Complete transmission failure on the 2002 GMC Envoy
1 fire 1 of the 16 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 complete transmission failure gets reported
Owners of the 2002 GMC Envoy report complete transmission failure at a median of 70,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 65,000 miles and a quarter after 140,000 miles, from 11 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 98,000 miles. It is the 13th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 30,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 140,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 108,000 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.
18% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 32,000 miles | 63,138 miles | 68,187 miles | 140,000 miles | 140,000 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 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 $2,800–$8,000 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.
This mode is classified as critical, which means a failure can leave the car unable to stop, steer, or stay out of the way of traffic. It is weighted accordingly in the risk score.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 4 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2004, at a median of 100 miles, and latest on the 2002 at 70,000 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.
While cruising at highway speed (65 MPH) my 2002 gmc envoy suddenly made a loud crunching noise and lost forward motion. The engine revved up, then down, then turned off (while multiple dash warning lights came on simultaneously). I managed to get the vehicle off the road without the help of power steering or brakes, and after a few minutes I started it back up and found I could drive off only at low speed on the shoulder, though there was continued noise from the underside of the car and it was erratically performing. I immediately brought the car to a mechanic who discovered that internal parts in the transmission had failed. The mechanic also informed me that there is a gmc technical service bulletin about this and it is a common/frequent problem. The tsb recommends replacing the internal transmission parts. The mechanic says that replacing the transmission is the only safe thing to do. The local gmc dealer service department says that despite this being a known issue with these transmissions, if you are out of warranty (I am) gmc will not address the issue. Catastrophic transmission failure is bad anywhere, but on the…
Dt: contact stated transmission went out at around 29,415 miles. Transmission failed while driving at 20 MPH, and leaving him stranded. Transmission has been repaired. The service dealer replace the sun gear, and stated this was a known problem within the gmc envoy. *ak *jb
We own a 2002 gmc envoy sle, which was purchased new december 2001 by us. In september 2004 at approximately 65,000 miles the transmission went out. My wife was driving the vehicle at the time. The envoy has a automatic transmission and 2nd gear and reverse went out. My wife was able to pull over and we took it to the gm dealership where we purchased it. They would only pay 50% for the repair to the transmission and we had to pay the other 50%. Less than 25,000 the transmission has went out again, having the exact same problem 2nd gear and reverse went out. Again, my wife was on her way to work and was able to control the vehicle and safely get it stopped. We took the vehicle back to the gm dealership and they are now willing to replace the transmission, however we have to pay 50% of that amount. My question is why was it not replaced the first time? I paid approximately $576.00 for the first repair and now they want me to pay another $1500.00, which is over $2,000.00. Why is another repair now not good enough to fix the problem? Why should we have to pay for a defective transmission? I have been doing some research on the…
Also reported on the 2002 GMC Envoy
Other engine problem
Other electrical problem
Other visibility problem
Other powertrain problem
Other body or interior problem
Differential or transfer case failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 16 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 complete transmission failure happen on the 2002 GMC Envoy?
Across 11 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 70,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 65,000 miles and a quarter after 140,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is complete transmission failure on the 2002 GMC Envoy?
16 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.2 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