ChasR's Repair Adventures! Ford/Saab.14/12 - More Saab Stuff

This brings us to 2016, when he came to sell the car.

BMW at the time offered him £1.2k for the Saab. Yup, after 2 years of ownership, they offered him a pittance. I was there in Sytners with him at the time. However, I had a bit of a plan, which I only thought of that moment, as is the RR way, if he was a Mandalorian.



Some would call it a brainwave, others would call it stupidity.

My sister at the time had a handed me down ex-private hire 2007 Mk3 Mondeo, which my dad and I drove from 133k to 315k, where at which point, my sister was gifted the car. I know, we're a great family giving out great cars right?

In our defence
-The interior was very clean
-Exterior actually looked OK
-It had alot of work done to it over the 4 years my dad and I drove and owned it
-It was on an LPG conversion
-Suspension was fresh all round
-It recently had a DMF and clutch put in
-It was on 4 Michelin Primacy 3s all round.

Here's a shot of it at 315k.



Did it have it's problems? Of course it did!

-It had an odd smell inside despite being cleaned alot.
-The rear quarter had been hit slightly in the past
-It had a monumental oil leak, from which I suspect was the rear main seal. Annoying as it had a DMF fitted and the leak really should have stopped, if the garage did the job right. Very annoying. Fitting an undertray did help massively.
-It was beginning to use oil, around a litre every 1000 miles, but Duratec HEs aren't unknown for this.

So, we decided it could live out its life for someone else. £350 later to a pub owner, and he was over the moon. He drove it, but I believe he was also the maker of that car. Ah, happy times. When cars were cheap and easy to by.


The way I saw it, the Saab was known, fresher, and something different for my sister to own. My dad, well, being my dad, wanted to offer Rich (my mate) £1200. I basically told him no way. My dad loves a bargain, but why would my friend sell something, to incur alot of hassle. All of us were busy around then, so it's not like we could drop him off at the dealership and wait around. So we settled on £1400. Rich would get some nice furnishings for his new place, and my sister would have a cheap drop top.

Yup, in 2016, my sister became the owner of a 2007 Saab 1.8t Linear on 117k for £1.4k in late 2016. Many folks were telling me I stole the car at the time. I thought it was a fair price TBH, but what do you folks think? I would be the chap who would drive it back and sort things out for her.

The first drive back if I'm honest didn't enamour me. In short

-The 2.0 turbo engine didn't feel that fast! Maybe torquier than the 1.8 in the Mondeo but not much faster
-You could put another gearbox in between the ratio gaps. It was stupidly easily to stall in 2nd in town, meaning you either slipped the hell out of the clutch in 2nd at low speeds, or drove around in 1st, with folks wondering why you weren't changing up. It also couldn't really pull in 5th on the motorways. If I am honest, it seemed similar in pace to a Ford Ka with the Endura-E unit aka the old Valencia lump.
-It was skuttle shakey, but all drop tops do that
-Steering had zero feel. The EPAS steering in a B6 Passat and my E91 are more feelsome, which is saying something. This is despite the Saab having a hydroelectric steering setup
-The Mondeo just drove nicer. I'll come back to this later.

But, it was something different and something my sister on the face of it liked. So I got to work.

First thing was to give it a full service. While I changed the oil for my friend, I didn't really change much else, and neither did the specialists! Out came the plugs.







Yup, they were done!

Did it drive alot different? It possibly started up better and was maybe slightly smoother but that was about it. I then mopped it, making it shine that bit nicer, all done with :

-Megs 105
-Megs 205
-Lake County Polishing pad for both.










It looked alright!

I even fitted some parking sensors. But what would my sister think of the car? We'll find out soon enough.

His mate replaced the Saab with a Z4 so ChasR bought the Saab off him for his sister.

Tom

Interesting to read about the Saab convertibles. They always seem very tempting when I'm browsing sub £2k stuff

Tom

The time came in 2017 to change tyres. What I'm going to say next will be familiar to many.

