Consumer Complaints
| Fail date | miles | occurences | Purchase date |
|---|---|---|---|
| ELECTRICAL SYSTEM - ALTERNATOR/GENERATOR/REGULATOR | |||
| 03/01/2000 | 1 | 01/01/2000 | |
| As of today's date, 7/12/00 the saturn auto is with the dealer in santa ana, ca. no safety defect listed in summary. *ak | |||
| 01/05/2000 | 0 | ||
| Serpentine belt tensioner kept tension on the belt felled. later, alternater came on, and then consumer lost power steering. if consumer was to lose it on the highway at 70 mph, there could be a serious accident. mechanic says belt was very poorly designed. *ak | |||
| ELECTRICAL SYSTEM - IGNITION | |||
| 04/21/2005 | 1 | 07/04/2001 | |
| I was parked at a shopping center, when i turned my car on, it would not start. after trying a couple of times,it made a pop sound and smoke flooded inside the car. i turned off the key, took it to a dealer and they could not find anything wrong with it. the windows would not work as well. i replaced the fuse for the windows, and the car started, but now only the drivers side window works. *tr | |||
| ELECTRICAL SYSTEM - IGNITION - SWITCH | |||
| 11/28/2005 | 1 | 04/20/1997 | |
| When turning the switch to start the engine, the starter motor stopped an smoke started coming from the dashboard. the vehicle was towed to the dealership where it diagnosed that the switch had shorted out. another component failure resulted from the shortening of the switch. the ignition cylinder seems to be a problem; however, i can not find information on safey recalls. web site http://www.alldata.com/tsb/53/975307fc.html shows what appears to be a safey recall 97-c-02 apr 97, tsb title ignition cylinder malfunction. *nm | |||
| 03/26/2005 | 48849 | 1 | 02/12/1999 |
| No prior indication of a fault. on march 26, 2005 my wife went to start the car and not only would it not start, but smoke started coming up from the dashboard. upon having it towed to a saturn dealer, we were told that the iginition switch had failed and had burnt out the wiring harness. this car has 48849 miles on it. this just does not make any reason, as should iginition swaiches go bad on a low mileage car and cause so much additional damage? | |||
| 05/25/2001 | 02/01/1997 | ||
| Saturn are an easy car to steal. saturn is aware of this issue so they replaced the ignition switch in the 2000 models. replaced ignition switch for 109.46 dollars. | |||
| ELECTRICAL SYSTEM - WIRING - INTERIOR/UNDER DASH | |||
| 03/26/2005 | 48849 | 1 | 02/12/1999 |
| No prior indication of a fault. on march 26, 2005 my wife went to start the car and not only would it not start, but smoke started coming up from the dashboard. upon having it towed to a saturn dealer, we were told that the iginition switch had failed and had burnt out the wiring harness. this car has 48849 miles on it. this just does not make any reason, as should iginition swaiches go bad on a low mileage car and cause so much additional damage? | |||
| 10/16/2003 | 54000 | 1 | 05/01/2002 |
| We experienced a dashboard fire in our 1997 saturn sl1 in the fall of 2003. my wife turned the key, started the car, shifted to reverse, and began backing up when the engine quit, the car jolted to a stop, and the interior immediately filled with acrid smoke. the knoxville saturn dealer replaced the ignition switch and wiring--not cheap. this is obviously a safety-related event.*ak | |||