I got the car put back together on Saturday, after changing the spark plugs. I had started to work on removing the thermostat, when I realized there was no way I was going to be able to get to it. At least not without spending another day doing tear-down, and the special tools required to disconnect the fuel lines. See, you have to pull the injectors and entire lower intake manifold off to get to the thermostat, which is firmly installed right at the bottom of the ‘V’ in the engine. *grumble*

So I put the car back together, to make sure I could actually get it that far apart and back in one piece, running the way it should.

No problems. It’s running better than it has in quite some time… but…

The thermostat is certainly stuck open. So I -has- to be replaced. Since I need to get the timing belt changed, I figure I’ll let the person who does the belt take care of the thermostat at the same time.

I simply do not have the tool to do the fuel line disconnect, and I don’t want to ruin the connectors. Otherwise, I would have kept taking things out, and worked my way through that third layer of engine to get to the thermostat.

Oh, and I ended up completely removing the EGR pipe, re-seating the compression fitting in the EGR solenoid, and putting it all back together. The Judges have reviewed the previous scoring, and determined the L300 was inappropriately rewarded. No point will be assigned for the EGR pipe.

Six new spark plugs are in, torqued, and ready to fire!

But not without sacrifice.

I was unable to remove one of the coolant hoses. It’s a very squishy hose from the throttle body to the block. It mates with the block at a 90 degree angle and was impossible to break free. After damaging the hose, I decided it was worth cutting it. I’ll need to get a new hose. That should run me about $10. Point Saturn.

But I was able to remove the intake manifolds, and get them cleaned, and that exposed the ignition coils and spark plugs. So I changed all six plugs. Six points Bryan.

In the process of taking off the throttle body (upper intake), I had to remove a pipe that routes exhaust back into the intake. It uses compression fittings on both ends of the pipe. I was unable to break the compression fitting free on the top side. Instead, the fitting spun on the pipe and the threaded coupling came out of the EGR regulator. Oh well, at least it came out and we didn’t have another incident like the power steering pump. No points, draw.

Then I went to do the thermostat…. I can’t get to it. My 3″ socket extension is about 6″ too short. Point Saturn.

Later today I’ll try and make a run to the parts store with Kylenes car, and see if I can get the hose I need, and the socket extension.

Here’s a bunch of photos I’ve been taking of the progress / work.

Tuesday morning on the way to work, the service engine soon light came on. Then it started flashing. About the same time I noticed the car was lagging, sputtering at idle, and started to have a bit of a knock.

Uh oh. I got to work (the whole 2.3 miles it is) and didn’t think much of it. Until I tried to go home for lunch. The car was shaking… the SES light flashing… I plugged in my ODBII reader, and pulled three codes off the engine computer. P0128, P0301, P0154.

I babied it home, where I put it in the drive way, and I took Kylene’s car back to work.

My 2003 Saturn L300 has 99,950 miles on it. It’s on the original timing belt, and the original set of spark plugs. It’s also on the first thermostat.

That’s not a bad run.

So about those codes…

P0128 – Temperature. The car isn’t warming up as fast as it should. I’d noticed this last year when it got -really- really cold. This year, it’s been happening more frequently, and although the car used to be warm by the time I got out of the neighborhood, lately it’s just been warming up by the time I get to work. It doesn’t cycle much either, and I’ve noticed a decrease in fuel economy (from 27 to about 23mpg, on highway). I think the car has been running in “open loop”.

P0301 – Cylinder #1 is misfiring. I’m not getting backfires, but it’s misfiring. You can smell fuel in the exhaust.

P0154 – The exhaust O2 sensor before they catalytic convert is giving bad / strange readings. Probably a result of the 301, unspent fuel in the exhaust, which will eventually cause damage to the cat.

After some lurking and some posts on the saturnfans.com forums, I’ve had a couple of former Saturn techs to take care of the 301 and 128’s first. A new thermostat and housing was $30 — that’ll fix the 128. The 301 is likely spark plug related, since it’s the original, OEM set of plugs on the car.

Spark plugs and a thermostat? Oh yeah. I can do that…. well… I think.

GM must hate their customers. Yes, my V6 3.0L engine with plenum coated intake manifolds DOHC, and ignition coils looks darn sweet when the hood is up and the engine is clean. Heck, it’s inherited some of the engine from the corvette. But.. it’s a bear to work on. You have to remove the entire intake manifold and throttle body to get to anything of importance. Plugs? You’ll be taking three layers off the engine, draining some of the coolant. Thermostat? Same three layers come off, then you remove the top radiator hose, re-position the oil dipstick, get our your 9″ 3/8″ ratchet extension, and remove the thermostat from the engine block.

I convinced myself, that for $350 of dealership labor fees and nearly 200% markup on parts prices that I could do this and rule out a lot of ‘what if’ / diagnostics on what’s wrong with my engine. Who knows, maybe I’ll have the confidence to try the timing belt & water pump replacement if this does solve the problem. That’s an $1100 job at a dealership, and getting to the plugs and thermostat give me expirence in ripping the engine down more than half-way to to the where it has to be in order to change the timing belt.

So for the last few days, the car has been sitting in the garage, the electric heater has been warming it up, and Thursday I made a run to the part store on the way home from work to pick up a few tools (torque wrench, E-socket set, throttle cleaner, de-greaser, plugs, thermostat, etc…

Thanks to this Latitude D620 tear-apart guide, this $5 part, and a little patience I got my laptop track pad buttons fully functioning this weekend!

When I bought the used laptop, the top set you would normally use with the track point in the keyboard were not working at all. So you had to mouse two handed with your thumbs in an awkward position.

If I had been paying attention, I’d have picked up a few of the LCD hinges as well. The set that came on the laptop are pretty… weak, and let the screen wobble a bit. I’ve tightened up the screws, and it’s clearly the hinges themselves that have play in them.

I also have a build of Haiku running on the real hardware. Fascinating!