As you said "drive it" may be the best course. I have always spent alot of time keeping my vehicles in top shape washing and polishing after each journey in a rain storm. As a result they sell almost as soon as they hit the dealers lot. Chief beneficiary, the dealers! I do like the idea of having a different driving experience in a different vehicle but the cons may outweigh the pros in the final analysis.
If your a "car freak".........Cost be Da**ed ! I keep my DeVille, Chevy truck, GTO, Escort, Triumph, and my recent 1984 Z-28 purchase all on the road and ready to roll as the mood strikes me !
BTW: Where I live in NY and at my age........... Plates and insurance is cheap ! Gas is a different story................
Its been 50 and sunny here in Syracuse NY the last few days so I have been hammering the Z.........
Too much snow in front of the barn and crap on the road to bust out the Triumph or Goat !!!!!!!!! Plus I would have to jockey the jet-skis and lawn tractor out of the way.
Enjoyed your post very much. Sometimes we have to do things just for the fun of doing them, your post suggests that you understand that. Have not decided about a second vehicle yet. Have a large two car garage that could accomodate two large cars. Of course with all the ins and outs of maintenance and insurance I will look carefully before I leap.
Yea, I got the dreary Escort back from the kid. He decided that he would practice extra hard learning to operate the stick shift Cav. !! Its a NICE clean lo mile geezer car I bought cheap!
It was a PIA to swap the "boom-boom' sound system from one to the other !!!!!!!!!!!
Now the kid wants "dubs and spinnaz". NO problem son......You got $2500 cash saved?..........DUH!!!!
The Z came up from NC with a beautiful body, t-tops, LOADED with a bad tranny, $500 bucks ! Now finished with a fresh modified 700-r, new brakes and tires, headliner and a few odds and ends in it. Total cost $1500 bucks !!!!!!!!!!!! (Thank god me and my car freak buds can spin a wrench!)
Kid about pissed his pants seeing that bad boy in the driveway. Thought HE WAS gonna get it !!!!!!! LOL!!!
Yea, I need my 16 yo and his buds wrapped around a tree after school in that monster..............
But the Cav is a safer car anyhoo SLOW plus belts/bags/abs.
It's amazing what kids can do with underpowered cars. I have that coming in another year or two with a new driver. I'm thinking of keeping my 98 LeSabre running for him to learn in. Heavy and relatively solid.
When I was 16 I went to school AND worked a 40 hour week and drove a 67 Chevelle SS 396.............
I smashed that one up in a year and wanted a 68 Camaro. Secret was it was a genuine YENKO YSC 427 only $2400 bucks It was during the 73/74 oil embargo and super cars were selling dirt cheap.............. Dad wouldn't allow it............So I got the GTO........ (and STILL have it 31 years later)
Man, You know how much that car is worth today. I followed it around the Syracuse area for a few years and rumor has it Reggie Jackson now has it in his collection!
I was surprised to find an oil spot under the front of my car this morning. I immediately called the dealer to ask if I could bring it in to inspect. Upon putting it on the rack we discovered an oil seal leak that was showing moisture in the bottom center section. My dealer is an independent family owned in same location for over thirty years. He called the local Cadillac dealership to describe in more technical terms what he found. I have an appointment later in the week (my dealer said problem was not critical). What would cause an oil seal leak with such low mileage? The Cadillac dealership has offered a loaner if they need to keep the car overnight, can I expect a good quality car as a loaner (I have already asked for a quality loaner). Will a call to Cadillac help insure that I get something decent as a loaner? This is my first experience with problems of this type my, 98 Deville, and 97 Chrysler LHS were trouble free as were my earlier cars. An oil seal leak at 29,000 miles seems unusual in my car ownership history. are they common in recent low mileage Devilles? Fortunately the car is under Cadillac warranty until July of 2007. Oddly this has lessened my interest in a second car as I can see that when these things start happening you might spend a lot of time on maintenance issues. Any feedback appreciated. I will of course report on the progress and outcome of this issue.
The Northstar motor is quite complicated compared to a regular v-8. Block is not cast in 1 piece with the good 'ol oil pan, intake,valve covers and related gaskets etc.
It is assembled in pieces with MANY gaskets.... upper case, lower case, yada, yada.
