CT5-V 2025 CT5 Blackwings - have your dealer check oil plug on the front of the engine (Service Bulletin attached)

[DCV]

weld it up. carefully.

 

[Todd]

weld it up. carefully.

Weld steel to aluminum? That would quite the feat.

This is a low pressure part of the oiling system (unless there is excessive combustion blow by, but that would be a worse issue).

A press fit, when done properly, should be sufficient.

The original press process wasn’t done properly.

 

[1Evil55]

Give it enough time, its going to weld itself together.

 

[DCV]

Get a piece of aluminum to weld the hole shut.

 

[chrishuy]

Anybody know why the plug is even part of the design? If the pan has an actual drain plug threaded in, what is the purpose of this gap?

My guess is that it is used in machining process of the oil passage in the pan and then sealed off. Similar to how the 'dog bone' plug is used in the engine block itself (which is mechanically locked by the transmission bellhousing from being able to come out).

 

[Emilirivera05]

On February 23rd the same thing happened to my blackwing after 9 days of having it. The car dumped all of the oil into my friends driveway (I was pulling in) The Cadillac executive resolution team has been in contact with me, they supposedly put a rush on the oil pan however it has been 3 weeks and I’m getting annoyed. To top it off when the vehicle was towed the tow truck drive hooked onto the rear wheel links DAMAGING it and I now have to open a claim against them and deal with that even though I did the towing through the Cadillac app! They are compensating me, I paid cash for the vehicle and they are going to calculate a car payment based off a 5 year loan.(I just found this out rn)

 

[CB34]

On February 23rd the same thing happened to my blackwing after 9 days of having it. The car dumped all of the oil into my friends driveway (I was pulling in) The Cadillac executive resolution team has been in contact with me, they supposedly put a rush on the oil pan however it has been 3 weeks and I’m getting annoyed. To top it off when the vehicle was towed the tow truck drive hooked onto the rear wheel links DAMAGING it and I now have to open a claim against them and deal with that even though I did the towing through the Cadillac app! They are compensating me, I paid cash for the vehicle and they are going to calculate a car payment based off a 5 year loan.(I just found this out rn)

Tell them to look up TSB A252495390 - the fix is to replace the plug, not the entire pan. That will allow you to get your car back much sooner as the pans are nowhere to be found.

 

[Emilirivera05]

Tell them to look up TSB A252495390 - the fix is to replace the plug, not the entire pan. That will allow you to get your car back much sooner as the pans are nowhere to be found.

I’ll ask about it but originally they tried to do the fix but said they weren’t confident that it would fix it.

 

[chrishuy]

On February 23rd the same thing happened to my blackwing after 9 days of having it. The car dumped all of the oil into my friends driveway (I was pulling in) The Cadillac executive resolution team has been in contact with me, they supposedly put a rush on the oil pan however it has been 3 weeks and I’m getting annoyed. To top it off when the vehicle was towed the tow truck drive hooked onto the rear wheel links DAMAGING it and I now have to open a claim against them and deal with that even though I did the towing through the Cadillac app! They are compensating me, I paid cash for the vehicle and they are going to calculate a car payment based off a 5 year loan.(I just found this out rn)

A note that that 'official' GM approved fix is to press the oil cup back into the existing oil pan versus replacing the oil pan itself, if possible. So assuming your dealer found the oil cup in the under engine plastic tray that may speed up the process on the engine repair. Very sorry to hear about the damage the tow company did to the car's suspension pieces. I have about 3k miles on my car including some track laps at Sebring with oil temps up to 260f after the fix and no issues so far. They did use a form of high temp epoxy/JB weld which had to cure overnight to seal the oil cup in place as part of the fix.

 

[Emilirivera05]

A note that that 'official' GM approved fix is to press the oil cup back into the existing oil pan versus replacing the oil pan itself, if possible. So assuming your dealer found the oil cup in the under engine plastic tray that may speed up the process on the engine repair. Very sorry to hear about the damage the tow company did to the car's suspension pieces. I have about 3k miles on my car including some track laps at Sebring with oil temps up to 260f after the fix and no issues so far.

Honestly I have no idea what’s going on they haven’t been giving me much information I had to ask multiple times for the pictures of the damage the tow company caused.

 

[jimijuma]

They did use a form of high temp epoxy/JB weld which had to cure overnight to seal the oil cup in place as part of the fix.

Is this standard across the board to address this Service Update? Not sure how I feel about having to use an epoxy........

I really hope to hell that this issue doesn't rear its ugly head for those of us with 2025s several years/miles down the road. This is just so terribly disappointing......hard to come up with the words......

I feel inclined to grill the dealer before I take delivery of mine.

 

[jimijuma]

I’ll ask about it but originally they tried to do the fix but said they weren’t confident that it would fix it.

So did they attempt to complete the service bulletin but weren't successful!?

 

[DCV]

Glueing it back in? I’d not trust that. I remember when Porsche was using glue on coolant lines for attachments and after a few years lots of failures, so much so that on the 997 turbo, tracks would not let you on unless the pipes had been welded.

 

[5VBW Nick]

@668LT4 feeling better all the time about our '24s!

 

[ngoni]

How the hell is there not a full blown recall for this yet?

 

[Todd]

Look at it this way: this was a press fit from the get go. The supplier slipped up on QC and GM allowed the defective part to be installed.

Now that it is caught, all that has to happen is the original step: press the plug into the hole.

It’s not like the plug got pushed out, it was never pushed in (all the way).

The oil sump is a low pressure part of the oiling system, and even works under vacuum during part of the power cycle.

I wouldn’t sweat this now that there has been a bulletin.

 

[Dirkbg]

Seems like a threaded plug vs. a pressed in one would have made more sense for such a critical part. Looks similar to a freeze plug in an engine block and those stay in place fairly well. But still, it's an expensive engine and a few cents more to keep the oil inside the engine is a pretty important goal.

 

[shbox]

I think staking the plug would inspire more confidence.

 

[Todd]

Seems like a threaded plug vs. a pressed in one would have made more sense for such a critical part. Looks similar to a freeze plug in an engine block and those stay in place fairly well. But still, it's an expensive engine and a few cents more to keep the oil inside the engine is a pretty important goal.

I hear ya, but this isn’t about the plug design (which has been used on this engine successfully for years now), this is about an assembly error,

Same thing could have happened with a threaded plug, the assembler could have not fully threaded it in with the same consequences.

Human error sucks, and this will probably flag the oil pan for an additional QC step when checked in by GM receiving dept for the foreseeable future. Supplier will also get financially dinged, too, I bet.

 

[dmillsskn]

Just finished up my appointment.
They were able to press the plug back in.

There wasn't any leakage but it definitely wasn't seated correctly.
It made it 2600 miles.