AtWhatMileage
Electrical · 14 owner reports

Other electrical problem on the 2001 Chevrolet Silverado

1 crash 2 fires 1 injury 4 of the 14 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.

Reports of this failure 14
With an odometer reading 10
Reports per 1,000 built 0.1 per 1,000
Filed below 36,000 miles 20%
Mention a crash, fire or injury 4
Typical repair $250–$2,000
What it means when it happens Moderate
Rank among this year's problems 15th

When other electrical problem gets reported

Owners of the 2001 Chevrolet Silverado report other electrical problem at a median of 65,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 45,000 miles and a quarter after 100,000 miles, from 10 reports that carried an odometer reading.

A part like this is normally expected to survive 85,000 miles. It is the 15th most-reported problem on this model year.

The mileage distribution

The reported range runs from 20,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 130,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 112,140 miles across the middle 80% of reports.

A spread this wide points at use rather than design. Towing, climate, service history and city mileage all move a failure like this, so the median is a weak guide to any individual car.

20% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.

The whole distribution

Percentiles of the 10 odometer readings owners gave.
10th25thMedian 75th90th
19,860 miles 47,371 miles 66,500 miles 99,000 miles 132,000 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 crash, 2 a fire and 1 an injury are 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 $250–$2,000 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 21 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2014, at a median of 5,000 miles, and latest on the 1997 at 190,000 miles.

By volume the 2003 carries the most reports, with 46; the 2001 has 14. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.

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.

What owners wrote

Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.

Cycling switch on A/C are no good. Had switch replaced on 08/09/03 and mechanic at dealer stated AC delco is putting out faulty switches. The switch he used to replace my faulty switch was also no good; he replaced it with another switch. It work for the 7 mile ride home. But on sun. 08/10/03 the problem was right back. The problem is every time you hit any kind on bump in the road the switch turns off the A/C, until the computer realizes the A/C is turned on, but the compressor is not running and it turns it on again. Until you hit another bump in the road. The mechanic demonstrated this to me buy tapping gentle on the switch and it turns the compressor off and tap again and it turns it back on. It also stated that all the chevrolet trucks are having this problem. *nlm

43,495 miles NHTSA complaint 424248 filed 2003-08-11

On going problem with the over ride sensor for the head lights causing them to go off prematurely while driving at night. The dealer was contacted. *jb the consumer was attempting to turn on the dome lights when the headlights and the instrument panel lights went off. *sc *tc

20,000 miles NHTSA complaint 500592 filed 2004-10-08

Upon placing the key into the ignition key would not turn. Consumer tried the spare key and it would not work. Consumer had to disable the air bags in order to start the vehicle.*ak

96,000 miles NHTSA complaint 502920 filed 2004-10-22

Also reported on the 2001 Chevrolet Silverado

ABS module or sensor failure

234 reports median 52k

Parking brake failure

63 reports median 40k

Other engine problem

62 reports median 64k

Loss of braking

58 reports median 54k

Liftgate, tailgate or trunk failure

58 reports median 42k

Other brake problem

49 reports median 53k

How far this goes

Complaints are voluntary, so 14 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 other electrical problem happen on the 2001 Chevrolet Silverado?

Across 10 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 65,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 45,000 miles and a quarter after 100,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.

How common is other electrical problem on the 2001 Chevrolet Silverado?

14 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.1 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