2013 LaCrosse, 15,000 miles--seriously

[Human]

So, as of yesterday, I am the proud owner of a second 2013 LaCrosse. Ironically, this comes on the six-year anniversary of my acquiring the first one. I've mentioned in other threads that my mother, age 89, had a 2013 LaCrosse, almost identical to mine, that was the last new car my dad bought. Mom had long said she wanted me to have her car when she was done with it, and in the last few months had begun talking more and more about doing that, but she has been having difficulty coming to terms with the idea of not having a car. She has admitted freely that this was purely psychological, but it was still a barrier for her. At one point, I half-jokingly suggested we trade cars, and this week, we did essentially that. She passed hers on to me and I left the one I've had for six years for her to drive on the exceedingly rare occasions she needs to. My sister lives a mile away and doesn't want her driving at all, so she provides the vast majority of her transportation needs, to the point that I have put far more miles on her LaCrosse than she has in the past year or two. All that said, it still felt strange yesterday when I got in the car at DMV after taking her license plate off and putting mine on, knowing that it was now my car.

So, how do the two cars compare? They're both 2013 eAssist hybrid leather editions, but my old one is almost a calendar year older, having rolled off the line at the beginning of the production run in July 2012, while hers left the factory at the tail end of the run in June 2013. Mechanically, my old car is showing its age with 137,000 miles on the odometer, compared to hers--my new one, to be exact--showing only 15,000 miles. It's a little more deluxe version than my old one, with its diamond pearl paint job and sunroof. Otherwise, they are identically equipped, except for one somewhat unusual add-on.

When Dad bought the car in the fall of 2014, he couldn't get past the fact that it did not have body side mouldings and they weren't even available for those cars. So he special ordered some aftermarket mouldings and had them color matched to the car. I think the mouldings are actually for a 2006-2016 W-body Impala. They look just like the ones that were on the 2011 Impala I got from them when they got the LaCrosse. Before I could take the Impala home, he supervised as Mom and I put the mouldings on the LaCrosse.

When I was transferring stuff between the two cars on Wednesday, looking at the two side by side, I noticed that some things on Mom's former LaCrosse looked a little more weathered, despite the car being slightly younger; for instance, the black plastics on the grille and fog light surrounds have faded to a charcoal gray, but are still jet black on my old car. The center caps on the wheels also look more weathered. The biggest thing, and the one I will correct ASAP, is the headlights. The ones on mom's former car are hazing over, while the ones on my old car are still crystal clear. I can only attribute that to the fact that my new LaCrosse has been parked outside its whole life, while my old one was likely garaged by the first owners.Had they been as easy to remove and install as they were on my Impala, I would swapped the ones from my old car over, but I really didn't feel like taking the front ends of both cars completely apart. Instead, I ordered a Cerakote headlight restoration kit from Amazon Wednesday night, and it arrived this morning, so I'll be polishing those old lenses up in the next day or so.

As one can imagine, driving the two cars is much the same experience, except Mom's former LaCrosse seems to have a bit more power and it definitely gets better gas mileage. I stopped off halfway home Wednesday, topped off the gas tank and reset the fuel economy calculator, and averaged almost 39 mpg. My old LaCrosse never got more than 35, and struggled to achieve 30 on its last couple of road trips. But no matter, it's now comfortably in retirement in the parking lot of my mom's retirement community.

 

[FrogFan]

Great story. Thanks for posting!

I bought my 2013 new in December of 2012. It's a 3.6L with leather, not a hybrid. It's always been garage-kept, and it's the red color. People are amazed by how good it looks for its age and mileage (115K now), and I suspect your "old" one looks better than your "new" one because it was garage-kept for awhile.

I've posted elsewhere about my maintenance cost concerns that are driving me to think about replacing mine, but, notwithstanding those, there is one thing about mine that annoys me: The drivers side armrest has been worn through and I can't replace it. I tried to fix it myself with a leather repair kit and managed to make it worse. My elbow is hard on armrests, I guess. But I'm wondering about your old and new armrests. I'm sure your new one looks great, and I'm envious. I'm wondering if your old one held up.

