W-body questions

[Satty]

I went yesterday and looked at a 2001 Regal. 56k miles, $11 grand, very nice car. I was ready to sign the paperwork and drive it home for the first few miles. Then I got on the highway and heard some hellacious road noise. I had the air on max and the radio on and the noise was still pretty loud. I turned the fan and radion off, the noise was still there, it wasn't engine noise and wasn't wind around the a-pillar, my best guess was either shoddy repairs after an accident or crappy tires. I go back to the dealership and mentioned it to the salesman (I drove it solo) and he ran an AutoCheck, which came back clean, so I figured the culprit was the cheap ass Firestone FR tires. He said he'd have it checked out and call me. Well he called me today, the guy from the service department who drove it said it was the tires and that they could be replaced before I signed anything. I really liked the car (where is Josh to call me a GM hater now?) but I have a few questions:

1-Have any other Regal or W-body owners experienced tire noise? It was very distincive, got worse when I sped up and got better as I slowed down. The car drove smooth and straight.

2-How are the big, puffy leather seats on long trips? They were really comfortable on my little 10 mile test drive but I'm used to having more support for cross-state drives.

3-Is the head gasket issue with the 3.8 something that pops up early?

[NOS2006]

I hit a curb with my dad's Grand Prix and we couldn't figure out what the noise was afterward. We thought it was the new wheels or the wheel weights on the inside of the wheels (my dad didn't like the stockers.. so he replaced them once I ruined the one wheel). So, today my mom finally took the car into the dealership and it's a hub bearing. The sound seems to be the same that you're hearing.. Not REAL bad at low speeds, although noticeable, and much worse at highway speeds.

[Flybrian]

1-Have any other Regal or W-body owners experienced tire noise?  It was very distincive, got worse when I sped up and got better as I slowed down.  The car drove smooth and straight.

Likely the crappy Firestones. Our '98 came with smooth Goodyears and was one of the quiestest cars I've ever ridden in thanks to the triple door seals - quieter than our current cars.

2-How are the big, puffy leather seats on long trips?  They were really comfortable on my little 10 mile test drive but I'm used to having more support for cross-state drives.

I'm a little bigger of a guy, but had no problem being comfortable in the driver, passenger, or rear seats of our GS. On a 400-mile round trip, I sat in the back and was perfectly fine. We also took the car from Clearwater to Dayton to Toronto to Washington D.C. and back. Very comfortable.

3-Is the head gasket issue with the 3.8 something that pops up early?

1987 Toronado - 3800 I - 95k miles, no engine problems

1998 Regal GS - 3800 II s/c - 45k miles, no engine problems

2000 Bonneville SSEi - 3800 II s/c - 110k miles, not a single engine problem. Ever.

The Toro made daily 45-60 miles commutes with my father, the Regal went to Canada and back, and the Bonnie went to D.C. and back and sees 200-400 miles a week with my father. That's our 3800 track record. Take it for what its worth.

P.S. Sweet choice.

[Satty]

P.S. Sweet choice.

Its a freaking sweet dark blue, 'twould be beautiful if it were clean. Alas, someone at the dealership decided that it hasn't deserved a bath in the last two weeks. I first noticed it while I was looking at MAXXs and didn't check into it further because I was hell bent on getting a MAXX and because of the black leather.

Edited June 27, 2006 by Satty

[ocnblu]

Hey, that's a goodlooking Regal, I like the colour combination. Let us know how it sounds after the tires are replaced.

[scharmer05]

When I got my impala it had some really noisy tires on it. They were uniroyals i believe, but anyway I put a set of bridgestones turanzas on and it cleared it right up. Nice choice of car by the way. Good luck.

[VenSeattle]

A friend of mine in Dallas owned a 2001 Regal GS Olympic Edition. Seats were comfortable and the interior held up well until he traded it in. We drove up to OK and down to Austin several times. No discomfort. The Regal looks exceptionally nice with a bra & full set of black mud guards. The mud guards actually make the Regal look like it's been slightly lowered IMO. The Regal has cornering lights as well, correct?

I've had two 3800s (both SC) and my mother has had at least three non-blown 3800s. None of them ever had a head gasket problem.

I'd say the road noise was due to the tires also.

Congrats and good luck!

