Newbie with Denali ???

[Jsho13]

Well I decided to come on here to see if anyone had any insight to the re-occurring problem. My Old Man has an 04' Denali, 94k miles, completely stock.

Here is the problem. For the past few months the truck would randomly decide not to start. It has been happening about once a week, and you never know when it is going to happen. Turn the key on, everything is "normal" with the electronics but when we turn the key to crank it over it is completely dead. Not a sound coming from under the hood. It is as if a solenoid is dead. Here is the catch, let the truck sit for a half hour or so and it fires right up. I know that it is some sort of electrical problem.

He still has 6k miles until his warranty is up. It has been towed to the dealership numerous times and they "found nothing." It never happens when the dealer has it in the shop. I believe something was replaced in the steering column that they thought was causing the problem, but it did not help. The truck not only doesn't start sometimes, the rear doors do not unlock when trying to unlock them from the inside. There are times we have to manually unlock them by reaching back there.

Ideas? Has anyone had something like this happen to theirs? I'm hoping to get possibly a couple ideas and take it back to the dealer and have them check it out. I have a personal interest in this because as soon as the 09's come out, I will be purchasing this vehicle from him.

Thanks,

Josh

 

[Rollin Thunder]

my 99 did that, not sure if yours will be the same, but mine had corroded battery cables. the way i could get it to work is turn EVERYTHING that i could off and it would start. or for some reason i could let it sit, and it would be fine. only cost me about 85 bucks at the local mechnic shop. :thumbsup:

 

[Getwired]

Hmmm.... Corroded cable from starter, or battery leads seems like it'd be more of a regular issue and not so intermittent.

A more scary scenario might be that the BCM (body control module) has a problem and needs to be replaced. You need to have him take it back and make 'em fix it for real, even if they have to keep it for several days to reproduce the problem. A BCM replacement is not cheap if you're out of warranty.

Or, it could just be an $85.00 battery.

 

[Jsho13]

I will have him look into it. When the car is not acting funky, it cranks over and starts just as good as the day he picked it up. All the electronics work except that it won't turn over, no noise from under the hood either. No clicking or anything you would expect from a battery problem. Thanks for the replies.

 

[Jsho13]

Update: The truck went in yesterday morning, they put it on the scanner and the BCM and Ignition switch both had issues. They are being replaced and hopefully this will solve all the issues.

 

[Getwired]

Cool -- glad to hear he's getting it fixed. Not particularly surprised to hear the BCM was part of the issue. Seems that lots of the more "bizarre" or intermittent electrical issues are the result of a flaky / dying / dead BCM. Glad I could help (a little), I suppose. :man: Hopefully it's not too ridiculously expensive, but I guess it's under warranty, eh? Let us know if that fixes it for sure. Perhaps he can get try and recoup some of his tow-costs to the dealership, since they seemed to have difficulty with mis-diagnosing it / diagnosing it properly...

 

[Jsho13]

Looks like we are back to the drawing board. Truck died on my Old man again up north. He had to get a ride home, and in the morning it fired right back up. Does anyone else have any insight or ideas what could be wrong. It is going back in this week, but time is limited, there is only 6k left on the factory warranty.