Driving to the store one night I realized halfway there, my dash light behind the fuel gage was almost out and then realized everything illuminated by my headlights looked very dim, like they weren't on, just my fog lights. I pulled over to find that it was just my fog lights, I had no low beams yet the switch showed my lights to be on. Thankfully no police were around, I've been told driving without your lights on is a red flag to the police that you may be driving drunk or driving recklessly, which neither was the case. Luckily a friend was driving behind me and pulled over at the same time. We both looked at it and then he had to help me get back home, didn't know I had high beams still. I've tried everything to figure out what's wrong and still working on it 6 months later. I'm now on a disability income and can't just bring it to the dealer/mechanic to see if they may or may not be able to fix it and end up with an outrageous bill, especially if I have to keep going back. I was doing research to see if I missed a recall or an article stating the problem & fix with this issue when I found this website and see that it has an awful lot of the same complaints as mine. Kind of a relief. After reading most of them, I still haven't found a comment/complaint that says exactly what the issue is and if it's expensive. If I'm not the only pontiac owner with this issue and at a loss, what should I do next besides the obvious? Is there an actual fix for this problem that I haven't read/found yet or when there is one, will I/we be notified?
2003 Pontiac Sunfire electrical complaints
Page 2 of 2: complaints 11 to 23 of 23, newest first, as owners wrote them.
I purchased the car in october 2003 and the car was great. In march 2006 I started having problems where the car when attempted to start would take a few seconds extra and then start, then 6 months later I was driving down the street and the car just cut off in the middle of an intersection. The car restarted about 10 minutes later. Then in november this started happening more an more frequently. One night in december the car cut off and would not restart at all. I was able to pull of the road. I waited an hour and still the car would not start. I came back the next day and the car would not start. I got the car towed to a mechanic who said that he thought it was the fuel pump so I replaced that and the car worked for 2 days and then the same problem again. He then tested the car and saw there was no power going to the fuel pump. I had him do a temporary fix and run a line from the battery to the fuel pump so the car would still start. Then everything else slowly started to fail. The air bag light would come on intermittently and now stays on. One low beam headlight went out and then the other followed by my high beam totally. My front left turn signal went then the rear right followed by the front right. My horn no longer works. I don't know if my airbags would deploy if I was in an accident. The windshield wiper recently stopped working as well.
Failure is in the left and right dim headlights. The left went out 1 week ago. The service light came on and there was a constant clicking noise until the lights were turned on (similar sound when turn signal lamps go out). The bulb was replaced and the service light went off. The light still did not work and the clicking noise was the same. The old bulb did not have the filament burnt out. Today the right bulb has done the same thing. Both bulbs have been replaced and still the same results. No headlights. Bright headlights still work. Luckily this happened during the day else my wife would have had a heck of a time getting around and avoiding an accident due to loss of visibility. Currently this condition still exists and we are swapping vehicles to play the drive during daylight game. From the research I have found this is fairly common to the pontiac sunfire. Poor electrical wiring harness.
Having numerous problems with the headlights. Started with dim lights then to no low beams, and now only one high beam. By researching on the internet I am certainly not the only one who has had the same problems with very expensive repairs. This to me seems like a very dangerous problem. Maybe no one was killed as a result ,but how many would have to for a recall to fix this problem. I think pontiac needs to address this issue with a recall.
Turned the car off , went in the store, came out and the car was full off black smoke. The wire harness melted from the fuse panel back to the tail lights. Dealer said it started from a faulty diode near the fuse panel, but warranty would not cover it. Thank god the kids weren't waiting in the car.
The wiring harness on the vehicle has failed three times since 2003 causing failure of the low and high beams on the headlights as well as the turn signals. My understanding is that this is being caused by early corrosion. There is no warning of the impending failure. The lights immediately go out with no recourse until serviced. There is a great deal of discussion of this common problem, and the service department has admitted that this has been a common failure.
Was driving on the freeway, traveling at 70 MPH and all of the lights both dash and exterior went out and the engine stopped. Pulled to the side of the highway and tried to restart the car, no luck. Waited for 30 minutes and tried to restart it and it started up, but when I got up to 40mph, it repeated what it did before, pulled to the side of the road and waited another 15 minutes and it started again, and it did it again. Again I pulled to the side of the road and waited, then it started, and I finally got it to an exit off of the highway. It would only run at 25mph, anything above that it would repeat the same symptoms as above. The next day after leaving the car sit overnight, it started just fine, ran just fine, except the engine light came on. Took it to the dealership, and they reset the computer, the code read that it was running to lean, they checked, but could not find any problems. The car will not run above 70mph, this has happened three times since the first incident. The only repairs that were done, were the recalls already on file for this vehicle.
Bought a 2003 pontiac sunfire in oct 2003. From feb of 2004 to feb 2005 it has been in the service dept of franklin motor co in jasper al a total of five times for the same problem. The car dies in the middle of the hwy. For no reason. Almost got rear ended at one point, was turning across traffic on a four lane hwy and it dies across 2 lanes. Can not make the car mimic the problem at any time but dealership will not take responsibility because it has not done it with them while being driven by them. Have gone thru arbitration which was a joke, was told because our complaint letter reached gm company in nov of 2004 that our year according to the lemon law was up. It didn't matter that we had tried to get them to do something about it for the last year.lawyer for gm company said the car was not a hazard because there had not been an accident. They have replaced resonator and pipe assembly, compressor assembly, & module, PCM/vcm all on 4/5/04.upped idle from 725rpm to 925-950 RPM on 5/28/04. Replace valve, idle air control on 3/23/2004
Numerous of failures;air bag light came on and stayed on, clutch sticks to floor, car doesn't want to start. *bf the turn signals and lights had gone out, it would take a couple of attempts to start the vehicle, there were times where the vehicle would start on it's own without the turn of the key, the vehicle used an extreme amount of gas, the dash would rattle, the engine would growl, the dash made a sound like the speaker was blown, there was a burning smell in the stereo and there was a thumping noise when turning the vehicle. (2003 pontiac sunfire)
While driving 55 MPH all lights from the vehicle turned off. The consumer was able to maintain control of the vehicle and pulled over. The consumer turned off the vehicle and was unable to start it up again. Vehicle was taken to the dealer the next day for inspection and the mechanic could not duplicate the problem. *ak the problem recurred. *sc
Rear brake light ignited due to faulty socket installation while driving car.
Rear seat is broken runk latch is broken. Warranty was not honored.
The vehicle experienced problem with the turn signal on six occasions. The turn signals and brake lights were inoperative. *ak *cb
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