William Maley

Staff Writer - CheersandGears.com

August 13, 2012

Chrysler's Pentastar V6 has been getting rave reviews since coming out in the new Grand Cherokee in 2010. However, the V6 has hit a snag.

A small portion of the Pentastar V6s (about 0.5% or 7,500 engines out of the 1.5 million engines built so far) to have faulty cylinder heads. Owners of Jeep Wranglers equipped with the 3.6L complain of a ticking sound coming from the left side of the engine, stalling, loss of power or misfires coming from cylinder No. 2 in NHTSA filings. The Jeep Wrangler isn't the only one Chrysler vehicle with this problem. Automotive News has learned from Chrysler dealers and Allpar.com, a popular Chrysler forum that the Chrysler Town & Country, Dodge Caravan, and Dodge Journey have a similar problem.

Chrysler has confirmed that the Pentastar V6 does have a problem with the cylinder head, but isn't saying why or what the flaw is, nor are they issuing a recall. What Chrysler is saying they're replacing the cylinder head with a “more robust” design. The “more robust” design cylinder head has gone into production for new Pentastar V6s and to repair effected V6s six weeks ago.

This has caused another problem. Dealers who are fixing vehicles with the bad cylinder heads are waiting for the new heads to arrive due to the supplies being constrained. This has caused the repairs to take longer than expected and leaving owners without their vehicles. Chrysler, for their credit, has been footing the bill for rentals.

“The biggest mistake we made is taking our eye off the ball on service parts. That always gets the dealers’ attention. Our intention is to always satisfy the needs of the service market ahead of production. This came to my attention a couple weeks ago. We have parts in the pipeline to remedy that shortfall,” said Doug Betts, Chrysler’s senior vice president for quality.

Betts said Chrysler went from a 1,300 unit shortfall to a 3,000 unit surplus. However, demand for the new cylinder head has now risen to about 500 requests per week.

Source: Automotive News (Subscription Required)

William Maley is a staff writer for Cheers & Gears. He can be reached at william.maley@cheersandgears.com or you can follow him on twitter at @realmudmonster.