And it's now just working fine. I have changed nothing.
And it's now just working fine. I have changed nothing.
wae said:And it's now just working fine. I have changed nothing.
Disconnecting and reconnecting stuff cleaned off just enough corrosion, maybe? I'd probably spray contact cleaner on every connector, just in case.
In reply to eastsideTim :
I'm going with Stabilant.
I would look reeeeeeal close at the female terminal, see if the springy part of the contact is relaxed or cracked, not making a good connection.
I did examine the connectors pretty closely and everything seems to be in place and equally springy. I am assuming that I bent it into a better shape as part of the process of de-pinning and re-pinning and perhaps the stabilant is giving a better connection than it had before. It's kind of a mystery to me, but I gave it a pretty good shaking and wiggling and everything seems to be in place.
Getting the knee bolster back in is going to require a second set of hands - I can't get the bolt hole to line up on the left side; in fact I can't even find the threads when looking through he hole in the firewall. I did take the opportunity to replace one of the front-lighting light bulbs that was burned out and reseated the other one that was a little intermittent. I also put the new brake fluid accumulator in place and it seems to be working properly now. The ABS light is on solid, so there's still something up with that but when I follow the process to read the codes, it doesn't blink the light at all. I suppose it could still be an electrical glitch in the cluster, so when it's all back together I'll go test the system and see if it works at all. If not, I may need a new ABS ECU.
I've got to put the alternator back on still, and figure out the belt situation. I ordered an alternator belt but there appears to be... two of them? And the one I ordered looks too wide to fit. That should just be basic part-hounding though. I've got the new alternator that showed up yesterday, but I'm not entirely sure how to get the existing one out of the car. I wasn't able to get to the bracket bolts, so I removed the regular alternator bolts but the bottom bolt is long enough that it hits the firewall before it clears the alternator itself, so it's all sort of stuck in there. I may just put the alternator on the shelf as a just-in-case.
Anyway, it looks like I'm ready to stop spinning my wheels and start making actual progress on getting this car back on the road.
Knee bolster is back in as is the cluster and the fascia.
Center console is reinstalled. I even got the little light ring installed around the ignition lock cylinder.
It took a little finagling, but all the belts are out. I need to pick up a second alternator belt.
wae said:
Is this a Saab or a really derpy Audi?
eastsideTim said:wae said:
Is this a Saab or a really derpy Audi?
Oooh! Derpy Audi! Derpy Audi!
ha! Derpy Audi!
I don't know about Audi, but derpy would definitely apply. They installed the engine backwards for crying out loud!
In reply to wae :
Yeah, but you can change a clutch in fifteen minutes!
...were it a manual transmission, anyway
In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :
That's true! Although, the belts and accessories need to be touched a little more often usually. The Saab manual says to pull the alternator by just removing the two bolts, but I am fairly sure that is absolutely impossible given the proximity of the alternator to the firewall.
Can you jack the motor up or lower it down slightly to get the bolts out? I had to do that con my Saab (GM Ecotec motor) in order to drop the oil pan.
In reply to wae :
I have always taken it out by removing the mount bolts, but this link to a Saab tech's site has instructions on leaving the mount on the engine
http://townsendimports.com/Web/electrical_system_folder/altbushregreplace.htm
In reply to dj06482 (Forum Supporter) :
I don't think I can easily move the motor enough to get enough angle for that bolt to clear the firewall. I've had to do similar raise-and-lower operations to get to things on transverse-mounted engines before, but the firewall is pretty flat and unforgiving in this case.
In reply to procainestart :
Ah-ha! Yeah, that sounds about right. After your warning, I was a little concerned with going in blind on those bracket bolts for fear of wallowing out the heads. With the alternator moving around a bit in there now, I can see what I'm doing a bit better and can make sure I'm square before putting a bunch of force on the wrench. Even if I leave the original alternator in place - which I'm inclined to do since there's nothing wrong with it and I feel like that's a better option than the FVP reman unit I've got in a box - it sounds like replacing those bushings is a good idea. And for that, the alternator definitely needs to come up and out.
