2001 Buick Century from North America - Comments

I have a 2002 Century and have had 4 broken wires on the wiring harness for the tail lights. It broke where it flexes the most when the trunk is opened. Also had 6 of the 8 wires break on the rear drivers side door. Same type of problem as it was in the area that flexes the most.

Wow, I wish I had checked this site before taking my 2004 Buick Century to the dealership for my driver side passenger window, May 2008. My husband tried to fix it but found the problem greater than his skill so with the door panel already off, the dealership charged me $555.00 to replace the whole mechanism in the door because they said they couldn't just replace the plastic clips that were broken. Then 6 weeks ago the passenger door regulator broke but this time I was a little smarter and took it to a local repair shop and it "only" cost me $325. A couple of days ago the driver door went out. For crying out loud, I haven't even finished paying for it and I've got close to $1000. in it just because of the cheap plastic parts used in the doors and now number 3 is shot with no. 4 probably getting ready to do the same thing. Now I read somewhere on the web that just the clips can be purchased for around $50. I'm seeing red. We bought what we thought would be a reliable car and it is starting to nickle and dime us already. Does anyone know where I can find these clips and what the part numbers might be for a 2004 BC? The dealership swore the whole mechanism had to be replaced so I'm sure they won't be forthcoming with part numbers for $50 parts.

By the way, our car is well cared for with 1 lady driver and only 40,000 miles.

I too have fallen into this GM nightmare. My 2002 Century was purchased 6/07 from an elderly woman with 52,000 miles for $2500. I thought I had a deal. (I offered to replace the headgaskets for her at my cost, but she said "No"). Should have taken that as hint.

I repaired the motor, all the power windows had new regulators, both front wheel bearings this summer, the heater fan, odometer/gear position indicator went blank, and the radio is all but junk right now.

And now another power window regulator spewed its guts in the door.

The windshield has leaked since day one, I can go on, but I'll stop.

This is my first Buick, my prev Chev and Pontiac before this were awesome cars. It's been the worst car ever. I thought my one and only Dodge Spirit was junk from day one. I think this has beat it.

I have a 2001 Century Custom and have had the same experiences as most have discussed.

Since the odometer-gear shift indicator light stopped working at around 70,000 my only way to judge mileage since then is to figure 20 miles per gallon I put gas in the car, I keep track of every drop.

The first thing to go wrong was the rear windows at around 40,000 miles 4 years or so but since the turbulence when driving with them down is so bad I left them up and never used them but about 3 months ago the drivers side rear window came down; I bought thumbscrew window locks for sliding glass doors $1.38, replaced the screws that came with it with 2 bolts.25 then wrapped Duck tape (I think it will be better than metal on metal when tightened) around the vertical track with the window held up for me then slid the door lock on and tightened it up, so far so good.

About the same time the fuel gauge quit, when I stop it will bounce around for 2-3 minutes then settle at the correct level for a minute or so, the warning light and bell works when it should so I have 50 miles or so to get gas, I rely on the bouncing gauge, never ran out yet just live with it.

At 7 years 10/07 around 80,000 miles took the car in for what I thought was an EGR valve and a noisy right wheel and replacement of hoses, belts as they were getting old, it was the lower intake manifold gasket (I had no visible loss of coolant) and wheel bearing plus a tie rod end and had the transmission fluid and filter changed, the EGR was reset no problems with it total bill $1800.00 and change.

A week or two after the work was done the low coolant light came on, the small dealership allowed me to go back, being late in the day the mechanic spoke freely, these problems are very common.

I was given the option of cleaning it or replacing the sensor $30.00, I had it cleaned for $30.00 labor, it remained off for 2 weeks, and their mechanic told me how bad the sludge was in the recovery tank two weeks before so I had no reason to believe the Dex-Cool would not mess up a new sensor.

About four weeks to a month later the transmission began to growl a little and shift harsh sometimes usually when it is colder outside, who knows what this but the car would cost more to fix than it is worth.

November 2008, about 84,000 now when I start the car the oil light has stayed on for 2-3 minutes before going off, the oil is fine, I hear no lifters or other engine noise but I know I need to get the pressure checked and will do so, with all of the electrical problems I hope it is a bad sensor, Las Vegas would put odds on it being an electrical problem.

If not for the problems I like the car, 22mpg local and 30-32mpg hwy when I had an odometer, I do not abuse the car and drive only 10-15 miles, no kids to tear things up; when I go out during the week and I stay on paved roads for a 50-100 mile drive through the country in my rural area, this is why I have so few miles on a 2001.

GM just seems to have designed a lemon, it is sad that they have gone this way, many have not had such problems but those who have issues have bad feeling towards GM.

I own a 2001 Century and after reading a few of the comments, I wondered if someone had my car!

