Dangerous minivan doors

by Sandy Maple (Subscribe to Sandy Maple's posts) Jul 22nd 2007 9:03AM

Categories: Just For Moms, Health & Safety Babies

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The suburban neighborhood where I live is mini-van central. We are chock full of kids and therefore require large vehicles in which to carry our families. I personally do not drive a min-van, but I can see the appeal. All that space for kids and those big sliding doors - they are like comfy little rooms on wheels.

A mini-van may not be the coolest car to drive, but having a vehicle that can safety transport lots of people makes them invaluable for many families. But on some mini-vans, those big sliding doors might actually be dangerous. According to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, at least 18 people have formally complained about the power sliding doors on 2005 and 2006 Chevrolet Uplanders. In four of the complaints, people say injuries resulted when the doors popped open or slid shut unexpectedly.

Elana Collins, of Orlando, Florida, says her 2006 Uplander was too dangerous to drive. She claims the sliding door popped open over 100 times, sometimes when the vehicle was moving. "At 55 miles-an-hour someone could fall out," she said. "Debris could come back and hit a child."

After three unsuccessful attempts to have the door repaired at a Chevy dealership, she filed a complaint under Florida's lemon law. Even though she had video-taped evidence of the door opening on its own, the General Motors people claimed there was no defect or safety issue. She won her case and GM was ordered to buy the defective Uplander back from her.

After Collins' story made the local news in Orlando, the television station received calls from others who say they have had similar problems with their Uplanders. If there truly is an issue with those vehicles, GM needs to own up before somebody gets seriously hurt.

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Comments (3)

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Chattie1 8-09-2007 @ 7:36PM

My '05 has been nothing but a problem. And wouldn't you know that with only 3 months left on my lease, the passenger side power sliding door decided to close on me while I buckling my child into his car seat and did not retract when it hit my body. After throwing my hip into it so it would open (and to avoid major injury), the cable now won't retract and the door chime goes off constantly. But as 3 dealers have told me, this is not their problem. I have to pay for a diagnostic analysis and repair. What if it had been one of my children caught in the closing door? This is the 5th time the door has closed on me without me pressing a button. But because the car has been over 36K miles since it started happening, it's my problem.
Other list of Uplander issues:
Radio stations randomly change by themself
Preset Radio stations disappear at random
Steering wheel seek button only seeks down no matter which way you press
Compass does not calibrate properly
Power Door pops open by itself

I am sad to say that after having 4 GM cars and only one foreign car, you couldn't pay me to drive a GM vehicle. And it's not the quality issues themselves, it's the lack of customer service altogether. They say the customer is their #1 concern, but when a safety issue like this arises - please, it's to be deamed my fault?? What a joke.

aliyahg1979 8-21-2007 @ 11:30PM

We also own a 2005 Chevy Uplander and the doors do the open and retract back to close by themselves. Sometimes the door won't close all the way and stop midway then retract. It has opened while we were driving and we have a 1 1/2 year old and a 3 year old that sit next to the doors. Also I have been crushed by the door that closed on me after I pressed the button to open it. I had to quickly grab my son and move him out of the way as I was getting him out of his car seat. I was pinched between the door and the door jam and had to wait a few seconds until it released me . Thank God my son wasn't hurt. Just the other day we spent over a half hour messing with doors so that we could actually get going. This happens about once a week and sometimes we will spend close to an hour trying to close the doors. The other problem is when the doors do close they won't open! We have to manually open the doors because the doors won't open when we press any of the buttons. This happens about 2 times a month and we have owned it since 2005 so imagine how many times this happened. This has been a serious safety issue for our children.

ame s 8-30-2007 @ 10:38AM

I had a problems with the automatic door on my 2000 Pontiac Montana. It would often not close properly, or it thought it didnt, and would beep, causing me to have to open and close it repeatedly. When the vehicle was 3 years old, I had problems with the door not stopping if it hit an obstacle. It almost "ate" a friend of mine, a 6'4" 200 pound male. I disconnected the cable so it would only open and close manually. NO more automatic doors for this family!