My Neighbor's 320,000 Mile Saturn

[atikovi]

The make electric cutouts for that.

 

[DweezilAZ]

Originally Posted by dpaldino

We had a 2008 Saturn Outlook. I don't miss it one bit. The only nice thing I can say about is that it had great headlights. My wife was the primary driver and I think she's a little hard on cars since she's late all the time so she accelerates hard and brakes even harder. In 2016 with 109,500 miles on the ODO, it developed a connecting rod knock that would have required an engine replacement for about $7000 according to our mechanic whom I feel is very honest. The car was well maintained and had regular oil changes by me with quality oil and filters so it's not like it was neglected. The vehicle was trouble almost from day 1 of ownership so I didn't feel like putting one cent into that car at that point so we unloaded it to PEDDLE.com for $2450. Good riddance.

Sorry, that's a GM corporate clone like the Relay. At the least the ION introduced the Delta platform, was made in Spring Hill under the original labor agreement and had polymer panels. The L was a polyglot of GM bits and pieces with doors and front fenders of polymer and built in Delaware. The VUE spawned the Equinox and Pontiac Torment [;-} ], was built in Springhill and used the polymer for all vertical panels. 320,000 miles that front end has been entirely replaced at least once. I've had the front sway bar bushings done twice Once under warranty. GM's legacy intermediate steering shaft will have been done as well. I expect that's next as I only have 72,000 miles on mine. They were fixing suspension bits during warranty from introduction in 2003. The signature Saturn is the S Series on which GM gambled billions and never made a dime.

 

[DweezilAZ]

Originally Posted by supton

Originally Posted by IronMaidenRules

I've seen that there are two, and only two, types of Saturn ownership: 1. Worst POS I've ever owned, was in the shop all the time, was a huge mistake 2. Drove to 400k without a single repair, sold it to nephew when starting using 1/2 qt. of oil in between changes Literally nothing in between. Weird.

Not sure where I land. I had a base model 2000 SL for nearly 5 years. I think I had the a/c fixed once, and I did a few sets of brakes (it always had warped rotors); I had one of the SOHC's with a bad head which luckily got fixed while under warranty. I traded after 116k. I suspect at the end it probably needed struts, and it was using oil, like a quart every 1,500 miles. And the wife didn't like anymore, and I was starting to think it was a bit loud on the highway.

I bought my first SL1 after riding in my older brother's 95, Supton. It was so solid at 116,000 miles when I bought it, that when my 99 Cavalier was destroyed in a rear ender I bought the 05 ION I still have. The 95 I gave to my little brother and his wife who are still driving it, nearly 200,000 miles. It just came back from a round trip, AZ to NC earlier this summer.It saw regular 40 mpg readings. And apparently, the 95 had had it's head replaced right before the warranty ran out at 36,000 miles. Way before I got it. GM's [or Roger Smith's ] Folly: tremendous waste of labor and money [even for fans of the brand] from which GM learned and earned NOTHING.

 

[DweezilAZ]

Originally Posted by IronMaidenRules

GM should have kept Saturn and Pontiac and folded Buick instead, IMO.

But then we'd never have had the Envision.

 

[DweezilAZ]

Originally Posted by madRiver

Originally Posted by IronMaidenRules

GM should have kept Saturn and Pontiac and folded Buick instead, IMO.

They would have folded all three of those duds but Buick China is a massive seller where GM China does incredibly well. I think better then GM USA. Saturn would have been a good brand to try electric cars in if still kicking about.

Did that with the EV 1. Saturn dealers were the service providers

 

[atikovi]

Originally Posted by IronMaidenRules

GM should have kept Saturn and Pontiac and folded Buick instead, IMO.

Who knows, GM might bring them back at some point, maybe as a halo brand. Think Maybach or Bugatti.

 

[AC1DD]

Originally Posted by DweezilAZ

[ GM's [or Roger Smith's ] Folly: tremendous waste of labor and money [even for fans of the brand] from which GM learned and earned NOTHING.

Saturn had the potential to be great but the top brass at GM couldn't keep the filthy paws off the independent management.

 

[cronk]

We had a 1999 Saturn SL2, the wife bought it in 03 and I drove it to work after she got a minivan in 06, I drove it until 15 or 16. Had around 150k, still ran and drove nice with pretty minumal repairs. The northern NY road salt was finally doing it in, the rear suspension mounting torq boxes were rotted out. Did some minor repairs like a water pump, wheel bearings and an alternator. Alternator was pretty easy by the way, drove it up on ramps and dropped it down from underneath, took under an hour. Most of its life it had synthetic oil changes every 5k, atf changes every 30k. I really liked how easy maintanance was on those cars, spin on filter on the transmission with a drain plug, spark plugs easy to access, easy oil changes on ramps. Honesty, if I found a southern one with no undercarriage rot, I'd buy another one.

