3.8 motor, 75kmiles, normal maintenance done. well the problem started a few months ago and would happen maybe once a week where you would turn the key and nothing would happen. It sometimes would take 5 minutes of turning the key and then it would suddenly fire and sometimes would take less. But this problem started becoming more frequent.

Then while driving the car would just stall. That happened about 5 times and we took the vehicle to the chevy dealer. The 1st time they replaced the passlock ignition module. Drove it home and it died on the way home. It refired and drove fine. The next day we took it back to them and they said they couldnt find any problem with it. Picked it up from them and died again and this time it took 5 minutes of cranking to get it started.

Now the car has been at the dealer for 5 buisness days- a total of 14 normal days with the holidays and they told us there is nothing wrong with the car and to pick it up asap.

Does anyone have any ideas. Thanks

 

Find a new dealer!

Not sure what the problem is though. I would think maybe something with security or the igntion cylinder, but I'm not sure. Maybe someone else can chime in on the issue.

 

Could be a leaking Upper Intake Manifold....I had mine replaced at 7K, had the same problem. This solved the problem, just a suggestion.

 

now see i was goign to say it sounds to me like the Ing. switch has gone bad on the ele side of it.
and to try replacing it.

but the easiest thing to do is pull codes on it and see what they are saying first. I would think having it stall would show something or at least give you aclue where ot look first.
Good Luck and let us know what happens and updated on this. I also have a 3.8 in a 03 SS i would rather know if this happens to mine how to fix it instead of taking it in. Just wish i could be of more help to you.

 

It has probably stalled 8 times and has not cranked 20 times- but the chevy dealer said the only code that they had was to replace the passlock ignition module. I also put a new air/fuel filter on it when it started acting up to see if that would help. The dealer is going to have a computer hooked up to the motor and when it dies again it will tell them what is wrong- only problem is they are charging me 10k on my credit card and reinbursing me when i return it. They said there is nothing wrong with the car.

they have driven it 22 miles and started it 100x with no problem. But both times i picked it up from them, the car wouldnt even make it home. The 1st time I took it back they were closed for the holidays on that friday and i complained and got a rental from them. I have had it since- about 2 weeks. I told them im not picking the car up again till its fixed. Well I am picking it up today with the computer hooked up. We will see.

Thanks for everyones help!

 

see that makes me wonder if it has a short or bad ground lose wire etc.... in that harness.
that harness is basicaly the heart of tht system. it is defently one main artery.

sorry about the 10 k but at least you get it back unless the car is stolen whiel it is hooked up to it .
but you know what will happen the car will act fine now becuse it has this hooked on to it. LOL

Good luck

 

A leaking intake manifold gasket wouldn't cause it to not even crank. That could cause it to crank and not start or crank a long time and then start.

Do you have more than one ignition key for the car? I don't know if GM keys have to be programmed, but I know I had a car at Volvo with a similiar concern. I couldn't get it to act up and we found out that the customer was leaving the car with us with a different key and keeping the key they usually used. They left both keys and sure enough, the one he had was bad.

 

Try replacing the fuel pressure regulator. Can't hurt being that it costs hardly nothing and takes about 20 minutes to do yerself. It's located under the plastic engine cover and connected to the fuel rail line. I had an issue where my 01 SS was having a hard start... (had an earilier Caddy ETC do the same thing... brought it in and they didn't know what was wrong; replaced fueld pressure regulator and problem went away).... replaced the fuel pressure regulator on my SS and problem went away immediately. However... only symptom was that the engine was not starting properly; never had any issues with the engine stalling. Good luck.

 

Ooops.... just reread your post, and I guess you're not haveing hard-start issues as I had thought when I wrote my previous post. Sorry!

 

Well after a few days with the black box hooked up to the car it died again today and we took it back to the dealer. He told us that they still dont know what is the problem- that it could be a number of things and that we would have to pay for parts to try and parts swap it until it worked.

Well after this dealer has had the car for over 2 weeks in a month. We felt like we should get a rental since he was in no rush to fix it. the car has been returned to them 4 times after they supposedly fixed it. So I asked for the number to district chevy and he gave me 800-222-1010

A **** SEX LINE.

So i called the general manager and had them tow the car to another chevy dealer under their cost.

We will see what happens now.