I did discover that it's a pretty trivial thing to pop off the throttle cable and remove the heater hoses to get some more room to attack the alternator and its bolts. If nothing else, it means I can move the ratchet more than 1 tooth at a time!
Check the condition of your engine mounts, especially the trans mount under the rad. Removing the alt should be more of an annoyance, not a quest. I think the engine/trans is leaning back toward the firewall.
Words later. Picking up kids from school.
Okay, words time is now.
Problem number one is that the belt I sourced from O'Reilly this morning was a different length than the belt that I sourced from Rock Auto. They both claim to interchange with that application and I suspect either one would work, but since it requires two belts instead of just one, the extra .4" is just a little too much. So back to O'Reilly. With two belts of the same size, I was able to get all the belts on and tensioned.
Next, I put all the wiring, cables, and hoses back that I had moved to get to the belts. I bolted the fuse box back down and went around to the other side to get the ABS box put back together. The battery insulator is back in place as well. Finally, I replaced the broken bits that were on the headlight and got it snapped back into place. It's not adjusted yet, but I'll burn that bridge when I come to it.
I started it up and pulled it out of the garage and immediately I had belt noises and smoke. Somehow, one of the alternator belts had wound up getting twisted around a bit and I didn't catch it. Having done it before, it was actually pretty easy to loosen the alternator, re-do the two belts, and get it back together. No more noises!
Next stop was the gas station. I put about 11 gallons of 92 octane in but the low fuel light is still on. The fuel gauge itself sort of had a seizure and wound up bouncing all over the place for a bit before finally settling in.
On the way to the school to pick up the kids, I hit a pothole and the car shut down. Which was exciting. By some miracle, I was able to make a left turn into Kroger and coast in to a parking spot. The car fired back up, but as soon as I gave it throttle, it died out again. Too much air getting in. The MAF sensor was still connected, but wiggling things around a little, I found that the charge tube was completely loose at the throttle body. I slid that back on and tightened the hose clamp and the idle immediately smoothed out and things were back to Swedish Normal.
That's going to be my metric going forward. There's very little that I would consider "normal" about this car in the general sense of the term, so when things are working the way they're supposed to for a Saab, we're going to call that Swedish Normal.
Anyway, the intake having been reattached, I jumped on the interstate and while it didn't exactly pull my fillings out, I was able to get up to speed without too much drama. And maybe I did play with the boost gauge needle a little bit. It really could use a fourth gear - 3k RPMs at just under 60mph is a little exhausting! But I guess that's 80's chic with a 3 speed transmission.
Overall, it was a pretty uneventful trip from the shop to the school to home. There is a little bit of a fuel smell, so I may not have gotten all the fuel lines completely buttoned up after the fuel pump job. I'll have to take a look at that, but there isn't anything leaking under the hood that I can see. It didn't want to restart when we left the school, though, and I had to hold the pedal at WOT to get it to start. So maybe there's an injector that's not closing all the way.
So overall, a very successful shakedown cruise. I think I may have the daughter drive it to the grocery store in a little bit.
Nominal, I believe, is the term.
I forget if it was 2010 or 2061, but they went out to Jupiter to retrieve Dave Bowman's ship and ended up duct taping it to the ship that brought them there (well, it was "carbon fiber tape" but WE all know what it was) and they made a point of saying "all conditions normal, er, nominal".
In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :
2010. They needed it to get away from Jupiter quickly enough. Not sure how I remember that detail, it has to be 30+ years ago since I looked at any of that.
Yes, I am recalling that now. 2061 was the one with the ghosts and the sulfur based life forms on Europa.
I think I read it in junior high, which was about 35 years ago, give or take. I had to do something in study hall that wasn't homework...
I loved 2001 and 2010, but 2061 I hated so much I was going to leave it on the plane, but I was afraid some well-meaning stewardess would chase after me with it so I just tossed it in the can as soon as I was off the jetway. I've never before or since thrown away a book that wasn't physically damaged.
Just got back from about an hour and a half of driving practice. It's a surprisingly comfortable place to be driven around in. I did forget that I had pulled the fuse for the right high-beam, though, so that made things a little interesting. And we can confirm that the ABS is not operational, nor are the dash lights. Cluster is lit, so that's good. Still have the issue with it flooding, even after sitting for a couple hours, but the smell of fuel is gone and I don't see any signs of leakage.
