Gee I must be the luckiest bloke in Oz.
I keep hearing all these horror stories about
oil burn and piston slap, let me tell you the other side........
My wife bought a new VT Series 11 SS Commodore in October 2000, first model with the LS1. The car had 10k's on the speedo when we test drove it. Engine was noisy on startup when cold, sounded like lifters. Traced to noisy belts on the early engines, all engine pulleys and belt changed, no more noises.
Dealer serviced every 10000k's, we always complained about drive train noise, and told "that is normal for these cars". At 90,000, transmission was slipping, replaced under warranty. Then, with the noise from the tranny gone, you could hear the diff.
Diff replaced under warranty at 95,000 k's.
The car is now
my daily driver, (as
she has bought herself an MX5) and has 286,000k's on it. It has had new pads, front struts, rear camber kits etc, but apart from being serviced every 10,000k's, the engine has not had a spanner on it. It used no
oil up to 150,000k's, and even now, I only add 1 litre after 6-7,000k's, between services.
The only problem I have now is when I book it in for a service, I am told, "Our service schedule only goes to 200,000, we don't know what to do!"
I sure hope the LS1 I buy for my Cobra is as good.
