SAAB 9 3 'Vert Shed
Discussion
Hi simon, no I didn't, I think they were done when it had the Promax upgrade
Hallsey, there are a bewildering array of badge sizes/shapes, I douldn't find anything other than proper SAAB ones on ebay when I was looking as the convertible has a curved boot and the rest have a flat area where the badges go
Hallsey, there are a bewildering array of badge sizes/shapes, I douldn't find anything other than proper SAAB ones on ebay when I was looking as the convertible has a curved boot and the rest have a flat area where the badges go
Going slightly ot, with a 951 is not the same as the 944 - hard lines with rubber connectors elbows? That's how my S was. On the list of jobs for my 951, would probably stick with oe hardpipe if that's what they used - and replace all joiners.
I'm still on the fence about silicone tubing, I have had some in the past that felt very floppy, like it would collapse under vacuum. I've not tried an expensive or re-inforced one though.
When I had my 850's the tuners suggested quality fuel hose, chemical resistant, good for 10/12 bar and reinforced such that it won't collapse under vacuum and cheap!! Still have a load hanging around so tend to use that. Not as pretty though!!
I'm still on the fence about silicone tubing, I have had some in the past that felt very floppy, like it would collapse under vacuum. I've not tried an expensive or re-inforced one though.
When I had my 850's the tuners suggested quality fuel hose, chemical resistant, good for 10/12 bar and reinforced such that it won't collapse under vacuum and cheap!! Still have a load hanging around so tend to use that. Not as pretty though!!
I did a 5 hour round trip to Surrey on Friday and on the way there I started to get a funny whining noise that rose and fell with the revs, when I came out after lunch to drive home, I flipped the bonnet and realised that it was one of the belt pulleys, so crossed my fingers and headed to the M25...I got home fine, but decided to minimise the use until i could figure out which of the pulleys it was. Listening to it at the weekend I was fauirly certain it was the Belt tensioner pulley
Well with the pulley noise issue and the rear mount getting worse and a couple of long drives coming up I thought I had better get my sleeves rolled up, so ordered up a secondhand mount, a belt tensioner pulley and a Thermostat from Neo Brothers yesterday which were delivered just after lunch. I had an appointment at work cancelled so I booked the afternoon off, wrapped up warm and got the spanners out.....
First things first, got the nose in the air and took one wheel off to get access to the rear engine mount:
You have to get it reasonably high as you have to undo the bottom nuts through the 2 holes in the subframe:
The 3 nuts that hold it on came off easily, but then I had to jack the back of the engine up to quite an angle to get the mount out, and wiggle the new one in.
The old one was very compressed, the cable bit was completely slack:
The new one went in OK on the bottom mounts, but wth bracket would not slide down the thread of the top studd easily, so I tried jacking it up and down a few times, which got me to the stud just poking through the bracket, then I just "persuaded" it down by whacking the side of the bracket with a hammer...then just did the nuts up
I dropped it back onto its wheels and later on tried shunting up and down the drive which was fine at first but then sounded like it fully settled and is slightly loose, so will tweak it up tomorrow, job 1 of 3 done...
I then looked at the noisy pulley, following instructions on here about using a socket bar and a drill bit to ease the belt tension i then spun the idler and the tensioner pulley, and whilst the tensioner pulley sounded OK, the idler was awful! Of course I had ordered the tensioner pulley, so put the belt back on and ordered the correct part from Neo to be delivered tomorrow
I then tackled the thermostat, a couple of the bolts are a bit tricky, but not too bad really, I tried and failed to remove the big rad pipe, 15 years of being on and it wasn't going to release its grip, so I decided to try an ddo it with it on, which actually worked out fine.
popped the new one in and tightened it all up, topped up with antifreeze and fired it up, let it warm through - the temp gauge started moving earlier than normal and went up to mid-way and stopped, the pipe to the radiator stayed cold until it reached temperature and then suddenly went hot, so the thermostat seems to be working fine.
