Chevy Avalanche - experience?

[72'z'steve]

The lifters themselves have issues?? that stinks,the 2 fellas at work,the escalade used oil like 500 miles to a quart and the avalanche had crazy driveability issues related to the DOD,The shop did recommend a "camswap" with different lifters,they told me[plus headers,transtune blah blah blah],Maybe they should peddle those things while they still Run!! LOL,Kinda glad I still drive old junk!! Later Steve!!

 

[gramps]

Older ones have bigger brakes? Huh

I'd probably plan to lose the dod at some point

What I meant was larger than the ‘02-‘04 years. I think they went bigger again in 08.

 

[Flynt]

One thing to watch for is on the ‘07 and up trucks and suv’s They have that multi displacement system, and in general those suck a ton of oil, to the tune of a quart or more every 1000 miles.
Personally I’d keep my eyes open for a nice 2005-06 you get the bigger brakes, and don’t have the oil consumption issues.

What is the cause of excessive engine oil consumption?

 

[Knuckle Dragger]

What is the cause of excessive engine oil consumption?

https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2012/SB-10062524-7690.pdf

 

[gramps]

What is the cause of excessive engine oil consumption?

The short version is the mds or cylinder shut down system. When in v4 (shutdown) mode half the cyls stop firing, and the valves don’t operate so there is no compression. The piston rings then don’t work as they should, so they get filled with the oil from the cyl wall which makes the problem worse as time goes on as the oil “cokes” or gets sludgy so then the rings are full of that crap and thus allowing the oil on the cyl wall to be burnt when the cyl activates again. And they don’t have kind of a junk pcv setup.

Honda’s are not immune to this, the accords, pilots and minivans with the v6 do the same thing. With the exception they drop an entire bank in that mode - requiring a special computer operated engine mount and sound canceling audio They shake like a mofo, and make a really loud horrendous (think it’s close to the sound we’d make when being mauled by a bear - after reasoning with it fails) so even if you have the radio “off” it’s not really off, it’s playing a frequency opposite to the sound emitted by the engine. Physically unplug the radio in one sometime - it’s deafeningly loud. But anyway same problem they start sucking oil and it just gets worse and worse.

 

[ol' grouch]

The short version is the mds or cylinder shut down system. When in v4 (shutdown) mode half the cyls stop firing, and the valves don’t operate so there is no compression. The piston rings then don’t work as they should, so they get filled with the oil from the cyl wall which makes the problem worse as time goes on as the oil “cokes” or gets sludgy so then the rings are full of that crap and thus allowing the oil on the cyl wall to be burnt when the cyl activates again. And they don’t have kind of a junk pcv setup.

Honda’s are not immune to this, the accords, pilots and minivans with the v6 do the same thing. With the exception they drop an entire bank in that mode - requiring a special computer operated engine mount and sound canceling audio They shake like a mofo, and make a really loud horrendous (think it’s close to the sound we’d make when being mauled by a bear - after reasoning with it fails) so even if you have the radio “off” it’s not really off, it’s playing a frequency opposite to the sound emitted by the engine. Physically unplug the radio in one sometime - it’s deafeningly loud. But anyway same problem they start sucking oil and it just gets worse and worse.

Toyota, the supposed standard for quality had problems with that on V-6 engines too. There is a small port on the piston skirt that is supposed to do something with excess oil. It gets plugged up and the engines sludge up pretty bad. This is one the higher end Toyota's and the Lexus cars. I don't fool with imports much so I don't remember the details but it got fairly heated between the customers and dealers.

 

[BonzoHansen]

https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2012/SB-10062524-7690.pdf

That makes me want to look for a vehicle built after February 1st 2011.

Either that or start building a 6.0 on the side.

 

[Randy 81]

Most have already mentioned the things to look for. Plenty of info out there on eliminating the AFM/DOD, so you can solve that issue.

Since it is the same chassis as the Suburban, parts availability is good for them. I haven't heard anyone complaining about the mid gate setup. I personally would look at the 2500 version, better brakes and 6.0L engine.

 

[BonzoHansen]

2500 with the 8.1 was discontinued in 2006. I'm not interested in that.

The Cadillac ext version has the 6.0. It seems there are 6.0 Chevys out there, maybe 07-09. I haven't seen one for sale yet

 

[Todd80Z28]

Have you looked down this way yet or in the Carolinas? Maybe better corrosion wise underneath...