Overheated Chevy Cruze / Sonic 1.4 Turbo LUV Engine Teardown. Don't Drink Coolant, It'll Lock You Up

These engines are great People just don't understand taking care of their car

So he starts out saying he doesn't like the engine.
I know 2 people who own 2014 sonics one 1.4 turbo and the other 1.8. 10 years 100k And no issues

My mom has had a cruze with the 1.4 turbo and I keep up with the matainance and its been ok but not great. Ever since she got it with 20,000 miles on it when you floor it the check engine light comes on. I forget what code it is but its for the knock sensor. So the car is babied, it has 112,000 miles on the odometer now and I keep begging her to get rid of it asap.

I love watching your videos. I've learned a lot from them, and I was looking for one like this.

My wife loves her 1.4 Sonic Turbo, so I'm stuck with maintaining it. I just changed out the line to the turbo based on the recommendation of a mechanic friend. The original wasn't that bad, and the engine is apparently in great shape.
What do you suggest as additional preventive maintenance to deal with such a problematic engine?

The turbos crack only if you do not use 5-30w DEXOS full synthetic oil and of you don't change your oil every 5K, or if you have a coolant leak from the plastic junk water housing inlet and end up low on coolant causing your engine to over heat! They finally make aftermarket aluminum water housing now! Also the oil filter housing is notorious for oil leaks as well ! Just installed a new gasket kit on mine!

i don't know about others but the 1.8L in my 2012 Cruze ate up thermostats.

I unfortunately have 2 cruzes, they are shit I never want to buy a GM product ever again

did they ever change the oil?

That's you opening

Clean oil is everything in the Cruz. Synthetic a must. 205,000 here going strong.

Just seeing how that engine look and was design. I can already tell you how poorly it was design. Literally all the components are place in the most stupidest place.

Crazy how the old VW beetles would put these to shame.

They r just big turds😂😂

Holden made the Cruze popular and gave people the false sense it was going to be reliable until you realize its a Daewoo.

General rule of thumb I have learned from experience ( scca, drag racing and drifting ) if you maintain an American car as if it’s a bmw you will be fine. Good oil/filters are a must. Another thing with these cars is if it’s plastic replace it. If it is a failure point that common NEVER replace with a stock replacement part it will fail again. The general consensus with these engines is buy they and replace anything plastic with metal and upgrade to a aftermarket turbo

Also if Scotty Kilmer says something do the opposite

And trax

I took really REALLY good care of my engine.... It gave me cylinder problems at around 110,000 miles.....I was so happy with my cruze.

It's funny how in the US is unreliable but in Europe these are run on LPG and taxi for 600k miles :) Gearboxes shit the bed waaay before the engine and everything with m32 manual

Aluminum block I wonder why…. These engines are known to get too hot.

why the hell did chevy offer a 1.4L turbo and a n/a 1.8L in the same car. The power is similar in the two engines.

You can put over 300hp on those engines without messing with pistons rods anything! They make tons of performance parts!!!!

Not saying this is a high quality engine but cheap people buy cheap cars and they don’t take care of them or anything else for that matter. If you drive these little turbo engines like race cars they aren’t going to last.

Cracked housing will cause underboost codes and put car in limp mode

I have had 5 of those engines, from 2012 thru to 2015, zero issues when properly maintained.

I just bought a used Cruze and I'm just keeping my fingers crossed. Regular oil change and moderation 🤞

My 1.4 is locked up can I swap a 1.8 in it if I swap the computer I don’t mess with smaller cars but I’ve swapped my 4.8 Silverado with a 6.0 and it was pretty straight forward do you think it would about the same amount of work for a 1.4?

1.4 sucks.

Bullshit, idgaf how well you take care of the 1.4. I've got over 7k in parts from rock auto, I do the work myself, I cant imagine how the labor would be since the going rate in my area is about 80hr for labor. Ive had my Cruze from 20k miles and had nothing but problems since 30k miles. I currently have 200k and on my 2nd turbo. Thankfully I've never overheated.

The amount of Chevy Cruzes I've seen with smoke coming from the engine bay is insane

It’s not a gym motor. As you can see it says eco tec witch is a Vauxhall engine

How about the fact the turbo and fuel lines are right subjected to the heat of the manifold? This has caused multiple fails on this fkn engine. I know, I've replaced 2.

Are the Chevy Cruze 1.4 Turbo engines the same in both 1st & 2nd generation?

I work for a Chevrolet dealer biggest problem with this engine is lack of maintenance and that all coolant housings are plastic and start to crack and leak coolant causing to run hot and overheating thus the reasons of failure.

Nothing wrong with a 1.4. tons of them go 300,000 km. Properly maintained with full synthetic oil and always on time. Engine external parts such as oil coolers etc are cheap on Amazon. Still a great car, had ours 10 yrs now.

Wow. I only changed the turbo and oil cooler gasket. Got 278k miles on mine and didn't want to sell it but I had to. I did replace the spark plug bank twice in 20k miles though. Why it cracked I have no idea.

What car and year is this. I have a 2017 cruze and has been so good to me 115k miles

Man , you should be wearing eye protection...

So those engines are in Opel cars too?

Drove the 2018 model 1.4 hard for over 6 years not one service call. honest truth.

Just because something is cheap doesnt mean it should be junk. Theres no reason they cant make a good engine cheap. They use to all the time. It's not always that something is junk. Most of the time it's people not taking care of their engine. If you dint have the money to care for something dont own it.

I am almost certain that the issue for this type of engines (cruze, aveo, trax, sonic) is the oil cooler, if you replace that thing every 60000 KM to 80000 you will never face this. trust me, I have 700 00 km on my sonic after finding this out, my car never failed again. pretty solid car.

I have a 2018 Trax (Same engine) 268K Miles still runs like new all original engine parts including the Turbo I drive more then 40K a year key is changing your oil every 5K with good quality oil like Mobile 1

My guy is worried about the oil on the exhaust manifold and i pump out the oil through the dipstick tube cause i dont like messes lol

Click bait.

Nobody takes care of these engines is #1. Oil changes/ vacuum lines/ small gaskets that start leaking/ coil packs & plugs/ mounts/ valve cover (pcv issues). Strange recall issues are something like negative battery cable needs to be swapped due to bad connections causing stalling and electrical issues. Turbos do die, but they’re also wear items on all vehicles.

Have A Buick with same motor 253 k on it runs great 30 mpg

130hp with the turbo? What a turd!

Thank you I'm tearing mine down right now I think I have a blown head gasket after 450,000 me I let my son use it for college and he just ran through it did not care about keeping up with the car let it run hot several times until coolant start leaking into the oil