[DFW1LE]

Aside from working with Al, why not send a letter to Mary Barra and explain the situation, including a link to this thread. Lawyers have a role, but squelching further dialog with customers may have negative consequences.

[k20attack]

How do you know they aren't going to fix the problem? Maybe I'm being optimistic, but they may have just had the engineers stop communicating with you due to liability issues. Like you said, they may not want to disclose any negligence on their part. They also didn't say they wouldn't take action. Hopefully they got what they needed from you and will just fix it behind the scenes.

[travislambert]

Originally Posted by k20attack

How do you know they aren't going to fix the problem?

My guess is that they have decided not to fix the problem, but there is certainly a chance the problem will be addressed. If they were planning to fix it, I'd think they would have just fixed it and moved on. (Should be a simple fix.)

Originally Posted by k20attack

Hopefully they got what they needed from you and will just fix it behind the scenes.

I'm confident that future models will benefit from the information that was gathered. From what I've been told, the 2018s have already benefited from some driveability fixes. I'll be getting a 2018 soon, so I'll see if the differences are noticeable and report back. Hopefully, the 2019s will be even better.

The million dollar question is whether or not the 2017 ZL1s will ever benefit.

[travislambert]

Originally Posted by DFW1LE

Aside from working with Al, why not send a letter to Mary Barra and explain the situation, including a link to this thread. Lawyers have a role, but squelching further dialog with customers may have negative consequences.

It might be worth a shot but I suspect she'll just tell me to take the car to a dealer service department. Personally, I'd rather live with the issue than roll the dice with a dealer mechanic. Most dealerships don't even know enough to lift the car properly, much less troubleshoot an advanced problem like this.

[k20attack]

[QUOTE= I'll be getting a 2018 soon, so I'll see if the differences are noticeable and report back. Hopefully, the 2019s will be even better.

[/QUOTE]

I'll be getting my 2018 any day now. I'll let you know if I have this traction issue. If it's still prevalent in 2018 models, it will definitely come out quick around here with the cold weather, leaves and crap all over the roads.

[DJ127]

Originally Posted by k20attack

I'll be getting my 2018 any day now. I'll let you know if I have this traction issue. If it's still prevalent in 2018 models, it will definitely come out quick around here with the cold weather, leaves and crap all over the roads.

I picked up my 2018 a couple of months ago and while I cannot say if it bogs under hard launches as I have not attemped yet. I can tell you under easy/normal accelerations it is not fixed. the ELSD meter will still spike unexpectedly for no reason and torque management will step in and cut power. Even when the throttle is less than 30% and the car is moving at less than 5 mph which is ridiculous. There may be no problem with the actual torque management itself but There is definitely a problem with the sensors and when they decide to apply it at low speed / low engine loads. Absolutely should not be intervening when there is ZERO chance of actual wheel slip and very little load on the drive train.

[Kobal]

I've been lurking for a while, hoping to potentially pick up a ZL1 next year, but I had a relatable experience with Ducati motorcycles a few years ago that this saga seems to be mimicing.

Around 2006-2012, Ducati produced several different models using plastic fuel tanks made of a nylon-type plastic material. The problem with nylon is that it is hydroscopic - it absorbs water. This was not a problem in Europe where the fuel does not contain significant amounts of moisture, but here in America, where almost all of our gasoline contains ethanol, it's a huge problem.

Ethanol also absorbs water, so after a year or two of running ethanol fuel through the Ducati gas tanks, the tanks began to swell and deform from absorbing water from the ethanol. This would cause distortions in the tank surfaces, paint defects and cracking, trim panels to fit poorly or not at all, and on some bikes it caused slight interference with the forks/steering head.

On newer bikes, people were able to replace their tanks under warranty, but the new tanks were made of the same material, so that was not a good solution. On one model motorcycle, they actually started producing smaller-size replacement tanks to reduce the possibility of steering interference once the tank swelled - a ridiculous solution.

Similar to how this eLSD issue is unfolding, Ducati took a denial stance to the issue until a class-action lawsuit was filed. After (in my rough estimation), a year or two in the court process, Ducati settled the suit by offering a 5-year extended replacement warranty on the affected models - another ridiculous solution as they never changed the material the tanks were made of.

People (or at least Americans) don't tend to keep motorcycles that long before trading them in, and we don't generally put a lot of miles on them compared to our cars, so by the time the class action suit settled, attention/outrage at the issue had subsided.

For those of us who wanted to actually keep our motorcycles (I have two of the affected models), two options emerged. The one most people opted for was an internal fuel tank coating that, while tricky to apply, could effectively isolate the fuel from contact with the nylon surfaces. The second option was an Italian metal-forming shop that began producing stunningly beautiful hand-made perfect replicas of the affected tanks out of aluminum, but at a price most people could not justify. Neither solution is ideal.

Ducati could have probably absorbed the cost of changing the tank material, or produced a limited run of metal tanks, without going bankrupt. Similarly, GM could no-doubt revise the eLSD software and issue a recall. However, we don't know the legal liability implications that might open them up to, nor do we know if the bogging issue was a deliberate decision to protect driveline components. Maybe, like Ducati, they just made a dumb mistake and they estimate the cost of fixing it to be less than the cost of the PR hit they might be taking on these forums.

Nowadays, I'm pretty sure all new Ducatis are made with metal tanks - at least, I haven't heard of any new issues of warping fuel tanks on the new models.