My friend had put mid-range stuff onto the car, consisting of

-2 Kumho KU31s up front
-2 Toyo CFIIs at the rear.

I from years ago went to sticking with the big boy brands, after flirting for a decade with mid-range and budgets. The handling of this car was never great as you can tell. What then happened was to find some replacements. My dad went the same way as me with tyres, which is why the mega-mile Mondeo was on Michelins. It did help that 16s were cheap on that.

Unfortunately, that was not the case on this Saab. It was a victim of funny tyre sizes. 215/55R16 for those wondering. How much? About £120+ a corner! Quite an expense! I think the Toyos set my fried back £80 a corner. Considering Michelins on the Mondeo were £75 a corner, the prices seemed excessive! While we debated what to do, a cheap set of alloys came along.

We (well, my dad and I) searched and searched for ages. Many folks wanted £400+ for mediocre wheels. One day however, a set of Aero wheels turned up for the princely sum of £135, with 4 good tyres. The downside? they were in Wisbech! A bit of a trek from Warwick. That said, I went up and picked them up, and even met up with some friends down that way, so that made the trip a little more worthwhile.

£135 howver doesn't get you alot of wheel! They were straight, but

-2 of them wanted a refurb, due to the paint beginning to come away from the rim
-1 had already been started on, but not finished, out of the two wheels above.

But on the flipside:
-They have 4 good tyres, 2 Landsail LS388s and 2 Conti SportContact 3s.

Being the cunning, and cheap guy that I was, along with practically every powdercoating shop being closed over the Xmas period in 2017, I grab some spare bits I had to hand, including some Renault Iceberg Silver paint, some primer, filler primer, etch primer and sandpaper. I wasn't after perfection, just something which was an improvement from before.



Suffice to say, it looked good, better than I expected, even with no wetsanding. Yes, it could have been improved with wet sanding, but I just needed a set of legal wheels on the car.






It was then time to compare, and fit the new wheels on.















It's fair to say, the usual formula of going with a bigger* set of wheels on a car of the same type worked out well, especially with this car being an odd model! I suppose I should have said this earlier!

*but not the biggest size .

This car is a half-facelift. How can you have a half facelift, I hear you ask? Well, I suppose it's when the bean counters are in, and trying to seamlessly enter in certain changes over others. This car, being so, had the earlier exterior but thankfully, the much improved interior of the later cars. It also meant these wheels were correct for the car.

Would the drive improve much? Time would tell, as would a drier day than Xmas time!

Hindsight can be a wonderful thing. You also think that, if things seem bleak then, things can get bleaker.

We needed to make a decision about this Saab. Having friends in the trade didn't help, and bear in mind, the car was crashed during the first lockdown. The way I saw it, we had a few choices, pending the insurance payout.

-Buy a replacement. At this time, for my sister, I recommended a PCP. She doesn't like broken cars, I don't like fixing her cars, and I have a dad who is all too keen to fix cars for family when they go wrong. A noble gesture, and maybe less selfishly, I was like that too.

However, going off trader mates, anything for sale was very much poor. Folks were keeping hold of their existing cars, unless they were done. We almost got her onto the idea of buying used-approved. I wanted to steer her into something German, mainly as they come with a 'new' car warranty which is extendable. Something which I understand other brands don't do. I didn't like fixing her car to her very tight schedules (she's a teacher, so it's basically the holidays I have to wait for, in order to fix things ; not always practical).


-Fix her car. Obviously, this would depend on the insurance payout. It would be quite a bit of work however.

Naturally, you can guess what we did.

It was then time to get it assessed. Naturally, no one could get a 1/4 panel for a Saab 9-3. That meant very lengthly repairs, with fancy machinery, like what Ed China wielded about in a Wheeler Dealers episode. This was not going to be cheap.

With the insurance money through, we decided to repair it. Great I thought. From starting to work on the car, I would come to regret this straight away. Naturally, I had big plans for the car, including

-Brake overhaul ; they never quite worked as well as I hoped
-Full Service ; it was around due
-Door lock fix ; the driver's door stopped locking all of the time. Great if you are a young woman driving through Brum, even better that the car doesn't have a key lock fitted to the driver's door.
-The dent ; finding a guy to fix it locally

Can you tell that I am thrilled looking back? Well, it's time to start with how things got rolling.

