Hello all! I am potentially going to be a new saturn owner. I wanted to join this (from what I can see) informative forum and learn as much as I can before I finally made the decision. I look forward to learning as much as I can from all of you in the days to come. Thanks!

 

Let us know what you're planning on buying?

 

Yes, please do.
Much easier than guessing.

Do NOT buy anything with a CVT transmission.

That narrows it down by about 3%

 

Thanks for the heads up about the transmission issue.

Is that the biggest general red flag? Any other good basic knowledge for making a selection?

Kind of interested in the Sky... but I can't tell if the issues I am seeing people talk about are justified. (Also isn't the most practical.)

Do you have any recommendations between years or the different series?

At this point, I am just looking into these cars to get some general insight. Always been interested in Saturn. Like the look of them.

Right now I have a friend looking to get rid of his Sky. But I also am talking to a guy about maybe getting his S-series or the Astra he bought for his daughter.

With so many Saturns being pushed on me, I thought I should learn something about them.

 

1) Buy an Astra only if you enjoy having to search overseas for pretty much any replacement part. And have no real fun while driving.
2) Buy an Aura only if you like an electrical nightmare on 4 wheels. Go to the NHTSA.gov site and look up the recalls and TSBs. Beautiful concept, beautiful car, crap design and execution.
3) Buy an L series if you want a nice sedan with a bit of ummph to it. Hopefully you can find one whose BCM has already freaked out and been replaced. Andy (03 LW200) on the forum hoards and rebuilds them. I hear they are a nice ride. Andy can tell you more about what to look out for---if he feels like it.
4) Buy a 2nd gen Vue (2008 and up) if you want a really nice SUV with a crap tranny and brake lines that apparently rust quickly from the inside out.
5) Buy a 1st gen Vue if you think Honda engines will fix everything. Some had the ecotec 2.2 which, after some hiccups, turned out to be a durable motor.

Actually, most 1st gen Vue owners love the thing and happily drive it into the ground.

6) Buy an Ion Coupe from 03 or 04 if you want a CVT in your vehicle that has actually already been in 5 diff coupes (it switches cars every time someone wrecks one of those Ions while the CVT still functions)

7) Buy an 05-07 Ion. They are nice dependable cars for the most part. Stock up on front swaybar end link bushings. However, some parts are becoming quite scarce due to their tendency to fail, so take this into account

8) Buy a Sky (esp the Redline) if you want to have a blast driving the thing. Until something breaks. And someone out there designs and manufactures their own replacement part for it. Because lord knows GM stocked about 9 months worth of replacement parts for the Skys, so even if you've gotten the flip up roof to seal properly, all you can do is sit in it with the top up going nowhere because you can't fix what ails the beautiful car. Talk about a tragedy.

I test drove the last Sky Redline on my dealer's lot before Saturn shut down. Little bit of turbo lag but once it kicked in that baby pulled hard. Handled so well I was taking sharp winding turns at 20 mph over the suggested speeds. That was all good and fine until I got too aggressive, forgot I was driving a RWD car and that plowing the gas while cranking the wheel does NOT help you cheat through a turn---it just sends the rear end in the direction of what you were trying to avoid. I slowed down and went back to the dealership.

9) Buy a good ol fashioned S series if you like dependable predictable behavior from a MAINTAINED vehicle. Auto trans is crap, manual is the way to go. I'm partial to 2nd gen w/o the air pump crap as far as solid build, but I love the looks of the 1st gen coupes w the popup headlights. They handle better than the 2nd gens.

S car parts are drying up as well. Many only remain available because the parts are cross application for something else GM. Or not enough of some particular Saturn part broke, so there's a bunch of spare parts lying around. SOHC's last longer.

 

That ought to be a sticky Derf!

 

The L series is actually an Opel Vectra B, they share many chassis parts with the Saab 900 and the 93 and 95 series cars. I have had a v-6 wagon and several 4 cylinder sedans. I am rebuilding a 2002 L200 stick shift car as my daily driver. The v-6 car has 200 hp and are all automatics. The 4 cylinder cars have 150hp and most are automatics, I really had to search for a while to find a loaded stick shift car.
Don't buy a first year anything is good to follow. That being said it took General Motors over two years to figure out they had a problem with the 4 cylinder engine in this car. Which is good for me since I car repair engines easily. It also makes non running L series cars cheap. The L 200 that I am just finishing for my grandson was $300.00. I have put another $1000.00 into this car and it will last a long time now with the improved parts that I put in the engine.
These cars have good road manners and are quiet on smooth asphalt. The 2002 models come standard with abs, traction control, a/c, lots of air bags and disc brakes. The other years some of this was optional. I have bought the other years for parts only, I am driving 2002 model year cars.