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1995 Saturn SL2 re-build thread

144K views 360 replies 31 participants last post by  david85 
#1 ·
Alright, I’ve decided to make a re-build thread for my new (to me) 1995 Saturn SL2 EV.

I’ve been thinking about an EV for a while, and did quite a bit of preliminary research over the last few months. My requirements are modest. 50 mile range, 5 seats (only kids in the back, so weight/space is not really an issue, just need 5 seat belts), sporty-ish (0-60 in the 9 second range with decent handling), able to cruise at 65 for 10-15 miles, and be easy for anyone to drive. No tricks, no funky shifting, no heaterless/air conditioning less cars allowed here. I settled on the idea of a basic 4 door compact car with a DC motor and lithium batteries, which I figured would fit the bill pretty well. Hopefully something new enough to have air bags and shoulder belts in the rear seats, but not so new that it’s completely computer controlled.

Right about that time, I saw this post here in the classified forum. Hmm, a free roller, that could be a nice way to get started! :D I have always liked the first gen Saturns, and I can’t weld so there’s definitely an advantage to buying something that already has battery boxes and motor mounts made. I emailed back and forth a bit with the owner, one thing led to another and I ended up buying it from him as is. Broken motor mounts, damaged Warp9, all electrics, 48x 130ah CALB cells and all! :eek:

Definitely a ‘fixer’ rather than a conversion at this point, but it still needs plenty of work. In addition to the obvious fixes needed to repair the damage, it also has no air conditioning (which I figure I have until next summer to figure out a solution), a non-functioning (but still installed, so hopefully fixable) clutch, a Logisystems 750a controller (one of the few still working from what I can tell, but I don’t hold high hopes for it in the long run) and it needs to have another motor mount added to prevent excess rotation of the motor. In addition to whatever else I find as I tear into the car…

I set up a transport to get the car from there to here (not cheap to ship a non running car!!), and in the meantime while I was waiting I came across this thread and now have a used Warp9 in my garage waiting to be installed.



While I was waiting for the car, I also procured a big, ugly, rusted engine hoist from Craigslist, bought a hand powered winch to get the roller up the driveway (which required drilling into my concrete floor and installing a half inch wedge anchor), and proceeded to clean out a space in my garage to work on the project.



More in a bit… :)
 
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#2 ·
Car arrived! Here’s my girls trying to figure out which one is our new car…



and here they are trying to figure out where to hook the winch line. :D (yes, the wheels are chocked...)



I was able to pull it up the hill into the garage without problem, I had one kid in the driver’s seat covering the brake, and the other in the passenger seat ready to yank up the e-brake on a moments notice! They took their jobs VERY seriously. Alas, there was no drama, it just pulled right up and in.

I fooled around with it for a little while, mostly making a wiring diagram and trying to figure out how everything was wired up. I also pulled the hood off, but that was the extent of my actual ‘work’ tonight. Most of the components have to come out in order to pull the motor (and replace the component shelf that was broken when the motor jacked up) so I want to make sure I’ve got a good complete wiring diagram before moving forward. Here’s a few ‘before’ pics of it nice and snug in the garage.







This is not going to be a quick project, I’ve got a lot of other stuff going on and really want this to be fun, not work. I’m also hoping to involve my daughters as much as I can (which will certainly slow things down a bit!). My hope is to get it up and running in a month or so, then take my time over the next few months fixing the little things.

I'd love to get the motor/trans out this weekend, but that's probably optimistic. We're in the middle of soccer season and the weather is real nice right now. Probably won't spend too many hours in the garage. :)
 
#3 ·
Good luck with the project.

Just a heads-up from a long-term Saturn SL owner:

These cars have an Achilles' heel in the transmission- there's a roll pin that retains gears in the cast differential carrier that works its way out. When it does that, the pin clips the transmission case, and the whole tranny grenades. Don't ask me how I know.

