32 Flavours...and then Some!

Starting back in early spring, I'd noticed that Bridget was starting to run a little bit too warm whenever I was in too much stop-and-go traffic or I'd idled her too long, even in the relatively still cool spring weather. This was odd, but J figured it was the thermostat letting go--which is wont to do on a 14-year-old car...

Come the first weekend in May, J changed out the thermostat, which meant he had to basically drain and refill the coolant system. If one doesn't have access to a pressurization device to re-pressurize the system, air bubbles end up in the works, leading to low coolant readings in the system, which means the coolant level in the works drops and more coolant needs to be added to compensate for the air bubbles' space.

J figured we'd go through the system purging out air bubbles for about a week or two based on how little I drive her. A month and change later, into last week, I was still adding coolant to the system because it was still coming up low. I swear I was about to start taking stock in Prestone's Dex-Cool, it seemed like I was going through enough of the stuff. Thing was, there was no obvious leak in my system--no puddles on the ground wherever I parked, and rarely ever a smell of burning coolant in the cabin to signal I was burning coolant somehow. This was getting ridiculous and untenable. Time for the mechanic...

Took her over on Friday morning. Told them what was going on, they put her up on the lift, added pressure to the coolant system and BLAM!! They call me into the garage and there was an orange waterfall of coolant coming from under my car...The radiator's got a big leak near the bottom and at least one of the hoses is totally boned and leaking as well. All the other coolant system hoses are in various stages of dry rot as well. Sigh...She needs a new radiator and all new coolant system hoses. $$$ Happy birthday!!

That would explain the occasional hot coolant smell in the cabin when I drove her when I was almost entirely sure I hadn't spilled any coolant when I'd filled the reservoir. That would explain the random droplets in the driveway as I drove in as well small bits of droplets wherever I parked. Otherwise, we were none the wiser, and probably couldn't have been much wiser without a serious visual inspection of the radiator somehow with Bridget up on our little car floor jack thingus and I doubt J would've been able to see anything amiss in those conditions. Excellent choice that I got frustrated enough to bring her into the mechanic for a looksee.

J probably could've done the work for half the money I paid the mechanic, but he wouldn't have been able to get the parts as quickly, didn't have the means to re-pressurize the system after the repair, and doing a big job like replacing the radiator on our driveway in the dicey rainy half the time weather? Not a good scene, so it was best to just pony up the coin and have the mechanic do it. They got 'er done in about 2 1/2 hours--not too shabby.

So, yeah. Shiny new radiator in my Bridget. She better be good for awhile...

For those who may not remember or even know in the first place, Bridget is the name I have for my 2001 Saturn SL2. Got her brand new off the lot in March of '01 with the Starter Husband and I was awarded her in the divorce. She's got about 181,000 miles on her now and OEM things are slowly going to pot on her, as is to be expected. That being said...Aside from burning a bit too much oil and regular routine maintenance for the most part lately she's been basically fine...

We have been having some trouble with the ignition sticking when attempting to turn the key when starting her. That's been going on for a little while now, probably a couple of months. Jiggle the key a little bit and things are a "go", but yeah, annoying, and something to watch. Could be keys wearing out with all the use, or it could be something with the ignition mechanism...

Then today happened...

This afternoon J started her in the driveway and was about to put her in reverse to leave the driveway. While shifting his right leg he brushed the base of the other keys hanging from my key chain with his knee and the ignition key fell out of the ignition and he caught them before they fell to the floor. Bridget didn't quit, though--she kept on a running as if nothing happened. J put her back in park, put the key back in the ignition and turned her off. Took the key back out, put the key back in and fired her up again. Barely touched the ignition key and it came out again. And again. And again. And Bridget stayed running all the while. o.O Thank Bast for that, but damn! That key coming out of a running car while it's in the "run" position was just plain freaking me out!! J was more than a bit concerned, too, what with all the GM ignition switch recalls and all.

