# Farewell, diesel cruze



## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

Post the VIN here so everyone knows to not buy this car with the engine bucking/stumbling problem.


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## Goodluckgluck (Nov 13, 2021)

That's a bummer. My car has the same issue I was hoping you would find some resolution....


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## Carminooch (Mar 23, 2018)

I had an employee at one of the dealerships offer to buy my car many many moons ago. I called him by chance and he’s actually interested in it, he believes it’s my EGR cooler and he wants to fix it. I’d be way happier knowing it’s going to someone who knows how to work on it. Shame I couldn’t get the dealership to actually do anything about it, right?

If he doesn’t wind up buying it, I’ll go ahead and post the vin in this thread before I trade it in.

Thanks for all the help here! I dig this community. Pending purchase, unless it falls through, I bid you so long and farewell, friends.


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## CRUISE-CRUZE (Nov 8, 2010)

To get a better idea!


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## Goodluckgluck (Nov 13, 2021)

Carminooch said:


> I had an employee at one of the dealerships offer to buy my car many many moons ago. I called him by chance and he’s actually interested in it, he believes it’s my EGR cooler and he wants to fix it. I’d be way happier knowing it’s going to someone who knows how to work on it. Shame I couldn’t get the dealership to actually do anything about it, right?
> 
> If he doesn’t wind up buying it, I’ll go ahead and post the vin in this thread before I trade it in.
> 
> Thanks for all the help here! I dig this community. Pending purchase, unless it falls through, I bid you so long and farewell, friends.


It's not the cooler, just had mine replaced. Same same.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

Carminooch said:


> I’ll go ahead and post the vin in this thread before I trade it in.


I was just kinda, sorta kidding when I said that. Most of us here aren't in the market to buy another car.


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## BodhiBenz1987 (Jan 13, 2018)

Sorry to hear it came to this ... I know you tried so hard for so long to get this issue sorted out. In my mind these are amazing cars with one big Achilles heel in that the support from GM is basically nonexistent and there's no recourse when you have a significant problem that doesn't have an obvious diagnosis/solution. Even if you find a solid dealer who wants to help. And the parts supply was iffy to begin with, made worse by, well, everything the last two years. I'm fortunate (knock on wood) that my mystery problem hasn't affected drivability, and I have other cars, so I can stick with mine without it being a big gamble. Unfortunately not the case for everyone.
I hope the dealership employee ends up buying it from you ... I would think it would be a good "mechanic's special" for someone. Kind of bittersweet because it would be nice to know someone can fix it and enjoy it, but also sad that no one could fix it so YOU could enjoy it. Hope you can score a nice deal on a TDI.


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## Carminooch (Mar 23, 2018)

BodhiBenz1987 said:


> Sorry to hear it came to this ... I know you tried so hard for so long to get this issue sorted out. In my mind these are amazing cars with one big Achilles heel in that the support from GM is basically nonexistent and there's no recourse when you have a significant problem that doesn't have an obvious diagnosis/solution. Even if you find a solid dealer who wants to help. And the parts supply was iffy to begin with, made worse by, well, everything the last two years. I'm fortunate (knock on wood) that my mystery problem hasn't affected drivability, and I have other cars, so I can stick with mine without it being a big gamble. Unfortunately not the case for everyone.
> I hope the dealership employee ends up buying it from you ... I would think it would be a good "mechanic's special" for someone. Kind of bittersweet because it would be nice to know someone can fix it and enjoy it, but also sad that no one could fix it so YOU could enjoy it. Hope you can score a nice deal on a TDI.


I think the car itself is well built, I love the way it looks and rides, I love the powertrain, the torque. But the main factors is my inability to convince any dealership in almost 3 years of ownership and 5x,xxx miles that the jarring bucking feeling is a dangerous problem even through the check engine light isn’t on. Chevy corporate was a waste of time, I’ve been lied to by the dealership and corporate countless times (telling me that they’ve been test driving the car when my dash cam shows it sat untouched for 2+ weeks), and its my understanding that Chevy corporate can’t exactly compel a dealership to take any action at all. If it ran better and I had a better dealership, I’d keep it. But it just feels like a major liability to own at this point. I’m looking forward to owning a tdi! But I will always miss my Cruze. It’s looking like the private buyer will take it off my hands, we’ll see


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

BodhiBenz1987 said:


> the parts supply was iffy to begin with


That's what I'm afraid of with this engine being orphaned. I used to make fun of Saab owners (The Official Car of "I'm sorry, that part is on back-order...") and now I've got a discontinued car with a discontinued engine.

