Complete engine failure or seizure on the 2011 GMC Terrain
1 fire 2 injuries 3 of the 18 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 engine failure or seizure gets reported
Owners of the 2011 GMC Terrain report complete engine failure or seizure at a median of 85,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 75,000 miles and a quarter after 140,000 miles, from 10 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 105,000 miles. It is the 7th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 70,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 150,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 78,000 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.
0% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 72,000 miles | 77,432 miles | 82,500 miles | 141,789 miles | 150,000 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 and 2 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 $4,500–$12,000 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 8 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2017, at a median of 70,000 miles, and latest on the 2014 at 135,000 miles.
By volume the 2013 carries the most reports, with 19; the 2011 has 18. 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.
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.
Engine has burned 2qt. Of oil between oil change which I didn't know. Engine seized up. It just stopped. Had it tow to dealer they want 9000.00 dollars to fix. Still have SUV but dose not run. Do buy gmc terrain .
Vehicle caught on fire after pulling off the highway onto a busy city road. The cause was oil spilling onto the hot exhaust after catastrophic engine failure when the piston rods went through the side of the block. A bystander had a fire extinguisher and was able to put the fire out in the engine bay, after I was able to safely get out of the vehicle. The vehicle was a total loss according to our insurance company, but we have a claim on our record with insurance going up since gm would not cover the claim because the mileage was over 100,000 miles even though this oil consumption issue was present well before 100,000 miles. Sometime prior to this the dealer performed a piston rebuild for excessive oil consumption. After the repair the vehicle made a knocking noise on start up. The dealer passed this off and we were told not to worry about it. We pressed the issue a couple of times and the answer was the same, don't worry about it, it will go away. This is just unacceptable and dangerous to the owners of this engine.
While drive down the interstate my car said service stability track then said engine power reduced, speed dropped dramatically then shut off completely. Engine would not turn back over. Had it towed to the shop only to find out the engine locked up due to no oil. Dealer said it was due to a very common problem with gm with excessive oil consumption! I had my oil changed and a full tune up 2 weeks ago! Called to check recalls only to find out that in fact there was an recall for excessive oil consumption but my VIN wasn't involved. Dealer says in fact it should be! This could have caused a accident and caused my children and I to be seriously injured!
Also reported on the 2011 GMC Terrain
Other engine problem
Other powertrain problem
Excessive oil consumption
Timing chain, belt or tensioner failure
Other fuel system problem
Wiper or washer failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 18 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 engine failure or seizure happen on the 2011 GMC Terrain?
Across 10 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 85,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 75,000 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 engine failure or seizure on the 2011 GMC Terrain?
18 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