Do I have Gremlins?

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tmt502

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So I have just had an interesting last few days with the Tahoe. On Sunday I was getting ready to go run an errand as usual, and open the driver’s door, only this time, the power running board didn’t deploy. Weird.

I hopped in, closed the door, key in the ignition, turn to start....nothing. A couple of clicks and nothing. I turn the key back to off and think about it for a second. Then I give it another try and it fires right up! Weird.

Go run my errand, come back home, think nothing else of it. About an hour later, it’s time to go to our daughter’s soccer game. This time the family loads up in the Tahoe, everything seems fine, running boards deploy, no problems starting, and we’re off. As soon as I back out of the driveway the head unit blacks out and the DVD player sounds like it’s repeatedly trying to eject something. That finally stops after about 15 seconds. Weird.

Head out of the neighborhood to get on the main road and come to a stop light. Light turns green and I give it gas to go, as soon as we start rolling, the trans shifts to neutral, gauges sweep, air bag light comes on, head unit does “the thing” again, then the trans shifts hard back into gear. Turn around to head back home and get the wife’s car. At this point I’m thinking it must be a battery issue, not sure why I made that determination, maybe due to the starting issue initially.

I pick up a new battery on the way back home from the soccer game and drop it in. Starts up fine and after a test drive everything is good.

Monday, Tuesday, good. Wednesday on my way in to work, good. I head home for lunch and again, after taking off from a stop light, bam, same symptoms as before, but this time, the door locks are repeatedly locking and unlocking. Shifting into neutral and back into gear constantly. Can barely get to 10 mph to get to a parking lot and sit for a minute so I can collect myself a bit. At this point, I’m only a mile from home, I figured I’d give it a go and try to make it. Successfully get home, but still having the same symptoms the entire drive. Parked in the driveway and let it sit. Take my car back to work after lunch.

Call the dealership to get a visit scheduled with the service department, earliest they can do is next Tuesday. Yeah, yeah, stealership, but I’m at a loss on where else to take it for troubleshooting. And if it’s the BCM as I’d found from some light googling, I figured they would need to be the one to marry up a new one properly.

Been pretty bummed since yesterday since this our towing vehicle, and that means no trip to the lake this weekend for Mother’s Day. This evening I went down to try it out and see if the symptoms are still happening. A short test drive shows the same stuff, no surprise. At this point I’m wondering if I can even drive it to the dealership next week or if I’ll have to get it towed there. However, I start noticing the sound of water sloshing from the rear of the truck. What the heck?

After I get back in the driveway and shut down, I started rocking the body to see if I could tell where the sloshing might be. I was able to track it down, seemed to be coming from the rear passenger door. I open it up and start rocking it. It’s FULL of water! I pop the seal off the bottom of the door and it drains a lot of water for an uncomfortable amount of time. While it’s draining, I take a look at the fuse block to see if anything looks weird and check the battery terminal cables to make sure they’re snug, all seems good.

Once I’m satisfied the water has been drained and pop the seal back in place, I decide to do another test drive. This time, no issues! None. Drives like it should. What the heck?

So, am I crazy, or are these things related? Could a door full or water cause shorting that could lead to all those symptoms I described? More importantly, how do I make sure I don’t get a door full of water in the future? We’ve had quite a bit of rain here over the last several days.

Thanks for reading this. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.
 

OR VietVet

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adventurenali92

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Not sure if your issues are related. Its entirely possible....
But I will say this... the GMT900 standard wheel base rigs are FAMOUS for trapping water in the rear doors. I read a thread on here a while back about it and a lot of guys saying the same thing. I think it has to do with the way the doors are shaped and it trapping water. Every GMT900 standard wheel base I detail for a customer, after the full wash part of my detail, I always pop the plugs and seals on the bottoms of both rear doors. and let them drain out. On a 2013 Yukon Denali I do quite often, it takes about 10 or so minutes to stop dripping.
 
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wsteele

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A friend of mine was a pretty good golfer as a kid. He got invited to play a round with the then Chairman of GM and a few of their executives.

On the first tee while they were waiting for the group ahead he wanted to impress them that he just wasn’t a good kid golfer, so he decided to ask them a question about their business.

He asked, “so what do you guys think about the other domestic competition?”, he then added quickly, “like American Motors for instance?”

The Chairman turned to my friend and said, “well Jim, we don’t consider a car company that would name one of their cars a Gremlin, competition.”

Jim decided he better stick to golf.

Too funny.
 

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