If anything goes wonky with emissions equipment and it's expensive to fix, I'll just spend the dollar on a delete pipe and a tuning box to tweak the ECU. But the rest of the engine is probably going to be hit-and-miss if there is ever anything else that goes wrong.


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## oregon_rider (Jul 21, 2017)

It's not just diesel cruze specific parts - I waited for 2 months for a dash part to fix a rattle on my cruze.

On my wife's buick encore (same luv 1.4 turbo motor as older cruze) - gm doesn't have a purge valve in stock - back ordered. This is a part that is used in many, many vehicles, it fails often, and they have zero. It probably would have been covered under warranty - I bought the part aftermarket from autozone and installed it myself. If my wife would have been "on her own" she would still be driving around with a check engine light while the dealer waited for the part. I also ordered the oem one from trunkmonkeyparts.com and I am still waiting - been over a month.

You can thank the head of GM for this issue - cutting costs to the bone means no parts stock. And no, this isn't just "supply chain issues", although it contributes to the problem.

jeff


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## MRO1791 (Sep 2, 2016)

Making a trade from a car that might have some GM logistics problems, for one that has a high pressure fuel pump ticking time bomb is not a trade I'd be making. The VW TDIs from 2009 until last brought into the US in 2015 have the Bosch CP4 HPFP, there are lawsuits against Bosch and every OEM that installed that pump in a vehicle on the US roads, and more failure horror stories than I have time to mention. While the bucking might seem inconvenient, I'd take that over a HPFP failure any day. Keep some perspective. I'd say you have some crud blocking your intake manifold and it needs cleaned, and the EGR system can be part of that issue as well. At 58K, it's a bit of a pain to do that work, but I'd take that over a HPFP complete fuel system replacement any day. When VW cheated emissions to save $330 per car, it's not hard to understand that using a crappy HPFP that saved $600 fits into their calculations.


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## MRO1791 (Sep 2, 2016)

Barry Allen said:


> That's what I'm afraid of with this engine being orphaned. I used to make fun of Saab owners (The Official Car of "I'm sorry, that part is on back-order...") and now I've got a discontinued car with a discontinued engine.
> 
> If anything goes wonky with emissions equipment and it's expensive to fix, I'll just spend the dollar on a delete pipe and a tuning box to tweak the ECU. But the rest of the engine is probably going to be hit-and-miss if there is ever anything else that goes wrong.


In the modern era with the average model life of 3-5 years.. this can happen with many makes and models, not just the Diesel Cruze. That US has low numbers sold makes US market parts especially scarce, but I think many more were sold overseas, mostly EU so there should be some way to find parts, thought it may be a challenge.


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## Carpentree (Jan 29, 2020)

For a 6 speed manual hatchback, in white, with the RS a package…without a single instance of defect on the exterior, and a matchingly immaculate cloth interior. What could one expect for a fair price? Curious to any thoughts! I also have the CNA Extended Warranty purchased through the dealership good for something like 9 years 150,000 miles. (If it doesn’t add value, I may cancel it and get some money back before the car goes to carmax or carvana).
[/QUOTE]


I'm sure you want to sell the car because it's a liability and you don't want to be stranded one day randomly if it decides to just stop working. But if you have the extended warranty, and eventually the problem causes something to break doesn't your warranty cover that? And potentially cover a rental car while it's being repaired? And if it blew up the motor, that'd probably total the vehicle anyway so maybe you would just get a new one or a buyout offer. I don't know but if it were me I'd probably just keep driving it and if it breaks make the warranty cover it if it doesn't break then still gets you from a to b and you're happy. I wouldn't want to buy any vehicle right now my 2018 GMC 1 ton truck is worth what I paid for it brand new with 18 miles and it has 40k miles on it now. I feel like if you replace it with something you're going to be paying basically brand new car price even on something 3-4 years old especially if it has low miles. And if you're purchasing it on a loan when you want to trade in again in 5 years or whatever and car prices settle you're losing a lot of money by buying high and selling low. Personally I'd keep it for another year or 2 and see if the markets settle down so you can get a decent deal on something else.

