No-start or intermittent start failure on the 2002 Chevrolet Impala
1 fire 1 of the 122 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When no-start or intermittent start failure gets reported
Owners of the 2002 Chevrolet Impala report no-start or intermittent start failure at a median of 79,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 59,000 miles and a quarter after 117,000 miles, from 100 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 1st most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 38,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 180,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 142,278 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
10% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 38,122 miles | 58,750 miles | 78,500 miles | 116,625 miles | 180,400 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 1 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $200–$1,800 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 15 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2014, at a median of 65,000 miles, and latest on the 2011 at 130,000 miles.
By volume the 2002 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
2002 chevy impala the security light goes on when driving. After a short period of time when driving this way the car will not start after being turned off. A friend who has a newer impala has had secuirty light go on while driving and the engine totally shut down . Very serious implications could arrive if on highway or bridge and car dies.
Dt: within 6 months after purchase the new vehicle stalled with no notice at stop light. After letting it sit for several hours it will then start. Sometimes it will not start even after sitting overnight. The dealer replaced the mass air flow pressure sensor several times.*ak
I purchased my '02 impala through the corporate leasing company of my father's employer. He had no problems with the car other than the transmission fluid turning black by 85,000 miles. When I got the car in june of '05, it was at 121,000 miles, I drove the car around all day, parked the car for 5 minutes, and when I went to start it, nothing happened. The dash lit up, the radio came on, but the car didn't turn over, not even a clicking sound, indicative of a dead battery. I waited 10 minutes, tried again and it started right up. I went for another month without any problems, however in late july, the car failed to start. Again I waited 10-15 minutes, and it started right up. This continued sporadically until october 20, when it took 30 minutes of waiting to get it to crank. I took the car to a local gm dealer, who put it on the machine and advised me that the BCM (body control module) had failed and was sending a signal to the passlock system telling it that my keys were incorrect. The service writer informed me that a new BCM installed would run about $500.00, and the service tech advised that this has become a common failure in…
Also reported on the 2002 Chevrolet Impala
Other electrical problem
Other engine problem
Other lighting problem
Control module (ECM/PCM/BCM) failure
Headlight failure or clouding
Tail light, brake light or signal failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 122 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does no-start or intermittent start failure happen on the 2002 Chevrolet Impala?
Across 100 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 79,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 59,000 miles and a quarter after 117,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is no-start or intermittent start failure on the 2002 Chevrolet Impala?
122 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.3 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed