Hey all...

I'm new to the forums, due to the fact that my girlfriend of 5 months now has a Saturn and as of late I've taken to working on it for her. She has multiple problems going on and I've been chasing them down. Originally she complained of a clunk when she put the car in gear, which I took to be a motor mount (it was), but never looked @ it. Then I noticed her exhaust dragging when she would pull into a driveway.

Finally I got the car up on jackstands and found out she had two busted hangers, so I welded those back up, and about 2 months later, she had an exhaust leak coming from the front end. 2 weeks after that, her service engine light came on.. o2 sensor. So, I took the car up to NTB, figuring they could give me a free estimate, effectively diagnosing the thing for me. I knew the exhaust leak was causing the o2 sensor problem, but couldn't find it, not having a lift or having put the car back on stands. They found a brake in the i-pipe between the downtube and the flex pipe. They told me it was caused by worn motormounts, specifically the front dogbone, and the upper passenger side mount. They said the dogbone was bad, and the other was going.

So they wanted almost a grand to fix it, but when I priced parts, it was about $73 for the two mounts, so she had me fix it. While replacing the dogbone mount, I found she had oil in her inlet tube going to the intake. I had tried to replace her pcv months ago, but the one autozone listed was the incorrect one. So I replaced her mounts, welded up the exhaust and the light went away, but the clunk didn't. Turns out her other dogbone mount below the crank is still bad.

Getting to the point... I replaced the pcv and I'm wondering how to tell if other damage is the case? I presume I can clean out the inlet tube and see if more oil shows up? The old pcv was pretty clogged.

Also, I was hoping someone could point me to some step by step instructions on removing and replacing the motor mount below the crank shaft. I have yet to see a listing for this procedure without being part of engine removal or cradle removal even using all data. I am only looking to replace the mount. I don't want to remove half the engine to do so if it isn't necessary. If anyone could help me out, including torque specs, I'd be grateful.

Thanks,
Mathius

 

you can replace the pass side lower torque mount by removing the pass side front wheel and plastic splash guard stuff. This will give you better access to the bolts. You'll also need to support the engine with a block/thick sheet of wood on a floor jack, jack it slightly to relieve pressure on the upper mount, then remove the upper mount. This will allow you to raise and lower the engine slightly to get at the upper mounting bolt of the lower mount and also to remove the existing lower mount from the holes in the frame rail. Make sure both mounts are installed but not tightened down before you tighten em up.

Hopefully you used new studs for the upper mount when you replaced it -- doing so significantly reduces the amount of vibration transmitted to the cabin.

Also, use Saturn OEM PCV valve -- aftermarket ones suck as they pass too much oil....(As you have likely found)

Will look up torque specs and post....

 

What position should the engine be in when you torque? Should the full support be on the mounts, or should it still be held by the jack?

Torque specs would be helpful. I have a list from all data, but I don't fully understand the wording they use. When I did the upper and dogbone mounts I ended up torquing them incorrectly... had the dogbone at 37ftlbs and the upper mount @ 52ft lbs... they should have been reversed. I ended up having to basically redo the whole process the next day to get the torque specs right.

Checked out a Haynes and Chilton from the library today, but when I perused them @ the library I didn't find much.

More advice on the pcv situation would be helpful... I suppose I should clean the oil out of the inlet first? Mean to do it, just the weather has been bad this week and I haven't gotten to it. Would just regular throttle body/carb cleaner work, or would it hurt the rubber? I'm hopeful that the problem was just a clogged pcv, but I spoke with a mechanic and he said that if the problem didn't go away then I'd have to do some kind of wet/dry pressure check to see if it was the valves? I get a little lost when it involves engine internals, but I'm pretty good with just about anything else.

One more thing I forgot to ask about... the odometer/tripometer gauge doesn't light up properly... it's working, but it's very dim and hard to read. Is that just a light issue or is there something wrong with the circuits in the gauge cluster?