There's a pretty good overview of the problem and the various solutions here:

http://www.saturnfans.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-121625.html

There are some things NEVER to do with a Saturn SL: Never spin the tires. Never drive the car with the small spare tire on the front axle. Never use tires of different size on the front axle. Never spin one tire coming out of a corner, etc.

Since your electric motor puts a lot of torque into the transmission, and you're going to have it out on the bench during your rebuild, do yourself the favor of looking into this problem and taking it on.

TomA
 
#5 ·
Good luck david.

I think in this case (at least now) the trans wasnt the cause of the damage.
The lower trans mount let go which shifted the trans up to the battery box snapping the passengerside cv joint and bending the warp9 enough to make all sorts of naughty sounds. Ill be watching with a tear in my girlfriends eye heh.

Careful in reverse...
 
#6 ·
Good luck david.
hey thanks! Hope I do the car proud. :D

I think in this case (at least now) the trans wasnt the cause of the damage.
The lower trans mount let go which shifted the trans up to the battery box snapping the passengerside cv joint and bending the warp9 enough to make all sorts of naughty sounds. Ill be watching with a tear in my girlfriends eye heh.

Careful in reverse...
fixing the clutch ought to help out. Or a smoother controller. Maybe both. :cool:
 
#7 ·
A bit more progress today, I pulled out all the components mounted over the motor. First I made a good wiring diagram, then started disconnecting and labeling everything. It was a shame to pull it all apart, it was wired really cleanly! Anyway, with the tray and components out of the way, I could get a good look at the motor.





In the closeup below, you can see the damage. The closer I look, the better it seems! It looks like it possibly is just that the metal screen rotated and pushed up against the terminals and the plastic connector. It broke the connector out of the case, but the terminals actually look decent, just the plastic insulators got thrashed. I may not need that second motor after all! Too soon to really tell though…





The picture below really shows how far up the motor twisted. It pulled the rubber motor mount clean apart on the right side.





below are a few photo’s showing the ripped apart CV joint (which sprayed grease on everything near it!) and the lower torn trans mount. It also completely separated.





so far so good! I just may get the motor and trans out this weekend after all! :)
 
#8 · (Edited)
well, no more garage time over the weekend, so not much else done. I did spend some time translating my scribbles into a readable wiring diagram. I am not an electrical engineer! But I think it all makes sense. What do you think? See anything wonky? This was a running car for over a year, so I know it works. Anything you'd change?

I did not put in the details of the heater or BMS yet, just the inputs to their 'black boxes'.

edit: hmm, I can't seem to get the .pdf to display in the post, but I think it did attach correctly.
 

Attachments

#11 ·
I think Logisystems controller is at least partially responsible for the damage to motor/tranny mounts. Its notorious for lurching at low throttle due to poor design, which is especially evident at low gear like rear gear. Many people come up with kludges to limit throttle when in rear gear to avoid jumping backwards at the touch of a pedal.

So, after you fix up motor/tranny and start testing, be very careful with this controller.
 
#12 ·
yup i could drive it fine but not the GF.

David that relay energizes on 12V but holds pack voltage across the relay. It is the relay for the dc to dc converter (144Vdc in) so its not on all the time without the ignition switched. With the precharge resistor in place the dc to dc would groan and whine so I put in the relay 5 minutes after the precharge resistor went on the car.
 
#13 ·
my 'plan' is to get it up and running with the Logisystems, then do some power tests to see how it feels when running well. From that data, I'll make a decision on what controller to replace it with (higher or lower power). Unless it feels fine, then I'll just keep it.

I read somewhere, not sure where, about someone who added a resistor or something across the pot box only when in reverse, which lowered the power output when in reverse. I'll have to dig that up... That seems like it could be a good fix too.
 
#14 ·
Well, it’s basically all ready to pull out the motor, but I have to wait till the kids have enough free time to do it with me! With soccer, homework and going to a Giants game last night (gotta have priorities, right?) there just has not been time. I’ve pulled the driveshafts and got most of the wiring out of the way, but they are real excited about the actual removal part.