Take a trip to the GMpowertrain.com site (and other dedicated Caddy sites) and see how many pieces make up this engine not to mention posts from folks with older N-stars and oil leaks and how $pendy they are to fix............................ Some folks let them drip and keep their eye on oil level. Others fret and have them fixed !
If its under warranty..........RUN to the dealer and have it documented and poss. repaired for free. I would..............
My dealer has rental cars available. To the extent that my warranty coverage allows for a replacement car while mine is worked on, they pay for the rental. I got a Suburban to drive the last time I needed a loner. The Suburban was all that the rental agency had available.
Oil seals can develop leaks for any number of reasons. A seal that is good will probably last indefinitly, while a seal that has some imperfection will hopefully fail before the warranty expires.
The drip so far is small limited to a few drops overnight in the garage, I have put plastic sheeting down to protect garage floor. The initial response from the local Cadillac dealer was to say that the repair will be covered by warranty but they have not put the car on the rack to inspect. Appointment is Friday. I spoke with customer service about a loaner, they will provide me something basic but will consider a car similar to my 2004 Deville. I called Cadillac customer service in Michigan for information and assistance. I had a rep. that could have cared less, is it any wonder that the GM stock price is at $ 20 or less. Have never owned a foreign car so don't have any experience with customer service with as an example, Lexus. Am most appreciative for the responses here and will continue to report developments. My 98 Deville with the older Northstar had no leak problems. Many thanks for the responses.
Consider yourself LUCKY they provide ANY freebie loaner car. On the few occasions I needed Caddy service I was given a free loaner. Sometimes a Caddy, sometimes a used brand x car............
When my Chevy was in for service it was "have fun walking or we have a rental counter"
But MOST dealers run some kind of free shuttle service to get ya where yoour going and pick ya back up !
You said " I spoke with customer service about a loaner, they will provide me something basic but will consider a car similar to my 2004 Deville. I called Cadillac customer service in Michigan for information and assistance. I had a rep. that could have cared less"
Read your manual. Read your warranty.
Neither says you will get a loaner when your car is being repaired.
If, out of the goodness of their heart, you dealership wishes to give you a loaner, then fine. But corporate Cadillac doesn't have anything to do with this.
My warranty book states that while my car is being worked on, some sort of transportation may be available and that the dealer should be consulted. What might be available depends on the dealer.
I will say that a Rolls Royce owner who expects to get Rolls loaner to drive is being silly in my opinion. Like I said above, when my car was out of service for transmission work they got me a rental (at someone else's expense) Suburban to drive. Since the car was out only overnight, I would have been happy for a ride home then picked up the next day to get the car. That is the way they did it the first time the transmission was worked on. They put the wrong part (gasket) in, so they needed to redo the work, so I got a loaner although I did not ask for one.
In my Cadillac "experience" a loaner car was ALWAYS provided to me a no charge at any time I needed major service. If there wasn't a car avail. at that moment they would run me home and pick me back up !
But in all fairness I DID purchase 3 Caddies from this dealer.................
Did I ever mention my sisters BMW repair fun? She had to wait for me to pick her up in my "lower status" Caddy while "fritz" gleefully had cash register bells ringing in his head from $pendy BMW non-warranty repairs........ NO ride for her...........Weird she LOVES those cars!
Many thanks for the responses regarding loaner car policies. I am getting an education on all this as I have not had this situation before. I live in a rural area with the nearest services about five miles away. Considering this I will prepare for the potential responses if a loaner is needed. Odd that at the very time I'm considering a second car this issue occurs. Depending on how it all turns out I will have a little more inclination as to whether I need a second car. My local independent car dealer says I don't. Since he's in business of selling cars I put some weight on his opinion.
If you only need a second car a few times during the year, a rental is almost certainly the cheapest way to go. Even if your dealer does not supply a loaner, a rental is cheaper than a second car would be.
Consider yourself lucky your only 5 miles away from Cadillac dealer service.................
I live out in the STICKS and the nearest Caddy dealer is a minimum of 40 miles away as the crow flies ! Chevy dealer 15 miles...........
But on the plus side there is a little repair shop1 mile away that charges ONLY $35 hr. flat rate (chiltons time guide) for ANY off warranty work that I may need.................
When I bought my 03 DeVille in Syracuse NY the salesman and his wife drove it to our Alexandria Bay NY (resort area along the US/Canadian border) motel operation 200 mile round trip)on a Sat. to deliver it and pick up our 96 DeVille trade!
