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This was pretty much the story with my '02 Suburban as well. 8 years old, 100k miles and never had anything go wrong on it. The only money I ever spent on it was standard maintenance type stuff; tires, batteries, oil changes, plugs, wiper blades, etc. Never had to buy anything for it because it was broken!
Trailblazer has cost me for repairs:
Battery $60.00 A/C Delco Upsized replacment
Alternator $130.00 Lifetime rebuilt unit, not an autozone junker (wasn't bad, was trying to correct the dimming headlamps, it worked)
Idler Pulley Bearing $22.00
Belt Tensioner $45.00
Great truck, I am on my 3rd set of tires, because I run toyota sequioa take-offs that i usually get with 10-15k on them already, I towed a 4000lb trailer up to 500mi/day for 5 months with it too.
My biggest peeve is that there is a small a/c leak at a junction and GM doesn't list the o-ring seperately last time i checked, so every year I have to add a little freon and oil. Maybe the next time i'm near a stealership, i'll try and find one.
^a lot of times you can just hit an auto parts store for an o-ring. I had an old truck that had a lot of o-rings in the a/c system go bad and I went to a Pep-Boys and the guy back in parts had a drawer of misc o-rings and I just grabbed up some that were about the same size as what came off. Worked fine.
...stating they offer better mileage than Honda and Toyota. Maybe a couple of miles better. But what about quality? What about reliability? They seemed to forget about these two issues.
Given how American cars have improved so much you are the one forgetting about those two issues.My brother owns an auto repair business so I speak with some degree of knowledge.
Whats with the people that say " I bought a Domestic and it was falling apart two days later". Did you test drive the car? Do you know how to drive? are you plowing it through snow banks? I mean, what is the deal. Between me and all of my family, we've owned alot of domestics and I can't think of any major issues other than a few with my wifes Tahoe. It was the new 2007 body style that we bought in 2006 and it had the transfer case go bad and something else I don't remember. I guess I'm just not a crybaby, if something goes wrong under warranty, who cares? The dealer takes care of it and gives you a loaner.
Although the 2009 Accord is now classified as a "large" car - it has for most of its history been a mid-sized car. The older Malibu was smaller - more like the previous Mazda6. But the new Malibu is about the same size as the Accord and Camry.
The Chevy that compares in size to the Civic is the Cobalt.
BTW - these classifications come from the EPA - based on interior volume, not length, width, or weight.
If you check the details more closely, the Accord is a EPA "large" car with over 10 cubic ft more passenger space than Malibu. Size-wise, it would almost be in the class of Impala. They are comparing different class size vehicles. The reason the Malibu cars have slightly more MPG is the Ford/GM joint 6 speed auto transmission. Although Impala only has 4 speed. Honda is just releasing their 6 speed next year (well in Acura). For Civic and Cobalt, the XFE has no power windows, no spare tire, and economy style tires, etc...
Also, and very important, the EPA MPG for highway is rated at 60 MPH, not that useful when speed limits are normally 65-75, so it will also depend on the aerodynamics of the car at the higher speeds.
^a lot of times you can just hit an auto parts store for an o-ring. I had an old truck that had a lot of o-rings in the a/c system go bad and I went to a Pep-Boys and the guy back in parts had a drawer of misc o-rings and I just grabbed up some that were about the same size as what came off. Worked fine.
i own more o-rings than most parts stores
it isnt your standard o-ring, it's more of a flat, quarter sized rubber gasket with a metal insert
close to that yellow one at the top right, however, it's green
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