In the meantime, I’m thinking and planning. Cause I have to do something! :D So, I came up with a list of projects I’d like to do. Some of this is for now, some is for after it’s all back together and running, sort of a phase 2,3 etc. down the road.

1. Redesign the rear motor mount. Currently, the rear mount (CE of the motor) is a beefy strap clamped around the end, then connected to the stock upper motor mount location. I don’t like this setup because a portion of the clamp is actually over the inlet screen, which is not well attached to the motor itself. This appears to be what actually damaged the motor. The clamp to screen was solid, but the clamp and screen rotated together on the motor and damaged the posts and connector when everything broke and rotated. (you can see this in the photo’s on page 1). I see two options here. Either a) modify/remove the screen so the clamp is directly on the motor or b) replace the clamp with a simple CE bolt on plate that connects to the same mounting point. Either way I’ll add a lower torque bar to reduce motor rotation. This will require welding a tab to the frame, once I get the motor back in I’ll have to tow it to a shop to have that done. I’m sure the torque bar itself will be enough to solve the problem.

2. Install a blower for the motor. Maybe not needed, but I like the idea of not only extra cooling, but also the added protection of having the motor inlets covered up and fed by a filtered blower. Seems like it would help keep the motor cleaner and cooler. I’ll incorporate this in my redesign of the rear motor mount.

3. Replace the component shelf with polypropylene. It is currently clear acrylic (at least I assume It’s acrylic) which looks cool, but it is pretty difficult to work with. It’s brittle, and broken already from where the motor hit it. I thought about replacing it with Lexan, but that’s $$! And with all the wiring and components you can’t really see through it anyway, so there’s no real point in it being clear. I’ll just stick with something cheap and easy to work with, but a little more visually appealing than plywood (and quicker since I don’t have to seal and paint it).

3. Move 12 batteries up front. Right now all 48 are in the trunk, 36 in the recessed box and 12 in the trunk behind the rear seats. I’d like to move the 12 out of the trunk and up to the front. To clear out the trunk space and move some weight forward. I have not weighed the corners yet, but the car looks rear heavy. I’ll actually weigh it before doing this to confirm my suspicions that I could use a little more weight up front. The front rack already exists from when the car was lead acid, and the front to rear battery cables are already long enough to reach the front rack, so no major fab work will be needed.

4. Make polypropylene battery boxes front and rear. I’m intrigued by dtbaker’s use of 1/4" polypropylene and a heat welder and want to follow in his footsteps here with some nice looking DIY boxes. Well, maybe not nice looking, but definitely DIY. :)

5. Band all batteries in groups of 6 with a strapper. The strapping is just for organizational neatness and ease of handling.

6. And the biggie… add air conditioning! The car had it originally and still appears to have the evaporator and all the underhood wiring intact. But everything else was removed. Unfortunately the open fittings were not capped when the expansion valve was removed, so I assume the evaporator will be bad since it’s been open to the elements for a few years. BUT at least it should be replaceable, it’s not like I’m starting from ground zero and building an AC system. There’s plenty of room up front for a condenser, I’ll just have to decide how to handle the compressor. Either pulley off the Warp9, a second motor dedicated to a stock compressor, or a Masterflux style compressor. I lean towards the Masterflux since I don’t have a compressor at all right now, but it’s pretty steep $$ so we’ll see as I get further into that project research. Still a little time for this one, no urgency on getting aircon.

That’s it for now! Looks like we may have a few hours tomorrow after school, we’ll see if we can get that sucker yanked out!
 
#16 · (Edited)
3. Replace the component shelf with polypropylene. It is currently clear acrylic (at least I assume It’s acrylic) which looks cool, but it is pretty difficult to work with.

