[04lss]

Ill preface this by saying this post is as much a rant as anything. I plan to call corporate tomorrow, and writing this out should help me organize my thoughts. I'm not saying all Camaros have bad QC, just that mine seems to.



I've not had a good experience with my 2021 LT1. I love driving it, dont get me wrong, but aside from that im not thrilled. I fully understand that some of these things are trivial annoyances(finance, tire pressure etc ), but they add to the overall negative experience.



Ill start from the beginning.



They sold me the wrong car. I bought it back in July, went to a dealer 100 miles away as they were the only ones in the state to have inventory. They had two camaros on their way, a black and white LT1. Went up there haggled numbers etc, and agreed to buy the BLACK lt1. They call be tell the car arrives, and i get their to find the WHITE camaro. I told the guy it was the wrong car and he went all salesman "White looks pretty good man, just go with this one" Etc. The white did look good in person, but its the exact opposite of what i wanted. I ended up going with the white, because they had done all the paper work etc, and the black one wasn't due for a while longer. The fact that the sales guy would try and push the literal opposite color on me because he gave them the wrong vin still burns me up.



The finance guy never asked if i wanted auto pay. when i mentioned it, he said he would have to start all the paperwork over and that they didnt have time as it was close to closing. I went along, and called my bank to set it up a few days later. (saves half a point of interest) Not a major thing, but annoying that i had to do his job.



I drive the car for a while, do 1000 miles super gentle then a progressively more throttle heavy 500 till i hit 1500.



During this time I notice the engine making a ticking sound. I figure its "Probably" normal, and post on here. The forum confirms it sounds normal. I decide ill just have the dealer confirm next time i take it in.

Also during this time a friend of mine is looking at the car and asks me if my passenger door is open. I look and the gap does look like it didn't latch all the way. Turns out the door isn't evenly aligned front to back. I compare with the drivers door, and some camaros in parking lots / car meets, and its definitely off.



This is fairly annoying but not unheard of. I make an appointment online with a local chevy dealer. Note that i want the engine noise confirmed as normal, the door fixed, and my oil changed. The appointment is 3 weeks out.



I call 2 days before, and ask to confirm the details and how their night box works. I'm told they cant diagnose the noise, and they cant look at the door because they are very backed up. (completely wasted my time)



I am also asked if my car has side skirts or a front splitter as it may not fit on the lift. I tell the person its stock , and they say that doesn't matter , if its very low it might not fit. (what kind of Chevy dealer cant fit a stock Chevy on a lift?)

I ask if they can at least tell me if the engine sounds normal . Im told no, that they don't get many Camaros, so they aren't familiar with them. they "Mostly service trucks and SUVs" (this one just floors me, how can a chevy dealer not be "Familiar" with a car they sell.)


I cancel my appointment immediately, and make another one with the big local dealer that sells a lot of Corvettes and Camaros. Another 3 weeks out. I check the box for them to call me when making the reservation. They never do (minor, but still). During this time my driver side Knee rest comes loose and breaks one of the clips. They are able to work on the car. They tell me the ticking is normal, and that they see the door issue and are having the body shop look at it.



Body shop says there is nothing they can do, that trying would probably just make other stuff worse. They say its "in spec" anyway despite acknowledging it doesn't look right. They did however fix the knee rest.



Its worth noting, my tires were ~5 PSI low on air when i brought it in. I figured its an easy way to gauge how thorough the mechanic is. They marked on the inspection sheet every tire on the car was at 35. My bluepoint tire gauge showed 29, as did the dash, as did the tire pump at the local gas station. (again minor, but not Confidence inspiring)





Wednesday this week, i'm cleaning the car for my thanksgiving trip. I notice paint flaking in the passenger side part of the trunk where the trunk lid hinge is. Somewhere that is extremely unlikely to be disturbed scratched etc. I touch it and it flakes off leaving a dime size hole in the paint. This is the first non cosmetic problem aside from the knee rest. I know its paint, but its in an area water drains to, and will definitely lead to rust.

