I had the timing belt changed on this car by a good technician about 23,000 miles ago (at about 57,000 miles) and now the idler pulley broke and likely messed up my timing belt and may have bent my engine valves. It is likely going to cost me over $900 to fix (I will give an update on costs later). I have treated this car well since I bought it at with about 7,500 miles and it mostly has highway mileage on it. I was on the highway driving at freeway speeds when the idler pulley broke. This is very likely the last time I buy any Chevrolet or GMC car. I paid around $10,500 for a new car that is a piece of junk that breaks down at around 80,000 miles. Heartbeat of America? Yeah, Chevrolet, you likely lost a customer for life and I will spread the word about your quality products.

Update from Jan 21, 2012: My engine ended up costing me very close to $1,890 to repair. The valves were bent when the idler pulley snapped. This car is Korean junk. May the heavens have mercy on the next person who owns this car because I am likely selling it within one year after I can afford to get a new car.

after timing belt broke at 90,000 miles repair cost new head total cost 1200$.105,000 miles thermostat housing broke in half mainly because it was plastic put in on my self,now idler pulley broke at 114,000 miles not counting brake shoes fell apart on back,wheel barring strut bushings in the last 2 years we have put 4,000$ in this car what next we bought it used but only had 17,000 miles on it. If u are thinking of buying one of these u are better of buying a bicycle or walk.If u have one get rid of it trade it in, if it will make it to a dealer.Hard to find parts and a b#### to work on I love the car and the gas mileage but def a money pit never ending

My own an 2004 aveo,I was making a left turn, when my car just quit running, no loud noises or anything just quit. the idle pulley snapped off, explaing because of what they call an "inferance" motor it caused the timing belt to quit working, jamming the water pump, destoyed all the valves, cracked the head and bent some of the pistons(not sure how many yet). I had to have it towed to my machinc he explained all this to me telling me it would cost around $2500. to repair it. He said I should call GM because the idle pulley should not have just snapped off like it did.

I called GM looking for some help with this matter, after explaing to them the problem I was told that I needed to take it back to the dealer, so I get it towed to the dealer, they look at it and tell me the SAME THING that my mechinic told me about what had happened. I contacted GM again to find out what they would to to help me with this, for over two weeks I got a big run around about it. I finely to ahold of someone who informed me that because I bought the car used that they would NOT help me & because the timing belt should have been replaced at 50,000 miles. I kept telling her that the timing belt did not break that the idle pully snapped but she refussed to lisen to me. So now I have no idea where to turn, as I have no way to come up with that kind of money and I'm not even sure that it's worth fixing.

My father has bought nothing but GM cars and trucks since the 1940's and never had this kind of problem with his and I have followed in his footsteps, but after this is the LAST GM car that I will EVER buy!!!!!!!

I have a 2004 Chevy Aveo with only 55,000 mile on it. When the idler pulley broke, it took out the timing and the result was bent valves. I spoke to a customer representative that said assistance may be available if I took it into the local GM dealer... So I had it transferred from my local garage. Nobody would let me know how I qualified for the assistance until three weeks after I took the car into the shop. They told me that I would have to provide all maintenance records, and when I told them that I hadn't kept them, they said that they wouldn't help me at all... Now, if they would have told me this in the beginning, I would have never had it transferred to GMs garage because I knew I didn't keep that stuff... I did most of the oil changes myself (except for the winter months - which I had done at WalMart). I even went to WalMart and asked them to print the records for the oil changes and turned them in for proof. So far, no one for GMs assistance program has returned a single call. They told me over the phone that they would help out of goodwill... Now, because I don't have service records, they have NO goodwill? It just doesn't make sense. To top things off, the first assistance lady I spoke to said that the repairs would be about the same cost as the garage I had the car pulled from. The original quote from that garage was just over $970 for a valve job... GM wants to charge me $2000 for the stuff they've already done to the Aveo, and another grand to put it all back together. How is that comparable? The car has been in the same shop for over a month now... What worries me however, is the fact that they know that my mother has cancer and they are treating us like this. The car is actually in her name, and is how I get her back and forth to all of her appointments. We missed (but rescheduled) 2 chemo appointments because we don't have our car. The dealership didn't even offer a loaner vehicle.