4. Make polypropylene battery boxes front and rear. I’m intrigued by dtbaker’s use of 1/4" polypropylene and a heat welder and want to follow in his footsteps here with some nice looking DIY boxes. Well, maybe not nice looking, but definitely DIY. :)

5. Band all batteries in groups of 6 with a strapper. The strapping is just for organizational neatness and ease of handling.

dude... you're dissing my polypro welding. :) ?!

actually, its very easy to work with, although it makes a mess of the garage with the chips having significant 'static cling' to everything. The heat-welding is easy... like caulking, but you really need the tip that lets you feed in the rod of material like a TIG welder to do a decent job. The poly gets a little flexy, and needs at least aluminum 'edges' to keep long spans straight.

the strapping thing is separate, but pretty easy way to make 3,4,5 cell blocks more manageable. The 'ends' may be better with plates to prevent bowing, but maybe not. I am not convinced that tight banding is better... if tightly constrained, than an overcharge event (causing by internal overheating) would be even more likely to vent rather than flex a little, so I don't see any real advantage to tight banding...
 
#15 ·
Finally got the motor out!!! It took me a week to find the time to do one hour of work… Told you this isn’t going to be a quick (re)build. :D

Here’s the obligatory ‘motor hovering over the car’ shot with my helper/hoist operator,



a few more of the motor/trans, and empty car.





Hope to have the motor/trans separated cleaned and inspected in the next few days, then I’ll see what I need to do in order to get it back together.
 
#18 ·
david,

I cant remember the weather where you are at. The reason I had them all in the trunk is to keep them the same temp. I worried about having some up front in 20F weather and some in the trunk at 40F perhaps for no reason. Also its easier to get them above 32F in the trunk for charging (spec sheet says cant charge below freezing.) but yes its bottom heavy.
 
#21 ·
quick question here! I just pulled the cover off the motor and peeked into the brushes. One of the brushes was not being held in by it's clip, as shown in the first photo below. I played with it a bit before taking this picture, so I don't know if all those marks were already there, or if I made them by putting the clip on and off before taking the photo.

The second photo shows the brush after I clipped it in place. It appears to be much more prominent than the adjacent brush. My assumption is that this is because it has been unclipped, and so it has not worn as much.

So, my questions are:

1) what happens on a motor if one of the brushes is unclipped like this? Will it damage the motor in any way? Is it possible that it's been this way for a long time with no ill affects?

2) Does it matter that now one brush is not worn the same amount as the rest?



 
#24 ·
how do I hold the pressure plate from turning when removing it's bolts from the flywheel? :confused:
Great question. One answer: borrow or buy an impact air hammer wrench. It will make short work of any bolt (great for exhaust parts) and will "surprise" the mass so much you won't even need to lock it somehow. I recommend Ingersoll Rand 2135 TiMax, you can find em on eBay. That's what I have and it's amazing. If you ever do other car work with big bolts, it will be worth the buy as a time-saving investment.
 
#23 ·
Regarding the brush, were you able to get that metal clip to hold it down properly again? If yes, then I agree its not an issue.

For the pressure plate, ideally you would jamb it with something. Even a thick steel coat hanger that is twist tied to something on the transmission and the flywheel might do the trick. Or in some cases you can smack the handle of the wrench with your palm hard enough that the inertial of the flywheel is enough to break the bolt torque.

Last time I had mine apart, I was able to do it all by hand even with loctite on the bolts. Although if they are rusty, that may not apply.

Regarding the van? you know the answer to that;)

Just a suggestion, but you might find it easier to install and remove the motor and transmission assembly with the transmission mount on the transmission itself and undoing the hold down nut from under the car instead (Metric 15mm). That way the stem hangs down when you lower everything in place and aligns that half of the powertrain for you.
 
#25 ·
i do have an air wrench, but I prefer to not use it unless I have to. It just seems so 'brute force'-ish... :) Plus, while it may help remove stuff, I'd still need a way to hold everything still on reassembly.

was able to use the motor mount strategically wedged into the pressure plate held with a large crescent wrench to hold the pressure plate from rotating while removing the bolts.

