[HawaiiEV]

I’m in my driveway replacing all the brake lines on the Escalade because they rusted through. I love my GM truck, love the engine, love the usability and ease maintenance. Then every once and a while I have an experience like this. The replacement line set with plastic lined stainless steel is $100, I’m sure it would have cost GM a lot less back in the day. Has GM improved as a company from where they were in the 90’s and early 2000’s?

I’ve always fixed everything I’ve owned and many of my friends and families vehicles too. They all have deficiencies, but just google rusted brake lines GM and you can see what I’m dealing with and why I would question buying another product from a company that would make such catastrophic and dangerous cost cutting choices. Obviously the interiors have improved, but is GM still a company that would use substandard materials for something as important as braking?

 

[2kwik4u]

I owned a '91 Syclone, '00 S10, '03 S10, '03 Yukon, '06 TBSS, '10 Traverse, '15 Sierra.........I can tell you quality has been on a constant increase with each new unit I buy. My '15 Sierra was absolutely great to me, with no real production or assembly QC issues. Honestly, no materials issues. A few design issues, but nothing major.

 

[WXman]

I had an '88 K1500 pickup that was the most poorly engineered and designed vehicle I've ever seen. Just utter garbage from tip to tail. Also, it stranded me 3 times on the side of highways before everybody carried cell phones in their pockets. Won't bore you with the laundry list of issues that were common on those trucks.

Then I had a '93 Z28 and it was also poorly engineered and designed. They actually stamped a large hump in the passenger floorboard to make room for the catalytic converter under the car. To hell with your feet I guess, put them somewhere else. Body was composite in places, so paint would stain or peel easily. Engine was buried halfway under the firewall so good luck doing maintenance on it. Won't bore you with all the issues on this either.

Later I leased a new '06 Silverado Z71. In the first 12 months it went to the dealer for repair 10 times. No exaggeration. Just utter garbage. After this I vowed there will never be a GM POS in my driveway ever again. I was willing to give the EV a try because I assume that with so much on the line, surely they'll actually try to engineer some quality into this one, right? But I've decided to move on for other reasons anyhow..

 

[tsuintx]

Not sure if the brake line issue has been corrected, but I'd imagine so as that was a big thing especially in the early-00s. Probably even earlier.

But overall GM quality has definitely improved by leaps and bounds from what it was, say, 20-30 years ago. There was not other direction than up from those times, anyway. My 2016 Silverado is vast improvement overall from my 07. Interestingly enough, 07.5-13 NNBS trucks sure were hardly an improvement from the 99-07 NBS trucks to begin with. GM seemed to learn their lesson and K2xx was huge leap over NNBS.

Sure, there are still problems and issues, but so tend to have all other manufacturers. Some more, some less.

 

[HawaiiEV]

Wide range of opinions on the topic. I guess the risk with the EV is we are heading into unknown territory with repairs. Almost anyone could get parts and repair an ICE Silverado. So we are counting on GM starting with a decent quality product.

 

[2kwik4u]

Wide range of opinions on the topic. I guess the risk with the EV is we are heading into unknown territory with repairs. Almost anyone could get parts and repair an ICE Silverado. So we are counting on GM starting with a decent quality product.

When you look at competition......from a serviceability standpoint. I think GM and Ford are neck and neck. Regardless of which we choose, either has an extensive service and parts network setup already, and rolling out new methods/practices and tools isn't anything new for them. Rivian is behind here IMO.

We're talking about buying mass manufactured machines with thousands of moving parts. There are going to be issues, no matter who you buy from. Any indication online is going to be anecdotal at best.

 

[SilverDan]

Don't know about GM ICE vehicles, but on BEV's its largely been a non issue. I posted this elsewhere, but the traction battery problem was LG's fault, and they came through with a replacement on that. Otherwise the 12V went bad, and a side door sensor, but those are regular parts that are shared across cars. BEV's aren't computers on wheels, that's a gross simplification, but to my software engineering eye GM appears to have software DNA in their blood. Promise is that on the Silverado that will really shine with the new Linux platform, I have expectations they'll deliver but we'll see.

Otherwise BEV's are very complicated, but yes they're not prone to the breakdowns you get with ICE.