Interesting Facts About Daewoo You Probably Don’t Know – Common Problems – and PDF Manuals for Download…
Daewoo Motors was a part of now defunct Daewoo Group, which went bankrupt. The automobile division, Daewoo Motors was later acquired by General Motors and now operates under the name GM Korea.
However, when Daewoo declared bankruptcy, as a part of the liquidation deal, a bunch of car stocks already produced by Daewoo were available on the market for very cheap.
Many auto dealers in the US bought up those stocks and hence you may have been able to buy a Daewoo car for quite a steal.
Even though they were offered at quite a low cost, the price was not necessarily indicative of the lower quality of the car. Rather the low cost was a result of the mandatory liquidation of stocks.
Is its heydey, Daewoo Motor was one of the largest automobile manufacturers in South Korea. Its parent company, Daewoo Group, was one of the massive Korean chaebols (family owned conglomerates). The history of Daewoo Motors goes quite a while further back than its parent company.
It was founded just before the Second World War in 1937, when Korea was still under Japanese occupation. When it was founded, it was known as National Motors. It had an agreement with Japanese companies to manufacture cars using their designs.
It continued even after the end of the Second World War and the fall and retreat of Imperial Japan. Later in 1962, the company changed its name to Saenara Motor, but was still manufacturing Nissan’s designs such as the Datsun Bluebird.
After the Automobile Industry Promotion Policy was announced by the South Korean government, the Saenara Motor factory was modernised with new equipment and overhauled manufacturing facilities.
It received special attention as the first major automobile company in South Korea. It later changed hands a few more times, also changing its name along the way. It also tied up with other foreign automobile companies like Toyota and General Motors.
Finally, in 1982, Daewoo Group acquired the company and in 1983 it was renamed as Daewoo Motor Co. It had agreements with General Motors, and produced various models based on GM car designs. It also had agreements with German car manufacturer Opel.
Daewoo’s premium offering, the Royale and the Prince were based on the Opel Rekord executive car.
The first result of the company’s development efforts after coming under the management of Daewoo, the Daewoo LeMans, was based on the Opel Kadett. Daewoo was selling rebadged Nissan Vanette in 1986.
It also sold a few minivans and mini pickups based on Suzuki’s designs. In 1992 its agreement with GM ended and hence it could not use Opel’s designs.
To fill the gap, it made an agreement with Honda and started selling Daewoo Acradia based on the Honda Legend in order to cover the premium market.
In 1996, Daewoo introduced the Lanos, which was produced without any assistance from any other company.
It was a first among many other such cars produced by Daewoo in the 1990s. It also collaborated with various Italian design firms to design its cars.
The aesthetic styling for the Lanos was designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro’s Italdesign, a renowned design firm. Giorgetto Giugiaro also collaborated with Daewoo to help design Leganza and Matiz.
The latter was in fact based on a concept car design made earlier by Giorgetto Giugiaro. Due to its distinctive styling, Matiz is one of the most recognisable Daewoo cars, and it was a commercial success.
Daewoo acquired the SsangYong Motor in 1998, but had to sell it off in 2000. Daewoo went into financial trouble and went bankrupt in 1999.
It was acquired by General Motors after its bankruptcy, however, it kept producing various models under the Daewoo brand until 2011.
Even after the Daewoo brand was discontinued, GM continued producing the Daewoo models and sold it under other names while continuing to develop them further.
For example, the Matiz became the Chevrolet Spark, while the Lacetti was marketed in some markets as the Chevrolet Optra.
Common Daewoo Problems
A common anxiety for owners of discontinued brands is the availability of spare parts. But in this case, since the models or some variants of them are still in production under a different badge, it is quite likely that you will be able to source any needed spares.
A good technical manual will be a tremendously useful resource in this case. A technical manual would lay down all the parts in the car and their generic identifications, so if any of them needs a replacement you will easily be able to source it, since GM still widely uses many of the platforms that were also used for the Daewoo cars.
Besides sourcing spares, a technical manual is also quite useful for other purposes as well. Some Daewoo models are known to have some common problems. For example, the Daewoo Lanos is known to have an engine misfiring issue sometimes.
It is also known to have a brake issue, wherein the rear brake pad seizes the drum. The engine misfiring issue is also reported by some owners of the Daewoo Nubira.
Some users of Daewoo cars also reported the failure of electrical systems and leakage of coolant pipes. A technical manual will help you diagnose issues such as these and address them.
Conclusion
Having a detailed maintenance manual will enable you to properly maintain your vehicle. Regular and proper maintenance will likely reduce the problems that you are likely to face with your car.
Once you know how to take apart a few external panels, you can look inside for signs of rusting or damages. If you are able to spot any problems early on, you will likely be able to fix it for much cheaper than if the issue had developed more severe.
It is especially helpful with brands like Daewoo since the cars are not as common and hence any peculiarities of maintaining the specific cars of the brand are unlikely to be as widely known.
Having a maintenance manual will enable you to take better care of your care, increasing its reliability as well as reducing total cost of ownership.
Purpose of this is to catalog and include one of most comprehensive, useful and accessible “automotive repair PDF manual” database on the web for all Daewoo models.
It’s your go-to source for learning all about Daewoo – when you can’t find it elsewhere.
To get started, select the intended car model below…
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Evanda
41 manuals -
Kalos
96 manuals -
Korando
43 manuals -
Lacetti
121 manuals -
Lanos
177 manuals -
Leganza
182 manuals -
Magnus
38 manuals -
Matiz
383 manuals -
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No 1
39 manuals -
Nubira
326 manuals -
Prince
1 manual -
Rezzo
86 manuals -
Tacuma
9 manuals
