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In 1995, I was a college student in need of a car. My close friends, who had only owned Honda's, Toyota's, and Nissan's begged me not to buy an American car. I should have listened. I looked around for about a month and considered every possible aspect one can look at when purchasing a car. As it turns out, the Saturn's somewhat cheaper insurance, safe design, and what looked to me at the time like innovative engineering, caused me to go against my peer's advice and buy a brand new Saturn SL1.
From the very beginning, I have had numerous and absurd problems with it. Just to name a few, I have had to have new seat covers put on at about 6,000 miles because the cheap fabric which they use started to pilfer and separate due to the simple fact that I happen to wear jeans most of the time. I have complained about the brakes from probably the second week I have owned the car. They have checked and rechecked them, and still, to this day, they are constantly spongy and weak. People who drive my car for the first time are often scared at how far they sink down to the floor and the poor stopping power they provide. I was told by Saturn, "That's As Good As They Get." They explained it away by telling me it was the result of some new, advanced design that they were trying. I didn't know I was going to be a guinea pig for the Saturn corporations engineering experiments. One would think that after all of these years in the business, G.M. (Saturns parent company) would have learned how to make a decent set of brakes!... And let's not forget a slew of other ridiculous problems, which started at about 10,000 miles and continue to this day; unexcusable problems like a constantly rattling and annoyingly squeaky dashboard, poor door seals which leak every time it rains, a temperature sensor which has been replaced twice (the second time was only 15,000 miles after the first), and numerous door, ignition, and trunk lock problems. |
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My latest problem is completely unforgivable. I believe that it is pretty much an accepted fact that aside from running one without oil, an engine should last at least 200,000 miles. One of the selling points, and one of the reasons why I bought my Saturn, was the fact that it used a steel timing chain, instead of a timing belt. I was told that "The timing chain, unlike a timing belt, could never break unexpectedly", and this was to keep me safe from encountering severe engine damage and the costly repairs that would follow. Well, I guess the first part of that statement is true. At almost exactly 100,000 miles, my car was driving o.k. until all of a sudden it just stopped. I have been told that it "jumped timing". So this timing chain didn't break, it "jumped time", (whatever that means), causing the same damage to my engine as if I would have had a regular belt that had broken. So I now need to spend approx. $4,000.00 to fix a car that's only lived half of it's life. Not to mention the fact that several months before this occurrence, I had enquired about changing my timing belt and was told that there was really no set time to do this, and when it got close to needing it, I would just know it. Apparently, I haven't been in touch with my cars inner being!... |
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