Radiator or coolant leak on the 2003 Jeep Grand Cherokee
1 fire 1 of the 10 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.
Only 5 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When radiator or coolant leak gets reported
There are 10 reports of radiator or coolant leak on the 2003 Jeep Grand Cherokee, 5 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 98,000 miles. It is the 17th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 53,000 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 $350–$1,900 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 19 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 1996, at a median of 1,000 miles, and latest on the 1997 at 165,000 miles.
By volume the 2002 carries the most reports, with 101; the 2003 has 10. 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.
Tl*the contact owns a 2003 jeep grand cherokee. While driving 55 MPH, the contact heard an explosion underneath the hood and observed plastic particles coming from his vehicle. He pulled over, lifted the hood, and noticed that there was a hole in the radiator and the cooling fan disintegrated. The vehicle was driven to a local repair shop and the mechanic stated that he needed to replace the radiator and the cooling fan. The vehicle was repaired the same day. The dealer advised him to call the manufacturer in regards to submitting claims for reimbursement. The manufacturer stated that there would be no reimbursement for the repairs because the vehicle was not included in any recalls. The current mileage was 63,000 and failure mileage was 60,020. Updated 11/6/08 *cn the consumer found recall # 06v199000. Updated 11/10/08. *jb
Tl*the contact owns a 2003 jeep grand cherokee. The radiator fan has burned out twice within 17 months. The first time it occurred the contact was pulling out of a drive thru at 10 MPH and the vehicle began to overheat. The following day, she took the vehicle to the dealer and was informed that the air conditioner fan relay switch failed, which caused the radiator fan not to work. The dealer replaced the fan and it worked properly. However, seventeen months later, the failure has recurred. The vehicle is currently at the dealer. The manufacturer stated that there was a recall for this failure and the contact believes it is due to a manufacturer defect. The NHTSA campaign id number was not found. The failure mileage was 56,000 and current mileage was 74,000.
Jeep grand cherokee laredo 4x4 2003 continuous failure of the relay switch for the radiator and also fan assembly. Relay switch goes bad every 6mo to 9mo. Fan assembly was replaced oct 2010 and needs to be replaced again march 2011. *tr
Also reported on the 2003 Jeep Grand Cherokee
Other visibility problem
Other body or interior problem
Premature brake pad or rotor wear
Blower motor or climate control failure
Other engine problem
Other powertrain problem
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 10 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 10 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 radiator or coolant leak happen on the 2003 Jeep Grand Cherokee?
Across 5 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 55,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is radiator or coolant leak on the 2003 Jeep Grand Cherokee?
10 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