At this point i'm really annoyed with the build quality on my car. I deiced to deal with it after my trip.



Tonight, I'm driving around and a "Service Safety restrain system" light pops up along with the airbag light. Then it goes away. This happens 3 more times before i get home. On the last one I was able to grab a photo. I made an appointment with a third local dealer to have it looked at.
Im not taking it to the dealer that "isnt familiar" with camaros, and im not taking it back to the dealer that didnt even check the tire pressure.



I realize most of the issues can be fixed. But for a car ive owned for 4 months, and with 3k miles, its really disheartening.

I really like driving the camaro , the engine and chassis are so much more fun than the mustang GT i owned, but im really disappointed with the build quality so far. My mustang had a clutch fail some related issues to a bad repair on that, and then some suspected engine issues, but honestly , it seems like it was better built, which really makes me sad to say. Ive owned a lot of GM products. I have a 99 tahoe right now with 255k miles on it. Ive put more miles on that in the last 4 months than the camaro, and its had less issues.

[arpad_m]

Man, this must be quite irritating. Apart from the QC issues, these dealerships aren't doing you much good...

The passenger door and the flaking paint should definitely be fixed, these engines do tick because of direct injection, and the service restraint system message is likely due to a bad connection or harness. Must be a Friday evening car, this LT1 of yours.

[04lss]

Originally Posted by arpad_m

Man, this must be quite irritating. Apart from the QC issues, these dealerships aren't doing you much good...

The passenger door and the flaking paint should definitely be fixed, these engines do tick because of direct injection, and the service restraint system message is likely due to a bad connection or harness. Must be a Friday evening car, this LT1 of yours.

I figured the tick was normal , im not worried about it. I just wanted it in writing that its normal before i begin driving my camaro ... like a camaro.



The rest of the issues are just disheartening. I went chevy because ive had many good well built GM products, 4 Wbodies, my tahoe, and so on.

I expected to have a better experience than with my Mustang, but at least the ford dealers tried to fix any of the issues i brought them.



Hopefully this new dealer is the charm.

[Sindri]

Have you changed the oil yet? Make sure there is no "magic glitter" in it. Did anything occur before the ticking noise?

My '21 SS1LE made a random "pop" noise and then started ticking, and vibrating, and ended up needing a whole new engine. Long story short, I no longer have a Camaro.

[NateZ28]

OP I've had some pretty negative experiences with local dealers. Even the "reputable" local one scratches my front splitter and didn't fix one of the issues I brought the car in for.

Originally Posted by Sindri

Have you changed the oil yet? Make sure there is no "magic glitter" in it. Did anything occur before the ticking noise?

My '21 SS1LE made a random "pop" noise and then started ticking, and vibrating, and ended up needing a whole new engine. Long story short, I no longer have a Camaro.

I take it you were out of warranty?

[Sindri]

Originally Posted by NateZ28

I take it you were out of warranty?

No, it was was well within warranty. It was a brand new 2021, I had only had it 2 weeks and it only had 500 miles on it. It had no mods and I drove it IAW GM's break-in procedures. I was on my way home from work, turning into my neighborhood when it went *POP* and the ticking and vibrating started.

There's a lot more to my story, it's buried several pages down in this sub-forum, but long story short the replacement engine failed 5 days after it was installed (valve spring issue that plagued a bunch of GM V8s built in 2020). After that was fixed, I kept finding more issues with the car (poor workmanship, broken stuff, missing parts, etc.) I got tired of making payments on a car that was always in the shop due to the dealership's incompetence so I got them to buy it back from me under the lemon law for full purchase price.

I agree with your sentiments about dealers - I learned my lesson on who not to deal with. After all this went down I left them a negative Google review, and they posted a canned response about how they were sorry about my experience and I should contact them so they could make it right. I did, and they ghosted me. So much for making it right.

I just wanted OP to be careful. Some ticking in these cars is normal from the DI fuel injection, but if it's really bad, accompanied with vibration, and/or occurs after a loud *POP*, it could be a more serious issue.