2009 Aveo Giving Me the Fits.

[mritchie77]

Hello,

I joined this forum just now to get some help for my wife's 2009 Aveo.


Sitting at 133k right now and boy, this thing is really making me pull my hair out. In the last 1k miles the brakes started dragging which warped the rotors, ate the pads and caused enough heat to trash the bearings. I don't drive it so I wasn't able to catch them in time before all of that happened. During disassembly I had to cut off the ball joints (rusted from salt). New front brakes and bearings later I was on the road.

Couple of days later the lower radiator hose started leaking (hose clamp cut it) and ended up draining the coolant while driving and overheated the motor. I caught it while it was heating up so I don't believe any head gasket problems occurred. I replaced the rad hoses but the next week the return heater hose blew. Apparently the overheat fried the thermostat and caused it to over pressure the system. New heater hoses, reservoir hoses, and thermostat (man they are pricey compared to all the others I have worked with) and we are back on the road.

Several days after that I got a P0171 (bank 1 lean). I let it be and figured I would get to it in a couple of days. The next day I got new tires as they were needed but on the way home the car started cutting out when stopped and started "bucking" when accelerating. Got home (had to feather the gas when stopped to keep it from cutting out) and found new codes. P0171 still, P0014 (over advanced), and P2270 (downstream sensor stuck in lean position).

My trouble is where to start looking for problems. Tomorrow I am going to check for any broken vacuum lines (I doubt it) or exhaust leaks for the downstream sensor but I am sort of lost at what to do after that. This car has been maintained religiously without abuse. Plugs, and coil replaced about 30k miles ago so I don't think those are the issue.

If anyone could give some advice or tips on something to check out I'd greatly appreciate this as I have spent over 1k in the last month between tires and parts (I used to be a mechanic so labor is done by me) and I am tired of throwing money at this thing.

Thanks,
Michael Ritchie

[mritchie77]

Well, when pulling the air intake off of the throttle body it ripped into two pieces (without much force) so I am assuming it did indeed crack. I pulled off the valve cover and coil pack and found that oil was leaking through the valve cover gasket and past the spark plugs. As far as the P0014, I pulled the cam actuators solenoids and will be replacing them. I couldn't find anything wrong with them but after 130k they might as well get replaced. We will see if any of these will fix my problems.

[mritchie77]

So new plugs, valve cover gasket, and exhaust cam actuator solenoid, and intake tube and the car runs without any check engine codes. For the most part everything seems okay, but occasionally at idle the car shudders but I can't seem to notice any corresponding drop in RPMs. Don't really have an idea what that could be. Any ideas? Thanks!

[Thymeclock]

133K? It's served you well but it sounds like it's time for a new car, rather than putting more $$$ into it. Cars don't last forever ya'know.

BTW, please tell me how you pulled the cam actuators. Did you use vise grips?

[mritchie77]

Unlucky for me I still am having problems and an in no financial situation to purchase a new car. I grounded the car for the last couple of months until now that the semester is over and I can devote more time to it.

Took it to GM and paid $85 for a diagnostic for the still P0014. Their system came back with and passed the exhaust cam actuator solenoid (the part that I replaced and that is shown on this forum a bunch) but they wanted $1085 to replace the exhaust cam actuator. Does anyone have any idea where this is located? Google only brings up the solenoid. I believe this had something to do with the rear of the cam gear itself, but before I pull that all apart and have to redo the timing belt I'd like to get some more info. If anyone has had anything similar any advice would be appreciated. I'm hoping not to have to spend $$$ to get a GM service manual.

[mritchie77]

I don't think many people have dug this deep into these 1.6L but to anyone following I believe this to be the actual adjuster that is on the back of the cam gear that the timing belt spins. Upon further research I discovered that for the 2009 year the adjusters were moved to the back of the cam gears so this only applies to 2009+ Aveos and 2011+ Cruze. Gonna pull the timing belt off again and replace along with a new cam gear/adjuster (GM sells them as a unit) part number 55567048.

I will post once I get this done, and see if this works. As far as I can tell P0014 can only be caused by either a faulty adjuster or a faulty solenoid, and since the solenoid checked out fine it's got to be the adjuster. If this doesn't work my Plan B is to drive the car over a cliff or into a tree. That'll solve the problem.