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Truck yesTrucks are good! The Chevrolet Colorado ZR2 is supposed to be a sturdy, robust and form-fitting rear axle pickup that can easily handle off-road trails. And yet, a number of truck air bags deploy on off-road trails, leaving homeowners with major problems. This is what happens.
In May, a reader sent a tip to Jalopnik regarding the deployment of Chevrolet Colorado off-road airbags. "As the owner of ZR2, I am very concerned about removing my truck from the roadway now," he told us after reading various complaints on the owners' forums. I started to examine it.
Last Saturday, a Pennsylvania truck driver, Matt Gotowchikow, posted a video on Facebook showing Colorado's all-terrain variant – the fat and bad ZR2 – blowing up its side curtain airs while navigating a relatively smooth track.
About 13 seconds after the video begins, the slow-moving truck makes a loud noise and a voice is heard, shocked by the explosive deployment of the airbags – a deployment whose timing does not seem to match any particularly troublesome obstacle on the track . .
I contacted Matt by phone to find out what had happened. He told me that he was at an autism fundraiser in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, in his 2011 two-door Jeep Wrangler, when traffic began to slow down. The group ahead of him struggled through one of the most difficult obstacles in the relatively "green" advanced track; In particular, the white Chevrolet ZR2 was struggling to find the right line over a rock.
So Matt and his group came out of their platforms and went back to watch the truck attempt the climb. "It was like the third or the fourth [attempt]and I said "you know what, I'm going to film it," said Matt.
So he did it. That's when the Chevrolet Colorado ZR2, apparently in stock, made its way onto the rock and was never home. At least that's what it seemed like until the vehicle climbed higher up the slope. "They are almost at a standstill, and you can hear the sound, and you see the airbag coming down, and you hear the girl screaming," Matt said.
"After that, the first thing I heard was that OnStar was calling them to make sure they were fine." Describing what caused the airbag, Matt said: "No shock, no shock or impact of any kind [triggered it]. It was just very weird.
And this is not the only time that has happened.
Asked about the wave of similar complaints about the Chevy Colorado airbag deployment, a Chevrolet spokeswoman said, "We are aware of this situation that occurs on rare occasions. The reason this would happen is that the curtain airbags are designed to deploy if the detection system predicts that the vehicle is about to roll on its side.
But the owners say that goes against the off-road driving of this truck.
After talking with Matt, I was able to get in touch with the owner of the truck, David Kostura, who confirmed Matt's account and sent me the picture above with the description "I'm sorry ".
While Kostura admitted that he might have had to drive his 2018 Colorado ZR2 gas with 2,700 miles on the clock more slowly, he said the track looked pretty soft, especially in the section where the airbags were being deployed . He guesses that it was only an inclination of six to seven degrees.
"[The airbag] should have come out milliseconds after the truck responded to the biggest rock you see in this video, "he said.
Kostura, a long-time GM customer, is upset and asks GM to pay to repair the now-locked seat belts, damaged roof trim and airbags. But after reading information about similar incidents online, he fears that this will not happen.
"If they want to try to get out of it, I really do not want to have anything to do with the truck anymore," he said on the phone, clearly disturbed by the fact that this arrived heavily at a truck. marketed as an off-road off-road.
He says his vehicle is currently at the dealership assessed by a third party hired by GM.
A press truck had the same problem
This is not the first time this has happened in a Chevrolet Colorado, as pointed out by the reader who sent Jalopnik the first tip. He linked us to the Kelley Blue Book review above, which includes a model Z71 press vehicle with airbags suspended from its A pillar.
"Only Colorado managed to bang our heads by spontaneously deploying the side curtain airbags while driving on a groomed railroad at dizzying speeds of five to seven miles at the hour," said the spokesman. KBB facilitator. believing that this was probably "an abnormal incident".
It happened on the dunes
But this is not an abnormal incident, and Matt's video is not the only one to do the same. This clip that he has published has made many people talk about this problem, drawing to my attention a number of other cases of Colorados that blew their airbags off the road. Just watch the video above that someone posted in the comments of Matt's clip.
I do not recognize much about the conditions surrounding this truck's off-road tour, but the video clearly shows a black Colorado tearing donuts on the sand dunes, and the side-curtain airbags deploying for a reason that seems not obvious.
Another low-speed ZR2 incident in California
Matt's video also helped to get in touch with another ZR2 owner in California, who wanted to remain anonymous for fear that this story could, in one way or another, affect the demand that he had filed with GM. It's his truck above.
The owner told me that he was sailing in his brand new $ 47,000 Colorado ZR2 diesel on "easy and moderate" dirt tracks near his in-laws in the San National Forest region. Bernardino, when he received a bad surprise.