They stayed (free) in one of our rooms and we ALL went out to dinner/party at nite and did a little boating/ fishin' while the girls went window shopping in town !
I went to the dealer as scheduled and on putting the car on the rack they did not find firm evidence of an oil seal leak. But did suspect that the oil filter was either loose or defective. The technician changed the filter and added some dye to the oil. Since the leak was dripping from the bottom of the oil filter there is a good probability that the leak is resolved, we will know in a few days. They also are ordering new buttons for my cruise control to see if that corrects the cruise issue. The best part was the really courteous and attentive service I received from both the technician and the service advisor. I was in and out in less than an hour. Since I like the Cadillac brand this will go a long way to buying another one if the service continues as it was today.
Ya got the dye job huh? Thats a SURE sign of a GOOD service tech. spinnin' the wrench on your Caddy !!!! Instead of doing the "throw parts at it" diagnosis.
Now your cruise issue.........Like I said....Its US OLD geezers not pushing the right button on the steering wheel (Those darn confusing buttons!!)!!!!!!!!!!! LOL!
You know I had/have the SAME problem as you with my 03!
My truck and Zs cruise on the stalk both work perfect !
The buttons for the cruise control could be defective and when they are pushed could send more than the one signal that they are supposed to. The set and coast buttons are the same and if when you pust the button to set the cruise at a speed and some extra signals are generated, then the fist signal will set the cruise, and the next one or more signals will be interpreted as coast signals resulting in the set speed to be one or a few MPH slower.
There is an oil level sensor somewhere. A leaky oil filter is certainly a possibility. The dye will show where the oil is coming from if the leak continues. I had a couple of oil leaks on my 98 Aurora, which was a first generation northstar engine. The first leak was a valve cover leak which was fixed under warranty. The second leak started after the power steering pump needed replacement. I think some bolts were loose on the front of the engine. After they were tightened, the leak stopped.
Has been 24 hours and no further oil leaking, my intuition tells me that it was the oil filter whether loose or defective, will never know for sure, than again is only 24 hours but the fact the garage is bone dry tells me problem solved. It was good of the dealership to show so much interest in resolving the cruise issue whether they resolve it or not. This will be their third try. Of course it is warranty work so GM will pay them for their efforts. Am I correct in suspecting that when you had the described problems in your 98 Aurora that the car had much higher mileage than the 28,000 on my 2004 Deville?
I don't recall when the valve cover started to leak. The Aurora was still under warranty, so my guess would be around 30,000 to 40,000 miles. The power steering started to go after 50,000 miles and the car was no longer under warranty. I do recall being told that the valve cover problem was a $1200 job to repair. I think that the engine needed to be removed to get at the cover.
Your cruise control problem is either in the buttons or there is a source of spurious signals somewhere else in the wiring. If the problem is somewhere in the wiring, then fixing it is probably only possible if all the wiring is replaced. My cruise control still works very well. There are some other electronic problems since the transmission was worked on, but they are not affecting anything but the fuel used. I still have to decide if I want to get an extended warranty beyond the 4_year/50000_mile period.
Thanks for that valuable information. It has been two days since we changed the oil filter and no further evidence of oil leaks. If it does leak again I will bring up this sensor above the oil filter as a check point.
I can live with the cruise as it is if I have to but it would be nice if they could fix so it would be as good as my 98 Deville or for that matter my 93 Plymouth which was traded in 1998 for my Chrysler LHS. The LHS also had little buttons on the steering wheel but worked much better than the cruise on the 2004 Deville.
Regarding warranties I bought a seven year 100,000 mile extended warranty on my 2004 Deville for a little over $ 1000 dollars. Nice part is that the unused portion of the premium is refundable if the car is traded before expiration of warranty. I got over $ 700 dollars refunded on the warranty for my 98 Deville when traded in. So my cost was about -0- in that the car was on the extended warranty when the alternator went and I paid nothing for the repair. The job was billed with parts and labor at about $335.00. The name of the warranty company is Wynns. Am sure there are some other good ones out there but my pre-owned dealer uses Wynns and arranged the repair when I needed it. Whether you decide to buy a warranty is a very individual decision. If it was not for the pro rated refund for unused portion I would be much less likely to purchase.
