Hey all. 2004 Black SRX/V6/AWD/Ultraview purchased new in July 2004.

So far the car/truck/suv/wagon whatever/the/hell/you/want/to/call/it is my favorite new vehicle purchase.

OK here is the story. On the hottest day this year, 92 F, parked in the sun, the passenger door was opened and the crumpled in the pass. fender. My wife called the police and they could not see damage that would have started the crumple. No car parked on pass. side before and after the incident.

My dad was a manager of a body shop and I am an automotive paint chemist, so I have seen auto body damage. This was different, only the edge of the fender crumpled just above the crimped trough of the body. After looking at the dent for awhile, I believe that the fender-door gap was off and when heated, the door hit the fender. Wife took the SRX to the dealer, he said that there was one other SRX with the exact same thing. Then he proceeded to give an estimate of $750 to fix. What really pi$$ed me off was he pushed out the dent so "we could use the door". I had wanted to keep the damage so another friend could judge.

Anyway, has anyone else heard of such a thing? Who should I call and how to report?

Thanks.

Sorry, havent heard of this one before but it comes as no surprise. Even though this car comes from what is supposedly the highest quality factory in North America, they have a proven inability to align body panels. I brought up their inability to vertically align front fenders and hoods in a thread called Assembly Quality. I also mentioned in another thread that I checked 15 SRXes at my dealers lot and all of them had at least one fender out of line. To be honest, I wasn't looking at the fore and aft fitting. I will go back sometime in the next couple of days and look at their stock in this regard.

I like most people here love to drive this animal (for errands, not trips) and think it is a really sharp car. However it's assembly quality and attention to design refinements and features would be more appropriate if it bore the Chevrolet logo instead of the Cadillac logo. (Excluding the Corvetteof course)

If we find other SRXes to be misaligned fore and aft as well as verticially, I would seek out the SRX Brand/Product manager and demand that he/she take corrective action and cover your repair.

I just took a better look at my SRX in the daylight. The passenger side just clears the front fender when you open the door. The drivers side has at least 3/16s clearance.

I'll bet you $10 that your passengers side fender is lower at the front than your drivers side fender. Most SRX fenders tend to be attached high toward the front and now I see why. They are compensating for door clearance by shifting the fender angles and height.

Also noticed an interesting disparity between the relationship of the plastic cladding on the front doors. The cladding on the drivers side is lined up exactly with the door. The cladding on the passenger door is shifted 1/8" forward and has rubbed the cladding on the front fender. The cladding fortunately is softer and can probably be pushed backwards by the contact and keeps you out of the body shop. The metal mislignment unfortunately is anoter problem.

I've had my srx for 8 months and i love it BUT from the beginning my passengers have intermittently complained about the door popping when they open or close it. I took it back to the dealer and they couldn't find a thing wrong with it... I never thought about heat affecting it. Still does it on and off - will have to monitor it with regards to the weather. Maybe i'll have to take it to the dealer on a particlularly hot day.

This is similar to the rear hatch problem of the taillight making contact with the roof. I have wondered how many of those with the top mounted stoplight problem have been sitting out in the noonday sun. Looking at the ones that posted pictures with damage to the roof it would seem that the door may not have been adjusted properly or was loose. If the clearance between the door and the roof is too close or the door moved forward while up it would exert lots of force if the stoplight contacts the roof when being closed. Certainly enough to pull the stop light up.

Our rear hatch is hard to open on a hot day. The fit looks OK and it does not make any contact but the door latch that is normally very easy to pull requires a good jerk on the handle to get the latch to release.

As I stated previously, I could see where the plastic cladding on the passenger door bottom and the matching cladding on the front fender had rubbed sometime previously.

Yesterday I parked the car outside with the suspect side to the sun. Went back a couple of hrs later and the cladding rubbed whenever I swung the door. Luckily the plastic rubs on mine not the metal. I suggest owners check this clearance (look where the indentations are toward the bottom of the door/fender). You know it is going to cost when the metal catches the metal. Especially if you have Redline or White Diamond.

I don't know about you guys, but I am going to my dealer next week to get it on record that I think the clearance is too tight, I want it in writing so that when my door or front panel crinkles someday I can show that it was not abuse or damage on my part.

Just to followup on some points...

As for panel alignment. On the vehicle affected, the pass. fender is aligned with the hood, pretty closely. I can see that if the fender is higher, it would help door clearance. Maybe the factory is aligning the fender to aid door clearance.

Referencing the cladding. The cladding of the pass. door sticks out beyond the metal door by about 1/16 or less. There is some damage on the cladding that suggests that it caught the door, causing this damage. This is the them that got caught, probably pushed in metal and viola - damage.

Referencing thermal expansion. I'll back off this statement, as the coefficient of thermal expansion could only cause a fraction of a fraction in expansion. But it could be the straw that damaged this horse's fender.

This was fixed by the General. There may be a problem when parked at an incline....
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This problem had nothig to do with an incline. see string http://www.cadillacforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17666

I had the same poblm and th body shop aligned everything the second time.