I think they've decided to punt on making parts for older vehicles.
They sold over a million of
these yet my independent mechanic had to resort to eBay to get parts when the central locking system failed on mine.
I ran into a similar problem this past summer, although admittedly, with an older car. My '67 Pontiac Catalina needed a new sway bar bushing bracket, the little U-shaped bracket that bolts to the underside of the frame. One of them had rusted completely away and was sort of just hanging there.
Now, GM was pretty annoying back then, in the sense their divisions weren't "corporate" enough. Even though the '65-70 big cars are all the same basic design, they still changed them just enough that a lot of suspension parts for a '67 Pontiac will only interchange with a '68 Pontiac. Not a '69, not a '66, and not a Chevy/Olds/Buick/Cadillac. So, it can be a bit hard to find parts for, sometimes.
Anyway, the mechanic could not find this sway bar bushing bracket. I tried Advance Auto, just on a whim, and the young'un there offered some of the stupidest advice possible. He told me that what I need to do is go find a donor car, that way I could pull whatever I need off of it whenever something on mine broke. Umm, yeah, good luck with that. There aren't that many GOOD '67 Pontiacs left, let alone junkyards full of them just waiting to be saved. And chances are, a lot of suspension components would be rusted out. The guy got me really annoyed, because he was speaking in a condescending, know-it-all sort of voice. Sometimes, it's better to just say you don't have the part in stock, and just shut up.
I ended up ordering it from a company called Ames, that specializes in classic Pontiacs. But the parts they sent me looked really generic, like the bracket could have fit any number of cars, and the only thing they changed was the diameter of the hole inside the rubber bushing. I have a feeling Advance Auto had a universal part that would fit, or could have ordered it. But the clerk just didn't know how to look it up, or didn't want to.
Another thing that was a bit annoying, my mechanic said that he couldn't find an air filter, either. In the past, air filters for this car were always easy to find. They made millions of 400-4bbls over the years. And I'd think that since the GTO is a hot item, there would be a market for them. Unless the air filter for a GTO's 400-4bbl is a different size from a full-sized car?