I have 85k miles, stalls and rough idle. has some (three or four) small oil drip leaks under the motor on the ground after the car sits and cools. pvc valve is ok. any idea are very muchly appreciated. new to edmunds, Thanks!
The buttons on the cruise were changed but there was no change in the efficiency of the cruise system. The new buttons were indistinguishable from the old ones. Guess I could have put a small mark on the old ones to know they were changed for sure.
While there is no more oil leaking from the oil filter the service tech wants to change the "oil filter adapter". Since this is a part I am unable to see I have agreed in that the car is still under warranty.
I am not sure what you mean by "efficiency". Your cruise control problems were that the speed you were trying to "set" would not be the speed that the cruise actually was at. This has nothing to do with "efficiency". Either you cruise set buttons are working right or they are not, but this was an intermittent problem, so have you had the repaired car long enough to determine that it is not fixed.
If it is not fixed, then you have a problem in the wiring I think.
Does anyone know how to get the trunk lock crest or the hood ornament off of an 88? Anything you can tell me at all will help, as I have no idea whatsoever about how to do either. Thanks,
The technician drove the car the day he changed the buttons and said that the performance of the cruise was consistent with this model car (2004 Deville) so I could carry this on indefinitely but am content to use as is. It was not my intention to bring it up again but when I had to take the car in for the oil leak I let them have another look at the cruise and change the buttons. I will mention the question of the wiring the day they put in the new oil filter adapter part. Many thanks for your input.
Either the cruise controls are now, with the new buttons, working right; or they are not working right. As I understood your problem, it was intermittent, so have you actually driven the new buttons long enough for them to fail or not?
Either there was a problem of some sort with the cruise controls, or the operator was sending by accident extra signals, so that the cruise settings would shift.
Drove 125 miles today no change in performance of cruise. I did not plan to bring this issue up again at the dealership in that they had looked at it three times before and failed to find the problem. The cruise as it works is adequate but no match for the 98 Deville or the Chrysler products I drove in the past. Since highly trained GM personnel have driven the car and said that the performance is in the normal range I am ready to put the matter behind me. Have you read the paper regarding GM lately? Lost half its market value, cut its dividend in half, tens of thousands of layoffs and much more as you may know. My neighbors while liking the Cadillac product switched to Lincoln in that they felt the customer service at GM was poor. I am not a Lincoln lover but would buy a Lexus if there was a dealership near me.
I have a busy life and WOULD NOT have spent any more time on the cruise issue if the car hadn't developed the oil leak but since I was there anyway I let them have one more chance at the cruise. Incidently the new Service manager at the Chrysler dealership owns a Chevrolet with the same problem, his works the same as mine, it was his opinion that there is no way to correct (probably an inability to diagnose the problem by GM).
While my next car may be another Cadillac my experience with this whole issue leaves the question open.
Well, my 2002 Seville's cruise control works very well. My understanding of your problem (I went back to the original posts) is that your cruise settings drift downward from the set speed by several MPH. One thing that has never been clear to me is just when this took place. Either you set the speed at say 65 MPH and the cruise takes over and the speed of the car slows down right away to say 59 MPH; OR.... the cruise takes over and you are cruising at 65 MPH to start with, but after some period of time (say 10 minutes or more) you notice that you are now cruising at 59 MPH. If your problem took several minutes to appear, then I suspect that you may, at times, accidentally push down on the "set button", which is the coast button when the cruise is engaged. Punching the "coast" button one or more times will reduce the speed by 1 MPH for each hit.
GM is currently well on its way to bankruptcy. They lost about $5 billion in the last quarter, or $20 billion per year. They will be in chapter 7 soon.
It is too bad that your life is so busy that you have no time to enjoy life. I am retired.
I am busy enjoying life to and sitting around a dealership is not what for me is enjoyment. The oil leak re appeared after by 125 mile journey yesterday. The dealership was good about getting me in within an hour of my call. They changed the oil filter adapter gasket. hopefully that will solve the oil leak. We will need some time to see if that solves the problem. The speed after the cruise is set drops immediately from one to six miles an hour and then stabilizes. Often it will only drop one to two miles an hour but has dropped as much as six after the cruise light has lit on the dashboard. As said before I can live with it, actually has caused my driving skills to sharpen in that I have to watch the speed more closely than in any previous car I owned. I prefer the style of the Deville and Cadillac line over most other cars I have seen so I think we would agree that life isn't perfect. The oil leak is another matter in that if not resolved soon it would cause a serious reservation about build design and the time factor spent at the dealership. We will see. Many thanks for your continuing interest and responses.