I guess in conclusion, continue to be vocal in every avenue you can. You definitely have reason to complain, but don't get your hopes up too quickly.
If GM wants to be a better company than Audi (who owns Ducati), then maybe they will issue a retroactive fix, or at least fix it on future models. For me, my desire for a new ZL1 is a little bit lessened because of this issue.

[travislambert]

I've been reaching out to everyone I know in order to keep making progress on the issue (or at least get an explanation of why communication has been cut).

Today I received this glimmer of hope:

Originally Posted by Ron Kiino

...
The data you sent over is being reviewed by our performance engineers, and the team plans to address this concern via the new social-media forum “Ask Al” (with Camaro chief engineer Al Oppenheiser), or thru a bulletin to dealers, as necessary. The Ask Al forum can be found at http://www.camaro6.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=309.

Regards,

Ron Kiino

I'll do my best to keep working for a resolution.

[Shorty45]

Like you said, take it to the drag strip and see how well they can launch it...Remember this was to be the "Triple Threat" and I bought it to take it to the drag strip and possibly a road course. What are some of the tuners seeing? I know some members have tuned them so I just wanted to know specifically; is it eLSD or timing or Traction Mgt. Can someone tell me if the Corvette ever had the issue? I've looked on their forums but haven't seen it or I may have overlooked it..maybe there is something from CTSV. Just trying to get some other perspectives.

[travislambert]

Originally Posted by Shorty45

What are some of the tuners seeing? I know some members have tuned them so I just wanted to know specifically; is it eLSD or timing or Traction Mgt.

I'm not a professional tuner, but I think I can provide some input. Maybe some pro tuners can fill in the gaps.

As you may already know most Camaro tuners use HP Tuners. HP Tuners is probably the best publicly available tuning software, but it's very limited compared to what GM has at their fingertips. HP Tuners is basically limited to the ECM and TCM, and within these modules only a small portion of the configuration tables are available for tweaking. The software within the modules, where most of the problem likely is, isn't [easily] configurable. Since tuners cannot adjust the code, they'll usually hack the settings to get a desired behavior.

The eLSD isn't part of the problem to my knowledge. I thought it was originally, which is why the thread is misnamed. (I'm not aware of any publicly available software to tune the eLSD module anyway.)

The ignition timing is altered dynamically by the ECM for lots of reasons... wheel slip, torque management, intake air temps, knock, etc.. For the launch problem, timing isn't the root issue. For the driveability problem, the timing tables could probably be tweaked for low-RPM and high airflow to help offset some of the timing loss when wheel slip occurs. I wouldn't bother though.

If you are looking to improve the launch via tuning, torque management is probably where you'll want to focus. The HP Tuners software exposes a lot of options here. There are torque management engine coefficients, but the tuning process for the coefficients isn't perfectly established (It's getting better though). Most tuners simply make small tweaks to maximum torque and driver demand tables until the car does what they want, as opposed to a more scientific and comprehensive approach.

I believe the torque management is likely where GM intends for it to be. It's the wheel slip % problem that I believe might be the oversight in the launching equation. My best launches have come from maximizing target wheel slip % and using a low launch RPM to avoid wheel slip. The wheel slip target % makes me very suspicious. Unless this setting is completely ignored at very low speeds, the setting doesn't make sense. At very low speeds a very high wheel slip % might be perfectly fine. A % metric only becomes meaningful after ~7 MPH.

Originally Posted by Shorty45

Can someone tell me if the Corvette ever had the issue? I've looked on their forums but haven't seen it or I may have overlooked it..maybe there is something from CTSV. Just trying to get some other perspectives.

I don't know of any launching issues with the Corvettes or CTS-V. The C7s seem to launch fine from what I've seen. All of the new CTS-Vs are automatic, so I don't believe it suffers from the same issue. I work with a guy who has a '16 CTS-V and it launches hard compared to the manual transmission ZL1.

Everything above is just my opinion based on observations and testing. Unfortunately, I don't have access to the source code to confirm my theories. Hopefully GM will provide some overdue answers to us in the near future.

[PinHead]

Originally Posted by DFW1LE

Aside from working with Al, why not send a letter to Mary Barra and explain the situation, including a link to this thread. Lawyers have a role, but squelching further dialog with customers may have negative consequences.

^^^^^
THIS

How about we take the issue to a Motorsports TV Show? Speed Channel, Cars etc?

That will at least inform all potential buyers, (both new and used) of GM's commitment to their new;

"ZL1 M6 Black Mark of Excellence Program."

[travislambert]

Originally Posted by PinHead

^^^^^
THIS

How about we take the issue to a Motorsports TV Show? Speed Channel, Cars etc?

That will at least inform all potential buyers, (both new and used) of GM's commitment to their new;

"ZL1 M6 Black Mark of Excellence Program."

Go for it, but I honestly doubt you'll get any journalists to run a negative story.

I spoke to Matt (Lethalhammer) at Camaro Fest. At the time he was willing to do a video about the issue. He has 30K+ YouTube subscribers. That might be enough negative press to get this issue a higher priority within GM.

[Stoner]

At this point it sounds like they have not dropped the issue, but are addressing it through a different venue. For now it may be best to see where this leads. but if it's not resolved, I would have no problem contacting the attorney that is handling the Corvette class action lawsuit and making inquiries as to whether or not this would meet the standard for an additional class action suit.

Do this sound reasonable ??

[DJ127]

I think lethal camaro doing a story would be Huge.. Not only because of the overall number of subscribers he has, but the fact that many are dedicated camaro fans and may spread the word about the issue. Personally I think if someone is getting ready to drop $65K+ on a car they deserve to know one of the major selling points of the car is flawed.