Quote:
Originally Posted by John Holmes III
I heard all of the horror stories before I bought my '97 Eldorado with the Northstar in 2004. The key here is lack of oil and coolant changes in regards to Northstar engine problems.
After three years of ownership, I couldn't be happier with the Eldo. It uses a quart of 10W-30 every 2k, and runs like new. The first thing I did when I bought the car was to change all the filters and fluids. The only problems so far have been appropriate for a eleven year old car: brake pads, water pump, engine mount, battery and sparkplugs. Not bad for three years of daily driving.
I find the build quality to be excellent, and all the gadgets still work. When I take the car in for oil changes, the dealer lets me borrow a late model Cadillac for the day. I have noticed that these rental cars feel pretty beat, even though they are only a few months old. Even the DTS they loaned me with less than a thousand miles on it felt like a five year old car. People really beat on loaner cars, and even a Mercedes loaner would feel pretty bad after a few weeks.
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John, you have been lucky.
My former 1999 (I think that in an earlier post I wrote 1998, but I checked the paperwork and it was a 1999 model) Northstar Seville was purchased new by my Dad. Because of my mom's illness the car became very inconvenient for her to get in and out. So I bought it from my dad.
Since new the car had been consuming about a quart of oil per 1000 miles. Numerous "exchanges" with the dealer got us no result. At one point we were even told that the oil consumption was normal and,now get this, that the high oil consumption was a design feature that allowed a fresh supply of oil to be runnign through the engine at all times. HA!!!
There are owners of 150k plus miles W124 in this forum who get all bent out of shape if their cars consume 1 quart of oil every 2k to 2.5k miles.
In a 6 month period of time, before the car reached 48k miles, a number of things began to go wrong with the car, including several tranny "issues." The car was at that point still under warranty, so it cost me nothing, but GM spent nearly $9k in that 6 month period of time. I finally said enough is enough and so I traded it in for my current 1998 E320.
So far the only "unusual" expense for the E320 has been repairing a bulky sunroof. the dealer paid for half, even though the car has been out of warranty for a long time.
I must admit that the Seville was a good looking car. It was black on black, with big, shiny chrome wheels. I felt like a Mafioso, or a pimp, driving it.
I must also admit that out ont he open road the car was fun. Big, fast, quiet and comfortable.
Just not very reliable and really expensive to maintain.
Maybe I got a lemon.