[aaaantoine]

My dad's 2002 Grand Prix is still below the 50k mark on the odometer, but he hasn't had any problems other than with tires and brakes.

And a recall or two.

[trinacriabob]

I went yesterday and looked at a 2001 Regal.  56k miles, $11 grand, very nice car.  I was ready to sign the paperwork and drive it home for the first few miles.  Then I got on the highway and heard some hellacious road noise.  I had the air on max and the radio on and the noise was still pretty loud.  I turned the fan and radion off, the noise was still there, it wasn't engine noise and wasn't wind around the a-pillar, my best guess was either shoddy repairs after an accident or crappy tires.  I go back to the dealership and mentioned it to the salesman (I drove it solo) and he ran an AutoCheck, which came back clean, so I figured the culprit was the cheap ass Firestone FR tires.  He said he'd have it checked out and call me.  Well he called me today, the guy from the service department who drove it said it was the tires and that they could be replaced before I signed anything.  I really liked the car (where is Josh to call me a GM hater now?) but I have a few questions:

1-Have any other Regal or W-body owners experienced tire noise?  It was very distincive, got worse when I sped up and got better as I slowed down.  The car drove smooth and straight.

2-How are the big, puffy leather seats on long trips?  They were really comfortable on my little 10 mile test drive but I'm used to having more support for cross-state drives.

3-Is the head gasket issue with the 3.8 something that pops up early?

1.

Better drive it with the NEW tires to see if it went away. I, too, had a front hub go out on my early 90s previous gen Regal, as NOS pointed out. They're not THAT costly but still it would not to be replaced so you can fully trust the car on the open road.

2.

I hate leather seats. Wrong person to ask. They will eventually develop hairline cracks. A lady at my work has a mid-90s Sedan de Ville and those fine hairline cracks are evident. But, for the near-term, the seats should be fine if they are fine now.

3.

That in there would be Series II. I have a Series I 3800. No problem thus far and looking at the quarter million mile milestone. I think it was probably the earlier ones within the Series II family...can't be sure. What kind of "dot" does Consumer Reports give the Regal under "Engine"?

Bon chance.

[loki]

nice color, just check blue book see if the price seems resonable. nice looking car

[deftonesfan867]

I went yesterday and looked at a 2001 Regal.  56k miles, $11 grand, very nice car.  I was ready to sign the paperwork and drive it home for the first few miles.  Then I got on the highway and heard some hellacious road noise.  I had the air on max and the radio on and the noise was still pretty loud.  I turned the fan and radion off, the noise was still there, it wasn't engine noise and wasn't wind around the a-pillar, my best guess was either shoddy repairs after an accident or crappy tires.  I go back to the dealership and mentioned it to the salesman (I drove it solo) and he ran an AutoCheck, which came back clean, so I figured the culprit was the cheap ass Firestone FR tires.  He said he'd have it checked out and call me.  Well he called me today, the guy from the service department who drove it said it was the tires and that they could be replaced before I signed anything.  I really liked the car (where is Josh to call me a GM hater now?) but I have a few questions:

1-Have any other Regal or W-body owners experienced tire noise?  It was very distincive, got worse when I sped up and got better as I slowed down.  The car drove smooth and straight.

2-How are the big, puffy leather seats on long trips?  They were really comfortable on my little 10 mile test drive but I'm used to having more support for cross-state drives.

3-Is the head gasket issue with the 3.8 something that pops up early?

Hey, maybe if you get the Regal you can add to Buick owner/GM hater to your sig.

[I hope GMRULES again]

Drive it with the new tires first and see. It may be a wheel bearing. Try driving on curves to see and if the noise gets louder then its a bearing for sure.

[97regalGS]

i drive a 1997 Regal GS with 210,000km. (approx 126,000miles). it appears that there is a small valve cover gasket leak. but doesn't seem to be an issue.

no issues with road noise. run Toyo tires now, had goodyears originally.

my dad had a 2001 Regal GS and put a different set of Toyo's on it. they were noticeably harder/louder than mine.

long distance comfort - well, it could use some more lumbar support, but I just move the power seat around to change positions a bit.

[Northstar]

In our LSS (95) that now has somewhere between 70k and 80k miles on it (I haven't driven it in a long time), the only problem we've had with the engine is the intake manifold and that was a while ago.