Firstly, I got a Kenwood CarPlay headunit. The car had zero Bluetooth functionality, so I thought I'd fit it before it went into repair. Normally, the headunits with me, go in, and they work. Even the stalk controls work fine. I should have known this would not be a simple fix.

In order to make this work with the steering controls, I ordered the Connects2 connection kit. With this car having a later dash, it should have worked. Should, being the operative word. With a Canbus connection kit, it should have been easy to fix.

It didn't. I followed the instructions to the letter, and the Connects2 Videos. I even called them, only for one guy to say, this is why these cars should got to specialists for them to fix, and that no consumers should fit these parts. So why then, did they bother making public YouTube videos?

Would I recommend you buy Connects 2 products? No. Things were looking bleak.

I even put a video out, to no avail:



With this, I ruled out the Connects 2 kit, and bought the InCarTec. However, I would not be able to try it, as I dropped the car off to the local bodyshop to repair. This would take some time. More than I banked on to fix.

It was fair to say, I was not enjoying working on this Saab. Maybe I missed the Mondeo that much! It could also be I stumbled upon why these cars are cheap. Whatever the reason, I'd push on.

Clearly, my 3/8" drive sockets were going to get me nowhere. There was only one thing for it. Some 1/2" Impact sockets.

With these on the rattle gun, one of them came out super easy. It goes to show, the right tools can make or break the job. I'd try the other with the breaker bar. After a massive crack, and the car moving about a bit, that one also came out fine. This however, would uncover a new problem. The disc would not come off the hub!

Fortunately, I've been here before a few times. I could either bash the hell out of the disc, and potentially damage the hubs/bearings, or destroy the disc, by cutting down it, and relieving the tension in the bell of the disc. With this, I grabbed the reciprocating saw, which my dad claims I love more than life itself, cut through the disc until I hit the bell. With one tap of the hammer, the disc fell off. This technique works brilliantly everytime



Before I did the rears, I thought I'd take the car out on a roadtest. It seemed I was wise to do this. The front caliper had seized on, badly. I tried freeing it off, but it would not have it. Being my sister's car, I didn't want to take any chances.

So, it looked like it needed a new front caliper, and the Chinese one I inadvertedly ordered didn't quite look the same. What's more, from looking into the piston area, the piston didn't even look coated! Everyone has told me the calipers on eBay are no different to the overpriced stuff at the local places. So in the end, £70 got spunked onto a new OE replacement caliper from the motor factors.

Yup, the replacement looked exactly the same. It may have been OK, but it was my sister's car, not mine, so I couldn't take that chance.







The rears would also prove to be fun! It should just be a simple fact of removing the carrier bolts right? Well, that's what they were expecting you to think



Yup, it wasn't that simple. Due to the rear suspension bolt, I couldn't get the impact socket on. The clearance was too tight, and I didn't want to go at it anything but square on.







I then realised the socket was never going to go on, despite what the Pelican Parts site sites. I had heard (and many Saab folk) told me an E-Spanner could do it. But considering the bolts probably had not been touched for 140,000 miles, alone with the fronts being a pain to undo, I had my doubts, and I really didn't want to spend yet more cash and time on spanners that may not work. So what did I do? Get creative.

Moving the suspension up and down made zero difference to the access of the bolt. That was ruled out. There was only one thing left. Remove it partially. 12 year old car on 142k. I'm sure the bolt would just come out. Well, the rattle gun and an E16 socket on the highest setting along with PlusGas removed the nut. The bolt surprisingly was free to move inside, which was a big relief.

It would turn out, the way I did this job is actually how Saab tell you to do it from their Work Instruction Sheet (WIS). No, really. This has to be one of the most stupid rear brake pad changes I've ever done on a car. The Aeros don't have this issue as the carrier can remain in place while the disc is removed. That is not an option with the solid disced cars. I have a video, which I'll upload later, as I would come back to the brakes in 2 years time. I just would not know it then.

