Another Saab story: AK2’s 2010 9-3T

AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to dj06482 (Forum Supporter) :

Because, you know, "while you're in there" is different in the rust belt. 

I think of it kind of like having the Midas touch, except whatever I'm working on either crumbles in my hands (subframe, parking brake cables, backing plates, heat shield, rear springs), or is so permanently corroded together that it needs to be replaced (rear lower control arm bolts and bushings).  And about 75% of my work on vehicles involves using a Dremel with a cutoff wheel, which is probably not a good sign!

i should also note that my flipping the bird at the Saab is only due to the distraction from MonZora, not because i'm unhappy with the Saab.  She's been a great car so far, and i totally expect issues like this on a car with 12 years and 145k of Michigan usage.

I think I found the reason for the loud exhaust:

A couple months ago I bought a new mid pipe with resonator and a new muffler, and today I set about installing them. When I looked at the clamp holding the front end of the mid pipe:

I decided to see if replacing just the muffler would be enough. Quick answer: it is! The car is now quiet enough to hear tire noise.

I tried to replace both rear shocks but my ugga wouldn't dugga so it's got a new shock and mount on right rear only. Drives good enough. Will borrow a gun with more grunt and see if I can't break that bolt. Loose, I mean.

EDIT: Mama took it for a drive and said it's like a friggin' EV, so I'll take that as a win.

If I said reman calipers eat E36 M3, would I get an amen? Calipers arrived this AM, so I swapped the RH since that one was hanging up. Out of the box, the piston dust boot isn't seated to the caliper body.

Ok, I'll give 'em a little grace on that. Bleeds fine, no leaks, maybe it's all good. Except the park brake does not engage. The lever moves with the cable, but the piston does not clamp. berkeley you, caliper. Right where you eat. Oh well, mama's got somewhere to go, so it's staying on til next weekend.

So instead of happily boxing up my core, I started cleaning and disassembling the OE caliper to see what I was up against there. Torn dust boot on piston let some crud build up inside, and there was a good bit of aluminum oxide built up on the housing. A bit of careful scraping and a light hit with a soft wire cup got the housing cleaned up, so I moved on to getting the piston to retract.

Pro tip: instead of potentially damaging something by muscle-berkeleying the piston to retract, it's a better move to operate the park brake lever and push the piston out a little from where it's stuck. This gives you a little room to clean the piston, and reduces the chances of damaging the seal when you do run it in. I got everything working smoothly and ran the piston through full travel a few times before thinking I should take the piston out and inspect the internals.

bore and seal groove:

park brake side of piston:

sealing surface of piston (that's just discoloration, not pitting, I promise):

and piston seal:

If you look closely you can tell which way the seal was oriented in the bore.

I will buy new piston seal and dust boot, put it all back together, and R&R it next weekend so I can return the POS reman.

Today I celebrated my independence from crappy reman'd calipers with non-functional parking brakes. Carlson brand seal and boot kit from Rock Auto got the OE caliper squared away, so now I just need to bag and box the reman that I'm returning.

Then I enjoyed further celebration by changing the oil and filter. It's balls hot out here today, so I'm calling it quits.

just shy of 146k. Still love this car.

A couple days ago, Mama said the Saab was slow to start, and the "refill fuel now" warning came up on the message center when the car did finally start. We traded cars yesterday and I observed it clicked a couple times before cranking, and it did seem to be cranking slowly. I cleaned the battery terminals but that made no difference. On one startup it threw faults for traction control and stability control, so I was pretty sure all these things were being caused by a weak battery. It was a Duracell Gold dated F5, which translates to June 2015. Holy cow, 7-1/2 years! Figured I'll buy another one of those, but for $20 more I stepped up to Duracell Platinum AGM with a 4-year free replacement warranty. My local Batteries Plus had it on the shelf, so I had their guy install it. He even gave me the "online only" 10% discount, so $217 out the door and I didn't have to lift a finger. It cranked so fast I actually LOL'd. Dude tested alternator output and it was within specs, so we should be good for a while. 151k and counting. I'll post another update with pix when I change the oil this weekend.

In keeping with my weekend theme of pre-winter maintenance, the Saab got some love today.

Engine oil and filter, 4 qts ATF drain and fill with Aisin Type IV, and winter tire & wheel swap.

Old ATF was dark but didn't smell too burnt, and the trans hadn't shown symptoms of any problems. For comparison, there's a dribble of new ATF in the cap next to the jug below.

It took a gang of extensions to get the dipstick bolt out, and I was a little nervous when the dipstick came out dry. I will check the level again next weekend. Now that I know the process, it shouldn't take long.

I will probably pull the pan and replace the filter when the weather warms up again in 6 months. While I was under the car, I did notice some pretty significant rust in front subframe, close to steering rack mount on passenger side:

151k and counting. We still love this car!

Michigan "significant rust" = OMG totalled in almost any other state.   Time to source a subframe from a southern state for a springtime installation 

Sonic said:

Michigan "significant rust" = OMG totalled in almost any other state.   Time to source a subframe from a southern state for a springtime installation 

No doubt!

AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) said:

 

Almost 85 mph at a tick over 2500 rpm?!!  Can't wait to cross a desert!  =~  )

In reply to 914Driver :

Yeah, she's geared nice, knocks down killer highway mpg.

Glad you are still enjoying it.  We loved that car.

That's what we up north call "some rust.". The rust is only on some, not all. 

If me, I'd hit that with some Por15 or similar. You know, so the paint can then hold it together. 

