My brother had a rental 2006 Uplander yesterday. The company he works for gave him one because he needed to drive a bunch of employees to a jobsite. This particular van had only 9800 km on it when he picked it up, and 4 percent left on the OLM. The oil looked pretty filthy, with a reddish sludgy look to it and it was half a quart low. Engine was the base 3.5 V6. Plenty of pick up around town and on highway with just 2 people and a tank of fuel, but I imagine it would get slow with a full load of people and luggage. The engine gets a little loud towards the upper RPM ranges, but with normal driving it's quite silent. My brother 'tried' out the rev limiter in neutral and it's quite different than when I'm used to. Put the tranny in neutral, stomp the pedal and the tach swings to 6000 and just sits there revving away. No abrupt on-off type of fuel interruption to stop the engine from revving higher. The onboard computer read highway fuel mileage at about 24 mpg at 60 mph, dropping to 20 or abouts at 70 mpg. I'm unsure whether that's using the US or Imperial gallon. Ride is fairly smooth and quiet, but still has the wallowly feeling going around corners or through dips in the road. The voice activated OnStar system is a nice touch but it can get tedious to use. We never actually used any of the functions that would have cost money, but just played around with the voice commands. You have to speak clearly and slowly and be looking towards the controls to get the best response out of the unit. I can't imagine how hard it would be to use the voice feature with a vanload of screaming kids or loud adults. The standard MP3 cd player worked well but the factory speakers can't handle a lot of music with heavy bass. They distort quite easily if you turn the volume up high.
Took a ride in an 06 Uplander yesterday
- Thread starter 55Test
- Start date
- Status
These CSV's (Cross-over Sport Van) as GM calls them are basically a band-aid fix until they can rollout their new Lambda platform. While the exterior looks are very subjective, the interiors are supposed to be quite nice. The engine (3.5L OHV V6 ~200hp) is basically just the 3.4L OHV V6 that's been around for years. For 2006 they added an optional 3.9L OHV V6 rated at ~240hp.
Maybe the reason why my 1999 Ford Taurus had to have head gaskets @ 61k miles was due to it being a Hertz car for it's first 21k miles...
Sad to see someone treat a outfit like this.
Someone is going to own that Van someday...
Bill
I fail to see how that would hurt the engine..
Sitting still with the engine being rev'd to 6000 RPM without a load?
You really think that is good for a engine and it's long life?
Bill
Many new cars won't let you do that.
Try it in a late-model Mercedes-Benz, and the engine won't go anywhere near redline, even with your foot to the floor in neutral/park.
Try it in a late-model Mercedes-Benz, and the engine won't go anywhere near redline, even with your foot to the floor in neutral/park.
robbobster
Member
Member # 1592
"Many new cars won't let you do that.
Try it in a late-model Mercedes-Benz, and the engine won't go anywhere near redline, even with your foot to the floor in neutral/park."
The Van(probably like my Malibu Maxx) doesn't have a "redline" anymore. That's what the rev limiter is for.
Member
Member # 1592
"Many new cars won't let you do that.
Try it in a late-model Mercedes-Benz, and the engine won't go anywhere near redline, even with your foot to the floor in neutral/park."
The Van(probably like my Malibu Maxx) doesn't have a "redline" anymore. That's what the rev limiter is for.
Hitting the rev limiter in neutral versus hitting the rev limiter in gear, explain to me how it's different? I've asked that question to many other 'experts' on other car-related forums, and no one has ever given me a straight answer.
Well, I'm no "expert" but I think hitting the rev limiter anytime is not good for engines long life.
As far as no load, I was taught that you want a load on the engine when reving as it's better for the bottom end bearings. When you rev them without a load, it does damage to the bottom end.
Plus, when your on your way, the engine is getting better cooling and it's not going to rev up as fast since it has a load.
What are you gaining by taking the engine up to 6k in park I guess would be my question...
I'm in the old school of if it's not doing something good, don't do it.
I know others don't have this mindset and thats the way it is.. But after my Taurus eating almost $2400 in headgaskets and labor in less than 110k miles, it's hard to see outfits run like this when it's not their own.
And sadly, Rental cars are not treated with respect of ownership...
Like I said, someone is going to have to own this someday and may not have the $$ to repair it.
I learned the hard way not to buy rental car "buy backs".
Bill
I agree with Bill, in that rev limiting an engine without load could be harmful to your connecting rod bearings. They need load at higher rpms.
I also agree that beating something (a car or otherwise) that isn't yours is disrespectful (don't worry Bill, you're not the only one with this mindset!).
I also agree that beating something (a car or otherwise) that isn't yours is disrespectful (don't worry Bill, you're not the only one with this mindset!).
Take a baseball and throw it as hard as you can, then, go through the motion of throwing just as hard as before but without the baseball, then ask your shoulder the difference without load on it. Same principle
I just rented a Grand Prix and I actualy put oil in it . The car was over a quart low and the oil was black. The car had 9000 miles on it, but I would bet that it has never seen an oil change. No way would I buy a program car and no way would I redline something that does or doesn't belong to me.
OMG, that Uplander is one hideous looking vehicle. Come to think of it 90% of GMs vehicles are ugly as sin.
I agree Gilitar, this vehicle makes no sense to me. All it appears that they've done is made the nose longer and more square, probably making it longer (more difficult to park) and less aerodynamic than the Venture/etc that came before it. GM needs to realize that they aren't fooling anyone, it's a minivan.
Gilitar is on to something here. A lot of the GM cars are prettu unattractive. For a ray of hope, look to Nissan's progress over the last ~15 years. A decade or so ago, Nissan was building some hideous, butt ugly cars. Now, they've got their styling act together, the product is solid from a quality perspective, and they're doing comparatively well.
GM is building some nice, mechanically sound cars vans and SUVs. The uplander's predecessor vans, for example, did terribly in crash tests, the the Uplander and its twins, are getting top ratings. But the styling is still off -- way off in some cases. Good cars that don't make you want to puke when you look at them - now there's an amazing idea.
GM is building some nice, mechanically sound cars vans and SUVs. The uplander's predecessor vans, for example, did terribly in crash tests, the the Uplander and its twins, are getting top ratings. But the styling is still off -- way off in some cases. Good cars that don't make you want to puke when you look at them - now there's an amazing idea.
Maybe GM should sell itself to Renault like Nissan did
From what I've gleaned from new sources on the web, GM's internal management is utterly dysfunctional. I've no doubt they have the styling, engineering, and manufacturing talent to produce great vehicles, but somewhere along the way the managers, marketers, and accountants kill the good ideas.
So, since some people believe that revving an engine hard during break-in is good, doing it to an engine with under 10000 kms is bad? Explain it again to me? Oh yeah, other people say revving an engine hard occasionally can be good for it, but to an engine with less than 10000 kms, it'bad somehow. I'm just going to believe what I believe, as I still haven't gotten any factual evidence why doing what my brother did is bad. All I've gotten so far is hearsay. The mechanic of my brother-inlaw's friend's niece kind of thing. By the way, it's a rental vehicle, and as such probably had been driven hard ever since it was delivered to the rental dealershp, so tell me how going to 6000 rpm for maybe 3 seconds is going to ruin an engine? Do you have any proof of that?
- Status
Similar threads
