2020 2500 HD High Country Issues and GM's lack of caring

[TripDad]

5 hours ago, Wbrisett said:

On thing that is quite helpful by the way is to test the truck first. Those inexpensive testers with LEDs won't work anymore, the smart electronics in our systems tell the system when there's a load or not. You need a tester like the Electric Brake Force Meter from Innovative Products of America part #9107A. Look it up on Youtube and you'll see how it works. This would have saved me two days in troubleshooting the wiring on my trailer. 

I did pick up a proper tester.  The trailer brake issue happened on two trailers (RVs), one of which I had no issues with my 2013 F150.  The connection worked with the tester, but the tester has higher resistance the the campers.  This is a GM issue by not properly engineering the trailering package.  I orders the Curt adapter mentioned in an earlier post to see if this corrects the issue.

[L86 All Terrain]

I think Carlo is on to something, my 2018 gasser is on its 2nd BCM too, had some random electrical glitches before and after, fuel pump stuck on even with truck off and fuses pulled, signal would trip while warming in yard, horn would randomly beep. So I got crawling around and tightened up my negative cable on the battery then checked the engine ground and it was loose which probably caused the glitches and fried the BCM. There have also been lots of K2 owners that have been removing the dash panel to get at a ground by the DS window to clean up and tighten that is causing a lot of issues. GM has been bad with grounds and cables these last 2 generations. I would crawl around it a bit and check the grounds. 

 

As far as switching, I see a lot of new Super Duty diesels always parked in the service lot at the dealer, sometimes for weeks at a time. Dodge should be pretty solid mechanically, but they have other quality issues. Just wait for the DEF issues, I don't know a single private K2 Dmax owner that isn't deleted. I quit buying them for the work wagons, too unreliable and I cant delete them as a business, have no choice in my Class8's and get nailed to the wall by those as well. The gassers go to work everyday, cant pull a loose tooth compared to a diesel but I don't make any money with a diesel when its in the garage 1 week per month. 

[Sask Farmboy]

All manufacturers are terrible at ensuring good ground connections.

They all bolt the cable end directly onto painted surfaces -- paint, undercoating and primer are very good insulators -- the opposite of what you want in a good connection.

The best case scenario is when they bolt the grounds to unpainted, aluminum surfaces.

Many times they use a star washer which helps but it still has very little surface area contact for the current to flow through -- the barbs that cut through the paint are the only contact points.

What I do with all my grounds to ensure the best contact and to prevent contact area corrosion is the following:

• Remove the ground wire/cable
• Buff off the eyelet and the grounding point, all the way down to bare metal
• Spray white lithium grease (can use any grease) on all the bared surfaces and the eyelet
• Re-install the wire/cable then spray down with grease to seal the connection to keep water and crap out
• Check them every spring to confirm the connections are still good -- very easy to disconnect, clean and re-apply the grease if needed.

I also do this with battery connections, spraying grease to cover all the metal surfaces, including inside the clamp surface (DO NOT use battery post/clamp paint in there!).

In 30 years of wrenching, I have never had a poor ground connection after doing this.

Bad connections (grounds and power supplies) causes the voltage to arc or jump across the poor connection, which is very high/erratic current flow which fries anything electronic, just like lightning does.

 

Electricity has been around for a long time, you would think manufacturers would have clued in to this by now.

[SteveDuramax4x4]

Another thing to consider is body damage/poor body work repair.      Perhaps the truck was damaged/crashed while in the dealers possession.   If a body panel was repaired or replaced,there is always the possibility of a wire being cut or nicked during the repairs.  Of course the dealer is not going to disclose these repairs.   It may be a good idea to take the truck to a body shop and have them look it over for signs of body repair..

Good luck to you. 

[SkidooSteve12]

Wow! I can understand that you want to keep the faith in that truck and that the dealer will fix it right for you.... but man, I don't know if I could trust it to pull a trailer hours away on vacations for years to come. I was going to say that you should negotiate a longer extended warranty with zero or very low deductible.... but what good is a warranty when you are hours away and it takes days/weeks for repairs? I'd take the hit and trade it off on a brand new truck. And just curious if you have looked at the new 6.6L Gas motor trucks?

[Wbrisett]

22 hours ago, SkidooSteve12 said:

Wow! I can understand that you want to keep the faith in that truck and that the dealer will fix it right for you.... but man, I don't know if I could trust it to pull a trailer hours away on vacations for years to come. I was going to say that you should negotiate a longer extended warranty with zero or very low deductible.... but what good is a warranty when you are hours away and it takes days/weeks for repairs? I'd take the hit and trade it off on a brand new truck. And just curious if you have looked at the new 6.6L Gas motor trucks?

Steve: I'll be honest, I haven't ruled out trading it for just the very thing you mention. Can I trust it? Everybody from the Tech to the service manager thinks they know exactly what's wrong with it, but it's getting the parts out of GM that has been the biggest challenge to date. The strike really hurt the supply chain. 

 

I haven't looked at the gas models. To be honest, I loved my 2015 Duramax diesel and just want this one to work. But, the confidence I currently have in this one is taken a huge hit. I will say that I'm encouraged by the fact that I'm not seeing these issues as widespread on the forum though. There are some common things, but not the one I have, which does make me think that it could be just the parts they are waiting for now. 

[Z45]

On 1/21/2020 at 4:53 AM, Wbrisett said:

Actually I am the 'original' owner. It was never titled. Think of this as one of those 'loaners' that you get from service. They don't title the vehicles and when you buy them they have up to a certain amount of miles before they have to be titled (bought a GMC Sierra that way and saved thousands because GM kicked in extra cash for that deal because it was a loaner/demo). 

