150K Miles in a 2014 Cruze Diesel

So, I have made another major milestone in my 2014 Chevy Cruze Diesel, 150,000 miles. I have previously posted my experience through 50K and 100K

Here: http://www.cruzetalk.com/forum/64-c...iscussion/56962-50000-miles-cruze-diesel.html

And Here: http://www.cruzetalk.com/forum/64-c...7-100k-miles-2014-chevrolet-cruze-diesel.html

This review will pretty much be from the 100K point to the present. Other than normal maintenance items such as a timing belt and rear brake pads at 145K miles, nothing needed replacing during the period from 100K to 150K miles. It continues to be a reliable, comfortable, fuel efficient and powerful (for what it is) car. It still runs and drives just like the day it did when I picked it up with 55 miles on the clock. The car remains rattle and squeak free, the seats still look new, the suspension is still tight and supple. That being said, the timing belt tensioner (or something in that belt system) did start to whine a couple thousand miles before I had the timing belt replaced, but I do not consider that an “issue” since I went almost 50,000 miles past when I was supposed to change the timing belt.

I did say that nothing needed to be replaced from 100K to 150K but I did have a couple issues, which I file under the “learning experience” category. I am a bit biased on this car admittedly, so there will be some who read what I am about to say and take it more negatively than I did, but I will state the facts, what I learned, and most importantly how others can prevent it from happening to them,

At about 115K and again at 131K, I got a CEL (Check Engine Light) and a message that my DPF was full and to keep driving, immediately followed by a Power Reduced message. I got very lucky in that both times I was able to drive it straight to the dealership for a manual DPF (Diesel Particulate Filter) regeneration. After it happened the first time, I got an aftermarket gauge to monitor certain parameters of the car, namely:

“Regen Status” (Indicates when there is a regen of the DPF to burn off accumulated soot)

“Soot Grams” (Indicates how many grams of soot have accumulated in the DPF)

“Manifold Absolute Pressure (MAP)” (Indicates turbo boost – or vacuum. 14.0 is the equivalent to zero boost. Anything under that is vacuum).

After I got the monitor (well, two monitors, but we can ignore the first one) - called a Scangauge II (it’s documented thoroughly on this forum) – I thought I was free and clear, but not so much. One day, I observed that my grams of soot were up to 22, higher than the usual 19 grams that trigger a regen, but I thought nothing of it. I also noticed that the MAP had dropped well below 14 before I shut the car off, but the Regen Indicator said there was none in progress. When I shut the car off, the soot grams went from 22 to 35 immediately. When I started the car the next time, I had the dreaded “Power Reduced” message and CEL again.

Here’s what happens. There’s about a 30 second window in which the car starts gearing up for a regen and this is indicated by MAP below 14, but the Regen Indicator is not on yet. I believe the car has started the process of injecting fuel in to the DPF to heat it up, but it’s not hot enough to start burning the soot off at this point, and as such it gets clogged if you shut the car off during this 30 second (or so) window. The solution is to never shut the car off when both the Regen Indicator is off AND the MAP is below 14. (Or for those of you who prefer to monitor turbo boost – it will turn to a negative number)

Hopefully I haven’t lost you there. The downside to this is that you will need to buy a gauge ($120-ish) to monitor this, and it is considerably cheaper than the cost of one manual regen ($250-ish). Should you have to do this? NO, but it is what it is. Maybe the engineers will figure out a way around this in the next go-around, or at least figure a way to alert the driver.

Odds are pretty good this won’t ever happen to you. It took 115K miles for it to happen to me, and I am glad it did because now I have a clear understanding (I think) of what happened and am able to help others prevent it. If you do have this message, you probably can’t drive much further than 50-100 miles without damaging the DPF. Since then, that particular set of circumstances has not presented itself and all the emissions components have been working well. I am averaging 800-1000 miles in between regen cycles lately.

Now that that’s all out of the way, I can go on raving about the car. I never in a million years imagined I would still have this car after 150K miles and now looking forward to the 200K mark. I love this car as much as I did the day I test drove it, and simply find it very engaging and fun to drive every day. I continue to be thoroughly impressed with the engineering and build quality of this car – all aspects – but especially the powertrain. I am at a point now where I can see this being a good and reliable car for hundreds of thousands of miles. Of course time will tell, but I am still in the game and on my way to 200K as a daily driver and we shall see where it goes from there.