I then removed the Carrier bolts with the breaker bar and an E18 socket. Yup, I was quickly getting my money's worth out of the Impact TX-E socket set.



The best part of the job? Trying out a new windback tool, but an air powered one. This made putting the pistons back a very quick job indeed, and far less fiddly than the mechanical ones.



This saved valuable time and made a fiddly but simple job much easier.

The steering also needed changing as the UJ had failed. Not a problem I thought. A £150 shaft ordered later and it was a pain to fit. Actually fitting it was fine, but the new shaft itself wasn't the best made. The bolts bound going in, so much that I stripped a bolt, and the re-tapping and cleaning process revealed junk inside of the shaft which didn't help.

A bit of time with a drill bit to enlarge the bolt hole, which stopped the binding, and some Dremel action to get rid of flakes of metal in the shaft, finally had the shaft going in OK. This really shouldn't have been necessary on a part of this value. But I guess where you can't get OEM parts (Sorry Saab folk, I searched and I couldn't find a genuine replacement ; this one was from Neo Bros) you don't have a choice

Finally, the car was done, and I could ship the heap away from my memory! I was sick of an awkward car to work on, with poor parts availability, and iffy parts at that. I suppose it could be forgiven, with the wind in your hair and the car hitting boost! Or maybe not...




It seemed like a waste of a week, as I booked the time off work to fix it in that week. I never banked on the brake pad change taking almost a week in itself to do. I hoped to never see this car again. I was wrong. I'd see it in almost 2 years time, which would bring us to this year annoyingly. More on that next time.

My only response... Ughhhhhh

Was this the end of the car before I gave it back to my sister? Of course not! The driver's door lock decided it didn't want to lock on the keyfob anymore. Handy, if you are a young woman driving through Birmingham most days. That's fine, I hear you folks say, use the key! Well, there is a catch.

The keen eyed viewers will have noticed that this car doesn't have a key barrel in the driver's door, only in the passenger door, meaning that, to open it, you'll always have to go inside the car to open the driver's door. Great when you just want to go back from work, or if you are in a hurry. Bear in mind, the key is hidden away in the keyfob on this Saab, meaning you have to dissasseble the key fob in two pieces to use the key. The car is also started on the keyfob!





Fine I thought. I'll disassemble the door lock, and use an online guide to rebuild it.

www.bentasker.co.uk/posts/documentation/vehicles/371-saab-9-3-door-lock-unit-repair.html

I followed the instructions, albeit some areas didn't get much coverage, as much as I would have wanted them to. I came to assemble it. Our survey said, no. Still no working doorlock.

Calling Bagnall Saab, they said, the above repair is very hit and miss, and they themselves don't yield much success. Being a GM/Saab, the door locks are now NLA. Fantastic. A car which will forever, have to accept that the door can't be locked. Valuables hidden away? Don't worry, they can be nicked? Work laptop, when you go out to meet folks? Tough? Safety? Tough.

I hated the car at this point. I ended up bagging a door lock off Bagnall for £30 with a 3 month warranty. At this point, I just wanted the car gone.

However, my sister was happy to have the car back. The door lock would go again in 2 months, but my dad never went back to return the lock, and my sister's being a teacher during Covid, just didn't have the time to hand the car to us, unless we gave her a car. I don't know how her colleagues cope. Maybe this is why folks have PCPs.

Anyway, a year down the line, she would get a Mercedes S204 C250 CDI Sport, for a very good sum. The car wanted for nothing. Truth be told, I wanted it! But she needed the car more than me, and I didn't want to spend north of £4k on a daily car, no matter how nice it was.

With this, the Saab came back to my dad, who would use it now and again to go to work. Come to 2022, it would come back to me, for more work. I'll say more on this next time. It was indeed for the brakes, which as you can guess, went as well as anyone expected.