All 4 window regulators have gone bad one at a time. Only the first broke under warranty. The others have not broken again. The intake manifold gasket had to be replaced. The radiator leaked some until I put these little pellets in it. That seemed to fix that problem. I am sure it will need more from time to time but a $3 can of pellets seems worth it every so often.

It had an nearly overheating issue when we went through a local Christmas light display, but after checking it thoroughly with my dad who is a mechanic, he feels that that what most likely happened is that the fan got stuck.

We could not get it to replicate its problem.

I have 104,000 miles on the car and have kept up with most of the regular maintenance on it. (It still has the original battery which is getting replaced this month)

I have never had the problems with the wheel bearings that I have read about on here, but I take great pains not to drive it through standing water.

I haven't taken the car in to get the latest window regulator problem fixed. I just plan to pull the door panel and figure something out so that it doesn't slide down anymore.

What bothers me the most is that this is an obvious design flaw and rather than provide the part that breaks, they take us to the cleaners.

I do love the way it rides and its huge trunk. I love the space inside the car. The interior has held up fantastically when you consider I have 2 kids. The CD player still goes strong as does everything else on the dash. The tape player gave up, but I don't miss that very much. The accessory plug/cigarette lighter quit working, but that was just a fuse. A quick read through the book and I learned which fuse it was and the fuse panels have a fuse puller and some extra fuses in there so we actually fixed that in a parking lot somewhere.

All cars have problems and even more as they age. I won't buy another Buick with their problems on the horizon, but my only regret on this one has been the window regulators.

My great grandma has a 2003 which the rear driver side window stopped working in the up position for several months. I drove it to work the other day and tried it, surprisingly it worked. It may be the cold that made it work? She has never had any windows fall into the door.

We're all in good company. If anyone has some answers, I'd be grateful. Somehow our 2001 Buick Century has escaped the window problems (I'm knocking wood!), but our problems include: the ac/heat fan only working on high (apparently it's just a quick fix?); the check engine light always on and was told also that it has something to do with the tires? Is that true and is there a reason to fix it? And just now, at about 42k miles, the big money, like all of you above: the intake manifold gasket set with valve. They told us that with parts, labor, tax it should come to just over $1000 to fix the gasket. Looks like that's about right, according to what some of you have said, but can anyone confirm that?

Also, the mechanics here in So.Florida said the climate is very hard on tires; that it rots them quickly. Anyone know if that's true?

Thanks for any help! Good luck all with your cars.

It is very important to remember that the only people who come looking for this site are the people who have problems. I've read hundreds of positive reviews on this car outside of a few well-documented problems. Most of them have been discussed here.

- Window regulators. You already know about the cheap plastic piece that breaks if the door is slammed hard enough. There is no replacement for just the piece, so you have to buy a whole new regulator. I've bought several $50 ones off Ebay and installed them myself. The install is actually pretty easy. Any guy good with tools can do it himself. Anyway, even the $50 Ebay replacements are made from plastic. I'm searching for a good aftermarket part (since GM won't fix them), and I hear good things about Dorman. Rumor has it they've redesigned the part, but I haven't tested this myself yet. As it stands, I've been bolting a flat metal bar between the window mount and the failed regulator to keep the window up. I suggest you do the same to your rear windows and just accept that you'll probably never use them again.

- Leaky manifold. On my Century, this causes the Low Coolant light to be on often. Far as I have read, this happens to a third of all Centuries. I've read that it's caused by the original Dex-Cool coolant that GM put in the cars. The coolant is supposedly slightly corrosive and will eat away at seals. If you still have this coolant, I wholeheartedly recommend a pressurized flush. If you already have a leaky manifold... is it hurting anything?

- A/C knob. Yep, it's cheap plastic, along with much of the rest of the interior. Not much you can do but keep buying the $20 replacement, unless you're lucky enough to find another kind of knob with a similar hole in the back. It's just a D-shaped hole, same as every other knob known to man.

- Ashtray. The face of my ashtray pulled right off. Another problem caused by cheap plastic. They could be made from metal if they didn't have to save weight any way they could. You know, cars wouldn't have these problems if they weren't required to meet such stringent environmental standards. Anyway, the broken ashtray isn't particularly visible, but it still sucks to have.

- Transmission. I'll try to remember what I read, but it has been a while. There's a part of the transmission that's made of a hard metal and it is encased in a softer metal. Vibration causes the hard metal to destroy the soft metal, causing a transmission leak. The tranny is computer-controlled and programmed to compensate for this sort of thing, but it can only compensate for so long. Soon you will start feeling bad shifts right after you start the car and in parking lots, and it'll throw a code. The only fix is to pull the tranny down and install a newer, harder metal socket that GM designed specifically because of this problem. Still, you're paying for a remove/replace on the tranny.

