1997 Geo Metro from North America - Comments

At about 3000 miles the A.C. quit.

At about 10,000 miles the A.C. quit.

At about 15,000 miles the fuel pump went out.

At 29,800 miles the A.C. quit.

Just to let out my frustration I have to let you know what General Motors has done to me. I bought a new Geo Metro in November of 1997. In the spring of 1998 I turned on the air conditioner and didn't like the performance. I called the chevy garage to see about changing the freon from r134 to r12 they told me that I should not be able to tell the difference. I took it in to La Riche Chevy Cadillac in Findlay to have it checked out. They told me the Freon was low and refilled it (under warranty). The next summer again bad air conditioning. This time I took it to McDaniel Chevy here in Marion. Answer was it's just low and it was refilled and I was on my way again (under warranty). In 2000 the same thing. Last week I took it to McDainel motors again and this times the warranty is up and the extended warranty takes over what a joke, but that's another story. Well since the warranty is over this time they take the time to install dye to the air conditioner to find the leak. Guess what? They find the leak and it will cost $438.00 to fix. (Extended warranty does not cover it)

My guess for the rip-off is this.

The freon cost about $10.00 per pound (r134)

The cost of the dye is about $7.00

My car holds 1.3 pounds of Freon.

When I do the math I get this answer.

1998 Car is under warranty just spend the $13.00 and send it down the road and don't try to find the leak.

1999 Car is under warranty just spend the $13.00 and send it down the road and don't try to find the leak.

2002 Car is not under warranty spend the $7.00 to find the leak and charge the guy $438.00 to fix something we should have fixed twice before, but did not want to spend the $7.00 for fear of what we might find and have to fix. If you own a chevy beware of the warranty.

Steve I just wanted to say I had the exact same problem with my 1997 geo, but the only thing they could never find the falt. It is not working at all now.

The 1997's seemed to be plagued with AC problems. I bought my GEO Metro new and and like others it has been back in the shop numerous times for no AC. The dealer finally told me that I would need to recharge it every year due to a small system used also by the defroster and the small amount of freon it holds. Otherwise it's a great car!

I own 3 Geo Metros, 93,94 and a 95. I've been an auto/motorcycle mechanic for over 35 yrs and I can tell you that any dealer that tells you that the air conditioning system has to be recharged every year to work is either a crook or an idiot! You can use either the dye or the electronic freon sniffer to locate a leak. It's usually the O-ring seals at the back of the compressor on most cars. It's possible to have leaks at any of the connector fittings. And a Geo air conditioning is sorta like the old joke about how do you stop a run away Hyundai? Turn on the air conditioning!

Mike.

I have a 96 Metro 4 cylinder. I have had the problem as you have had and the dealer did the dye the second time I presented the car under warranty. No leak was obvious. The fact remained that I needed to recharge the system every season. I do it myself for about 4 Dollars. I suspect the leak is in the coil in the dash. and the leak is small enough that the dye molecules don't pass out, but the freon molecules, which are smaller do pass. Small inconvenience in the long run. They are great inexpensive transports. a friend has one with over 200,000 miles and he loves it. Mine is over 9 years old and has 39,000 miles and I am not complaining. I just bought an 04 Mustang convertible, and I still drive the metro more. What can I say... I am am weird!

I also have a 97 Metro, which I purchased brand new, and have had the same problems with the air conditioning not working.

Twice the freon was replaced while the car was still under a 3 year warranty.

After the warranty ran out I paid $500 for a new compressor. Normally a new one cost over $1,000, but the dealership offered me a 50/50 deal.

Less than a year later that compressor also had to be replaced.

I'm now on my third compressor since owning the car.

Since I've owned it, I've also had two passenger side mirrors fall apart, which are also very expensive to replace.

I've also been told by another car dealer that this model vehicle is what is called a "re-badged" Suzuki, and is not actually a GM product.

It's the same with engine and transmission problems, just patch it up until it's out of warranty, then the dealership can make a killing.

It's immoral, crooked, devious,...

Try using a newer product on the market to replace the r134a with.

Do a goggle search of Duracool. It is a neat product and they have several flavours to use to weed out minor problems when switching a system over.

They have products that can fix minor leaks.

This stuff they sell is DIY so if you lose refrigerant, you can top up with duracool at a much lower price and as a bonus it cools much better than r134a.

Well we've got a 1997 Geo Metro 3 cylinder and I'll be darn if we don't have the same exact problems with our A/C. We've not had another single problem with the car. 120,000 miles and we just bought our 2nd set of tires (factory tires lasted 50,000 and the Firestone Tires we put on lasted 70,000 so we bought Firestone again)... anyway... our A/C is

the problem. Now we know why GM went out of business... you can't do this to customers and expect them to "come back" and "buy another vehicle" from you. We'll never get rid of the Geo (and it is made by Suzuki with Geo Nameplates) as it's a nice around time transportation vehicle... but we now buy HONDA...

Rick.

Ah come on guys..

With what you paid for these things you certainly did get your money's worth.

I have 5 of em.

Used to own POS Ford Taurus and Windstar of the same vintage.

Believe me you don't know half the problems these Fords cause.

Even when they are fixed, they don't stay that way for long.

I don't like getting less than 60 to 80 K out of my vehicles, but the Metro/Swift/Firefly all got upwards near 250k mileage without any real major repairs and stay fixed once repaired for a long time.

I'll take that any day over a Ford.