Boy, I'm starting to wonder if I made a mistake buying a Blazer. I bought this 97 4x4 Blazer last month. I haven't had one week of driving without PROBLEMS. It was in the shop for 2 weeks, got it back last Saturday. Today we were coming home and about 9 miles out of town it just quit running. Got it to the side of the highway would crank but not start. No check engine lights, everything electrical worked, radio, turn signals, etc. Well, thank God for cellphones, after a couple of calls a tow truck arrived and $150 later it is in the shop again. Not the same shop. I'm calling the Honda dealer that sold this to me in the morning to see what is going to happen. I have enough documented problems that have happened to this truck since the first 30 minutes I owned it to go to court if I have to. The dealer sold this truck to us without full disclosure. So we will see what goes on from here. This is the worst Chevy I have ever owned. I'm thinking the fuel pump failed but on the side of the highway it is hard to check. I couldn't hear it come on. I'm loosing confidence in this truck quick.
My rant for the day I guess. I'm pissed off that I know for sure.

 

The statement "I'm starting to wonder if I made a mistake buying a Blazer" seems harsh. Maybe "buying this Blazer" would be a better statement to make. You bought a 10 year old used vehicle. Even vehicles that have been taken care of with the utmost of attention have problems when they get this old. Now if any one of the previous owners has been lax in their maintenance or operation of the vehicle, subsequent owners can have problems that are more the fault of previous ownership than the vehicle itself.

I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but sounds to me more like you didn't do your due diligence in your inspection of the vehicle prior to purchasing it and just took someones word for the condition. Not that you could have spotted a fuel pump about to go, but many other problems, issues would have been brought to light with a spirited test drive and a thorough inspection of the vehicle by either yourself or someone you trust that knows what to look for.

With that said, fuel pumps go bad. Sounds like this may be one of those cases.

 

Yea, "I'll go with this Blazer". This truck was misrepresented by the dealer. Myself & another old school mechanic took it for a test drive we looked it over carefully. We found a couple of minor things that they fixed before we left the dealer. I bought this 150 miles from home. When we got 40 miles away the miss fire started. Well it was late so we brought it home. We started checking some more & a few more minor things appeared, nothing that caught our attention as to what I found out after I took it back to get the A/C compressor replaced. The deal is the dealer had a used engine/trans installed before I bought it. I asked about this type of thing & they said no this is a 1 owner local truck. Which is true by a CarFax. But what happened to need an engine is the mystery. We haven't been able to drive this truck 300 miles without problems. This truck has fooled 3 mechanics to this point. A friend of mine who works on all the City police cars did a complete inspection on this truck, & he came away believing the mileage was close, that the wear items were either replaced or still in good condition. I understand were you are coming from, but the dealer doctored this truck real, real good to present it as a low mileage well cared for truck. Between the 3 of us we have over 80 years of mechanical experience. That doesn't count the shop here in town that has it now, They also looked at it thought as the 3 of us did.
I like the Blazers, that is why we bought it. It was exactly what we wanted. we drive old stuff. We have a 93 Chevy Lumina with 237,000 miles on it I have had less problems with it in the last 3 years, than this Blazer has had in a month. We own an 86 F250 4x4 with 186,000 miles & the same with it.
I support a Ford forum & I have to say I see alot of more electrical & computer, & front end problems on this Forum than I see with the Exploders. I have owned 6 Rangers & Exploders & only had minor problems with them. I drove them 10+ years & well over 100,000 miles. Never replaced a fuel pump, FPR, or had service engine lights. Now I will say the Exploder trans went at 65,000 miles after using it to pull a 6000# double axle trailer for about 30,000 of those miles. It took it good, no rebuilding it was wasted, case & hard parts.
Anyway, I'm sure the Blazer will be repaired & I continue to HOPE to get good use out of it. But if it continues to give me grief, it will be REPLACED I doubt another Blazer will be in our driveway.

 

Heh, sounds exactly what happened to my Blazer when I bought it.

Got a 97 2 Dr LS, 4X4. Needs Fuel Pump, Check Engine light comes on, goes in shop, afterwards, tune up, then fuel pump dies again on a frequently traveled highway. Wasn't a great day for me, but after that she never stopped running. (Once I fixed those problems.)

