Sugar Bears 2015 GMC Terrain SLE-2 2.4 AWD

[Grumpy Bear]

150,900 Maintenance 

 

10/18/2021

So traded the dipsticks between the wife's two 2.4's and guess what. I can read this one just fine. I will order a new one for the Verano. 

 

Added 4 ounces at 1,038 miles or a quart in 8300 ish....so far. Higher than the worst end of the engineering range but 4X better than what it takes to get GM's attention. It's a rate I can live with...for now.  Every time I go to the heavy end of the detergent addition it improves. 

 

 

 

 

Edited October 18, 2021 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

151,439 Maintenance Notes

 

10/30/2021

 

8 ounce oil add with fill up. 12 ounces total with  1,562 on this OCI. A quart in 4,165 miles by the math. Not as good as it looked at 1,000 miles. But I can see better now with the new dip stick. Very close to the last OCI measured drop numbers so consistent is good. Gives a stable place to jump from. Confirms maximum detergent add next fill and that 2K OCI's is plenty long. 

 

Rustoleum White rattle canned the undercarriage  were visible rust was showing. Love these 'any direction' cans except that you can't clear the nozzle. Cheap enough not to matter much. We may have a situation where the truck and the drive line give up in concert  It's a good 10 footer still. 

 

Leaves get into everything and everywhere. Rodding out the wiper cowl drains is almost a daily thing. Clearing the HVAC system inlet screens ditto. Have to keep close watch on the moon roof drain. That was a repair that gets it kicked to the curb next failure. 

 

Since I started keeping track, she's burned 393.857 gallons of fuel over 11,280 miles.

Result = 28.66 mpg. 

 

 

Edited October 30, 2021 by Grumpy Bear
Additional content

[Grumpy Bear]

About 12K Miles of fuel log.

 

[Grumpy Bear]

152,000 Mile Services

 

11/6/2021

2,000 mile OCI

151,877 mile actual

14 ounce of makeup oil this interval for a usage rate of 1qt : 4,571 miles

Very close to last change. No worse it good. 

 

4.23 quarts Kirkland 5W30

27 ounces TRIAX S-7 This a a 5:1 ring cleaning ratio. 

No filter change. 

 

Clean under hood, fill wiper bottle, add 8 oz Gumout Regane to tank and fill. Adjust tire pressures.

 

This months head scratcher. I add 5 total quarts to a 5 quart system without a filter change and have to add additional oil to get to the full mark after running it a few minutes and giving her plenty of drain down time. 

 

Once again my TRIAX bottles are an ounce per container short filled. 

 

 

 

Edited December 9, 2021 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

152,167 Mile Services

 

11/10/2021

 

Replace lift gate wiper GM# 20999459 $14. The old ANCO gave good service. No complaints. 

Replace lift gate struts, 84131445 & 46 $46.78 (each) left and right have different part numbers. 

Replace engine oil dip stick 12657799 $24.67. Gave the Buick back her original part.  

 

$142.81 with tax. 

 

Off to the shop to dispose of the waste oil. 

 

BTW Lift strut 84131445 is the left one. Not that I could tell a difference between them. 

 

 

Edited November 11, 2021 by Grumpy Bear

[diyer2]

Is that new oil dipstick a blade type? Not the wire type?

I just looked and at it and it says it will fit my sons 15 Equinox. He hates the wire dip stick like everyone else.

[Grumpy Bear]

1 hour ago, diyer2 said:

Is that new oil dipstick a blade type? Not the wire type?

I just looked and at it and it says it will fit my sons 15 Equinox. He hates the wire dip stick like everyone else.

 

Nope a replacement wire type. I even tried making one for it.

 

Problem seems to be the coating becomes ineffective over time. Just will not 'wet' the stick anymore. Then new one is a breeze to read even with fresh oil. 

 

It tried blade types from other motors. They will not clear the casting from some reason no matter how much you tease them. Sorry. 

[garagerog]

The cable dipstick on my wife's 2017 2.4 was the first one I had ever encountered and I wondered about it, so I took a gander at things. Mind you this was some time ago, but if I recollect correctly the dipstick tube itself is rather convoluted, kinda like a lazy S from where it enters the oil pan to where they decided to locate the ring pull on the dipstick. Blade style dipstick just wouldn't have enough flexibility, guess we should be happy that GM got the cable right and didn't give us a string to try and push through the dipstick tube. 

[Grumpy Bear]

Oil Log

11/11/2021

 

Oil was changed at 151,877. 

Oil checks after sitting overnight after each fuel loading but I will record in this post every 250 miles (approx.) noting any oil added for that period. If this works out right I will graph this. What I think it will show is that oil usage is not linear but dependent on aging. I do not have an hour meter on this truck, which would be more useful. But I will use 38.46 mph to estimate time. 

 

 

151,877 Oil change, Full. Clean. 0 hours 11/6/2021

152,127 Full / Clear. 6.5 hours run time est. 11/8/2021

152,377 Full / Clear. 13 hours run time. 11/11/2021

152,627 Added 2 ounces. A tad over full. Best guess 1.5 to full. <1 on color scale 11/13/2021

152,877 Holding full. Color 3. 11/17/2021. That's half way!! 1K miles.