Hopefully get the pulley done tomorrow and then do a shake-down 35 mile round trip to pick my son up from school before I go to Bracknell on Friday and Heathrow on Monday!
Well with the pulley noise issue and the rear mount getting worse and a couple of long drives coming up I thought I had better get my sleeves rolled up, so ordered up a secondhand mount, a belt tensioner pulley and a Thermostat from Neo Brothers yesterday which were delivered just after lunch. I had an appointment at work cancelled so I booked the afternoon off, wrapped up warm and got the spanners out.....
First things first, got the nose in the air and took one wheel off to get access to the rear engine mount:
You have to get it reasonably high as you have to undo the bottom nuts through the 2 holes in the subframe:
The 3 nuts that hold it on came off easily, but then I had to jack the back of the engine up to quite an angle to get the mount out, and wiggle the new one in.
The old one was very compressed, the cable bit was completely slack:
The new one went in OK on the bottom mounts, but wth bracket would not slide down the thread of the top studd easily, so I tried jacking it up and down a few times, which got me to the stud just poking through the bracket, then I just "persuaded" it down by whacking the side of the bracket with a hammer...then just did the nuts up
I dropped it back onto its wheels and later on tried shunting up and down the drive which was fine at first but then sounded like it fully settled and is slightly loose, so will tweak it up tomorrow, job 1 of 3 done...
I then looked at the noisy pulley, following instructions on here about using a socket bar and a drill bit to ease the belt tension i then spun the idler and the tensioner pulley, and whilst the tensioner pulley sounded OK, the idler was awful! Of course I had ordered the tensioner pulley, so put the belt back on and ordered the correct part from Neo to be delivered tomorrow
I then tackled the thermostat, a couple of the bolts are a bit tricky, but not too bad really, I tried and failed to remove the big rad pipe, 15 years of being on and it wasn't going to release its grip, so I decided to try an ddo it with it on, which actually worked out fine.
popped the new one in and tightened it all up, topped up with antifreeze and fired it up, let it warm through - the temp gauge started moving earlier than normal and went up to mid-way and stopped, the pipe to the radiator stayed cold until it reached temperature and then suddenly went hot, so the thermostat seems to be working fine.
Hopefully get the pulley done tomorrow and then do a shake-down 35 mile round trip to pick my son up from school before I go to Bracknell on Friday and Heathrow on Monday!
The pulley that was sent was wrong, turns out they started making some changes to the B204 in late '99 so mine has a B205 idler pulley...
Once I got that sorted I did a 230 mile trip on Friday and the car is a lot better in terms of the chassis, but still something still moving so may just do the other two mounts to be sure, but the car now warms up straight away and stays warm! it is also a lot quieter with the new pulley, so I would say about a 75% success on the past week's mucking around!
Will do the the other mounts in mid December which will then base-line the chassis as back to a good standard
Once I got that sorted I did a 230 mile trip on Friday and the car is a lot better in terms of the chassis, but still something still moving so may just do the other two mounts to be sure, but the car now warms up straight away and stays warm! it is also a lot quieter with the new pulley, so I would say about a 75% success on the past week's mucking around!
Will do the the other mounts in mid December which will then base-line the chassis as back to a good standard
Edited by Fat Albert on Sunday 30th November 16:16
So with the engine still shunting around the engine bay I decided to do the next most likely (and next most expensive/difficult) mount; the offside one, had my mechanic do some of the donkey work for me, it took us more time to remove the plastic bits than it did to change the mount. I used a good secondhand one, but the one coming off didn't seem too bad:
New one on the right:
On the test drive it had improved things, but there was still a definite thump as I pulled away, so decided to order the third and final mount (£28 delivered), this was meant ot be the easiest one to fit, but I think everyone means the manual one, becuase the two bolts on the rear of mine were an absolute S*d to get to and undo, still, 1.5 hours later I had a transformed car, driving just how it should1
The two difficult bolts:
The mount was a bit broken:
I also then treated the car to a pre-christmas bucket of dirty water:
Convertibles are much easier to clean the inside of!