Northstars do not have a usual block and 'oil pan'. They have a 'split block' design, with a major seal a significant ways up from the bottom of the block.
This seal is well known to leak as the motor gets some age on it.
The motor has to be pulled to replace this seal. Expensive.
I think you should be aware of this so you can start building your 'serious reservation about build design' because it could happen to your car.
And, have you heard about blown Northstar head gaskets?
Since the drop in speed from the set speed takes place immeadiately, there must be some additional signals from somewhere that is interpreted as a coast signal. Can you add the missing speed by pushing the accelerate button a few times to add the missing miles per hour? Each time you push the accelerate button down will add 1 MPH. Of course, the problem is that you may also generate some additional coast signals too...
As I have pointed out before, my cruise control does not do this. Your cruise control system, or perhaps more to the point, your cars entire electrical system is compromised somewhere, so do not be surprised if the car shuts down somewhere, sometime and refuses to move. This will probably happen at the worst possible time.
The resume accel. button corrects the problem one mph at a time and is very accurate. I doubt the car will shut down as you suggest as it has never done so after eighteen months of ownership. In addition it has been driven by three Technicians from Cadillac who I think would have at least warned me if there was that potential. In addition there is another Cadillac owner that posts here with a similar problem with no history of a shutdown. More likely a flat tire than an engine shutdown related to this quirky cruise control. I think that the worst that will happen is that the cruise system just quits but the rest of the car continues to work. My original warranty runs until July of 2007 and my extended bumper to bumper warranty runs until 2011. I think my protection in this regard is adequate.
That would be me with a 03 DeVille and a quirky cruise !
Had dealer check it out once and they "reflashed" the PCM.
I still think its us old farts and those confusing steering wheel buttons ! The "old fashoned" cruise on the stalk on my other GM vehicles work flawlessly !!!!!!!
Almost 30k miles and NO other problems or issues.... :shades:
I may need to buy a car soon and i am struggling with this idea. For the same amount of mony to buy a new impala ($22K), you can buy a 4- or 5-years old top-line Cadillac with 30K or 40K miles. I may need to drive a lot on highway and I am assuming the Deville will be more comfortable than the Impala. But with Cadillac, I may have to use Premium gas and pay more on maintainance. There is also the image issue. So what do you guys think about this? Please give me some input.
If the resume button, which is the same switch as the set button, only pushed the other way, can adjust the speed with no side effects, then I wonder just what the actual problem really is. I suspect that you are having problems setting the speed correctly for one reason or another and the cruise system is working perfectly well. It must be that or there are shorts in your wiring which probably would by this time have caused additional problems.
I will agree with you that your electrical system is probably not going to cause any serious problems. However, your warranty will not make an inoperative car more convenient, it will just pay for the expense of repairing it.
An aging Cadillac would not have a warranty. The Cadillac would probably be more comfortable than the Impala, but you need to try both out to see. Impala's are not bad cars and the engines are much less complex than Cadillac's aluminum DOHC V8.
I own a 2004 Deville, have considered a second car. The one I would first consider (have not test driven) is the Mercury Grand Marque or the Ford Crown Victoria). To me these are very attractive cars but more importantly I believe they are the best value in the large sedan market. There are several 2005 currently available at the local Ford dealership. The amazing part is the price, one of them in white with a little over 15,000 miles on it(LS model) is priced at $14,900. It is a certified car. It has most of the features that my Deville has but the price is what caught my attention. You may not be attracted to the Ford line of cars but if you haven't considered or are not familiar with the line you may which to consider for a second car. I suspect they are available in most areas of the country at similar prices.
Comments
washing and polishing after each journey in a rain storm. As a result they sell almost as soon as they hit the dealers lot. Chief beneficiary, the dealers! I do like the idea of having a different driving experience in a different vehicle but the cons may outweigh the pros in the final analysis.
I keep my DeVille, Chevy truck, GTO, Escort,
Triumph, and my recent 1984 Z-28 purchase all
on the road and ready to roll as the mood strikes
me !