Mathius

 

the 91-93 chiltons manual states (for 92 and 93) 52 ft lbs for motor mount (front to block). The text states this for the upper as well as lower front mounts. States 35 for rear mount to block bolts. pg 3-76

The 91-02 chiltons manual, however, states 37 for the right front mount to block bolts (for 92 and later), and 35 for rear mount to block bolts. (pg 2A-25) The 52 is listed ONLY for the 91 model year (before the torque axis mount system was used.) This is inconsistent with the earlier book. Don't know if it is a correction....or a typo....(??)

Personally, I have used the 52 on front top and bottom (on 95 and 97 Sc2's) and have never had an issue.

You can call a saturn service dept and they should be able to give you the correct torque spec...

I believe the torque specs should be met with the weight still on the jack.
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I would think throttle body cleaner would be best -- try a little on a rag on the outside of the plastic to ensure no damage will occur (never had the occasion to clean this before)
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Change PCV valve to OEM SATURN first -- then we'll worry about that if it keeps depositing oil in the air intake tube....

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is odometer digital on the 99's?? if it is the standard (make that old fashioned) rolling gear type, then it sounds like you have a burned out dash bulb or two.

Half the dash is out on my 97, not a single bulb is out on my 95. I think it's a pain in the **** to get in there, so if you do go in there you might as well replace em all....

 

See, that's what I mean? The torque specs are all available on the all data program my friend lent me, but deciphering what's what is a different story the way they word everything, and apparently even the chilton's and haynes isn't clear?

I see what you mean about the pcv... I've already changed the valve, but I'm concerned about getting the oil out of the inlet pipe. I think I'm gonna try some simple green or something to clean that out. I'm concerned that all that oil is just gonna be sucked back in, clogging the new pcv and not really fixing the problem.

Regarding the gauges, they are digital, which is why I'm not sure if it's a problem with the circuit board, or just a bulb. I'm not really certain how digital gauges work, but I don't think it's a bulb, I was just hoping for something simple. The gauges appear to work, but they're only really visible in good daylight.

Sorry for the slower responses. Times are tough and I can't afford internet except on my cell phone (because I'm on a friend's plan), so I have to use other people's internet or the library to get online for anything involving a decent amount of typing. It's too much trouble to type a long message on a cell phone, particularly where puncuation is involved.

Thanks again,

Mathius

 

if it is a digital dash and lcd based , then the backlight on the lcd might be dim from use/age. If it is LED based, then.....?? Are you sure the dimmer **** on the dash is rotated all the way clockwise (dash lights turned up all the way)?

Let us know how the simple green works...

Tell your friend that Derf says she should compensate you for your saturn servicing in monthly internet access charges. She gets a functional saturn and you get to ask peeps how to get it there.....sounds like a fair trade to me....

 

Dimmer **** is all the way up. That's not the problem.

I haven't had a chance to try the simple green, the weather here hasn't been too hospitable and I live in an apartment so I do all my work @ my buddy's place. He's cool about it.

My GF is one of those who buys a car cheap and runs it into the ground and buys another, but money is tight for her too now, and she doesn't have money for another car, so she is starting to take this one seriously for a change. When I first met her, she told me the last time she finally took the car for an oil change the mechanics told her she was out of oil. I find that hard to believe, and I think they probably exaggerated, but I'm sure it was bad. I took the thing for an oil change not too long ago, and she is now @ about 7 miles over her oil change and I started to hear a lifter tick. I checked the oil and she was two quarts low. I'm not sure if that's related to the pcv puking up oil or if the car is burning that much. A 5 minute yahoo search revealed that oil burning is pretty common on these cars. I read about how to do a piston soak with marvel mystery oil that they claim helps. We'll see what happens.

Yeah, it'd be nice to have her get me internet, but I'm not gonna go there. She helps me out with money enough as it is, even loaning me her car to save gas over my truck (Chevy 4.3L is over double the gas mileage that she gets in her little sl2), and if I even joke with her about quitting my job and moving in with her, she gives me a big speech about how she's not supporting a man. I would never really quit my job and do that, but we would save money if we moved in together, although I'd pay more to commute to work since she lives in the country and I work in the city.

But I do the best I can.

Mathius

 

oiy...2 quarts low on a 4qt engine? Saturns are most unforgiving to that type of treatment. Once the oil gets low, the oil control rings get quite varnished and seize in their channels, letting more oil pass. The head gets starved and stuff wears.....