 

[SirTanon]

Originally Posted by atikovi

Can't imagine driving the same car that long day in and day out even if it does run fine. Maybe if you view cars as appliances, ok, but I'd be bored after a month.

When you commute 100+ miles per day like I do, there are basically 4 factors that come in to play: 1 - Reliability 2 - Comfort (both in seating and climate control) 3 - Sound quality (is it good at isolating outside noise from the cabin, and is the sound system good?) 4 - Fuel economy .. there are other factors as well, but for me, that's the big 4. If you have one that meets these factors, why on earth would you want to change it? Fun has very little to do with it. Doesn't really matter what you drive.. you're going to be stuck in traffic, creeping along at 5-10 mph half the time anyways.

 

[atikovi]

Originally Posted by SirTanon

Originally Posted by atikovi

Can't imagine driving the same car that long day in and day out even if it does run fine. Maybe if you view cars as appliances, ok, but I'd be bored after a month.

When you commute 100+ miles per day like I do, there are basically 4 factors that come in to play: 1 - Reliability 2 - Comfort (both in seating and climate control) 3 - Sound quality (is it good at isolating outside noise from the cabin, and is the sound system good?) 4 - Fuel economy .. there are other factors as well, but for me, that's the big 4. If you have one that meets these factors, why on earth would you want to change it? Fun has very little to do with it. Doesn't really matter what you drive.. you're going to be stuck in traffic, creeping along at 5-10 mph half the time anyways.

I like pizza. If I had to eat it 5 days in a row for breakfast and dinner, I'd get tired of eating it. Not a direct analogy but...

 

[SirTanon]

Originally Posted by atikovi

Originally Posted by SirTanon

Originally Posted by atikovi

Can't imagine driving the same car that long day in and day out even if it does run fine. Maybe if you view cars as appliances, ok, but I'd be bored after a month.

When you commute 100+ miles per day like I do, there are basically 4 factors that come in to play: 1 - Reliability 2 - Comfort (both in seating and climate control) 3 - Sound quality (is it good at isolating outside noise from the cabin, and is the sound system good?) 4 - Fuel economy .. there are other factors as well, but for me, that's the big 4. If you have one that meets these factors, why on earth would you want to change it? Fun has very little to do with it. Doesn't really matter what you drive.. you're going to be stuck in traffic, creeping along at 5-10 mph half the time anyways.

I like pizza. If I had to eat it 5 days in a row for breakfast and dinner, I'd get tired of eating it. Not a direct analogy but...

I'd say a better analogy would be - You HAVE to eat pizza for dinner every day for a year, and the only choices you have are where it comes from and what toppings are on it.

 

[HangFire]

I don't think the pizza analogy can be salvaged... let each person buy what they like.

 

[supton]

Originally Posted by SirTanon

Originally Posted by atikovi

Can't imagine driving the same car that long day in and day out even if it does run fine. Maybe if you view cars as appliances, ok, but I'd be bored after a month.

When you commute 100+ miles per day like I do, there are basically 4 factors that come in to play: 1 - Reliability 2 - Comfort (both in seating and climate control) 3 - Sound quality (is it good at isolating outside noise from the cabin, and is the sound system good?) 4 - Fuel economy .. there are other factors as well, but for me, that's the big 4. If you have one that meets these factors, why on earth would you want to change it? Fun has very little to do with it. Doesn't really matter what you drive.. you're going to be stuck in traffic, creeping along at 5-10 mph half the time anyways.

Depends on where you live. I live 54 miles from work, and it takes about 55 minutes. Thankfully I only have about 4 lights that I have to stop at, on the way in or out (there's more than that but on average I only stop 4 times). But yeah, fun has nothing to do with that either, even at highway speeds there's just so many times you can gaze at the scenery you've seen over and over again.

 

[grampi]

395K miles on my '04 Corolla and none of the suspension parts have been replaced. Still drives fine and tire wear is superb. I usually get the rated mileage or more from my tires. People usually ask how I can stand to drive such a boring car for so long...it's because I will soon be getting an exciting car to drive and this will become my daily beater mobile...

 

[DweezilAZ]

Originally Posted by AC1DD

Originally Posted by DweezilAZ

[ GM's [or Roger Smith's ] Folly: tremendous waste of labor and money [even for fans of the brand] from which GM learned and earned NOTHING.

Saturn had the potential to be great but the top brass at GM couldn't keep the filthy paws off the independent management.

True. And post Roger Smith after the initial contract the UAW insisted that Saturn hire any UAW scrub they sent to them. Not a lot of Spring Hill people ever got a job out of it. And the other divisions battled for the money being spent on Saturn, lots of intramural rivalry.