04 Saab 9-3 Aero Sedan Daily

In desperate need of a cheap car, I hit craigslist and stumbled upon one of the car's I've wanted for aaaaaaages: a Saab 9-3 Aero with the six speed manual. Even better than that, it was a steal at $1500 (imo at least) and it drives just about perfect. This thread will start with just fixing some minor stuff with the car, such as:

Driver's window reg seems frozen/broken
Driver's door lock just spins, I think the rod for the lock cylinder isn't lined up right with the actuator
CD stuck in the player is annoying
front lip is damaged, of course
minor clunkish type noise from RF
remote doesn't work and lock cylinder doesn't work for driver's door, So I can't really lock my car, which is kind of a big deal
Maintenance Items like Oil Change, degunking the intake and MAF, maybe Brakes (slightly warped and squeaky but stops fine still)

After that, I'll at least do some bolt-ons for a little more go and a little cleaner aesthetic, but who really knows where a project is going to go?!

RF clunk is usually sway bar endlinks.

Welcome to the 9-3 aero club.

might want check the wiring to the drivers door. seems like a lot is not working there. if you have questions I have had 04 and still have an 08 vert and 10 sedan.

thank you all, front end links are already on the fix it list so I'll move those up in priority. As far as the door, I took the panel off and the regulator is actually broken, as is the door lock cylinder. The lock is a little different from what I'm used to looking at but the piece on the inside that the rod attaches to is actually broken off. I was hoping it would just snap back into place but no such luck.

As far as updates go: I worked on it for a couple hours at work saturday, did some basic maintenance. Of course, everything started going south almost immediately. Car isn't leaking oil except for possibly from the valve cover, but there is a leak at the trans: whether it's the rear main or the case, i don't know yet. I cleaned it off and I'm going to keep track of it. Of course the drain plug was extremely rounded off, but they sent me the wrong plug when Iordered it so I put it back in with vice grips. I'll change it at next oil change. The tires are still good, has some decent yokohama all seasons on it. Bled the brake system because the fluid looked terrible and I guess I bled it too low because I then had no pedal feel unless it was pumped vigorously. Spent another hour getting that air out and it's good now, plus all the gunk fluid is out. When cracking open the lines at the MC, i lightly brushed against the coolant res and of course broke off one of the nipples. noone has it in stock so I ground the "ears" down on the res and pushed the hose on there further and secured it with a REALLY tight screw clamp, I'll replace it sometime this week or next because I'm leary of driving a redneck engineered car around that much. All told, the car is running great, driving great, and I am still very satisfied with my purchase. Plus my insurance is only twenty a month, so that really can't be beat for a decently quick, good looking car. Next on the list is sway bar end links, machining the rotors if they have enough meat left (noticeably warped), and fixing the door stuff. I'm just going to keep an eye on the trans, it still shifts great so I don't particularly want to pull it unless I need to replace it or the clutch, and those are probably several thousand miles in the future.

Everything electrical has decided to start hating me:
The sunroof won't open anymore, sounds like it's stuck in the track to me. The washer motor cropped out during our snowstorm last weekend. There is a strong misfire when the boost goes over halfway on the pressure gauge, so driving is no longer much fun at all. It does fine cruising, idles smooth for the most part, but shakes itself apart under those conditions. It wouldn't throw a cel for the longest time, and when it did it was a p0300,so it doesn't really help much. At a loss as to how to diagnose this without throwing parts at it, any saab gurus have any suggestions? I still need to disassemble the wiper motor and resolder the gear to fix the wiper stopping issue (saw a write up on a forum)
Same goes for the cd player.
Brakes are starting to make noise so I need to pull her in and check that out. This is getting fun.

I'm gonna assume this is the 2.0T.

The washer motor is super easy to replace I did it by taking the driver side wheel off and removing hte fender. Easy half hour fix.

p0300 sounds like ignition coils to me. GO on rock auto and order the correct ignition coil. IF the check engine light is intermittent what I would do is purchase the TORQUE app for android and wireless usb obd2 dongle for like 5 bucks off amazon or ebay. Under the Torque app you can check the number of misfires per cylinder. Did you change the spark plugs by any chance? Also check out saabcentral. But my guess is 85% coil pack issues.

I haven't changed plugs, po did one of the coils. I can't afford to replace all of them right now because they are $100 each at the best price I've found. That's why I was hoping or a specific misfire code. I'll check out the app, thanks!

In reply to corytate:

Find out which coils are bad. Although I would change the spark plugs first and see if that helps at all.

Yeah when you get the app, make sure you use the correct PID if i recall. You should be able to determine which cylinders have the most number of misfires under realtime data.

I'm not sure if i'm allowed to post links to other forums but here.

http://www.saabcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=409425

Much appreciated!
I've been sort of down on my luck and homeless/jobless/dogless/loveless lately but starting new job next week and I'll be diving into this thing.

Keep the faith. My 9-3 Aero has had one thing after another go wrong. Including a coil pack. Next up is all four disks and pads, keeping my fingers crossed that the calipers are all good.

Congrats on the new job. Hope it works out well for you.

Kia_Racer wrote: Keep the faith. My 9-3 Aero has had one thing after another go wrong. Including a coil pack. Next up is all four disks and pads, keeping my fingers crossed that the calipers are all good. Congrats on the new job. Hope it works out well for you.

I dno man most of those sounds like maintenance items.I have to do front and rear brake pads soon and replace the rear tires. I'm thinking about getting some stoptech brake pads for the front and I already have some EBC reds for the rear (wrongfully purchased). I had to replace all 3 ignition coils (300$) and replace a throttle body (used i think was like 50$) this past summer and the car now has no problems with the drive train aspect. Surprisingly I feel the car handles really well for a fwd car.

Yeah, the maintenance on mine was long deferred. Two months after I bought it the clutch started slipping, then disappeared. It can be done DIY just a pain.

Brakes came in yesterday, so tomorrow they go on.

My convertible rides nice, a little stiff in the spring rate. Might be aftermarket. The chassis is very stiff, when I jack up one side, both tires come off the ground.

I'm very happy with how it handles, especially coming back to fwd after being in rwd bliss.
Hopefully this thing turns out to be worth all this work I'm gonna have to do to get it right