Dealer
Choices
If
you bought either the Vibe or the Matrix, it is a Toyota under the skin. Pontiac has their unique appearance parts on
the exterior and interior, but everything else is Toyota. Even though your car was assembled in Canada
(Matrix) or California (Vibe), the engine and transmission are made in Japan.
My
early experience is that the Pontiac dealer knows little about the Vibe, while
for the Toyota dealer the Matrix is just another sibling for the Corolla or
Celica. Pontiac doesn’t sell locking
wheel nuts, Toyota does. Pontiac
doesn’t sell (or have) repair manuals, Toyota does. The Toyota repair manuals are spendy -- about US$300 if you buy
all three -- so you may not want to rush to the phone and order the set. You can now order Vibe repair manuals from
Helminc.com for US$120**, but GM dealers rely strictly on electronic
documentation.
If
I have the unfortunate need for dealer repairs I’ll price both Toyota and
Pontiac dealers and let you know who gets the job. So far (6000 miles as of
January 2003) my car hasn’t been worked on by anyone but me.
Some
differences exist between the Matrix and Vibe simply by marketing whim – for
example, a Matrix has painted mirrors, while even the monotone Vibe does
not. Presumably the Pontiac and Toyota
repair parts are identical and come in black only.
**
January 2003: I got my two-volume 2003
Vibe Service Manual from Helm -- while the amount of paper is impressive, it is
riddled with errors. It did give me
enough help to get my dashboard off and back together successfully, but the
electrical stuff seems especially suspect.
My manual has a cutoff date of 7/16/02 and carries a 2002 General Motors
copyright. (It appears Helm publishes
GM documents with little modification, which makes me wonder if dealers see the
same errors.) Those of us who don’t
live in a GM dealership are unfamiliar with GM engine and transmission
designations, which are different that those used by Toyota for identical
items. So I set out to figure out which
chapters apply to my car. It seems they
created chapters for the two different engines by doing a copy/paste of one
chapter, without even bothering to correct the specifications or section
headings. Same story with the two
manual transmissions. I eventually
found the “RPO code List”, but it was so cryptic I still wasn’t sure which
engine was which. I got the answer on
genvibe.com, but not before stumbling across other errors and mislabeled
diagrams. These are pretty glaring
errors if I can find them, so who knows how many subtle errors are in
there. If a corrected manual becomes
available, someone sends me a copy, and I find it improved, I will let you know
here. Meanwhile, GM, why not let
customers have access to the online service documentation? And why must you rename everything Toyota
makes? I can’t believe GM even
renumbered the pins on an electrical connector!