1996 Saturn SW2 aka the Tupperwagon

I picked this up for $900, and considering what it is it's probably not worth that. This was my first actual car-buying experience and I probably (definitely) wasn't as observant as I should have been. Oh well, I'll just call it a learning experience. The PO did a manual swap as well as an engine supposedly from an '01. Except for a little bit of missing headliner and a seat problem, the interior is great, AC works fine, etc. Unfortunately, the front end bodywork is a little loose, and the foglights are broken, though a good fender was included to replace the broken one that was on it. Also the left tie rod end is bad, and the coolant was gross. The latches on the rear seat were jammed, or broken, or something, so the seat wouldn't actually fold up. I did find a functional one of those at the salvage yard, though.

Now the sketchy stuff. I hadn't noticed that in lieu of one of the gas tank supports being broken, it's partially held up by a ratchet strap. Then, knowing the coolant temp sensor going bad is a common problem, my brother pulled it out.. as in, it just pulled out, looking like this:

So there's the inside, and the casing including the part with the threads, is still stuck in the engine block. I don't know if it's just stuck or what, but I haven't bee able to get it out. I'm considering leaving it and just wiring the fan up to run all the time as a temporary solution at least. Not sure how plausible that is though. I bought this to drive while my Escort was out of commission, but that ended up getting fixed before this. Then my friend fried the electricals on his SL2 so I've been taking some time on that too and have kinda gotten stuck on this. I guess four cars is enough for a working student.

i wouldn't trust the remnants to not leak. if not now, it will probably wait until the most inopportune time to do so.

drill out the middle and use an easyout. Well, it's an option at least. i would also use some heat on the area and likely some penetrant to try and coerce the remaining piece out.

Welp, since it's only been 10 months since I've bothered to update this... Here's what's happenin'. It's not a lot. It's still sitting in the garage. At least it's not lonely, as it has the 924 in there, and now the Escort and my brother's Town Car just outside, to keep it company.

Unfortunately, well, first I found out it didn't leaking from the sensor hole (for the few minutes it ran at least), but then tried an easy out and that... broke. Maybe because I forgot to drill the end of the thing out. It was also cheap. Welp. From then on I was kinda stuck for a while and I have trouble being motivated in general but I've since made an acquaintance whom actually wants to help me and actually knows things about cars.... We figured the best thing to do is weld a nut to the broken bit and turn it and whatever else out. So here's where things are now: Except, cleaner now than when I took those. The spark plug chambers were pretty gunky and the back of the engine has been super oily (no surprise) so it's a good thing I've had to go this far. Now, I had no experience with engines at all, so I took an engine service class last fall to get an idea + maybe take a step toward some actual education. I was still frightened by the idea of having to take one of my own apart, but can't learn anything without doing it, so...

Hopefully soon we'll get a chance to get the thing out and put everything back together. I also ordered new mounts because this is what the top looked like: ...along with various other bits.

In addition to the ECT sensor issue, I've since replaced the front brakes, tie rods, and fuel tank straps. However, in attempting to swap the beige inner back door panel for a matching black one, I broke the outer panel where a couple of the screw goes through, since the screws were apparently pretty well stuck to it. And I have yet to take the time to figure out a way to mount it or get a replacement; so it's missing an outer door panel, which is fine. Most of this (very little) progress has been made in the last couple months, so it might not be another few months before more things happen Then it's on to the Porsche...

Well, I made more progress, in a way... We tried welding a nut to the extractor, but that didn't work, just broke. Tried drilling, didn't work either, since it's too hard. Found a machine shop, they said they can't do anything because, well, it's too hard. Figured I'd go ahead and find a new head, which I did for $80 on eBay. So—here's hoping—at the least I'll have to take time to clean it up, but as far as I could tell it's from the same generation motor so I shouldn't need to get any more parts such as a cam cover, etc.

Yay, Saturn Wagon!

Time for a hopped up engine build?

I’m updating for my brother. We’ve been working on his Saturn off and on all winter. The car has a white door now. It’s also gotten a head rebuild, new motor mounts, some interior pieces, and coolant leaks fixed.

It runs and drives now! He took it to a local shop and paid them to properly button up the cooling system and front brakes. I drove it home for him and it made me miss my old SL2.

Now it’s in the garage again, waiting for parts. Next thing on the list is suspension work, an alignment, and a rear disc swap if we can get the parts. We think we saw a SL with rear discs last time we were at the junkyard but we didn’t have the tools to grab them; so another junkyard trip needs to happen soon.

$2018 Challenge plans? Wagon sub-class this year...

In reply to maschinenbau :

We talked about it. I’m not sure if it will meet the budget since he wants to do a lot of work to make it a nice all around daily driver.

He should chime in here shortly.

In reply to BlueInGreen - Jon :

Ad a fellow Saturn enthusiast, I very much approve of this build.

Not to be a downer, but I've always heard the rear disc brakes weren't much of an improvement on these. Not sure I'd put the effort into a swap, especially if just a daily driver.

