Hello!

I am new to the forum. I just purchased my first chevy van. I've got a 2015 Chevy express 2500. I've been looking to get one of these vans for years and finally got one. Anyways It is used and has 160k miles and 4100 engine hours. I am trying to figure out which engine it has on it, mainly because I am wondering if it is flex fuel. Also wondering about some pointers on what to service first and check, i've kind of gone through the usual (fluids, spark plugs, tires, etc) but any tips and tricks would be greatly appreciated.

Anyways here is this sticker on the engine, Is it the L20 engine? what does the laser cut number with letters on the block mean? emailing chevy just gets me stone walled, telling me I need to go to stealership and pay




here is this code laser stamped on the drivers side




I was told by PO that is an LS engine but I am not sure. The eight digit of the vin code would be A but it is F. Also I believe it has a 4l80e transmission because of the pan configuration, but I counted the amount of bolts and it's 18 not 17. PO had the van retitled recently in feburary of this year because the van was in his business name, his delivery business didn't work out, and he wanted to get personal insurance instead of commercial. The insurance company wouldn't allow him to get personal insurance if the title was in his buisness name. Sounds plausible, or perhaps the engine is just scrap metal he shoved in. IT all looks factory though, but I guess I wouldn't really know, other than all the times I kicked the tires looking for one of these vans.

pUlled a couple spark plugs, here is what it looks like





Also the diff fluid was low, like an inch below the fill hole. No visible leaks. Any ideas on that.

The gas cap says " tighten until one click or service light may come on, " the cap is black and not yellow. The engine sticker on the "vortec" plastic holder for the air filter says " gasoline". NO BADING FOR FLEX FUEL ON THE REAR. THe only badging back there is the (gimmicky) stabiltrak. But vin checks websites say it is FFV, however everything else as you can see is saying it isn't FFV.

ALSO can any of you guys PM me a digital SERVICE MANUAL? I don't really care if it's for an earlier model because it seems like this model hasn't changed much since 2003, the newer the better though, I would be eternally grateful. This crummy owners manual doesn't help much.

 

Easiest way to go is to find the RPO codes on the door jam sticker and look them up. Do you have a yellow gas cap?
https://charm.li/Chevrolet/2013/Expr...500%20V8-4.8L/

 

The fluid level in your diff may be correct. The 10 bolt in my 1500 van calls for the fluid level to be around 20mm below the fill hole. Apparently overfilling it can cause the fluid to foam up. Your van has a different diff so look it up before topping it off.

 

Try this link for LS engine ID

 

The RPO code is missing from the glove box or is covered up by PO with foam. There is no RPO code on the door frame, just a model number. The model doesn't turn anything up with a search. However that sticker on the engine under the dog house has a RPO code. It is L20, (look at pic and tell me if that is RPO code). When I run that CODE through a decoder SOMETHING DOES COME UP. This is what comes up L20

• ENGINE,FLEXIBLE FUEL,(GAS/ETHANOL E85),8 CYL,4.8L,SFI IRON, GM

Thats all that comes up. Guessing that means it's flex fuel? Since nothing else showed up. Unless someone slapped that sticker on there, but I doubt that. IS it really normal for chevy to make a flex fuel vehicle and have NO YELLOW gas cap and NO badging? Come on chevy.... how you suppose to know for sure? I still can't find where the damn fuel lines go into the sensor, I guess I need to remove the dog house again to find that little sensor to triple check. I guess the worst case is I try some flex fuel at some point and it spits out a code, I have to drain the tank somehow.

In other news I have bigger problems that I guess I knew were coming. PO told me that there was a gas fume smell coming off the vehicle. I didn't smell it when I went to purchase the vehicle. But the other day I smelled it. IT's coming off the gas cap and the drivers side rear wheel well area. I looked down there but saw nothing leaking. I did notice there is a little tube type thing almost looking like a fuel on top of the gas tank in the very very rear of the gas tank. This is the GENERAL area (I can't stick my head in any closer to be 100% sure) where the smell comes off of, but NO leaks. Also I asked the PO if he had any problems filling up at the gas station specifically " do you have any resistance when filling up" and he said NO. But now when I am filling up the pump clicks off once, then I set it again, then it clicks off again, I set it again. and finally it pumps and stops clicking off....

so damn well I will probably make a seperate post about all this, but I am just wondering if there is some kind of preventative maintenance I can do to stop this, The smell is NOT STRONG and if he didn't tell me about it I probably wouldn't have noticed. HE said it can get REAL STrong smelling at times. The scariest thing is watching videos on youtube about people who can't fill their tanks anymore, and it seems like an evap problem. They have to purge their lines, usually drop the tank. Also NO CHECK ENGINE CODES AND NO PENDING CHECK ENGINE CODES Too. Im thinking it might be the cannister going out. This vehicle did SIT for years, which is a bit concerning. Preventive maintenance to avoid getting an expensive tow bill at the pump? or don't fix it if ain't broke yet?

 

I just went here, put in my VIN and it gave me details including the engine.
https://www.gmpartsgiant.com/vin-decoder.html

 

Did you look in both door frames? VIN is on one side, RPO on other.

 

The link in post #6 gave me around 70 RPO codes specific to my VIN. It even described the block heater, cold climate package, rubber mat etc... Engine, trans and rear end gear are there too.

This link gives more descriptions to what each code means. https://decoderpo.com/

Clearly the OP has his VIN or he couldn't register the van.

 

Yeah I found that sticker. "Service parts IDENTIFICATION". It was on passenger side door. It contains a bunch of three letter RPO codes. One of the codes is L20. This is the RPO code for the engine I guess. I mean it checks out with the other sticker that was on the engine itself, under the dog house. That other vin site wasn't useful because it said that if the 8th letter of was "A" it was the L20 engine. This is not the case here because the 8th letter is "F" but the vehicle still has the L20 engine. Not sure why chevy makes things so confusing, if one of you guys could shed light on it, awesome. I really just love piece of mind when it comes to flex fuel as we all know, putting the wrong stuff in could damage the vehicle. Easy to do when things aren't clearly marked.

I also found this too when typing RPO code for MYD . This turns out as a transmission code

Transmission, 6-speed automatic, heavy-duty

• TRANSMISSION AUTO 6 SPD, HMD, 6L-90

IS that a good transmission? says it's head duty. Im hoping it last a good loooong time.


REar axle turned up a lot less info than I wanted. RPO code GU6

Rear axle, 3.42 ratio

• AXLE,REAR,3.42 RATIO

I'll probably make another post here in a while about the whole evap system. I really need to pull one of the lines and see if it's clogged. Thanks, I guess we got as far as we could with this thread.

 

According to the RPO lookup site the L20 code is for a 4.8 liter Flex fuel engine.

You might try googling "GM VIN lookup" and trying some other sites. I had similar results as you with some of the sites saying one digit was off when I knew it wasn't. I shared the one that worked for me.

The rear ends are basically sorted by the number of bolts on the cover. 10 bolt 12 bolt etc... If you Google "GM __ bolt" and the year you should be able to identify it.
The 3.42 is most likely the tallest gear available with the gears getting lower as the number increases.