BTW: Where I live in NY and at my age...........
Plates and insurance is cheap !
Gas is a different story................
Its been 50 and sunny here in Syracuse NY the last
few days so I have been hammering the Z.........
Too much snow in front of the barn and crap on the
road to bust out the Triumph or Goat !!!!!!!!!
Plus I would have to jockey the jet-skis and lawn
tractor out of the way.
Its a "sickness" I saay !!!!!!!!!!! :P
that you understand that. Have not decided about a second vehicle yet. Have a large two car garage that could accomodate two large cars. Of course with all the ins and outs of maintenance and insurance I will look carefully before I leap.
He decided that he would practice extra hard
learning to operate the stick shift Cav. !!
Its a NICE clean lo mile geezer car I bought cheap!
It was a PIA to swap the "boom-boom' sound system
from one to the other !!!!!!!!!!!
Now the kid wants "dubs and spinnaz". NO problem
son......You got $2500 cash saved?..........DUH!!!!
The Z came up from NC with a beautiful body, t-tops,
LOADED with a bad tranny, $500 bucks !
Now finished with a fresh modified 700-r, new brakes
and tires, headliner and a few odds and ends in it.
Total cost $1500 bucks !!!!!!!!!!!!
(Thank god me and my car freak buds can spin a wrench!)
Kid about pissed his pants seeing that bad boy in the driveway. Thought HE WAS gonna get it !!!!!!! LOL!!!
Yea, I need my 16 yo and his buds wrapped around a tree
after school in that monster..............
But the Cav is a safer car anyhoo SLOW plus belts/bags/abs.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
When I was 16 I went to school AND worked a 40 hour week
and drove a 67 Chevelle SS 396.............
I smashed that one up in a year and wanted a 68 Camaro.
Secret was it was a genuine YENKO YSC 427 only $2400 bucks
It was during the 73/74 oil embargo and super cars were
selling dirt cheap..............
Dad wouldn't allow it............So I got the GTO........
(and STILL have it 31 years later)
Man, You know how much that car is worth today.
I followed it around the Syracuse area for a few years and
rumor has it Reggie Jackson now has it in his collection!
The Cadillac dealership has offered a loaner if they need to keep the car overnight, can I expect a good quality car as a loaner (I have already asked for a quality loaner). Will a call to Cadillac help insure that I get something decent as a loaner?
This is my first experience with problems of this type my, 98 Deville, and 97 Chrysler LHS were trouble free as were my earlier cars. An oil seal leak at 29,000 miles seems unusual
in my car ownership history. are they common in recent low mileage Devilles? Fortunately the car is under Cadillac warranty until July of 2007.
Oddly this has lessened my interest in a second car as I can see that when these things start happening you might spend a lot of time on maintenance issues. Any feedback appreciated. I will of course report on the progress and outcome of this issue.
to a regular v-8. Block is not cast in 1 piece with the good 'ol oil pan, intake,valve covers and related gaskets
etc.
It is assembled in pieces with MANY gaskets....
upper case, lower case, yada, yada.
Take a trip to the GMpowertrain.com site (and other
dedicated Caddy sites) and see how many pieces make
up this engine not to mention posts from folks with
older N-stars and oil leaks and how $pendy they are
to fix............................
Some folks let them drip and keep their eye on oil
level. Others fret and have them fixed !
If its under warranty..........RUN to the dealer and
have it documented and poss. repaired for free.
I would..............
Not to worry tho.
Oil seals can develop leaks for any number of reasons. A seal that is good will probably last indefinitly, while a seal that has some imperfection will hopefully fail before the warranty expires.
have a regular old fashioned gasket !!!!!!!!!!!!
They use some "goop" as a gasket at critical areas
like oil pans, timing covers, etc.........
Thus leaks..............
Seems pennywise and pound foolish.......... :confuse:
service in Michigan for information and assistance. I had a rep. that could have cared less, is it any wonder that the GM stock price is at $ 20 or less. Have never owned a foreign car so don't have any experience with customer service with as an example, Lexus. Am most appreciative for the responses here and will continue to report developments. My 98 Deville with the older Northstar had no leak problems. Many thanks for the responses.
loaner car.
On the few occasions I needed Caddy service I was
given a free loaner. Sometimes a Caddy, sometimes
a used brand x car............