If I could, I'd buy a new Lacrosse to replace mine in a heartbeat, but it seems like you've done the next best thing. Congrats on that new ride!

 

[Human]

Great story. Thanks for posting!

I bought my 2013 new in December of 2012. It's a 3.6L with leather, not a hybrid. It's always been garage-kept, and it's the red color. People are amazed by how good it looks for its age and mileage (115K now), and I suspect your "old" one looks better than your "new" one because it was garage-kept for awhile.

I've posted elsewhere about my maintenance cost concerns that are driving me to think about replacing mine, but, notwithstanding those, there is one thing about mine that annoys me: The drivers side armrest has been worn through and I can't replace it. I tried to fix it myself with a leather repair kit and managed to make it worse. My elbow is hard on armrests, I guess. But I'm wondering about your old and new armrests. I'm sure your new one looks great, and I'm envious. I'm wondering if your old one held up.

If I could, I'd buy a new Lacrosse to replace mine in a heartbeat, but it seems like you've done the next best thing. Congrats on that new ride!

All of the armrests on both of my LaCrosses are in great shape. Are there self-service junkyards in your area? You might be able to find what you need there. The best part of harvesting your own parts, not only do you get them at a good price, you can learn how things come apart and go together at no extra charge. The older LaCrosse has really held up well, other than having to replace the timing set at about 84,000 miles.It does use more than a little oil, as indicated by the sooty spot on the rear bumper above the tailpipe, and as oil consumption has gone up, acceleration and gas mileage have gone down.

 

[richardnewton]

For headlights, there are some companies that sell "stickers" to put on top of cleaned lenses. Not sure how they work.

One can DIY with 2k clear. But the 2k is very dangerous to your lungs so without serious equipment, I think it it too dangerous for the home gamer.

On different cars we have tried different kits. The headlights come out clean but the results don't last too long.

Another option is to bring the car to a pro where they have the dangerous coatings.

 

[Human]

Yeah, I've had similar results with Simoniz and Turtle Wax kits. They look great for a couple of months, then haze up again. The Cerakote kit I just bought comes with a lifetime warranty, and was less than $20, so I figured I had little to lose. It's a three-step process, including solvent wipes to get the grunge and deteriorated original sealant off, then 2,000 and 3,000 grit sanding discs to polish out the lenses, and finally a sealant, which is what usually fails with these kits, so we'll see how it goes.

 

[richardnewton]

Use a lo of water with wet sanding discs. Just keep watering.

That washes away the grit to prevent scratches. It also prevents the discs from getting clogged.

 

[Human]

Use a lo of water with wet sanding discs. Just keep watering.

That washes away the grit to prevent scratches. It also prevents the discs from getting clogged.

Exactly. It's the same as with paint and bodywork. The manufacturer stresses this point in the instructions enclosed with the kit. Curiously, the instructions make no mention of protecting the paintwork surrounding the headlights by masking it off, which I plan to do. If they were easier to remove, I would take them off of the car to work on them.

 

[richardnewton]

What are your "maintenance" plans now that it will b a daily driver?

 

[Human]

What are your "maintenance" plans now that it will b a daily driver?

I'll basically be maintaining it the same way I maintained the other one with frequent oil checks. I'll also keep an eye on other things that typically fail with age or disuse. When I was in college, I bought my great aunt's 1977 Buick Skylark coupe (Nova clone). It was six years old and had 14,000 miles on it when I got it. The first summer I had it, the air conditioning failed because the seals had dried up from disuse. The tires were also a bit dry rotted and didn't last very long. The one maintenance item that frustrates me on those cars is there is no dipstick to check the transmission fluid.

 

[richardnewton]

Did you change the drive belt already?

 

[Human]

Did you change the drive belt already?