That Regal looks nice, should look really good when they wax it for you for delivery.

[Justin Bimmer]

When I bought my Grand Prix it had Goodyear LSs on it and it made horrid noise

Now I Michlen X Radials on my car (rated best in consumer reports) and it made all the difference in the world.

[Mike The Canadian]

2002 century, runs amazing except for that intake manifold gasket $h!..

though i've noticed something since we got tripple treads (well some time after?)

when the windows open you can hear a flappy rubber noise as the tire rotates, noise increases with speed. I think it's the tires though.

I'd reccomend a few modifications to improve some things on the car.

Theres a lot of stuff you can do for the frame/handling/suspension.

Theres absolutely a tonne you can do for the engine.

I'm registered by the same username there as I am here,

take a look

http://www.regalgs.org/forum/index.php

you can learn a lot about your car, the search function is your friend

[trinacriabob]

Try driving on curves to see and if the noise gets louder then its a bearing for sure.

Excellent point. That's the primary layman's technique for diagnosing wheel bearing/hub bearing problems. They are also a little more "metallic" than tires in their drone.

[trinacriabob]

I like the colour combination. 

PB, have you gone Canadian on us?

[Sixty8panther]

Nice car, nice color conbo & seems liek agood deal.

So long as the noise is not present go for it!

1. 56k is too early for a wheel bearing assuming the previous owner wasn't a total meathead. It is a common practice at a dealership to replace worn tires on newly arrived used cars with the most ghetto cheap tires available. The Firestone FR is a cheapy all-weather tire that likes to wear funny and is hard to balance. If they offer to repace them with better tires, go for it.

3. It's intake gaskets that like to go on the Series II's, and that is because the gaskets are made of silly putty and compressed rust from old Chevy Vegas. They usually go around 40k and GM has a better, non-leaky one to replace the old gasket with. Check the maintenance records and see if they were replaced already. The dealership should have them on the computer.

You crack me up WMJ. SO very true abotu the dealership throwing on

$h! tires just to look like they're "doing the right thing".

[Satty]

I love the color, I'm going to call the salesman tomorrow to see what they can do about tires, some good Michelins would probably put the car in my garage.

On another car search note, I went and test drove a couple of PT Cruisers, an '05 turbo and an '06 non-turbo. To be frank, they both sucked. The '06 had 9000 miles and none of the interior pieces fit right. The glove box door didn't close unless you wiggled it a bit, same with the center console. Whats sad is that the salesman was playing with these things when they wouldn't work yet he still tried selling me the car on being a great value and Chrysler's improved quality.

[Satty]

Still waiting to hear back from him.

On another note, I'll finally be financially able to get a new car because State Farm has finally (more than a month after I filed the claim) paid Chase. The woman from Total Loss that I talked to said they didn't need my Solara's title and that they would pay Chase on June 9th. Well as of last night they still hadn't paid, so I went into my agents office, told her what was up, she called the Total Loss unit and they said they never paid because they didn't have the title. D'oh!

I spent part of my lunch break arguing with a Suzuki salesman about the availability of a AWD with the stick on the Aerio. He said I could get one that way, I said I couldn't. He was a jerk. No Aerio for me. Probably wouldn't have bought one anyways.

[zhawk]

We had a 2000 Grand Prix GTP and the tires it came with were really noisy. I don't remember what kind they were. Well, we swapped them out and the car was very quiet after that.

I can't believe this, I just found our car back at the dealer we traded it in at.

2000 GTP

It still has the wheels it had before.

Edited June 28, 2006 by zhawk

[76ChevyTrucker]

My Impala has 117,000 on the odometer right now, no intake manifold gasket problems at all. The tires on the car were defintely noisy (REALLY cheap Wal-Mart tires) so I've got a set of BFG's on it now and its as quiet as a mouse no matter what speed I'm driving at. As far as the leather seats are concerned, I'm 5'10" and about 320lbs, and they support me well and are comfortable on long trips. My wife occasional gripes about the headrest being too hard, but she's always got the seat reclined and sleeping on it. And I've not had a problem with the intake or head gaskets on the engine and the engine hasn't been in.

Overall impression, great car.