153,127 Just off full. Color 4. Added 2 ounces and again over full. We'll see where this works out. 

153,377 Add 2 ounces. Color 6. A hint of moisture accumulating in the rocker area. 11/27/2021

153,627 Full Color 6+. Moisture abated after vent cleaning. 12/1/2021. 

153,759 Add 2 ounces. No moisture. Color 7

153,877 A quart in 8K miles. Straight up full. 

 

 

Ordered 6 more pints of TRIAX S-7 (Came a few days ago) 

Made appointments for 150K coolant and transmission services for Saturday next. 

 

Color Scale

                

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 9, 2021 by Grumpy Bear

[garagerog]

Grumpy, not sure about your wife's Terrain, but on my wife's Nox, there is a timer function in the DIC settings. Although not a true hour meter,  for your purposes it will function like one. It's on with the ignition, automatically resets after 100 hours. You could reset it after each oil check if you wish assuming you have said timer.

[Grumpy Bear]

153,100 Mile Services

 

Trans service. Drop and fill 5 quarts Red Line D6. 

 

150K scheduled coolant service. Drop and flush by machine. New GM $37 thermostat. Hoses were good to go so just new clamps

 

Took it for a 50 mile run and love the work that was done.

Not so much the thermostat doing a continuous 13 degree Yo-Yo. 178 - 191 F at 62 mph on the Interstate. 180 F is the factory set point. Not even close. 

 

So being dumber than dumb and loving to do a job twice I've ordered a Stant SuperStat 180 F #46628 which I KNOW throttles and cost $12. The only person I can be upset with is myself. Had an idiot moment thinking that the cycling piece of junk I put in would be better then the OEM cycling piece of junk I took out. I had them save the old one. As soon as I saw I knew it was gong to be trouble. 

 

Added a few ounces of coolant. Air burp I expect. 

Edited November 23, 2021 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

153,443 Mile Service

 

11/27/2021

 

Added two ounces of oil. Rate is increasing. 750 miles for first add. 500 miles for the second add and 250 miles this add. Which answers the question of usage rate vs time/miles. (2nd order polynomial best fit curve, yellow. Cumulative addition in red)  

 

 

 

153,525 Mile Services

 

11/27/2022

 

New Purolator One air filter A36131. Cleaned fresh air side of PCV system and checked vent vacuum. Good. 

Edited December 4, 2021 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

Stant no longer Stant Quality?

 

The Stant Superstat came. Right box. Wrong part in the box. No replacement available. Then I noticed the MotorRac on the body and the print on the box stating "Made in Israel" Same place as junk Balkamp and same junk SS wax motor. Ugh......

 

Refund was easy enough after the automated 20 questiona.

 

Ordered a Premium Gates34025S. Stainless body, brass motor. Tighter than OEM temp control. $24. 

[Grumpy Bear]

153,759 Service

 

12/4/2021

 

Added 2 ounces oil. Now 8 total for 1,882 miles. Headed for a quart in roughly 7,500 miles. Seems to have slowed a bit. 

Updated chart. 

 

Edited December 4, 2021 by Grumpy Bear

[Grumpy Bear]

153,960 Mile Service Report

 

12/8/2021

 

8 ounces straight up in 2,000 miles. A quart in 8,000 miles this OCI. 

 

 

I continue to learn this vehicles quirks and nothing on it is more quirky than the dipstick. The bullet being near the same size as the tube ID requires some very specific routines to get an accurate reading. Okay, yes, 2 hour minimum for drain down. But if you remove the stick and reinsert it you drag oil up the tube due to the tight fit and "S" bend/internal obstruction.  No clear line. If you simple pull it the line is clear BUT the reading depends on where AROUND the stick you read. The difference is exactly 4 ounces in this motor. A 3* slope is also exactly 4 ounces of level. 

 

By cutting off the old stick and plugging the tube when I shut it off in the PM I avoided the oil drag of cleaning and reinserting in the AM which I found to be exactly the same reading as just leaving overnight and pulling it once without cleaning IF you rotate the stick 360 degrees before withdrawal. Fully seated. 

 

So just check it first thing in the morning rotating the stick one full revolution before withdrawal and read it and call it good. No need to withdraw, wipe and reinsert or read one side of the stick or the other. Oh....reads the same 2 hours or 2 days latter. Just easier to read cold than hot. 

 

Oil change soon. Waiting on some supplies. 

 

Now about this TRIAX S7. As consumption is lower using it at the cleaning ration is lower than other and will continue to be effective for a few changes after returning to 'maintenance' concentrations I can not argue with the results. To some degree it works. That said fresh rings lasted 80K miles before it became an issue so not the final word. It did not rebound to the degree of the previous episode. So I will run the clean again as it did improve BUT will also pull a sample for UOA. First time, as you can see, took four rounds to get it right.