"On the way back to the asphalt, I went through a bend and flew over a bunch of bumpy bumps at high speed," he said. "They were very progressive … they were not rocky bumps with quick fallout."
The owner of the ZR2 told me that he had rolled on the first hump at about 5 mph, then on the second, before realizing that the ripples were a little larger than expected, so he braked. "It was a sturdy and not aggressive crush of the truck. And the airbags deployed at the end of the second hump, "he said.
"I sat there in shock," he said. OnStar then called and connected with a tow truck, but the owner of the low-mileage all-terrain truck refused the tow and instead chose to cut the air bags blocking his view and return to where he was.
Like the Kostura truck, the vehicle worked well after the deployment, except that something related to the seatbelt pretensioners was apparently activated, preventing the seat belts from fully disengaging from their retracted positions. And since he did not want to drive nearly 100 miles on the highway without a functional seatbelt, the Colorado owner had his truck towed to a dealership for over $ 300.
The driver and his wife do not think they have to pay for it because it happened on a "standard, dusty and easy runway", especially on a section that the driver describes as "not even moderate". His goal is to GM car rental, towing and repair.
It should be mentioned that this anonymous owner is a big fan of his ZR2, which he bought especially for daily driving and getting off the road. He constantly excited me on the phone with me saying, "I love my truck … everything is great, apart from the stupid deployment of the airbags.
A guy was left with a huge repair bill
But none of these stories are as unfortunate as Joe Finn's, because after his airbag took off on his Chevrolet Colorado ZR2 2018 during light off-road driving, he said GM had refused $ 6,512.74 (see below).
His story was picked up on GM-Trucks.com, but I contacted him to get a more detailed account.
Finn, who lives near the Sequoia National Forest in California, was out on a Saturday in April to explore dirt roads near his home, planning to go camping. He told me on the phone what the conditions of the road were. "I was in 4×4, I was in off-road mode, I did not go fast and I drove on a two-lane road with deep ruts," he said. "You were moving back and forth, but you started slowly."
It's at this point that Finn says that the right side fell down and leaned the truck at about 20 degrees, and then things headed south.
"I climbed uphill and [the truck] leaned to the right … Yes, the airbags went off. OnStar arrived, I managed to start the truck, put away the airbags and bring it home.
Two days later, he took the truck to the dealership and filed a claim with GM customer service.
Finn says GM then asked third-party investigators to look at the vehicle, and as the letter on the left shows, GM has finally determined that it will not cover the repairs.
"After a thorough investigation of your case, none of the available data suggests that the product claim has any merit," notes the note. "On the basis of the facts provided, General Motors is not in a position to assume its liability or damages and we suggest that you resolve this problem through your insurer."
And that's what Finn finally did. He filed an insurance claim with Geico, which covered approximately $ 4,000 in repairs over $ 5,000. (This total repair cost was significantly lower than the estimate of $ 6,512.74 according to Mr. Geico, because he reused the old headlamp and airbag module. because he looked in good condition, so Finn spent about $ 1,000 and did).
Finn says GM has refused to cover repairs due to electrical modifications and damage to the vehicle, pasting the following message – allegedly from the Chevy Trucks Facebook page – on the Coloradofans message board:
It has been advised to damage the wiring of your Colorado and your aftermarket. It has been suggested that you also wish to apply for insurance. We know this is not the result you were hoping for, but we must support that decision.
The owner of the ZR2 told me that he had installed LED headlights, LED fog lights, a winch connected directly to the battery and an electric lock for the hatchback.
This last modification, which allows the key switches to lock and unlock the liftgate instead of having to insert the key, forced Finn to tap into the wiring harness. It is a fairly common mod in the Colorado community; Here is the detailed installation procedure:
Finn, a "roadie" who says his job as a production manager in the entertainment industry makes him very familiar with electrical systems, says his changes could not affect the airbag system. and "bullshit".
"The airbags went out because a sensor determined it was a rollover, which it should not do in a branded truck and marketed," he said by phone, obviously upset by the situation.
Regarding the damage GM allegedly cited as the second ground for refusing coverage, Finn said it was only scratches on the rear bumper that had been caused by a steep downhill and slight damage to the defense. said the dealer corrected this). "Basically, they invented things," says Finn.
The situation left frustrated Finn. Shortly after the incident, he filed the above-mentioned complaint with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. What's bothering him is not just the money he had to pay or the six weeks of downtime on a truck he just bought, it's also safety.
"GM is just refusing to recognize the problem and the potential safety problem it poses," he said, mentioning how he could have come out if he had seen his head out through the window. "[Airbags are] certainly like an explosion next to your head, "he said about his first experience with such passive restraint.