Obviously you probably don't care about my opinion and that's fine it's the internet I just wanted to throw out a comment my diesel 2014 Cruze just hit 120k miles and has been good to me but I got it at 100k miles. I think it's a great car but my sister's boyfriend has a TDI and it's also a pretty nice car I don't think he's had any problems with it. I personally wouldn't buy anything right now because I'm too cheap spending any amount of money on a depreciating asset that could be a lemon like you've experienced when the market is this inflated is a really terrible decision in my opinion but I hope you find something good that suits your needs.


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## Carminooch (Mar 23, 2018)

MRO1791 said:


> Making a trade from a car that might have some GM logistics problems, for one that has a high pressure fuel pump ticking time bomb is not a trade I'd be making. The VW TDIs from 2009 until last brought into the US in 2015 have the Bosch CP4 HPFP, there are lawsuits against Bosch and every OEM that installed that pump in a vehicle on the US roads, and more failure horror stories than I have time to mention. While the bucking might seem inconvenient, I'd take that over a HPFP failure any day. Keep some perspective. I'd say you have some crud blocking your intake manifold and it needs cleaned, and the EGR system can be part of that issue as well. At 58K, it's a bit of a pain to do that work, but I'd take that over a HPFP complete fuel system replacement any day. When VW cheated emissions to save $330 per car, it's not hard to understand that using a crappy HPFP that saved $600 fits into their calculations.


I’ve looked heavily into the HPFP issues and every car is going to experience a failure of some kind at some point. My main concern here is I have 4 Chevy dealerships in my area who have lied to me, strung me along, who don’t know how to work on the car.

In terms of the TDI, my best friend owns a reputable and highly regarded Volkswagen / audi shop and I feel a lot more comfortable lowering my car payments and getting something that I know can be worked on confidently. It makes me feel a lot better. 

I’ve been experiencing this jarring bucking and hesitating feeling starting at 15,000 miles. Whether it’s the EGR, intake, a clogged up sensor, I just don’t want to deal with it anymore. Three years later, months sitting on a dealer lot, being lied to, strung along, I have zero confidence that it’s going to ever get fixed. I bought a new car to not have to worry and this thing bucks so hard for the first minute of driving that it will send a water bottle flying off my front seat, on to the floor. Hell, it happened with a tech in the car and a service advisor. They kept the car for 2 weeks where it was moved once into the shop briefly, and they told me everything is normal and their hands are tied because there’s no check engine light. So I’m moving on, I don’t want any part of that. I’ve had gobs of visits to the dealerships and I can confidently say not one has been anything resembling easy or pleasant


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## Carminooch (Mar 23, 2018)

Carpentree said:


> For a 6 speed manual hatchback, in white, with the RS a package…without a single instance of defect on the exterior, and a matchingly immaculate cloth interior. What could one expect for a fair price? Curious to any thoughts! I also have the CNA Extended Warranty purchased through the dealership good for something like 9 years 150,000 miles. (If it doesn’t add value, I may cancel it and get some money back before the car goes to carmax or carvana).
> 
> I'm sure you want to sell the car because it's a liability and you don't want to be stranded one day randomly if it decides to just stop working. But if you have the extended warranty, and eventually the problem causes something to break doesn't your warranty cover that? And potentially cover a rental car while it's being repaired? And if it blew up the motor, that'd probably total the vehicle anyway so maybe you would just get a new one or a buyout offer. I don't know but if it were me I'd probably just keep driving it and if it breaks make the warranty cover it if it doesn't break then still gets you from a to b and you're happy. I wouldn't want to buy any vehicle right now my 2018 GMC 1 ton truck is worth what I paid for it brand new with 18 miles and it has 40k miles on it now. I feel like if you replace it with something you're going to be paying basically brand new car price even on something 3-4 years old especially if it has low miles. And if you're purchasing it on a loan when you want to trade in again in 5 years or whatever and car prices settle you're losing a lot of money by buying high and selling low. Personally I'd keep it for another year or 2 and see if the markets settle down so you can get a decent deal on something else.
> 
> Obviously you probably don't care about my opinion and that's fine it's the internet I just wanted to throw out a comment my diesel 2014 Cruze just hit 120k miles and has been good to me but I got it at 100k miles. I think it's a great car but my sister's boyfriend has a TDI and it's also a pretty nice car I don't think he's had any problems with it. I personally wouldn't buy anything right now because I'm too cheap spending any amount of money on a depreciating asset that could be a lemon like you've experienced when the market is this inflated is a really terrible decision in my opinion but I hope you find something good that suits your needs.


