Chevrolet Avalanche

I am writing this letter of my disappointment with my 2004 Avalanche, which

I purchased from First State Motors, a Chevy dealership in Georgetown, DE on July 28,

2004 with 137 miles on the odometer. Having the 3-year/36,000-mile warranty, I also

decided to purchase the Value Guard GM Protection Plan. Of course, the vehicle was

great for the first 37,990 miles.

My first problem came on 10/31/06, only 2 years 3 months after purchase date.

My tailgate handle broke while opening it. Thinking a tailgate handle replacement would

be around $200, it actually turned out to be $568. To my surprise and apparently also to

the representative from the dealership (Fox Chevy Laurel, MD) the existing spoiler had

to be torn off and replaced with a new one to get to the broken handle. That was an

additional $186 plus labor. I question the designers of the tailgate assembly. Why

would anyone design something that would have to be destroyed in order to service

another part? In fact, why would any part that would normally be used frequently by a

regular trucker break so easily? Of course, neither the warranty nor the GM Protection

Plan covered this.

The next problem occurred on 12/27/06 at 41,901 miles, my windshield wipers

started not shutting off. Into the dealership we went and $334 later a wiper board was

replaced. No warranty again covered this problem.

I no sooner got home and had to return to the dealership on 12/28/06 at 41,944

miles. Now my dashboard light “Service 4 Wheel Drive” was on. This time I was told

the transfer case encoder shorted out and $779 later it was fixed. I might have used the

4-wheel drive 8-10 times at the most. At that time, I’d owned this vehicle for 29 months,

that’s pretty sad!!

While writing this letter, I was looking at the Avalanche brochure stating phrases

such as; “Ultimate Utility Vehicle”, “the most dependable”, “longest lasting truck on the

road”. I’m not sure if I just got a lemon but I sure have a hard time agreeing with those

statements.

Today with the latest episode, 02-26-07, I tried to lower my front passenger side

window and it wouldn’t work. The other 3 windows work fine. I waited and tried again

later – still no luck. This probably means another visit to the dealer.

_____

AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com.

**************************************

AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at http://www.aol.com.