 

That's a lousy experience you've had with the dealer and this particular Blazer. I got burned on my first ('95) Blazer which I loved despite those problems. The problem for me was that I bought from a private party, and the issues weren't worth hassling anyone over (for me, at least).

YMMV, but you might want to have a chat with someone knowledgeable about law. I can't give you any legal advice, but if you can't get a fair deal from the dealership, you're welcome to PM me, and I can try to find someone who's informed about that kind of thing.

 

I drive my 95 with 115000. 200 miles every day, yes really 200 and itsloaded with 500 lbs of tools and equipment, it had NO maintenance before I bought it at 95000 6 months ago and I mean NONE!
Lots of little things but NO PAYMENTS!!!
I'm happy to have a truck I can work on myself that doesnt need a degree and a hospital to do it.
Dont give up, buy some metric tools, I spent$25.00anddo some research on the Forum, its free, they are good strong trucks and the parts are cheap compared to foreign cars.
Go to the parts store, plug it into their code reader and find out what is going on, it takes 10 min. also free and a good idea to do on a test drive.
I have replaced the ball joints, shocks, brakes front and rear, bushings, pitman arm, rear bushings and shocks, the cat converter that I later made a bit less restrictive (illegal wherehumanslive) cold air intake I made with a filter and some flex vent pipe for $20 bucks, I riged the windshield washer to spray over my car so I can annoy the drivers that tailgate me by spraying their car on the freeway (Very Fun and free, small drill bit required) I installed helper springs ontherear and today a FPR for a grand total of about $1100. and the $25 I spent on tools, labor was free cause I'm not mechanic!
Good luck, it beats the hell out of the Kia I had before, try working on one of those!

 

I think you were blinded by the whole 'customer experience' you got at the Honda dealership. I saw quite a few posts about how much you loved the dealer and the service of foreign dealers over domestic ones

And if I read your 2nd post of the thread right...this blazer is your first vehicle you bought at an old age + high mileage. It's much different buying a used vehicle that you have no idea of previous maintenance on. I drive a Land Rover, and am pretty active on a few forums and it's a pretty big issue with LRs too...drivers let them go because maintenance costs are so high (or frequent), then a dealer just puts a bandaid on the problems, and ya gotta expect $1000+ just to get it running normal. Dealers have been fooling mechanics to sell used cars for quite a bit longer than mechanics have been fixing them

 

Thanks for the great responses. I'm getting it fixed by a good shop, So tomorrow I'll know where things are with it. We have been gone to Nevada for a few days. As I read NO PAYMENTS, Pretty soon there won't be much else to fix so it should be good. As a rule once you buy used you have to do some repairs. So far I'm not out much money. I have bought a set of wires, one spark plug, PCV, new serpentine belt. The tow bill will be paid by my insurance company, I called my agent & she told me bring her the bill I should get my money with a week. All I have is the cost of the repairs, which I'm trying to get the dealer to pay. I talked with them & they haven't said NO. So tomorrow I will contact them & see what they have come up with. I'm 60 years old & have driven new, & used cars & trucks of almost every make & have never been stuck on the side of the road & had to call a tow truck, NEVER. Until Friday. I don't do helpless to well.
Anyway tomorrow will bring some answers. I will be glad to get back home to Nevada where I have a place to work on my stuff. I have use of a complete shop that belongs to my buddy. His oldest boy is a real sharp mechanic he is in tune with the newer vehicles, so I can alway get his help if I need it. As said, I can ask here on this forum. I have to say you guys have given me a world of great knowledge on my Blazer. I know way more about it than I ever have. I'm hoping to get good service from it once all the bugs or fixed.
I'll post tomorrow what I find out. They are installing my brake controller also. I wired up the plug last week. I had the heavy tow package with the 8 wire harness. That is a goody for me because we have a cargo trailer that we haul my motorcycle in & it serves as a small shop when we are on the road. We have been in Arizona for a year at the end of May are going home for who knows. If my wife is offered a contract then we could be home for sometime. That looks real good right now.
Craig

 

UPDATE:

The Blazer is back on the road once again. It was the fuel pump. The Dealer DID PAY FOR IT, SO THAT PLEASED ME A BUNCH. So I hope this truck will run for a long while with out any real problems.
Drove the Blazer today about 100 miles & it seems to be running great. We really like this truck we're hoping for a good long life with it.
Thanks for listening to my RANT.
Craig