Definitely need to get the top taken care of at this point, now that I can confirm that it's running and driving and stopping. We were working on our list and so far this is what we've got:
I think there are a couple other things, but that's what I can remember right now.
Did some stuff. Going for tacos with the top down now. Long story short, there was a loose clamp on the charge piping and the fuel pressure regulator is spraying fuel into the intake. New probably-3-bar regulator is ordered.
First, let's talk about tacos. This could really be an entry in the Minor Rant thread, but we're here. We skipped down the road to dash in to Taco Bell just to grab some soft tacos real fast. They're not the fanciest or best tacos in the world, but they were sort of on the way home, they're fast, they're cheap, and they have Diablo sauce in little packets. When we got to the drive-through, though, the lady on the other end of the intercom went in to a long whine about how they were short staffed and it would be at least 15-20 minutes. Now, I'll wait that kind of time for tacos, but they don't have a taco worth waiting for. So with tears in our eyes, we drove off in to the sunset looking for a different Taco Bell.
But that's not the kind of Saab story that you're here for.
We took the car over and started off with cleaning things up a bit. When I was getting everything put back together, I was in a bit of a rush to pick up the kids from school and I left everything in a bit of a state. Once we had all the tools cleaned up and put away, took the trash out, and swept up, the car came in and we went to work. The first thing I wanted to check was the state of the intake and vacuum lines. I was absolutely shocked that with the smoke machine hooked up, there was nothing leaking anywhere. The only spot that wasn't sealed up was the rubber coupler from the intercooler to the throttle body:
After zipping that down, everything seems to be sealed up tight, which is actually kind of surprising for a 33 year old car.
Moving on, we next checked the vacuum line to the fuel pressure regulator. One of the more common reasons for Saabs flooding is that the diaphragm in the FPR begins to fail and fuel get pushed throught that straight in to the intake manifold. Popping the vacuum line off resulted in a dribble of fuel which means the regulator is shot and that's why it's flooding out and running a bit rich. So rich, in fact, that it's only getting about 14mpg around town! Yikes.
The pressure regulator that originally came on the car is rated at 2.5 bar and according to the markings on the one that's on there, that's what I've got. Internet searching tells me that the non-turbo 900 of the same era used a 3 bar regulator and if I were to use one of those, I'd have the fuel I need for when I tweak the APC and turn up the boost a little bit. Looking at all the parts stores and sites, however, it looks like the only regulators that are available as "compatible" with both the turbo and non-turbo models are 2.5 bar. I guess the N/A version doesn't really need the extra fuel and neither does the forced induction version as long as you're sticking to stock boost levels. Doing some more searching - and this took us around an hour to track down! - it looks like there is a Bosch unit with part number 0280160256 that is a true 3.0 bar regulator which will bolt on. I ordered one up from eBay and it should be here next week some time. Theoretically, that should improve off-idle throttle response a bit and make the hard-starting problem go away.
Speaking of next week, according to Fed Ex, the new top is now scheduled to arrive on Tuesday. I'm looking forward to not having to put a tarp over the car.
After getting that figured out, we moved on the tune up process. The plugs all look good and the wires, rotor, and distributor cap all look nearly brand-new. We replaced it all except the plugs for now, but we'll probably put the old stuff back on.
The parking brake situation seems to have taken care of itself. I think it just needed to be exercised a bit after sitting for so long because it's working just fine now. The seat belts are getting a little bit better as well after putting a little Teflon spray in the buckles. I think that's another case of working the parts around to get it back in shape.
While the daughter vacuumed out the the car, I got the headlights adjusted and last night we picked up a fuse for the high beam and got it put in.
So not a lot taken off the list, but we're making progress!
But that's not the kind of Saab story that you're here for.
I have a small feeling that this thread has been building up to that one line.
Not complaining. Have done longer buildups for worse payoffs.
Not pictured: my rants on the state of Taco Bell soft tacos in 2023. They were awesome in, uh, 1998, which was so long ago that I simultaneously did not rallycross, and owned a Subaru. That ran.
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