I haven't done a tot-up recently, but I think I am still only about a bag in on this car in total and have done over 4,000 miles now
New one on the right:
On the test drive it had improved things, but there was still a definite thump as I pulled away, so decided to order the third and final mount (£28 delivered), this was meant ot be the easiest one to fit, but I think everyone means the manual one, becuase the two bolts on the rear of mine were an absolute S*d to get to and undo, still, 1.5 hours later I had a transformed car, driving just how it should1
The two difficult bolts:
The mount was a bit broken:
I also then treated the car to a pre-christmas bucket of dirty water:
Convertibles are much easier to clean the inside of!
I haven't done a tot-up recently, but I think I am still only about a bag in on this car in total and have done over 4,000 miles now
Finally swapped out the DI today, was delivered from a UKSAABs Member so stood it up for 30 minutes to settle the oil before fitting.
I disconnected the battery before I started to reset the ECU and swapped it out, the only drama was when i dropped one of the screws into the engine bay and took a while to find it!
Oh and the torrential hail storm as I went back out to re-connect the battery and test it after I had tidied up and washed my hands
Looks much better under the bonnet now:
Have only done a few short journeys and the weather/traffic has precluded any heroics to really test any difference, but the initial impression is that of smoothness, almost uncanny when it is on tickover.
I did have a moment on my first drive when sat waiting for some lights and I got a really strong smell of burning, but then that cleared, so not sure if that was just some oil burning off where it shouldn't have been after transit?
haven't smelled it since. Will give it a proper test later this week
I disconnected the battery before I started to reset the ECU and swapped it out, the only drama was when i dropped one of the screws into the engine bay and took a while to find it!
Oh and the torrential hail storm as I went back out to re-connect the battery and test it after I had tidied up and washed my hands
Looks much better under the bonnet now:
Have only done a few short journeys and the weather/traffic has precluded any heroics to really test any difference, but the initial impression is that of smoothness, almost uncanny when it is on tickover.
I did have a moment on my first drive when sat waiting for some lights and I got a really strong smell of burning, but then that cleared, so not sure if that was just some oil burning off where it shouldn't have been after transit?
haven't smelled it since. Will give it a proper test later this week
I had an LPT Hatch of this era and it has to be one of my favourite cars I have owned, low spec one in Cosmic Blue, I really miss it, replaced it with the later model Aero, which needed to be remapped to feel quicker, the suspension was too hard and it didn't have the charm the older one did, I think the rock hard suspension killed it, my mate (J4CKOS MATE on here) has the later shape vert and that reminds me more of my old one than the aero, smaller wheels and the normal suspension.
Looks quite a good buy for the money. A set of bigger wheels would make quite a difference IMO, I had they wheels on my old 9-3 and always thought it looked under wheeled. An Aero convertible is something I'd quite like at some point.
Obviously you'll be aware of how good the engines are, my old 9000 Turbo took a 'drink' of water and hydro-locked. I took the plugs out, turned the starter a few times, some WD40 on the plugs and she was right as rain! Ended up taking that car to stage 2 without trouble! Can't imagine there would be many cars like that these days!
Obviously you'll be aware of how good the engines are, my old 9000 Turbo took a 'drink' of water and hydro-locked. I took the plugs out, turned the starter a few times, some WD40 on the plugs and she was right as rain! Ended up taking that car to stage 2 without trouble! Can't imagine there would be many cars like that these days!
I have done 5,000 miles in it so far and my total expenditure (including the purchase cost) has just topped £1,000.
I wanted a Cosmic Blue one like my previous 9 3 , but at this price you just have to buy on condition.
