Consumer Complaints
| Fail date | miles | occurences | Purchase date |
|---|---|---|---|
| POWER TRAIN | |||
| 1 | 06/16/2003 | ||
| Problems with gear shift on 1998 saturn sl1. *mr the gear shift would not come out of park and the bcsi solenoid was replaced. *scc *jb | |||
| POWER TRAIN - AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION | |||
| 08/01/2003 | 4 | 06/14/2003 | |
| While driving, the engine stalled. the dealer replaced the crankshaft senor and coolant temperature sensor, however the engine stalled again. *ak the power steering and ignition switch needed to be replaced. the gear did not shift properly, mainly in first gear. *jb | |||
| When accelerating transmission doesn't shift into gear. also, battery is leaking fluid, deteriorating wire harness to transmission. dealer stated problem will reoccur because wires do not have a protective covering. *ak | |||
| 07/06/1998 | 1 | 06/23/1998 | |
| Transmission failed. | |||
| 09/30/1998 | 2 | ||
| While driving at 10 mph and coming to a halt the computer shut down and nothing in the car worked. dealer contacted two times in the same day with the same problem and attempted to remedy the problem. consumer drove the car away with no guarantee the problem would not reoccur. consumer is not satisfied with the situation. several repairs of due to loss of power, however vehicle still experiences problems. transmission experienced problems during shifting, found scuffed valves, replaced valves that were binding. *ak | |||
| POWER TRAIN - AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION - LEVER AND LINKAGE - COLUMN SHIFT | |||
| 08/24/2003 | 61007 | 4 | 06/16/2003 |
| Consumer noticed upon starting vehicle park paw would not shift out of park. dealer has been contacted. *ak this happened on four different occasions. consumer had to rock the vehicle, restart, pump the brakes and giggle the lever before it would release. when changing gear a scrapping sound was heard and saturn stated it would get worse. after four times, consumer had it replaced at a cost of $#144.09. consumer noted saturn would not work on his vehicle maybe because he filled a complaint for shabby work. *ph | |||
| POWER TRAIN - CLUTCH ASSEMBLY | |||
| 07/17/2001 | 1 | 12/01/1997 | |
| Clutch was in perfect conditions, faliure was in the pressure plate that operates the clutch. parts department told me that this was not un-common for manual transmitions on sl1 from 96-99 and when new parts were purchased at the dealer, there had been a design change which increased the total cost for the repair. why was a new design implemented if there was nothing wrong with the old one. just in hawaii/oahu there has been about half a dozen of low milage manual trans with clutch system falires. | |||
| POWER TRAIN - MANUAL TRANSMISSION - COLUMN SHIFT ASSEMBLY | |||
| 07/30/2004 | 1 | ||
| My wife's '98 saturn sl1 has approximately 80,000 miles on it. about a week ago, she was no longer able to shift out of 1st gear. after taking the center console out, i noticed that a rubber grommet that attached the shift rod to the shift cables had rotted and broken in half. normally, this should have been very easy to replace. a new grommet could very easily be popped in with around 1/2 hour of work. when i approached the local saturn dealers, they said they did not have the .50 cent grommet available, and that the entire shifter cable would have to be replaced (there is nothing wrong with the cables themselves). the person working there said they have to replace the whole cables very often. total cost for the cables and labor is around $600. they do not sell the grommet seperately. getting suspicious, i went on the internet to research the problem. i found many sites with people experiencing the same problem (see http://www.chaosmagnet.com/blog/archives/000112.html, http://www.autoguide.net/cgi-sec/autoparts/messages/msg.cgi?1589.shtml, for example). all could easily have fixed the problem by getting a new rubber grommet. i believe this is a serious problem that saturn needs to do something about. spending $600 for a $5 repair is rediculous and wrong. also, my wife's car is completely out of comission until this can be replaced. many reports from other owners i have read have stated that to get around spending $600, they are using self made fixes. this could be very dangerous to do, and could cause accidents in the future. however, their options are somewhat limited unless they wish to spend a lot of money. again, this problem could be easily rectified if saturn would simply make the grommet available for sale. regards, james langford. | |||