2002 Chevrolet Silverado problems
Owners have filed 853 complaints with NHTSA about the 2002 Chevrolet Silverado. Brakes is the most reported problem area, at 46% of complaints. Next are engine (7%) and transmission (6%).
At a glance
- Complaints
- 853 filed with NHTSA
- Most reported
- Brakes 46% of complaints
- Crashes and fires
- 85 and 5
- Injuries and deaths
- 54 and 1
- Typical mileage
- 46,000 miles 594 complaints with mileage
Source: NHTSA owner complaints
Where the complaints are
Share of this model year's complaints by the part of the car involved. One complaint can name more than one part, so the shares can add up to more than 100%.
When problems show up
View the numbers
| Mileage | Complaints |
|---|---|
| 0k to 20k miles | 102 |
| 20k to 40k miles | 142 |
| 40k to 60k miles | 140 |
| 60k to 80k miles | 66 |
| 80k to 100k miles | 52 |
| 100k to 120k miles | 29 |
| 120k to 140k miles | 26 |
| 140k to 160k miles | 11 |
| 160k to 180k miles | 9 |
| 180k to 200k miles | 12 |
| 200k+ miles | 5 |
What the data shows
Of the 594 complaints that include odometer readings, half describe a problem before roughly 46,000 miles. For brakes specifically, the median reported mileage is about 50,000 miles (329 complaints with mileage).
Safety-related details: 85 complaints mention a crash; 5 complaints mention a fire; 54 injuries reported; 1 death reported.
Looking only at complaints filed within five years of the model year (so older and newer years are comparable), the 2002 ranks 4th most-complained-about out of 26 model years of the Chevrolet Silverado with enough data (631 complaints in that window). It is also covered by 4 safety recall campaigns.
What owners wrote
A few complaints as filed, shortened and with personal details removed. The first ones are among the most serious reports for this model year; the rest are typical.
On sunday, march 14 my friend was hunting with a group of friends on a ranch in tennessee. My friend shot his first ram and then he and the guys loaded it in the back of the truck. Guys loaded into the cab and the bed of the truck. My friend and another man sat on the open tailgate. They were just going to ride down the two track a bit back to the lodge. They were going approximately 10MPH. The tailgate broke. One man was thrown from the truck with minor injuries.
On oct 13, 2004 my 2002 chevy truck, 2500hd 4wd crew cab, was struck head on by another vehicle and a fire was started under the hood on the drivers side. This fire was extinguished several times by small extinguishers but kept coming back until there was no extinguisher left. The result was the total distruction of this vehicle. My family and I and a friend (4) were in this vehicle and fortunately got out prior to the truck being totally engulfed by fire.
I purchased a 2002 chevy silverado ext cab 4wd (z71) in october of 2003. The truck had 23000 (+) miles on the odometer when purchased. On december 13 of 2003 while on my way to work and traveling at a speed of approximately 30 MPH in a 45 MPH zone, traffic began coming to a stop at a traffic stop. When I tried to apply the brakes there was a loud "grinding" noise and I was unable to depress the brake pedal.
Many of the problems took several times in the shop to fix. The castrophic failures in the engine & transmission have never been fixed. The truck has lunging, dead spots & surges & the transmission clunks (shifts hard, jerky) the auto may or may not accelerate on demand & will later accelerate when you need to apply the brakes.
Dt*: the contact stated the vehicle was inspected and the mechanic determined the rear brake rotors and rear pads were rusted and grooved. The front brakes and pads were also rusted and grooved, but not as much as the rear. The rear brakes and rotors were replaced on 11-16-05. Updated 05/02/06.