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Issue with Chevy Cruze 2012 LTZ. Timing? Tranny?

2027 Views 9 Replies 4 Participants Last post by  Imajericho
Hello, I bought a brand new Chevy Cruze 2012 LTZ. I have had quite a few problems with it so far which all have seemed to be common with it.

Had a Vaccum Cover Leak.
Had an Oil leak onto Serpentine Belt.

Both of these were common issues I looked up on the car.

However, I am having a plethora of other issues which no mechanic seems to have an answer for.

1. Took to chevy garage for the squealing my far is having. They said it was oil leaking on it. Fixed the oil leak and said squealing should stop because Serpentine Belt is fine. No dice. Still squealing badly. Stops when I press in brakes. I asked them if brakes. They said no the brakes are 40% and fine.

2. Sometimes loud clunk when I hit brakes in.

3. This is the biggie. While driving home today about 20 miles into my trip I was accelerating up a hill. I felt an immedate deceleration and the right side of the car seemed to drag and a sound like dragging aluminum cans on the ground started. It went away but came back a couple of time when accelerating up a hill.

I then noticed a minute later the RPMs were sitting at 2000 despite I was accelerating. No movement. As I pressed the accelerator in more the car jumped straight to 3000 rpms and was rising normally from there but it jolted the entire car.

Lastly, about another minute later any acceleration of any kind was making a whirring and whistling sound. In which I finally abandoned the car in a parking lot and called for a ride.


When it does the sudden deceleration it feels like the right side of the car jerks badly.


Anyone have any idea what the issue is?

My car is at 39k miles and is still under warranty until October.
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Some interesting issues? While the Bumper to Bumper coverage ended at 36K, you still should have the 5 Year/100K powertrain warranty in effect. Is your car throwing any codes that can help diagnose the problems. Any dash warning lights lit?
No codes at all have come up. My uncle thinks CV joints are the issue possibly snapped? Not sure how much he knows about my car specfically though.
Go to recalls.gm.com and check for open recalls. Specifically look for the Half Axle recall. I don't think your car is affected but your symptoms point to a drive train or transmission issue.

The Cruze isn't prone to oil leaks. Water leaks - yes; oil - no.

Can you duplicate the issues at will? If so, take your car in and demonstrate the problems, preferably to the tech who will be working on your car.

Welcome to CruzeTalk.
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Go to recalls.gm.com and check for open recalls. Specifically look for the Half Axle recall.
That was my first thought as well.
Site says no recalls for my vehicle.

That said, I assume I can duplicate it at will as after I parked it and opebed the hood and revved engine looking for anything (no issues seemed to show while revving in idle).

I tried to drive the car up a hill in the parking lot I pulled over in. As soon as I accelerated a decent amount, the car literally seemed to shift itself like 2 feet to the left and the back and the car jolted to the left. (Light snow on ground so I could see clearly how it jolted badly).

It actually did it so badly I got scared and reparked it and didn't mess with it again.


This of course could have just been the jolt of it finally jumping gears without properly going up in rpms first, but I didn't want my car beyond parkable after that.

So, I assume replicating it should be easy enough. Chevy garage supposed to look at it tomm. Had to tow it there.
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I forget which website it was about the oil leak, but they said it was coming up a lot at dealers with leaking oil from a seal leak onto the belt around 35k miles. Mine was at about 36k miles.

^^^This response was to obermd about the Oil Leak. I couldn't find the website I was referring to. I thought it was this one in a talk about the code it threw. However, it was the Crankshaft Seal I was talking about.
Okay. Took it there.

They said they are pretty sure the Turbo blew.

Sound right?
You may have a problem with the turbo, but I don't think that explains the squirrely handling. I think a turbo would be an engine performance issue - not something that could jolt you 2 feet sideways.
Well, he said Turbo blown. And I was like what could cause that?

And he was like low oil pressure a number of things etc.

And I was like shouldn't we figure out what caused it???

He was just like, it should be okay just need to change the turbo.
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