When my Chevy was in for service it was "have fun
walking or we have a rental counter"
But MOST dealers run some kind of free shuttle service
to get ya where yoour going and pick ya back up !
service in Michigan for information and assistance. I had a rep. that could have cared less"
Read your manual. Read your warranty.
Neither says you will get a loaner when your car is being repaired.
If, out of the goodness of their heart, you dealership wishes to give you a loaner, then fine. But corporate Cadillac doesn't have anything to do with this.
I will say that a Rolls Royce owner who expects to get Rolls loaner to drive is being silly in my opinion. Like I said above, when my car was out of service for transmission work they got me a rental (at someone else's expense) Suburban to drive. Since the car was out only overnight, I would have been happy for a ride home then picked up the next day to get the car. That is the way they did it the first time the transmission was worked on. They put the wrong part (gasket) in, so they needed to redo the work, so I got a loaner although I did not ask for one.
provided to me a no charge at any time I needed
major service. If there wasn't a car avail. at that
moment they would run me home and pick me back up !
But in all fairness I DID purchase 3 Caddies from this dealer.................
Did I ever mention my sisters BMW repair fun?
She had to wait for me to pick her up in my
"lower status" Caddy while "fritz" gleefully had
cash register bells ringing in his head from $pendy
BMW non-warranty repairs........
NO ride for her...........Weird she LOVES those cars!
Cadillac dealer service.................
I live out in the STICKS and the nearest Caddy dealer
is a minimum of 40 miles away as the crow flies !
Chevy dealer 15 miles...........
But on the plus side there is a little repair shop1 mile away that charges ONLY $35 hr. flat rate
(chiltons time guide) for ANY off warranty work that
I may need.................
When I bought my 03 DeVille in Syracuse NY the salesman
and his wife drove it to our Alexandria Bay NY (resort
area along the US/Canadian border) motel operation
200 mile round trip)on a Sat. to deliver it and pick up our 96 DeVille trade!
They stayed (free) in one of our rooms and we ALL went
out to dinner/party at nite and did a little boating/
fishin' while the girls went window shopping in town !
or defective. The technician changed the filter and added some dye to the oil. Since the leak was dripping from the bottom of the oil filter there is a good probability that the leak is resolved, we will know in a few days. They also are ordering new buttons for my cruise control to see if that corrects the cruise issue. The best part was the really courteous and attentive service I received from both the technician and the service advisor. I was in and out in less than an hour. Since I like the Cadillac brand
this will go a long way to buying another one if the service continues as it was today.
Dang, I can't remember what this is.
Anyway, this may be your problem. It isn't much of a job to replace this sensor and cure the leak.
service tech. spinnin' the wrench on your Caddy !!!!
Instead of doing the "throw parts at it" diagnosis.
Now your cruise issue.........Like I said....Its US
OLD geezers not pushing the right button on the steering
wheel (Those darn confusing buttons!!)!!!!!!!!!!! LOL!
You know I had/have the SAME problem as you with my 03!
My truck and Zs cruise on the stalk both work perfect !
There is an oil level sensor somewhere. A leaky oil filter is certainly a possibility. The dye will show where the oil is coming from if the leak continues. I had a couple of oil leaks on my 98 Aurora, which was a first generation northstar engine. The first leak was a valve cover leak which was fixed under warranty. The second leak started after the power steering pump needed replacement. I think some bolts were loose on the front of the engine. After they were tightened, the leak stopped.
Your cruise control problem is either in the buttons or there is a source of spurious signals somewhere else in the wiring. If the problem is somewhere in the wiring, then fixing it is probably only possible if all the wiring is replaced. My cruise control still works very well. There are some other electronic problems since the transmission was worked on, but they are not affecting anything but the fuel used. I still have to decide if I want to get an extended warranty beyond the 4_year/50000_mile period.
since we changed the oil filter and no further evidence of
oil leaks. If it does leak again I will bring up this sensor above the oil filter as a check point.
Regarding warranties I bought a seven year 100,000 mile extended warranty on my 2004 Deville for a little over $ 1000 dollars. Nice part is that the unused portion of the premium is refundable if the car is traded before expiration of warranty. I got over $ 700 dollars refunded on the warranty for my 98 Deville when traded in. So my cost was about -0- in that the car was on the extended warranty when the alternator went and I paid nothing for the repair. The job was billed with parts and labor at about $335.00. The name of the warranty company is Wynns.