I am half tempted to leave the wheels on, even if I go down the Re-map and suspension route (lowered springs and eibach shocks are £450 for a complete set!) as it will give it a Q-car image, as well as the fact that the ride is comfortable and tyres are only £65 a corner!
Saying that, I know what you mean with bigger wheels, I upped my previous 9 3 from 16" to 17" and it did look good:
You can pick up genuine SAAB 16" wheels for next to no money, so might do that when the fronts need doing again.
This weekend's jobs are engine and gearbox oil changes and the fitting of a new Alpine Bluetooth/USB head unit
I wanted a Cosmic Blue one like my previous 9 3 , but at this price you just have to buy on condition.
I am half tempted to leave the wheels on, even if I go down the Re-map and suspension route (lowered springs and eibach shocks are £450 for a complete set!) as it will give it a Q-car image, as well as the fact that the ride is comfortable and tyres are only £65 a corner!
Saying that, I know what you mean with bigger wheels, I upped my previous 9 3 from 16" to 17" and it did look good:
You can pick up genuine SAAB 16" wheels for next to no money, so might do that when the fronts need doing again.
This weekend's jobs are engine and gearbox oil changes and the fitting of a new Alpine Bluetooth/USB head unit
Nik Gnashers said:
Interesting thread for me, thanks for posting.
I am looking for another car soon, my last being a 328i coupe (E36) which was old and is now a drift toy. I looked at a few recently but have been offered an 04 plate 9-3 2.2TiD for £750, with 124k on it, hmmmm am seriously tempted now
Hi Nik, go for it, they are a serious amount of car for the money, if you get yourself over to UKSAABs there is a lot of good advice and help on choosing a car and un-doing the GM 'improvements'!I am looking for another car soon, my last being a 328i coupe (E36) which was old and is now a drift toy. I looked at a few recently but have been offered an 04 plate 9-3 2.2TiD for £750, with 124k on it, hmmmm am seriously tempted now
My CD player rarely worked and jumped like crazy when it did, so was stuck with Radio only, so decided to change out the head unit as a new SAAB one was £150 and was a bit outdated now
I managed to do my head unit swap out today, about 85% successfully, with two simple to resolve issues and two requiring a little thought!
I decided to go for a simple mech-less head unit with built-in Parrot Blue-tooth and Aux-in & USB on the front panel, the Alpine has always been a favourite brand and Halfords have this unit on Internet Price-match (which includes reserving for in-store collection) so I paid £69.48 for it instead of £89.99!!
I also ordered up a tray to fill in the gap left by the SAAB Head unit:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/251644647822?_trksid=p20...
I removed the old unit (got the removal tool off ebay for 99p) and then offered up the cage and tray and found that the lip at the top behind the filler panel impinged about 5mm into the space, so a hacksaw blade and dremel sorted that!
I then checked the cabling, etc and found that the SAAB has an ISO aerial plug, and the unit has a DIN socket, so issue one (Iso-DIN converter on order from eBay for 99p) so i will pop it out and attach that when it gets here (easy issue 1)
The shelf and cage were still a bit snug and we tried the 3 bezels that came with the shefl and chose the middle one, but the top interfered with the stereo fascia, so I got the dremel out again and chopped the top off, with a bit of jiggery-pokey it all fitted. For the time being I have run the microphone through a hole in the back of the shelf, I will have a think of where/how to run it this week (thoughtful issue No. 1)
I got it all together and tested it with a USB stick and blue-tooth from my old Samsung phone and it all paired up and worked really easily and well, very pleased with the sound quality from such a cheap head unit, and I am pleased with how it all looks in the dash too:
Now for thoughtful issue number two...I am sure I wired it all up correctly but it cuts off as soon as the engine turns off (whereas the SAAB unit stays on until you take the key out) and it loses all its memory and config when it is turned off, is there any trick to providing a power feed to enable it to keep its memory? Have I missed something silly?
and finally, easy/idiotic issue number 2, I left my Sneakerpimps CD in the old unit :wall: , so when I pul the new one to fit the aerial lead I will power up the old one and press eject !!