It is important to note that other than the manifold leak and the tranny issue above, these cars' drivelines are known to be bulletproof. These are the only widespread, serious issues with the tranny and motor. Once you fix those, the car will run forever. Unfortunately, the interior will have crumbled in your hands long before then. Despite what you'll read here, these ARE very good cars for the money.

I have a 2001 Buick Century with about 65K miles. The ABS brake light, Check engine light and Trac off light are all on. Just recently the lights haven't been coming on until a few minutes after starting and driving the car. Before they come on there is a noise that sounds like a small electric motor, similar to the windshield wiper fluid pump noise.

When I press on the brakes there is a weird vibrating sensation. It feels very unstable and sometimes I wonder if the brakes are going to work. Suddenly the three lights come on and the brakes work just fine.

I have a 2001 Buick Regal LS, and when I accelerate fast, a loud humming noise comes. I can control it with the foot pedal; wanted to know if it's the tranny going?

Girlfriend has a 99 Century--pretty good car--except the window system as described so many times above. The driver and both rear windows are now not working. I tore them all apart and found the same problem with the regulators plastic pulleys, and the cable mangled around it. The window is moved by metal cables that are wrapped around a plastic pulley. The metal cables are also attached to weak plastic on the window's carrier. I have seen also where the cable has pulled out of the carrier. I believe that a failure in either one of these locations will cause the other to fail.

Now I'm no engineer, but I will graduate as one in December, and that design is really bad. I can see why they used plastic because it is a complicated part. The only way to make a metal part like that is powdered metal. They were cutting cost and didn't care about customers enough throughout the process. Does it sound like I'm taking an engineering ethics class right now?

The rest of the car has been good so far. They deserve credit for making the other million parts work--except the intake mani gasket.

I have an 01 Century we bought new. For some reason I love this car. I guess it's the fuel mileage. I can get 30 plus on the highway loaded to the max. 32 mpg if it's just me. That said I did have to overhaul the motor at about 40,000 for bad pistons. Luckily I like to do that sort of thing, so for about a grand and all my spare time for a couple weeks I had a new motor. I can't believe I have not read about the dreaded piston slap problem here! Whenever I see a Century, now my ears perk up to hear if they have it too.

As far as the wheel bearing go, I've replaced many of them on other peoples cars, but never any on my own.. I wonder why. Maybe it's because I refuse to use a sledge hammer to remove rusty, froze on brake rotors and rims. That's gotta be hard on the bearings! Seen it done a few times though.

I'm starting to get the ABS/ check vehicle soon/ and TRAC lights intermittently.. I imagine I'm going to fine some mighty old wheel sensors and or wires are to blame, but I can honestly say I've never had a single Check Engine code ever. That's more than I can say for my 05 Silverado, and just about everyone else I know that has one of those trucks.

No window problems yet, and the body is holding up pretty good for life in the salt belt.

I was trying to find info about a problem with my 2001 Buick Century. The problem is that the odometer indicator does not illuminate. I called a dealer and was told they don't know whatthe problem is but they will check it for $98. Phooey on that.

Actually, I have had many problems with the car, including a new engine. I gave the car to a relative and I help him with it. I was looking for some info about the electronic odometer.

For myself, I bought a Nissan Maxima, despite being a steady GM customer in the past. The Buick Century was a total disappointment. In my view, GM quality was the downfall of GM.

Where do I start on my piece of crap 2001 Buick Bentury?

I bought this car used from a Ford dealer. I bought it in 2006. I got a 4 year loan, and now it's on its last 8 months of the loan. I bought it with around 55,000 miles on it. Now it has 91,000 miles on it.

The weekend after I bought it, I took a road trip two hours away. Once on the highway, the 'low coolant' light was on. since then, it has come on and off at will. It has plenty of coolant in it! (probably due to a faulty intake manifold). The antifreeze does leak and the antifreeze overflow jug gets really dark and dirty. Perhaps from oil?

A few years later, the 'check engine light' and 'trac off' lights came on. Then again, I've had many many many flat tires and bad rims.

I've only had one window break. My dad fixed it by putting something in the window to keep the window up. After reading how much the part is and what a stupid design it is. I'm not going to bother fixing it.

Recently I've noticed that the oil is either leaking or burning off at variable degrees. So checking the oil regularly is needed.

Lately, the temperature gauge is saying the car is running hotter than it should. I just got an oil change and there is plenty of antifreeze in the jug. So I'm wondering if it could be the water pump, the radiator fan, the thermostat, the sensor on top of the thermostat, the timing belt. So I wait and see.

Thank you all for all your comments on this car. Now I know what I'm dealing with and I don't feel like I'm the only one with these problems. Good luck!