Cha-llenge, cha-llenge, cha-llenge

In reply to Indy-Barely Functional-Guy :

My understanding is one or both of the wheel cylinders and maybe a bleeder screw are borked so stuff is getting replaced anyway. I think it’s a case of “might as well.”

I still don't see how the car companies "saved money" by putting drum brakes on cars for so long after discs became popular. All those moving parts and complexity...

BlueInGreen - Jon said:

My understanding is one or both of the wheel cylinders and maybe a bleeder screw are borked so stuff is getting replaced anyway. I think it’s a case of “might as well.”

That’s basically it. Convenience and aesthetics, and frankly I probably would have rather plucked the calipers from the donor car at the junkyard—which happened to be very clean and trouble-free considering it’s at a junkyard in Michigan—than installed new drums anyway, especially since the swap is so darn easy.

I haven’t done anything since then, other than fighting with the front control arms and waiting for the brakes I ordered...

Ta-da. 

BlueInGreen - Jon said:
We talked about it. I’m not sure if it will meet the budget since he wants to do a lot of work to make it a nice all around daily driver.

Well, for now I want to make it a "driver" of any sort. I should actually check its cost so far; I haven't exactly been keeping track. Oops.
Planning for the Challenge would be nice if only just to give me a good, motivating deadline.

I've been trying to detach the control arms and after some persuasion, the passenger side arm came off, but the drivers side (the one that was actually definitely bad) is being extra stubborn. I realized the bottom of the stud seems to be pretty nicely corroded to the knuckle. Lots of hammering has had no effect. I don't particularly want to remove the entire knuckle just to try to pound it out from the top, so I'm thinking I might try a sawzall and drill from the bottom, or something. Though... that will probably be a lot harder than I initially thought fifteen minutes ago.

Lots more hammering on the knuckle. Think vibrations to loosen the rust. If not try pickle fork, ball joint splitter. If that still doesn't work, guys on here swear by 50% acetone and transmission fluid to dissolve rust.

I think cutting it would be last resort.

Yeah, I have a habit of overlooking normally obvious solutions.
Used both of those; found success. The issue now is that the inside bolt will not come out. It was pretty stuck, I got it to turn freely but I suspect what happened is the bolt seized on the sleeve inside. There's not really a good way to try to push or pry it out, as the frame bends outward immediately forward of it and the bracket it's in does not mind bending.

There's also something Not Good about this spot...

I'll try to clean that up and see what's actually left there.

If I don't make any headway there tomorrow I'll probably try the wheel bearing replacement and maybe hack into the exhaust with the hole in it and nothing holding it up.

Well, I got the control arm out, but it involved a sawzall and a slight mangling of the bracket.

The wheel bearing replacement hasn't gone so well either. Here's what came out...

...leaving the inside and outside stuck on the hub and knuckle, respectively—which I forgot to take pics of.
I figured I should do the other side considering the shape this one's in, and while I (finally) have the control arm off. Though that's gotten me thinking about doing struts too. They definitely could use replacing but I planned on making sure the car would actually work, normally, well enough... before I did them.

Here's the main problem with the exhaust:

Making an attempt at this, I found I should really get some better saw blades. I did that but didn't get to trying again today. Need to figure out what to do with that sensor too. There is a connector a little ways up but it was sitting directly above the exhaust so it's a little melted together.

 Wow.  That thing has serious cancer everywhere.  I think you paid about 10x too much :(

Good luck!

drewski1611 said:

There's also something Not Good about this spot...

I'll try to clean that up and see what's actually left there.

I think you should seriously consider replacing the sub-frame.  (Or at least welding in some new metal.)  Not much left there to hold the control arm.

Love the name of the car, I foresee some metalwork in your future.  Just stumbled on this thread and also this popped up on my local craigslist.

I've been tempted by my love of wagons and curiosity of Saturns.  Since friends of mine had these back in high school and beat the ever loving e36 m3 out of these cars.

In reply to ProDarwin :

Yeah... if I'd been at all careful when I bought it I would have, well, not bought it.
Let's just say I probably won't be out of the market long.

In reply to Indy-Barely Functional-Guy :

I had been thinking about that. I'm planning on potentially having a friend do some welding. A positive is, I'm pretty sure it's limited to that (driver) side.

While I hadn't had a lot of time this week, I took care of some more trivial things.

The white door has a handle now. I am not a fan of the little plastic pins that hold them in, as I mutilated the old one. Looks a little funny now but, no one will see it, plus it's easily removable.

I had lost a nut for this trim piece, so I finally got some and put it back on.

Now... I managed to get the inner piece of the bearing off the hub(s) (the other one fell apart similarly) with so far the most popular tool, the hammer.

Now the issue is this, the outer piece in the knuckle, which I don't yet have a solution for. Any tips would be very welcome.

One of the hubs had been replaced... The shiny one is from the passenger side, which had the bad-according-to-the-shop bearing.

Get a quality new hub with a new bearing.  When the bearing wears out, the hubs can deform and will still perform poorly even with a new bearing.  Your pass. side may have had a crappy aftermarket hub.