So far, everything looks great. I haven't found anything I need to replace yet. Even the clutch disc looks new. Which I guess isn't surprising since Dex said the clutch didn't work, so the disc essentially was used as a fixed coupler. There is a slight runout on the flywheel (which has the ring gear removed, btw), maybe .007" at the most (crude measurement with calipers), but I don't feel any vibration in the motor when spun up on 12v with just the flywheel attached. And there's zero wobble, nice and flat. I don't plan on removing the flywheel since that would potentially open up a whole can of worms regarding the coupler, and since the motor and everything looks fine I see no reason to anyway.

I've got a lot of degreasing to do (inside the bellhousing, and the outside of the whole trans) then it will be on to reassembly!

oh yeah, I peeked in the speed sensor port and the diff pin looks perfectly centered. No worries there!
 
#26 ·
I don't think the diff pin comes loose unless you're doing something silly with the car although maybe I've just been lucky with mine. My flywheel also had some wobble and runout to it, but I had that all taken care of the last time it was apart. Maybe its a saturn thing but the truth is, a 4cyl vibrates a certain amount anyway, so whatever defects they had at the factory were probably never noticed in most cases.

I thought about suggesting an impact driver, but that is a bit harsh for such a small bolt.
 
#28 · (Edited)
I don't think the diff pin comes loose unless you're doing something silly with the car although maybe I've just been lucky with mine.
The Dif Pin issues is only parent if you are doing burn outs.
Well, yes and no.

I have seen 4 cars with diff pin failures, and probably 100 without. 3 of the failures were 5 speed cars, one automatic. All had over 100,000 miles, but I've heard of failures as low as 60,000.

What actually works the pin loose is differential action, that is, loading and spinning the gears that are on the diff pin. If you never turn the front wheels, and never turn one tire faster than the other, the gears on the diff pin would never be turned in the carrier, stressing the roll pin that retains it, and the whole thing would stay in position forever. The likelihood that the pin will move is directly proportional to the amount of differential action (and stress) it is subjected to.

Spinning one tire is the worst thing you can do with the car. Second worst is driving on the temporary spare. That's probably what did in my '95 wagon 5 speed. 50 miles on that spare. (BTW, there is absolutely nothing in the Owner's manual about not running the spare on the front axle.) I know a road racer who puts serious stress on a stock gearbox, which hasn't failed in 4 seasons. He thinks its because he isn't using the diff much, rolling on power mostly with the wheels in a straight line, and never spinning one of them.

My gearbox actually broke at 1mph, pulling away from the curb up a steep hill, which is all differential action, and maximum stress on it given the gentle way my wife and I drove it.

Its something to think about, and once you crack a transmission open on the street, you think carefully about how you are stressing that lowly diff pin. Be careful not to spin the tires on snow and ice. No heavy torque applied with the wheels turned sharply. No burnouts. Same size tires always, with the same pressure side to side. So yes, abuse will drive out the diff pin, but so will other operational situations that are not really abusive. Its not really a luck thing- frequent, high-torque or sustained differential action WILL work the pin to failure, its just that such operation doesn't usually happen in most of the cars on the road.

The big problem is that these cars are now old, and in most cases you don't know how the transmissions have been treated the whole time, so its a bit of a crapshot. The best you can do is treat them right yourself, and keep your fingers crossed. Oh, yeah, and grab a low mileage spare if one crosses your path. They've gotten pricey, especially when you need one "right now..."
 
#29 ·
Got the motor/trans mated together last night, everything looks good! Did a quick 12v spin and it was nice and smooth. I also recived a box of parts from EVSource.com :D Motor blower kit and rear motor mount. It looks like their prefabbed mount will be pretty close right out of the box, so I decided to buy and modify it rather than have one built locally from scratch. I will still need to have the torsion mount made after it's all installed though.

No pics/video of the reassembly process, but nothing too exciting happened. You've seen one clutch you've seen them all! :rolleyes:

I've got some cutting to do, and need to go buy a new blade for my jigsaw (I HATE losing tools!) before I can start. The garage could use a little organizing, cleaning, and sweeping before rolling the car back in as well. Not sure if I'll get to reinstalling the motor/trans today or not, we'll see how it goes.
 