Mama complains that the Saab's headlights suck, and this jogged a memory for me. RH low beam was out when I got the car, and PO said there had been an issue with the headlight connector letting out some smoke. At the time, I pulled the access cover and saw the wires weren't attached, so I connected them and went about my life. Well, the other day I saw a new headlight connector in the box of oil filters  PO included with the car, so today I dug a little deeper. The original connector had been replaced with a couple of butt splices and spade connectors that didn't fit quite right:

and the bulb looked a little worse for wear as a result:

so I broke out my soldering kit and installed the new connector, as well as a new bulb PO stashed in the glove box.

I even remembered to put the shrink tube on the wire before soldering! We've got bright sunshine today, so it's hard to tell whether or not these changes made any difference. 

152k and counting. Still love this car!

AW called to tell me the "add oil" and "add coolant" messages came up this morning.  Added 1 qt oil and about 16 oz 50/50 dexcool mix, and it's all good.  She's at 3700 (in a row?!?!) miles since last oil change, and i know there's a small leak at the oil cooler, so i'd say she's probably not consuming any oil.  There's still a small coolant leak at front right of car. I'll dig into both these issues after the Challenge.
 

AW loves this car. Her only complaint is the rust where the quarter and the bumper cover meet at the wheel arch.

So i bought a couple of quarter panel sections from a same-color car, will have my local backyard bodyman splice them in and touch up the paint and call it good for a while longer. Painter's tape was to show the quarter panel guy where I want the patches cut. Better to have too much vs not enough.

Bottom line: 155063 miles, and we still love this car.

The oil cooler is a typical leak spot, I believe mine is leaking from there as well.  You used to be able to get individual o-rings for the cooler, but now they're only available with a new cooler.

On the coolant leak, check that it's not leaking from the plastic "T" on the right hand side of the car.  Those can tend to develop catastrophic leaks, GenuineSaab has an aluminum T that should last much longer than the stock plastic one.

It's the highlighted area in my engine bay (sorry for the CL-quality pic and highlighting job):

If it is leaking fro the plastic T let me know, I scored two metal ones from P-N-P and you are welcome to one.

I was a little late with this oil change, 7k since the last service. Today was the Saab's first time in the garage! In fact, she's the first non-Corvair to inhabit the garage since early 2019.

so today she got engine oil and filter, 4 qt ATF drain and replace, and *finally* the winter tires have been swapped for no-seasons. Just shy of 159k, and we still love this car.

Lame update, AW reported wiper blade deterioration on passenger side, so i'm running an experiment. On the driver's side i installed a Bosch Icon blade ($30 @ Autozone), and on the passenger's side I installed a Duralast blade ($23 @ Autozone). It will be interesting to see if there's a noticeable difference in performance over their lives.

159k and counting.  Still love this car!

Mama lodged a complaint re. stumble when accelerating at freeway speeds. No CEL. I drove to confirm, and it felt like the beginnings of spark plug gap misfires, so I loaded a very small parts cannon, 4 NGK Iridium plugs and 4 NGK COP boots.

Ordered on RA Wednesday, they came from somewhere in Chicago area, arrived Thursday afternoon so I checked the gaps and slapped them in. Mexican track test confirmed issue is resolved. $50 and under 1 hour well spent.

gap spec is .040". Old plugs are in the .060" ballpark. Coloring is good, threads are clean, plug wells showed no signs of VCG leakage.

Still love this car!

CEL today for P0128 "coolant temp low", most common cause is thermostat stuck open. Not gonna worry about that until after Woodward (3rd weekend of August).

in other news, touch up paint from automotivetouchup.com finally arrived! Also not gonna worry about that til after Woodward.

AW complains of all the abrasion pitting in the windshield making it hard to see when facing the Sun. "Leave earlier or later" was not the answer she was looking for. So...

$400 all in. I look at it as less than one payment on a new car.

with my luck, I'll catch a boulder on the way home. But for now, almost 162k and still love this car.

Two updates today:

1. Ody took a rock to the windshield, so while on phone with insurance I mentioned paying out of pocket for Saab windshield. "Your glass coverage will reimburse that. Send us the receipt." I made it clear that it was from a lifetime of abrasion, not a single catastrophic event. "Makes no difference to us. Email the receipt and we'll submit it." Done!

2. Window limit switch was acting up again, window would hit travel stop UP and roll back down a few inches. The simple fix of pushing down on glass while operating switch in UP direction wasn't fixing it. Found this video on YouTube, which was close but no cigar. Fortunately, one of the comments caught my eye. With key OFF, Pull #5 fuse, then key ON. This makes the BCM reset the window UP positions. Then key OFF, replace fuse, and follow the procedure in the video. Hashtag winning.

3. EDIT, I lied, three updates today. RR non-winter tire has a big screw in it, in the outermost tread block, so tire store won't touch it. I bought a glue patch kit, and I'll dismount the tire and have a go at patching it, maybe this weekend. For now, she's got a winter tire on that corner.

Today was winter prep day for the Saab:

Changed engine oil and filter (a little late again)

Installed winter tires

Freed up sticking piston in rear left caliper

Topped off coolant

I should have done ATF drain and fill, but I just wasn't feeling it today. Maybe if I wasn't getting snowed on.

Before I swapped tires, she had low pressure warning on front right. The winter tires do not have TPMS sensors. Here's something unexpected: she's still got the low pressure warning for front right, plus the generic TPMS fault. I wonder if the front right will go away after a certain number of drive cycles?

165k and counting.

Frame rust repair after the "challenge"?