 

The Texas lemon laws have to be some of the weakest in the country. I gave all my paperwork to the local attorney and he got back to me saying that I basically don't qualify because as far as Texas is concerned my truck hasn't been out of service (the dealership has been providing me a loaner). 

One thing to think about is the employee driven trucks are often loaned out to other while their vehicle is in for service etc. As so often happens, these users abuse the vehicle.  So while it was never tilted it may have been driven by 100 different drivers?

[It's Tim]

19 minutes ago, elcamino said:

One thing to think about is the employee driven trucks are often loaned out to other while their vehicle is in for service etc. As so often happens, these users abuse the vehicle.  So while it was never tilted it may have been driven by 100 different drivers?

It's an excellent idea to never purchase any vehicle that had a previous life as a rental either.

[Wbrisett]

So, I did get an update! The sensor is in and they are supposed to get the hub in about 10 days. We've got a short trip planned to make sure nothing else goes wrong with it before we take it on a multi-state trip in early March. I have a guy I went to high school with who is a salesman at the local RAM dealership, we did another test ride yesterday and if anything else goes wrong with this thing, I see a RAM 2500 in my future. 

[ickyoldman]

I won't do another GM vehicle......I certainly wouldn't trust that lemon, sadly.  

[KB Chevy]

I had the same issue  with all the lights coming on the dash... This happened when I picked it up on delivery. They reset the computer after they found  a "right wheel speed sensor was the issue". I agreed to continue driving and let them know if it came back on and it did approximately 1,500 miles latter. I brought it to the dealership and it tested out the same "right wheel speed sensor". They reset it again and it came on with in a few miles. I called the dealer ship and reset the lights by hitting cancel with the steering wheel buttons which left on only the check engine light. They replaced the right wheel speed sensor and it's been fine since. The connection pins were faulty causing a signal to the computer setting  off all the lights and codes to notify the driver that there was a potential safety issue i was told. I actually continued to drive it till the parts came in with no issues. My big issue with my new 2020 High Country is the obnoxious knocking/thumping sound in the diesel motor. The dealership has acknowledged that it is allot louder than others they have. Mine started at 500 miles and can be extremely loud at times as others have had the same issue with there's and commented on this forum.  

[Wbrisett]

3 hours ago, KB Chevy said:

They reset the computer after they found  a "right wheel speed sensor was the issue".

Wow! I don't know if it's the right sensor or not, but that's exactly what the cause of my failure too! The biggest challenge has been getting the parts. They ordered a new hub as well as a sensor. The dealership has the replacement sensor, they are just waiting for the hub (which they tell me should be in within the next two weeks). I'm hopeful this will fix the issue. I do love the truck outside the now 13 weeks it has been at the dealership (13/16 weeks of ownership = 81.25% down time!). That's not good. 

Edited January 28, 2020 by Wbrisett

[Wbrisett]

I had to go to the dealership this weekend to pick up some tie-downs (all of mine were still in the truck), the truck was actually in the bay but my service advisor had no idea why. GM corporate called me on Friday and asked if I had any updates, I told them the latest I heard from the dealership was that either late this week or next the parts we are waiting for were going to ship. The lady at GM said, that's all she had as well and was hoping the dealership knew more. I put together a spreadsheet of uptime and downtime and honestly, I'm not sure why I torture myself like this.  ... we have only put a total of 1170 miles on the truck. Most of that came on a couple of trips over Christmas/New Years.  While it may not do any good, I plan to write yet another letter to GM after all of this and tell them directly what poor a poor customer experience this has been and show them with data. 

[Wbrisett]

So the part is still 'in the mail'... totally frustrated and beyond words on this saga. We did the emotional thing this weekend and took a bit of a bath on the Chevy and traded it. 

 

I have tested every ¾ ton truck out there. Ford, RAM, and for whatever crazy reason looked at the GM products again. Got pricing and at the end of the day, after had the truck for exactly 113 days (79 of them in the shop), got rid of it. We took a bit of a bath but this chapter of our lives is over and now hopefully we can move forward. 

 

For the record, when we looked at all the trucks out there we still felt GM had the best options for what we wanted. We wanted certain things and weren't willing to compromise (OK, maybe a bit on the color), but at the end of the day we pulled the trigger on a GMC 2020 2500HD 4x4 Texas Edition SLT. It ended up with exactly the same package as what we had with the High Country except now it wears the GMC badge and is brown instead of red. 

 

We were able to get the truck with only about 9K of a hit, but for the peace of mind it now brings, it was I suppose worth it. So this closes this chapter and we move forward. 

Edited February 10, 2020 by Wbrisett

[FirstAscent]

So the part is still 'in the mail'... totally frustrated and beyond words on this saga. We did the emotional thing this weekend and took a bit of a bath on the Chevy and traded it. 
 
I have tested every ¾ ton truck out there. Ford, RAM, and for whatever crazy reason looked at the GM products again. Got pricing and at the end of the day, after had the truck for exactly 113 days (79 of them in the shop), got rid of it. We took a bit of a bath but this chapter of our lives is over and now hopefully we can move forward. 
 
For the record, when we looked at all the trucks out there we still felt GM had the best options for what we wanted. We wanted certain things and weren't willing to compromise (OK, maybe a bit on the color), but at the end of the day we pulled the trigger on a GMC 2020 2500HD 4x4 Texas Edition SLT. It ended up with exactly the same package as what we had with the High Country except now it wears the GMC badge and is brown instead of red. 
 
We were able to get the truck with only about 9K of a hit, but for the peace of mind it now brings, it was I suppose worth it. So this closes this chapter and we move forward. 

Congrats on the new ride but sorry to hear how the whole thing played out. Definitely send a follow up to GM. Will it do anything? Maybe not, but you weren’t treated fair and that’s not cool.