 grand prix (90K miles and over 20000 in repair work over 10 years.), I have decided that I will probably never purchase a Pontiac again. Also, make sure the joints between the firewall and pillars does not leak, I went out one morning and opened my door and found a small lake on the passenger side floorboard. The dealer told me this is normal for Pontiacs over 5 years old due to body flex.

mooneydriver

I have had remarkable luck with the Montana. I have a 2000 that i just put on the used market. Am only selling it because it has 304,000 miles on it. Everything still works fine, but I got nervous about the miles since I still reavel a lot. No major repairs and it still gets 27 mpg. Bought a used 2002 with 38,000 miles on it.

woolverton7

Wow! I'm surprised that it is in such good condition for being a 2000 with 137,000 miles on it. I would be careful though if I were you. We bought a 2000 Montana used that appeared to be in excellent condition also and it only had something like 20,000 miles on it. Shortly after we bought it, little by little we began to have electrical problems. I don't feel I can trust the van. Sometimes things don't work and then start working again days later with no rhyme or reason. On our van this includes the door locks, windows and instrument panel, but not all things on the instrument panel at the same time. Sometimes the airbag light comes on and then other times it doesn't, so we never know if the airbags are going to work or not if we need them. Over a short period of time all the lights on the display of the stereo went out one by one. Now we can't see the time or radio stations and have no way of being able to adjust the settings. After spending $50 to have the lights behind the stereo display replaced, it still didn't work. Then we found out that these stereo displays are not fixable. Even though the stereo itself stills plays the radio and CD's, we would have to replace the entire unit.

Just yesterday our battery seemed to die for no apparent reason, so we replaced it. Then immediately after it was replaced, a very faint ticking noise we have had in the engine, that we were led to believe was normal, got very loud. Now we are afraid to drive it.

In looking up answers to may van problems I noticed that many people seem to have electrical problems with there 2000 Montana's. I will never by another one!

tuesdaysgone

I would reconsider buying a used Pontiac. I have had 3 and have sworn off GM products forever now. My latest is a 2004 Pontiac Montana. I have the famous Cluster problem in the instrument panel. It started by blowing fuses in the back cargo area, and lighter area. First the heat gauge went wonky. 6 Months later the gas gauge went crazy. Now I am driving with out a speedometer it just went on the weekend.

I suspect the ground is crazy, I always get foggy headlights when it rains. I had water sitting in my headlights, and the Geniuses at my local City Pontaic Buick Dealership drilled holes in the plastic housing of the headlights to let the sitting water out. This seems to have made my problem worse. There only advice is to laugh and say it's a 500 - 700 $ job to have a new panel put in and they only do it in Whitby.

Without proper seals I think it will be throwing 5 - 7 hundred $ in the wind.