Today I was going to get an oil change when my car wouldn't start. It made a kind of clicking sound, like when the battery is drained, so I go get my sister's keys and try to jump it, no dice.

I look at the dash a see the messages, SERVICE AIR BAG, SERVICE ESC, SERVICE TRACTION and ESC OFF flashing.

I have a 2010 HHR, just hit 90,000miles. Any idea why it won't start at all? Read a lot of posts from others who said it would display the message, but not that theirs would not start. People keep telling me to go to AutoZone or something to get it checked, but that's kinda hard when it WILL NOT START.

I'm freaking out because I haven't had the car a year and already have such an inconvenience. I don't want to take it to a dealer and find out I have to pay an arm, a leg and my first born just for the diagnosis.

Please anyone, help if you can. And thank you, in advance.

 

Question number A is: did you read your Owner Manual and jump start it the way outlined therein? Or, did you ASSuME the that black box under the hood with the red and black markings was the battery?

If you did it wrong, all bets are off! The original click, no start sounds like a dead/drained battery

 

Of course my luck would have it mine did not come with an owners manual.. however, the battery shows you how to connect it properly.

Next question, please.

 

Owner Manuals are available here https://www.chevyhhr.net/forums/general-hhr-4/online-owners-manual-3074/.

I don't know what you mean by "battery shows you how to connect it properly".

Under the hood there is a diagram on top of the FUSE box that shows the Positive connection is under the red cover and the Negative connection is on the STRUT bolt.

Don't ask for help with insufficient data if you won't entertain questions.

 

Ok, sorry I'm freaking out about my car suddenly not working that I didn't look online for a manual. Under the hood it does show you where to connect the cables to. At least on mine it does, don't know what to tell you because you pretty much just confirmed that I already connected them correctly.. LOL

I don't know what other data I needed, which is why I came to this because I saw other people having nice interactions with other individuals helping them with their concerns.

You're coming out of left field. If you can't help, don't reply. Simple as that.

 

Pop open the rear hatch. Get to the battery and check the voltage with a meter. Any less than about 12.4 volts or so and it's most likely a battery issue. If it wouldn't jump from under the hood, you either had a bad jump connection or the battery could have a dead short.
While you're back there, check that the battery connections are clean and tight.
All else fails, try a new battery.

 

Chill!!! Donbrew is trying to help you out - and what he says is right. If you had beeen around this forum for a while, you would quickly see that way too many people jump start their vehicle incorrectly (because they did not read their manual), and end up with a mess of problems.

But moving forward, as previously noted: check the voltage from directly on the battery (it is in the trunk, under the floor), or throw a charger on the battery (directly to the battery), and see how it reacts. Your local auto parts store can put a load tester on it to check its health.

 

I don't think he wasn't trying to help, just has a strange way of wording things if that was supposed to be nice. Again, I've had the car for less than a year so forgive me for not knowing the battery is in the trunk and calling the fuse box the battery. All I was trying to say is that I did hook the cables up correctly, and didn't ASSuME anything. Thank you though.

 

Well things got a little sideways blkbear, but the salient point is determining the health of the battery. Unfortunately, HHR's aren't tolerant of bad or weak batteries, it'll cause them to act up quite spectacularly.

Have your battery checked and load tested, if it's bad or just even marginal, replace it and let us know how you make out.

 

Well, I'm out.