I got a little time last Friday to pull two relays off of the Crown Vic for inspection. The fuel pump relay had already been changed and cleaned; so I was good to go with that. The horn relay remained untouched. It was clogged with gunk. Cleaned the relay and the connector with contact cleaner. I let it dry overnight and intended to reinstall it on Saturday; but the neighborhood stray parked itself underneath to get out of the sun. So I will have to wait on that. I hope to get to it next weekend. Then I will make a serious effort to get that old 93 out of the gas tank.

 

On my way to work this morning; a dude in a Crown Vic pulled alongside me and drove with me until his exit. Looked to be a sport model as he had the rear spoiler and the 5 spoke sport wheels. Anyway, it made me think; for those of you who drive your Saturns; if you see a fellow Saturn owner on the road; do you pull next to or behind them and cruise with them?

 

Very few Saturns out here in Western Pennsylvania because the terrain was too hilly for the s cars and the whole Saturn thing just never seemed to catch on. Things seem to get to this area a good year after they actually hit real life, so I simply don't see a lot of Saturns around here. Not any model. Maybe a first generation Vue now and then. If I see an s car it is almost always a sedan.

With the swell of new forum members, a lot of the Saturns certainly don't still have their original owners. You can tell by the nature of the questions. Not universally true, but close.
Having driven my 95 and 97 SC2s off the lot in Wisconsin, it makes me realize how different my Saturn experience has likely been from someone who is picking one up for $1,200 and will be the 5th owner of a vehicle with 170,000 mi on it.

Where has it been? What has it seen?

 

I do see a S-series Saturn here and there. Believe it or not; I've been seeing Saturn Skys lately. I really like those cars over the Pontiac Solstice. One of my dream projects is a LS swapped Sky.

 

When you're done with yours, I have dibs

 

I think I failed to mention that I never reinstalled the A9P ECM in the Crown Vic. I discovered this whilst in Quarantine when I had COVID. Like the last run-in with COVID; I spent a good amount of time organizing the attic and my room. I was separating the Crown Vic parts from Putter Project's parts. There was a small postal box in the corner of my room labelled "A9P". I always figured that it was empty and that I already reinstalled it. To my surprise, it was still in there. So this past weekend, I pulled the tarp off the Crown Vic and reinstalled it. At least I was smart enough to cram plastic bags in the firewall where the ECM sits. The inside of the Crown Vic has a musty smell, but a dry musty smell. No mildew or moisture detected. I might have had a rodent in there because there was some plastic dust on my gauge cluster. Next time I am in there; I will inspect that area. If there was a rodent in there; it didn't do no.1 or no.2 in there because I didn't smell any of that. My buddy's '67 Chevelle reaked of it (as well as decomposing mice that had died in there) last time we fired that car up; which was 17 years ago. So now, all I have left to do is siphoning the old gas out of the tank. Then start prepping the car for another 1st start attempt.

Oh, and before I forget; I may be selling Putter Project. Some kid left his phone number with my Mom and told her to tell me to call him about an offer for the truck. Ironically, I was gathering all the parts I had for that truck to assess what I have for the semi-restoration. If I can find the title, I will seriously consider selling it. I may end up renting for now; and all the meanwhile looking for a Ranger, S-10, or old skool Tacoma to use as a work truck.

 

As usual; I didn't get around to siphoning the gas out of the Crown Vic. Instead, I had to deal with the ECM in my '05 Grand Marquis shorting out and losing the ability to hold a tune. When it happened, I did the usual and checked the air, fuel, and spark as I had no CEL or codes to point me in any direction. I spent a day trying to diagnose the problem before a week of bad weather rolled in. At that point, I sent it to my mechanic; who kept the car for 3 weeks trying to figure it out too. Then his son looked into it and asked me for my SCT tuner module; loaded in the stock tune 2x and it ran smooth. That was the beginning of last month; just got the car back last week. Yesterday, I went to replace the rotors and pads and discovered that 3 of the 4 caliper guide pins were seized. Just ordered loaded caliper brackets from NAPA, which I will pick up tomorrow morning before going to work. I will hopefully have it installed and the car running for Wednesday.

On top of this; I have my back porch step project that I want to complete. I bought a cement mixer from Harbor Freight a couple weeks ago so I can lay down a small pad underneath the porch steps and some of the rear porch. That will help to make the steps a bit more firm. All these little things keep me from getting the Crown Vic running. Hopefully one day though........

 

So I had my Grand Marquis back for a week; and then I decided to do the front brakes; which was what I wanted to do back in August. I struggled to pull the calibers off of their brackets. After doing so, I realized the guide pins were seized up. I managed to free 2 of them; but the other 2 were not budging. I searched around locally to see if anybody sold just the caliper bracket to no avail. NAPA had the caliper and bracket assembly in stock; so I bought them with the idea of using just the bracket. Well as Uncle Murphy would have it; the caliper and bracket were Lock-Tite'd together. I could have used one of my larger impacts to remove the brackets; but I didn't want to destroy the bolts. So the only other choice was installing the caliper and bracket assembly; and bleeding the system (again); which I hate doing. After last year's failed brake mod attempt; and installing new calipers; I bought a vacuum pump/reservoir (uses an air compressor) to bleed the brakes. I am indifferent to this device or tool. While it required far less effort to bleed the brakes than if I had done that manually; I still went through quite a bit of brake fluid before I stopped seeing bubbles; and even then, I wasn't confident that it had worked. So, when I have the time, I am going to sned the car off to my mechanic and have him properly bleed the system. As is sits now, the brakes work like they always did (nowhere near spectacular); so I will be happy with that.

I am hoping this is the end of the major problems for my car until the end of the year; so I can focus on my house and other car projects.

 

I too have purchased a brake bleeder and indeed it is much less of an effort.

 

So I made the time to backfill (with random rocks and stones) the concrete pad and setup the cement mixer I got last month. I did this on an empty stomach because if I eat; I get nothing done on the weekends. So after I did all of that; I ate lunch and prepared for the food-coma. Fortunately, my new neighbors have a friend with a '65 GTO. He rolled in front of their house and woke me up enough to get up and do some more things. I figured since that car put me in the car-mood; I would go out and siphon fuel out of the Crown Vic. I got nearly 10 gallons out of that car and that was all I could get out. It didn't look or smell stale; but I am switching it out anyways. As such, I know that I put about 12 gallons in there; but I am just going to dump a few bottles of fuel cleaner along with fresh fuel when I go for another 1st start attempt. Finally, some progress!