Headlight failure or clouding on the 2009 Pontiac G6
10 fires 10 of the 129 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 headlight failure or clouding gets reported
Owners of the 2009 Pontiac G6 report headlight failure or clouding at a median of 65,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 53,000 miles and a quarter after 85,000 miles, from 113 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 2nd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 33,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 99,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 65,180 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.
13% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 33,400 miles | 52,654 miles | 65,000 miles | 85,000 miles | 98,580 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, 10 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 $150–$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 5 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2009, at a median of 65,000 miles, and latest on the 2006 at 105,000 miles.
By volume the 2009 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.
Tl* the contact owns a 2009 pontiac g6. The contact stated the front passenger side headlight would fail intermittently. The contact took the vehicle to the dealer and was told there was a short in the wiring. The dealer advised that the headlight harness would need to be replaced. The failure mileage was 80,000.
In 2010 I purchaced a 2009 pontiac g6. I had it for a couple weeks and my head lights burned out. I then got a new one and it burned out again then the other side did the same thing over and over again. When replacing it I see the socket was burned and melted. To this day I have to replace the bulbs every couple weeks and they go out on my way to work and I work midnigh, so its very dangerous. I also have been online and seen hundreds of people who are having this problem and they chatch on fire. The car is a 2009 pontiac g6 sadan here is the link to see all the other people having problems. I have also seen many new g6 cars on the road with one head light out and there brand new.I would hate to see them catch on fire or someone get in to a accident because they can't see at night. I also have received a ticket for it which I had to pay because pontiac didnt build it right. I click up above because the socket was melted which tells me there was a fire.there are over 100 websites with people having the same problem. Http://www.arfc.org/complaints/2008/pontiac/g6/exterior_lighting/problem.aspx *tt
In 2010 I purchaced a 2009 pontiac g6. I had it for a couple weeks and my head lights burned out. I then got a new one and it burned out again then the other side did the same thing over and over again. When replacing it I see the socket was burned and melted. To this day I have to replace the bulbs every couple weeks and they go out on my way to work and I work midnigh, so its very dangerous. I also have been online and seen hundreds of people who are having this problem and they chatch on fire. The car is a 2009 pontiac g6 sadan here is the link to see all the other people having problems. I have also seen many new g6 cars on the road with one head light out and there brand new.I would hate to see them catch on fire or someone get in to a accident because they can't see at night. I also have received a ticket for it which I had to pay because pontiac didnt build it right. I click up above because the socket was melted which tells me there was a fire.there are over 100 websites with people having the same problem. Http://www.arfc.org/complaints/2008/pontiac/g6/exterior_lighting/problem.aspx *tt
Also reported on the 2009 Pontiac G6
Other steering problem
Other electrical problem
Cruise control failure
Other lighting problem
Loss of power steering
Other brake problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 129 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 headlight failure or clouding happen on the 2009 Pontiac G6?
Across 113 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 65,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 53,000 miles and a quarter after 85,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is headlight failure or clouding on the 2009 Pontiac G6?
129 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.2 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