I like your perspective and I appreciate your opinion. I see what you’re saying. I’d be inclined to agree with you but the main contender here and the big reason behind me wanting to get rid of the car is I’ve had a bad hesitating and bucking since 15,000 miles. 3 years later, 4 dealerships refuse to do anything because there’s no check engine light. It’s bad enough to send a water bottle off my seat and on to the floor. I almost got rear ended once. Nobody cares or takes it seriously so I’m cutting my losses and will learn from it. The warranty is nice but I’ve worked hard enough trying to get this to run properly and I give up. I don’t want to deal with Chevy corporate or sleazy dealerships anymore. My best friend owns a vw/audi shop and they seem to be more supported for aftermarket support.

The Cruze is all paid off so I don’t owe on it, if I get a good deal, I’m hoping to buy a TDI a cheaper than the price of my Cruze so I have a little money left over if I need to do any repairs down the line. At least I know it’ll be worked on properly!


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## MRO1791 (Sep 2, 2016)

Carminooch said:


> I’ve looked heavily into the HPFP issues and every car is going to experience a failure of some kind at some point. My main concern here is I have 4 Chevy dealerships in my area who have lied to me, strung me along, who don’t know how to work on the car.
> 
> In terms of the TDI, my best friend owns a reputable and highly regarded Volkswagen / audi shop and I feel a lot more comfortable lowering my car payments and getting something that I know can be worked on confidently. It makes me feel a lot better.
> 
> I’ve been experiencing this jarring bucking and hesitating feeling starting at 15,000 miles. Whether it’s the EGR, intake, a clogged up sensor, I just don’t want to deal with it anymore. Three years later, months sitting on a dealer lot, being lied to, strung along, I have zero confidence that it’s going to ever get fixed. I bought a new car to not have to worry and this thing bucks so hard for the first minute of driving that it will send a water bottle flying off my front seat, on to the floor. Hell, it happened with a tech in the car and a service advisor. They kept the car for 2 weeks where it was moved once into the shop briefly, and they told me everything is normal and their hands are tied because there’s no check engine light. So I’m moving on, I don’t want any part of that. I’ve had gobs of visits to the dealerships and I can confidently say not one has been anything resembling easy or pleasant


I hear your frustration, had a few similar issues, but VW was WORSE. They made me PAY to tell me an utter LIE. I had metallic particles in my fuel filter change, they made me PAY to tell me that is NORMAL, it is not. It is an early sign of a HPFP failure, and that was at about 40K miles. That is when I got rid of that car, and no a HPFP failure is not like most other breakdowns, it craps up the ENTIRE fuel system and it's 4-6K to fix, maybe more. It happens without much if any warning, and makes the car a reliability risk, that I'd not have my wife driving around in. The lawsuits are all over the place on that particular failure, and OEMs have stopped using that much cheaper HPFP, and that should tell you all you need to know about it. 

If you really want to go VW, I suggest always using a lubricity additive in your fuel as a way to make it last longer, and perhaps a pre-emptive HPFP replacement before 150K miles as a way to mitigate.. or there is a guy in Canada that makes 2 kits, one the minimizes the extent of contamination if you have a failure (re-routes the fuel flow) the other is a conversion to a CP3 style pump.. do that and you might have a good option. 