I managed to do my head unit swap out today, about 85% successfully, with two simple to resolve issues and two requiring a little thought!
I decided to go for a simple mech-less head unit with built-in Parrot Blue-tooth and Aux-in & USB on the front panel, the Alpine has always been a favourite brand and Halfords have this unit on Internet Price-match (which includes reserving for in-store collection) so I paid £69.48 for it instead of £89.99!!
I also ordered up a tray to fill in the gap left by the SAAB Head unit:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/251644647822?_trksid=p20...
I removed the old unit (got the removal tool off ebay for 99p) and then offered up the cage and tray and found that the lip at the top behind the filler panel impinged about 5mm into the space, so a hacksaw blade and dremel sorted that!
I then checked the cabling, etc and found that the SAAB has an ISO aerial plug, and the unit has a DIN socket, so issue one (Iso-DIN converter on order from eBay for 99p) so i will pop it out and attach that when it gets here (easy issue 1)
The shelf and cage were still a bit snug and we tried the 3 bezels that came with the shefl and chose the middle one, but the top interfered with the stereo fascia, so I got the dremel out again and chopped the top off, with a bit of jiggery-pokey it all fitted. For the time being I have run the microphone through a hole in the back of the shelf, I will have a think of where/how to run it this week (thoughtful issue No. 1)
I got it all together and tested it with a USB stick and blue-tooth from my old Samsung phone and it all paired up and worked really easily and well, very pleased with the sound quality from such a cheap head unit, and I am pleased with how it all looks in the dash too:
Now for thoughtful issue number two...I am sure I wired it all up correctly but it cuts off as soon as the engine turns off (whereas the SAAB unit stays on until you take the key out) and it loses all its memory and config when it is turned off, is there any trick to providing a power feed to enable it to keep its memory? Have I missed something silly?
and finally, easy/idiotic issue number 2, I left my Sneakerpimps CD in the old unit :wall: , so when I pul the new one to fit the aerial lead I will power up the old one and press eject !!
Edited by Fat Albert on Saturday 17th January 17:26
Busy day today! 2 out of 3 jobs finished successfully!
After the head unit change above the next job was meant to be an engine oil change as I have not done that since I bought the car, I have no idea when it was last done and I have done 5,000 miles in the car since I got it
ops:
But, it looks like someone before me tightened up the sump bolt with an 8' tommy bar as I broke two sockets, bent a spanner and part-rounded the nut before I decided to call it a day on that, I will book it into Offord for them to do it when I get back from my busines trips in early Feb.
However, the sump nut for the gearbox came off very easily and litres and litres of thick black treacle came pouring out:
I had heard that only 2 litres would come out each time, but it looked more like 3-4. I then poured a little new stuff in to wash some more cruddy stuff out, then fitted the plug and topped it up
I then took it out for a test drive
After the head unit change above the next job was meant to be an engine oil change as I have not done that since I bought the car, I have no idea when it was last done and I have done 5,000 miles in the car since I got it
ops: But, it looks like someone before me tightened up the sump bolt with an 8' tommy bar as I broke two sockets, bent a spanner and part-rounded the nut before I decided to call it a day on that, I will book it into Offord for them to do it when I get back from my busines trips in early Feb.
However, the sump nut for the gearbox came off very easily and litres and litres of thick black treacle came pouring out:
I had heard that only 2 litres would come out each time, but it looked more like 3-4. I then poured a little new stuff in to wash some more cruddy stuff out, then fitted the plug and topped it up
I then took it out for a test drive
- WOW* what a difference that makes!!! eager/urgent off the line, super smooth gearchanges and much more eager to rev, tellingly my average mpg was starting to go up whilst driving around the village, so I will give it a proper test tomorrow to see what impact it has on the economy.
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