Am sure there are some other good ones out there but my pre-owned dealer uses Wynns and arranged the repair when
I needed it. Whether you decide to buy a warranty is a very individual decision. If it was not for the pro rated refund for unused portion I would be much less likely to purchase.
4.5-4.9 or the 4.6 Northstar?
While there is no more oil leaking from the oil filter the
service tech wants to change the "oil filter adapter".
Since this is a part I am unable to see I have agreed in that the car is still under warranty.
If it is not fixed, then you have a problem in the wiring I think.
Sam
with this model car (2004 Deville) so I could carry this on indefinitely but am content to use as is. It was not my intention to bring it up again but when I had to take the car in for the oil leak I let them have another look at the cruise and change the buttons. I will mention the question of the wiring the day they put in the new oil filter adapter part. Many thanks for your input.
Either there was a problem of some sort with the cruise controls, or the operator was sending by accident extra signals, so that the cruise settings would shift.
I did not plan to bring this issue up again at the dealership in that they had looked at it three times before and failed to find the problem. The cruise as it works is adequate but no match for the 98 Deville or the Chrysler products I drove in the past. Since highly trained GM personnel have driven the car and said that the performance is in the normal range I am ready to put the matter behind me. Have you read the paper regarding GM lately? Lost half its market value, cut its dividend in half, tens of thousands of layoffs and much more as you may know. My neighbors while liking the Cadillac product switched to Lincoln in that they felt the
customer service at GM was poor. I am not a Lincoln lover
but would buy a Lexus if there was a dealership near me.
I have a busy life and WOULD NOT have spent any more time on the cruise issue if the car hadn't developed the oil leak but since I was there anyway I let them have one more chance at the cruise. Incidently the new Service manager at the Chrysler dealership owns a Chevrolet with the same
problem, his works the same as mine, it was his opinion that there is no way to correct (probably an inability to diagnose the problem by GM).
While my next car may be another Cadillac my experience with this whole issue leaves the question open.
GM is currently well on its way to bankruptcy. They lost about $5 billion in the last quarter, or $20 billion per year. They will be in chapter 7 soon.
It is too bad that your life is so busy that you have no time to enjoy life. I am retired.
changed the oil filter adapter gasket. hopefully that will solve the oil leak. We will need some time to see if that solves the problem. The speed after the cruise is set drops immediately from one to six miles an hour and then stabilizes. Often it will only drop one to two miles an hour
but has dropped as much as six after the cruise light has lit on the dashboard. As said before I can live with it, actually has caused my driving skills to sharpen in that I have to watch the speed more closely than in any previous car I owned. I prefer the style of the Deville and Cadillac
line over most other cars I have seen so I think we would agree that life isn't perfect. The oil leak is another matter in that if not resolved soon it would cause a serious reservation about build design and the time factor spent at the dealership. We will see. Many thanks for your continuing interest and responses.
This seal is well known to leak as the motor gets some age on it.
The motor has to be pulled to replace this seal. Expensive.
I think you should be aware of this so you can start building your 'serious reservation about build design' because it could happen to your car.
And, have you heard about blown Northstar head gaskets?
As I have pointed out before, my cruise control does not do this. Your cruise control system, or perhaps more to the point, your cars entire electrical system is compromised somewhere, so do not be surprised if the car shuts down somewhere, sometime and refuses to move. This will probably happen at the worst possible time.
Had dealer check it out once and they "reflashed" the PCM.
I still think its us old farts and those confusing steering
wheel buttons ! The "old fashoned" cruise on the stalk on
my other GM vehicles work flawlessly !!!!!!!
Almost 30k miles and NO other problems or issues.... :shades:
I will agree with you that your electrical system is probably not going to cause any serious problems. However, your warranty will not make an inoperative car more convenient, it will just pay for the expense of repairing it.
dealer has 05 ex-rental/lease DeVilles 3 to 19k miles advertised for $21,999.............
Another dealer has 05 Impalas also ex-lease/rentals
with 9 to 25k miles $11,900 100 to chose from !
These cars all have the balance of factory warranty.
Shop carefully and good luck ! :shades:
PS......Get the Caddy !!!!!!!!