Drove her straight to the local Chevy dealership, which adverts that it services all Pontiacs and Saturns and went into the service department to talk to a tech to check with them to see if there are any recalls on her, particularly with the ignition. Nope, nothing. Described what was happening with her and the tech thinks it's the ignition cylinder wearing out, but she would need to be looked at by a tech *of course) to be sure and nothing was available til Monday morning. He did a rough estimate for us--if it's just the ignition cylinder that needs replacing it'll be about $400 give or take with labor and part ($300ish for labor, $125 for part and re-keying of same). I take her in on Monday morning at 0900. While she's in for that, I'm also having them look at the burnt out lights in the instrument cluster on the dash, which could just be burnt out bulbs or it could also be something wrong with the instrument cluster light system proper. We shall see...

We could probably get a slightly better deal somewhere else on the labor cost for the repair at a mom-n-pop mechanic, but J's a bit cautious when it comes to ignition/key mechanism repairs and would rather we go through a certified dealer. I agree, so she's going back to the dealership. As for the instrument cluster lights, we've tried fixing them through my go-to local mechanic guy, but he wasn't able to find the right sized bulbs through his resources. I'm pretty darn sure the dealer won't have that sort of problem. ;)

The tech says Bridget is basically safe to drive as long as she's not quitting on me when the key falls from the ignition, which it's not so far. Regardless, I don't think I'll be doing much driving with her until this gets resolved. Why chance it? I do have some minor and very short distance local errands to run tomorrow afternoon, which should be fine, but I'm still pretty nervous about driving her for now...

Monday can't come fast enough!! :/ I want my baby back! :/

My 2001 Saturn SL2 has treated me very well over the last 13 years. As she ages, though, she's inevitably developing some issues. This is expected and not terribly surprising, but a bit annoying and inconvenient.

The current issue is the windshield wipers are not working. They started randomly giving me trouble about a year ago when, on the slow setting, they would randomly stop wiping, then start back up again as normal. My solution was to go to setting three on the intermittent setting, which was almost as fast as slow wipe mode, then switch back to slow wipe mode after a few minutes. No big whoop, figured since it was so random and relatively rare in its occurrence that I still had plenty of life in the wiper motor/switches...

About a month ago, I noticed the wipers arms were moving a bit slower than normal on all settings upon initial start-up, then after they worked for a little while the speed would go to normal and all would be well. That has since turned to them *always* moving with very little oomph across the windshield, then finally this past weekend, to virtually nothing. In fact, on Saturday afternoon when I attempted to use them they stopped a quarter of the way up my windshield and it took forever fiddling with the control arm to get them to cycle and settle again at the bottom of the windshield. Thank Gods I was only trying to clear my windshield of dusty build-up and it was NOT precipitating, and that I was in town on my way home from a nearby local eatery and not on the tollway!

J suspects, as I do, that the motor on the mechanism is barely hanging on and about to give up the ghost. He's checked all the Saturn forums online to see if it's just a glitch with my model that might be able to be fixed with some tweaking/tightening/minor repair, but found nothing. Which is a bummer, because working windshield wipers are kind of mandatory for driving here in the Midwest where the weather can get wet and nasty at the drop of a hat.

I called my trusty mechanic this morning and I explained what was going on; he asked me some questions I think wherein he was trying to determine whether it was a bad switch or a bad motor. After answering same, we both agreed it was probably a bad motor. He priced me a new motor at $206 plus tax without labor. Ugh, that's pretty steep, but with Saturn not being in production at all for several years now, plus being a 13 year old car...yeah, parts like that are going to be expensive. I just pray that the labor isn't too terribly extensive on this sort of repair. Let's also hope he doesn't find anything else wrong with her while he's got her; Bill always does a cursory complimentary check over of major systems (brakes, steering, suspension, battery, etc) when he does any repair work on our cars, so...yeah...please pray/chant/light a candle/send good car vibes my way...

I would've brought her in today, Get 'Er Done and all that rot, but it's been precipitating and getting to mechanic is a bit of a ride on the freeway--the last place I want to be without working windshield wipers. :/ So, since it's supposed to be clear tomorrow, I'll be taking her down to Bill tomorrow for the necessaries. As I requested--best wishes are more than welcome! :/