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2013 CHEVROLET MALIBU — Complaint #1248986

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NHTSA Complaint about ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING:ENGINE:GASOLINE:BELTS AND ASSOCIATED PULLEYS filed December 30, 2015

NHTSA complaint #1248986 (ODI reference 10817069) concerns a 2013 CHEVROLET MALIBU and was filed on December 30, 2015. The owner reports the failure occurred on December 23, 2015. The vehicle had 51,000 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to Indiana based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as engine and engine cooling:engine:gasoline:belts and associated pulleys, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.

The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: no, fire: no, injuries: 0, fatalities: 0. No crash, fire, or fatality was associated with this report, which places it in the early-warning stream rather than the priority-review stream. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.

Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same CHEVROLET MALIBU cohort independently describe similar engine and engine cooling:engine:gasoline:belts and associated pulleys failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 2013 CHEVROLET MALIBU shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.

Vehicle
2013 CHEVROLET MALIBU
Component
ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING:ENGINE:GASOLINE:BELTS AND ASSOCIATED PULLEYS
State
Indiana
Mileage
51,000 mi

Complaint Description

WHILE DRIVING HOME, I RECEIVED A WARNING TO SERVICE MY BATTERY CHARGING SYSTEM. EVENTUALLY, THE BATTERY SAVER WAS ACTIVATED. I LOST MY POWER STEERING EVENTUALLY AND MY CAR STOPPED RUNNING. I COULD JUMP THE CAR TO START BUT MY CAR WOULD DIE WHEN PUT IN GEAR. MY VEHICLE HAS 51,000 MILES AND YET THE DRIVE BELT BROKE. WHILE REPAIRING IT, THE TECHNICIAN DISCOVERED THAT THE DRIVE BELT TENSIONER PULLEY WAS BAD AND NEEDED REPLACED. MY VEHICLE IS NOT OLD ENOUGH NOR WITH ENOUGH MILES TO WARRANT THIS PART GOING BAD. I HAD TO PAY A $700 REPAIR BILL BECAUSE IT IS OUTSIDE OF THE WARRANTY. *JS

Complaint Details

NHTSA Complaint ID 1248986
ODI Number 10817069
Date Filed December 30, 2015
Failure Date December 23, 2015
VIN 1G11D5SR4DF

Similar ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING:ENGINE:GASOLINE:BELTS AND ASSOCIATED PULLEYS Complaints for 2013 CHEVROLET MALIBU

Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.