There is no need to say it's your fault stealthstylz, to be fair.

Maybe I'm being swayed by this car appearing to be a swine to me. You never know, you may have saved my old man a flywheel and a starter. In my case however, the Connects2 box refused to even turn the headunit on ; the Saab doesn't have a ignition wire in the harness, but a CANBUS ignition signal. I can only surmise that the Connects 2 couldn't detect it. Maybe the chap's reply annoyed me, but it seemed like a lacklustre service. Would it have been too hard to explain that earlier half-facelift cars aren't suitable?

Oddly however, the InCarTec kit has never had the steering controls work with that, now you mention your experience. The other way regarding a stereo harness would have been to have found an ignition source which wouldn't drain the battery, which was an issue on the CLK ; it would always drain the battery. On the E91, if I ever get to writing about that here (be it age or time reasons), I found out that picking the wrong CANBUS signal can destroy batteries, due to the drain on the battery ; That came to me with a towbar, and a CANBUS signal box.

Now, back to the Saab!

This year was a year of new things. I would become an uncle, start a new job, Go from one car I had for 5 minutes and buy something else (The E91). Some new home improvements. What would also be new, would be catching Covid for the first time, after avoiding it for 2 years. Ho hum.

After being knocked down for a week, my dad, sod's law, had a problem with, you guessed it, the Saab. The brake pads I had fitted on the rear around 2 years ago were down to near the metal again after barely 2 years, with one side being worse than the other. At the time, I was aware that the calipers were not as free as they were. I told him, that basically, it was going to need new rear calipers. Since after 6 days, I was better, albeit still quite achey, I decided to lend him my Mercedes CLK, and for him to leave the Saab on my drive. For anyone wondering, if anyone cares, I did not go into my CLK since I found out that I had Covid, and he took precautions anyway (cleaning the surfaces we'd touch etc.)

On around the 7th day, I would wheel the Saab into the garage. This would be the first time the car had entered my manshed.



With the new parts, including new rear calipers, and pads, this should have been a simple job. Should being the operative word



Come on. You know it's not going to work out that way. This is the car that never fails to disssapoint, and create issues. Naturally, this is exactly what this did.



That was my problem. Seized handbrake cable ferrules. The ferrules had corroded and naturally, expaneded in the housing. Since the calipers are alloy, we had a classic case of electrolytic corrosion. Balls. I would try heat as much as I would dare, without melting the cables too much, attempting to target the caliper area. I would then try hammering the cable out, only to now mark the ferrule. This would potentially stop the cable from being reusable again. There was nothing for it, but to accept the inevitable, as anyone with these Godforsaken Saabs/GM curse word would realise. Either the handbrake cable, or the cable would have to be destroyed in order to remove them. This is, what appears to be, somthing most Wrectra C owners go through.



I weighed up the pros and cons for a day. The handbrake cable would involve me getting on the floor, dealing with heatshields that have never been removed, as well as buying new handbrake cables. The calipers would cost me the surcharge of them.

The price difference between the cables and the surcharge was the same. With that in mind, I informed my dad, that the calipers would have to be binned, unless he wanted to battle it out with a European Car Part Motor factor, as to whether the old calipers could be taken back.

With that in mind, I grabbed the Dremel, and got to work.




With that, I wasted no time in fitting the new calipers. Suffice to say, this was very simple. Naturally, unlike when this turd was assembled, I would grease the cable, where the ferrule entered the caliper body.

The end result? A car, which had better braking than since we even bought the car, and a gain of near 5 MPG. Bear in mind, the car passed an MOT with the calipers in a semi-seized state, but the drag clearly wasn't enough to question the MOT man, or the rolling road machine.

The downside? I would have iffy knees after this. Whether it was Covid, me rushing into working on the car, after basically being in bed for half of the week, or me squatting while working (Jesus, I squatted alot!), Lord knows. What I do know is that, I was glad for this heap to be gone, and for me to be back in the Merc, even it was a loud 5 cylinder thing.



Would this be the last time I would see the Saab again? You know how that is going to go...