Holden Astra BK (Hatchback) (2016-2026) Questions & Answers

hey Jamie - I have sent you an email

hi there we have experienced the same problem. Very disappointed with Holden Customer Care. Did you have any success? thank you

Hi, No success, Holden Customer Care said they won't pay for repairs. Also Allianz who are responsible for extended warranty have also said they won't pay. So a car we have only owned for 8 months is going to cost us $6,500 to repair. It is not fair!

I am experiencing the same issue now but not under warranty. The company that sold it to me didn't tell me engine light comes on and just ran out of warranty the month I brought it.

I guess we have both been ripped off as the piston problem was a known issue by Holden. I have done research and found that the pistons used in our cars were known to be faulty, but nothing was done and now we have both had to pay so much money just to have a car to drive. As Holden is no longer made, I feel GM have deserted all people in Australia who still own GMH cars here.

What do u think about starting a class action with me? As alot of people have the same problem in the uk with holden/opel. Same model with lpsi issues, cracked pistons.

Hi Leish, I would love to, but have no idea how much it would cost.

Hey sweet someone above is wanting people to email to start a class action as this model astra should have 100% been recalled as i have researched and so many people have had the same problem

Looks like a class action is needed then. I will contact the person you mentioned and suggest you do too. I feel there are a lot of people who have gone through the same problem. It cost us $7000 to get our car repaired even though we were still under extended warranty. GMH would not repair our car under warranty, even though the piston issue was a recognised fault. I thought we had no hope because GMH are such a big company, we felt intimidated by them. Now I can see maybe we can all stand up and say we have been treated badly. I am going to contact the other person now.

Hi I have just picked my Astra up from the mechanics as I had idling issues and scanner first showed fault in cylinder 4. It has piston issues as my mechanic has changed the coil, plugs etc and then found the piston is stuffed and I have to replace the engine. Car has only done 65,000 kms. I paid $15,000 for it 2 years ago. I am not happy.

Hi, I can definitely see why you are not happy, just as others like me and my husband have been having to pay so much money to get our cars repaired and GMH have turned their backs on us. I don't know why you have to replace the engine as piston 3 in our Astra went, but they only replaced that one and the engine was fine. We now have a two year warranty on that piston. We were told that piston 3 went because of overheating, but when doing some research, it was known that the pistons were actually faulty. The cars should have been recalled, but instead many of us are faced with paying out thousands. If we had known about this, we would never have purchased our Astra, which we bought privately for $15,500. A person tried to start a class action against GMH, but the lawyers approached said the money involved for each person, wasn't worth them taking on the case. I don't think they realise just how many cars have been affected around the world. I can't remember the lawyers, but it was one of those that advertise, no win, no fees. They don't care about the little man, all they care about is how much money they will make. As for GMH, look how big that company is, but they are certainly not there when it comes to helping those who drive their Astras that have known faults. My husband and I are pensioners and having to pay so much money to get our car repaired has had a big affect on our finances and ability to enjoy life.

Google LSPI Astra issue. It may help.

Never heard of LSPI issue on the 1.6L equipped RS-V . I'm sure this is long since sorted but for the record bad idling on the 1.6 could be the PCV valve . It's built into the rocker cover so not super cheap to replace but also not a big job .

The pcv valve got changed due to squealing noise and the bad idling was there before and after, apparently they think its a fuel problem like the fuel pump in the tank, its still not sorted either no one really knows whats wrong but i think and a mechanic thinks its fuel related. Thanks for your response claire

What year is it and why did it crack to start with?

I’ve got a similar k’s and I find now I have a cracked rocker cover that is expelling pressure. The cost to replace is $700 plus 3hrs labour $1300 all up seams bs to me.

Hi. Could we have a chat about the problem you experienced. Iv got the same fault and want to understand more about the particulars of your situation and what happened.

Hey! All the details are pretty much in my post. I ended up with no bore damage because I noticed the issue immediately with loss of power and the turbo fan kicking in. I will say though that a few months ago I got a recall letter noting the issues I described and I had to take it in for them to replace the oil with a different one. It was listed as a known issue under the recall. If you haven’t received this I’d contact Holden direct and get them involved before going any further. I dealt with Holden direct after being stuffed around by my dealership for a hire car - Holden had it sorted in half an hour after waiting almost two weeks for my dealership to tell me they didn’t have any. Holden is also struggling to keep a good name with the announcement they are ceasing servicing in 5 years. Nows the time to make demands - not sit back and wait for them to deliver on the warranty. Good luck

Should also say mine involved replacing the piston and I got my service that was due at the same time - they did that for free. Then my next service which was done last month involved the recall and the service.

My car is a Holden Astra R (listed as BK on the book), which I bought new in 2017. It had a piston failure after 24,000 km. I decided to take Holden to a Tribunal to get them to repair the car but they are not upholding the warranty because of servicing. In your situation, did you buy the car new? Was it serviced at Holden's specified service intervals? When did you first notice you had a problem? Did Holden send you any letters about the mandated oil type changing? It appears that in December 2017 Holden issued a bulletin advising customers that the Car Handbook was wrong and listed the wrong oil type to use. It should have been Dexos 1 Gen 2 oil. The book stated Dexos 2 oil should be used, which appears to be more suited to Diesel vehicles. Did Holden ever contact you about this change? Do you happen to know what oil you used on your vehicle e.g. when servicing?