Good luck.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

MRO1791 said:


> I had metallic particles in my fuel filter change, they made me PAY to tell me that is NORMAL, it is not.


Every single VW owner needs to buy the CAT fuel filter kit for their common-rail Diesel engines.









Uber Fuel Filter Kit - Jetta & Golf MK4 & MKV - Nicktane Diesel


Fits 1999-Current Volkswagen Jetta/Golf A4 This is a complete kit consisting of the filter head, mounting bracket, banjo fittings, clamps, nuts, washers, bolts, o-ring, and filter wrench. The installation is straight-forward and can be accomplished by the average person with … Read More



nicktane.com





It's the easiest, cheapest insurance you can put on that car.


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## Carminooch (Mar 23, 2018)

I plan on buying an in-line fuel filter that you add to the system downstream of the HPFP to prevent it from grenading and ruining the rest of the injectors and stuff. It’s sold specifically for that purpose. Good news is it seems the new HPFP has been redesigned to address some of these issues as well. Running an additive would be a good idea also.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

MRO1791 said:


> OEMs have stopped using that much cheaper HPFP


I don't know if it's a cheaper HPFP or another one prone to failure, but my understanding is all the Ford pickups with the 6.7 Powerstroke (built in-house by Ford) have a potential issue. The routing of the HPFP is to where fuel goes into the HPFP to lubricate it and cool it and is then routed to the fuel rail and injectors. Proper routing would be to have the excess fuel for lubrication/cooling cycled back into the fuel tank so that if there are any metal shavings from a deteriorating fuel pump they would be caught by the fuel filter. But NOPE, Ford sends those metal shavings right into the high-pressure fuel rail.

Kits are out there to reroute the fuel flow back to the tank. That way, if there is a HPFP failure, at least the fuel rail and injectors are saved from being filled with metal shavings.


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## oregon_rider (Jul 21, 2017)

So - am I reading this right? A filter after the hpfp where the pressures can reach 20-30k psi? I wouldn't think metal debris with 30k psi pushing it along will be stopped by a filter....

I can see it on the fuel return line - just to save you from flushing the lines & tank after the bomb has detonated....

I also owned a golf tdi in the past - the older design prior to the hpfp problems. Loved the car - loved the mileage - I preferred the cruze drivetrain - wish it had the golf chassis and suspension. That thing handled so well - but the cruze td mileage was much better. And, being an old man now, I preferred the 9 speed auto over the 6 speed DSG. VW made it such a hassle to sell it back that I will never, ever deal with them again or buy any VW product.

jeff

p.s. Another downside to the vw was the infotainment system - the phone always had issue pairing (bluetooth) - a pain in the ass.


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## Barry Allen (Apr 18, 2018)

oregon_rider said:


> So - am I reading this right? A filter after the hpfp where the pressures can reach 20-30k psi? I wouldn't think metal debris with 30k psi pushing it along will be stopped by a filter....


I wish I had a good diagram to describe what the issue is in the Ford 6.7 engines. Let me try to describe it.

The low-pressure pump in the tank sends fuel from the tank through the filter and forward to the engine. The HPFP then uses low-pressure fuel to lube and cool the pump bearings. That fuel is then fed back into the HPFP and is pressurized to 30,000 psi and flows to the fuel rail and injectors to have a small quantity of fuel injected into the cylinders, and the rest of the fuel cools the injectors and then goes back to the fuel tank for cooling. The "spill return" also functions to keep the fuel from gelling in cold conditions.

So, think of the HPFP as having two separate sections. The fuel first cools and lubes the bearings, and then goes through the pump to be pressurized. This problem is that if the pump starts to self-destruct by shedding metal debris, that metal debris goes into the fuel rail and injectors.

The kits to change this on the Ford engines have the fuel rerouted to where it's used to cool and lube the HPFP and then returns to the fuel tank. That way, if anything goes bad it at least doesn't contaminate the fuel rail and injectors. The fuel going to the HPFP for pressurization to 30,000 psi goes through the fuel filter first and then to the fuel rail and injectors.


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