On which car? The drive belt on the one I've had for six years was changed with the timing set about three years ago. Amazingly, the mechanic didn't charge me for it, or at least it wasn't overtly reflected in the bill. As far as I know, the one I acquired from my mother is its original belt. That's on my list of things to check, but at 15,000 miles, it should be fine.

 

[richardnewton]

The rubber on these belts deteriorates with use and time. Our LaCrosse owners' manual says to inspect for cracking and other damage at the earlier of 10 years of 97,500 (I think).

We changed the belt on our 2.4 eAssist last year at 45k miles. It started to squeak a bit. Belt looked great from a distance. But upon closer inspection, there were very tiny cracks all over the ribs (the smooth side looked fine). Didn't see the belt cracking until it was out of the car.

As this is not just an accessory belt but a 15hp motor, the belt is under a lot more abuse than a normal accessory belt. Besides the inconvenience of a tow, the belt can be involved in some additional damage (e.g. broken generator bracket, tensioner, generator bracket, plastic intake ductwork, nearby wiring).

Maybe you can take some sharp pictures of the belt's ribs with a good phone camera and a lot of light.

I think both the belt and tensioner were upgraded. Replace both with OEM parts matched to your VIN as there are some variants.

IIRC, some of the belts were shredding and some tensioners were breaking generator brackets. There were no new generator brackets but some might be left in junkyards. I thought I saw a few people weld the broken brackets back together. This was an early service bulleten as GM was trying to figure what was going wrong:

https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2013/SB-10044385-9236.pdf

As you can see, I think the belt-tensioner upgrade can be a nice bump up in reliability.

Also....check the OEM tires too for age. We are on the third set for age (dry rot from visual inspection).

 

[EDSELRANGER]

Interesting story Human... I hadn't noticed it until now. Thanks for posting. It was tough getting my Mom to accept the fact her driving days were best left behind her. A couple of minor accidents that could have easily been very serious helped convincer her.

No LaCrosse for me though. But my brother is now driving a recently dented, beat up old Taurus.

 

[Human]

Interesting story Human... I hadn't noticed it until now. Thanks for posting. It was tough getting my Mom to accept the fact her driving days were best left behind her. A couple of minor accidents that could have easily been very serious helped convincer her.

No LaCrosse for me though. But my brother is now driving a recently dented, beat up old Taurus

Fortunately, my mom took after her mother in this respect. Over the past couple of years, she has gradually stopped driving on her own; in fact, I'm not sure she actually drove her LaCrosse (the one she just gave me) at all in the past twelve months. I drove her to church and to my sister's in it a year ago, when I was visiting for Christmas, and then when I returned at Easter, its battery was stone dead from sitting. AAA came out and got it started, and I drove her around in it again while I was there. Sometime in the late summer or early fall, the battery was stone dead again and AAA said it could not be recharged, so she had them put a new battery in it. When I was visiting at Thanksgiving, she brought the subject up by asking me how many miles were on my LaCrosse, and then told me I should just drive hers home. After considering the logistics, I decided to come back a couple of weeks later in the middle of the week, after my fall classes had ended, so we could get the title notarized. I then left her my car to drive, should the need ever arise, which I doubt it ever will. I honestly expect that in the next six months to a year, she will tell me to come get my old car and sell it.

I never really pushed her on giving me her car because I wanted it to be 100 percent her decision, when she was ready. She started bringing up the subject on a fairly regular basis about a year and a half ago, usually by asking how my car was doing and how many miles were on it. She'd then acknowledge that I should really have her car, sooner rather than later, but that she wasn't quite ready to turn loose of it. The old GMAC tagline of "It's not just your car, it's your freedom" still has a lot of resonance for her, even if it's just a matter of psychological comfort. My sister pretty much drives her everywhere. The idea of trading cars gradually took root and made the concept a little easier for her to accept. I was prepared to actually sign the car over to her, but my sister, who is executrix of her estate, suggested I just keep it in my name to simplify the estate, which is what we've done. All in all, I'm glad to have gone about everything in the right way.