He also mentioned that to prevent the airbags from deploying off-road, the Colorado owners were pulling the # 18 fuse or installing switches to turn off the air bag system.
He believes that the off-road mode should increase the deployment threshold of the airbags or that GM should use a configuration similar to that of the Toyota RSCA switch, which makes it possible to disable the roll detection function of the side airbag while driving. off road:
Finn later said that he had taken the truck for a 10,000 mile off-road adventure this summer and that he had not had any problems. But then, he told me that he had fired the fuse, a gesture that he found boring. The same goes for the anonymous gentleman mentioned earlier, who said, "I did not pay $ 50,000 to remove a fuse from a truck."
More incidents reported
Just a quick search on Google brings up other stories of Chevy Colorado's off-road airbag deployment. A user named Airmon on the Coloradofans.com message board said he was driving his ZR2 diesel on some dunes, when the bags jumped, writing:
As I headed for a small, unidentifiable dune, I gave the truck just enough power to reach the top and, when I arrived, it seemed like a shot had been fired and somebody was going to be on the road. a hit on the side of the head.
From there, things went the same way as others who claim to have experienced the same problem. OnStar called, he eventually turned on the truck (although the seat belts were out of reach because of the belt pretensioners), he cut off the airbags and brought it to the dealership later, where a third party analyzes what has happened.
Airmon describes GM's inferred conclusion below that it will solve this problem once free of charge:
GM will fix the truck this time. They are of the opinion that the truck has worked as expected and that if I use the off-road truck or in a manner that causes the deployment of the airbags a second time, it will be either my expense, either my warranty repair. Trader. As a result, GM will not make any modifications or repairs to the restraint system to prevent another occurrence.
…The GM representative suggested that I do not use the off-road truck or bumpy dirt roads. I mentioned the fact that it is a ZR2, probably GM's most off-road vehicle, and the representative again suggested that I was not using the truck in situations that the truck could interpret as a reversal.
And indeed, Airmon brought back his truck, but he said it took about a month. That's all that happened on January 27th of this year, which is certainly the Airmon NHTSA complaint at the top of this section.
Another story comes from a man named Mike Saad, who commented on the story of GM-Trucks.com about the Joe incident. Saad's post shows a dark Colorado with its side airbags deployed after apparently driving on a fire road. He writes:
We just bought a Colorado zr2 from Conelle Chevy. I have only 2,000 miles on my brand new truck and my inflatable roof curtains have deployed on me. I was just on a fire track. I need 4 wheel drive, I was in 2 wheels. My Airbag roof is off. So I think it's not that rare that GM wants people to think. My car is at the dealership right now, I think it's going to try to give me a little *** *** that my roll bar and the lightbar are the reason and try to refuse to fix it but we will see. Because my bags went out during the day, all my switches were off. There is no way to open the air bag circuit. That would mean that jumping his battery would force them to deploy. Come on, it's not a coincidence. They have a serious problem. GM must own and take care of it before a class action is commenced.
Between videos and stories shared online, I found a total of seven Chevrolet Colorado side airbag accounts deployed in moderate off-road conditions. In addition, in the time it took me to type this story, another apparent owner wrote a complaint about the GM-Trucks messenger card about the side airbags that would have been deployed at the time. A half-turn.
What to do with this
GM has been doing a lot of publicity about the off-road capabilities of this truck, so it's easy to understand why so many people who have had to deal with off-road airbags feel like they've been duped. . If the truck is a real all-terrain vehicle, it must be able to manage the dirt tracks without having to go to the dealer to repair them. And it should not require the owners to remove a fuse.
Of course, it is worth mentioning that many Colorados have crossed difficult roads without detonating their side curtain airbags, and the incidents mentioned here are probably only a small part of the trucks on the road.
It should also be noted that the Chevrolet Colorado is not the only vehicle to have experienced such a problem. Nissan truck owners have been complaining about the deployment of off-road airbags for years (here is a video showing that this is happening on an Xterra).
In the end, Nissan launched a service campaign from 2004 to 2014 for the Titans from 2005 to 2014, Frontiers and Xterras from 2005 to 2014, so that their Airbag Contol units would be recalibrated free of charge and reimbursed to those who had to replace their airbags. . . The company describes the problem and the fix on its service website:
The current ACU reversal detection calibration logic could allow unintentional deployment of rollover curtain airbags in rare cases, in some unique driving scenarios, generally involving unpaved or off-road roads where one side of the vehicle is higher than the other. The ACU reprogramming will improve the rollover detection calibration to meet these unique conditions and prevent the inadvertent deployment of rollover air bags, while retaining the design intent for deployment in rollover accidents.
It remains to be seen if Chevrolet will do something similar.
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