Wow - I got the letter in March this year (2020). I bought new from dealer - it was their demo and had under 500ks on it. March (after my piston problem) was the first I’d ever heard of the oil issue and it was via a letter direct from Holden. My vehicle has been serviced on time through the same dealer. I can’t offer advice on warranty claims if the service schedule isn’t adhered to. Funnily my issue arose in the 25-30k mark too. It would seem my dealer didn’t follow the directive from Holden if the oil issue was known before my fault and even before I bought my car (May 2018).

Thanks Amber. So just to be absolutely clear, your car has a full service history and you still experienced a piston failure at around 25-30,000 km on the odometer? I suspect that Holden (GM) built the cars at plant and used Dexos 2 oil. After you received the letter from Holden in March 2020 did you speak to the dealer about it? How did the dealership respond? Did they write to you or just speak on the phone? How did they react? Did they say that they had used Dexos 2 at servicing? Any small specific details you can share is appreciated.

Ok - yes. I had the piston failure with full servicing. When I got the letter I was about to book in for my first service post the failure. When I called and asked about the recall for oil they said oh yeah bring it in. No other info was given to me before or after the oil was ‘done’. I booked for my service at the same time - and despite the oil being required I was still asked to pay for the total amount of service. I did this as I was told if I didn’t then I would lose my capped price servicing. The worst thing with this model Astra is the requirement for 9 month servicing - it’s ridiculous. At least service I was over 10,000 below the expected k’s relevant to the timing. My dealer did nothing to help my faith in Holden and I had a much better experience dealing with Holden direct via their customer care team. However, the very first thing they did was check I’d serviced it to log book. I’d imagine if I hadn’t I would have had the same issue as you. Sounds like they are willing to spend money to fight you - I would wonder if there was any satisfaction that could be gained via fair trading. The worst part is Holden has zero interest in helping you via ‘good will’ because they’ll be gone soon enough. I would however be exploring the good will clauses.

Would you be willing to send me a copy of the recall letter you received and also a copy of the letter informing you about the oil? Are these different letters? I'll send you a private message with my email.

Hi Amber. Do you remember any of the specifics from the recall letter? Did it say that the wrong oil had been used in your vehicle? Did the letter identify when the wrong oil was used? Was the wrong oil used at the factory when the car was built? Did they say the wrong oil was used by the dealership at servicing? Did they outline what work needed to be done to remedy the problem?

2017 Holden Astra R- Had the same issue- @65000kms - engine check lights on, engine losing power and vibration. Left the car with the Holden service center (I bought a demo car back in 2017 and always serviced my car in there itself). The next day got a call from them and they told me that after the compression test they found cylinder 1 low i.e failed piston and ring. The expected bill was $6 to 7k. I send an email to Holden customer care regarding the recall letter I got in March 2020 and 2 months post that recall thing got fixed my engine had this issue. They agreed to pay 100% of the amount. Got my car back now paid $0 for the entire work, but lost confidence with the car and thinking of selling it as it might happen again.

Did you not get 5 years warranty in 2017? I bought my 17 plated car in ‘’18 as a demo and I got 5 year warranty. I’ve also lost faith in Holden as a whole due to this and a previous horror experience with a Captiva.

I have experienced this issue with Astra 2018 LS with Piston Failure, and I suspect the wrong oil was the root cause of this issue - just wondering how you want with your claim against Holden - they are not covering my issue under warranty.

The oil is not the issue. I had an engine reconditioning firm analyse the fault and it turn out that the sensors on the engine did not detect the piston failure. That wasn’t because the sensors were not working. It was due to the fact that the performance and fault detection parameters were set too high. Holden were attempting to get more power and performance out of the engine and set the combustion air/fuel mix settings to high. As a result what should have been combustion was in fact detonation. Holden released a firmware update to correct the issue, dialing down the power and the performance but preventing detonation.

Go into the system settings and you can adjust that from your stereo

You hit the unlock button twice. It’s a safety feature to prevent unwanted access to other doors. So if just you - hit it once, if you want all doors and/or boot to open, press unlock twice.

keep the car serviced, latest model good performance and fuel eficent every car maker has a lemon or two

I have one with 110,000km on it Reliable so far, and no major issues Every model has a dud but so far so good Original rotors as well at that many km

Honest advice: SELL IT. Astras are not good cars. They are expensive to fix. They have lots of continuous problems. They are German cars with a "Holden" badge. Holden charges an arm and a leg. Buying an Astra is the start of sliding down a slippery slope.

Not a huge issue and should be covered under warranty, direct injection engines are very shaky cold but good once warmed up Just a feature of that type of engine Most likely sounds like you have an intake or air fuel mix problem, dealer should sort it under stat warranty

Ignore the poster above, Astra for me is good and many others, service it on time and keep it well looked after and you should easy see 200,000km out of it

So far I’m at 123000 on original rotors so you be the judge ?

I have owned one for 15 months. Very well fitted out and a powerful engine. I love driving it - I own V8s as well and I find myself really enjoying driving the Astra. Seats very comfy too.