#30 ·
any Saturn owners who are looking here, I have a question if you happen to know/remember... Is the center of the motor/engine in line between the two bolts for the upper passenger side motor mount? My motor was mounted that way, but it does not look right to me. To my eye, it seems like the center of the motor ought to be about 1" rearward from the centerline of the two upper bolts.

Am I making sense?

anyway, motor's back in the car, but I don't have the passenger side mounts re-done yet, cause I'm just not confident on where the motor ought to be...

Unfortunately, I sorta have to do something tonight (probably just a temp solution) so I can move the hoist that's currently holding the motor and roll the car all the way in the garage tonight! :eek:
 
#31 ·
Unfortunately, I'd have to remove one of my battery boxes to answer that question.

All I did to set my motor in position was line it up so that it was parallel with the radiator support at the front of the engine bay, then lift the passenger side as far as needed to make the CV shaft roughly 1" abovethe K member since thats how high it is on the transmission [driver's] side where the OEM mount was still intact.
 
#32 · (Edited)
I don't have a Saturn currently, but I've had two and worked on a couple more, and I'm pretty sure you're right- the frame side pad for the Torque Axis Mount is definitely not centered on the crankshaft.

Looking around on Google, I actually found a picture that shows this:

http://arrc.epnet.com/autoapp/8956/chiltonimages/8956/89563pc1.jpg

Notice how the plane that passes through the centerline of the spark plug holes, which is centered between the camshafts and is plumb above the crankshaft below, are not in line with the two frame holes for the TA mount.

IIRC, there are two reasons for this. First, the engine side mounting pad for the TA mount, which is cast into the timing cover, is not centered on the crankshaft. I think its a little forward of that. Second, I don't think the TA mount itself is actually symmetrical. I think the frame site mounting holes are a little offset from the engine side mounting holes, but I don't have one here to check.

In any case, the picture above clearly shows what you surmised- that the engine crankshaft centerline is about an inch rearward of the center of the two threaded holes in the frame where the TA mount bolts in. Here's another set of shots that don't show it as well, but confirm what I remembered about it (and the PITA water pump change I had forgotten about...)

http://mustardcat.brinkster.net/p3g/Misc/saturnrebuild/saturnrebuild.htm

Scroll down to the shots of the motor fully dressed with the TA mount on it. Sort of looks like what you thought, but it isn't very clear.

Anyway, I think you're right, and without a positive location for the old lower passenger side mount, either, you're kind of guessing where the motor should be located. A good check is to find the centerline of the drive wheels and compare it to the plane of the motor.

There are several ways to do that, but I'd mark a line on top of the motor that's parallel with the motor shaft. Then I'd hang plumb bobs from the centers of the wheel hubs, mark the floor, roll the car back two feet, connect the marks with a straight line, return the car to the original spot and take a look. The motor line should be parallel to the line on the floor...

And while you're at it, put an angle finder on the motor and make sure its level side to side, too.

HTH...
 
#33 ·
Thanks for the info!! Vertically I used an angle finder and just set the motor flat. For the front/back, I ended up tying a line across the strut towers and then just eyeballing the motor to the line. It's close enough! I took some measurements and need to have a piece of angle cut/welded to fit. For the time being, I strapped the motor up with a tie down and moved on to installing the axles.

Holy crap, I can't get the driver side axle into the transmission. :mad: i feel like such a dope. Not sure why it won't seat, but I'm frustrated, giving up for tonight and will try again with a fresh attitude in the morning.

good night.
 
#34 ·
Alright, with the light of a new morning, the axle slipped right in. Go figure. :confused: Actually, the key was simple, I put the trans in 1st gear which held the internal spline from rotating a little better and let the axle rotate relative to the mating spline just enough to fine a nice engagement. sort of a 'duh' moment.

Anyway, here are a few pics from the last few days...

here's the inside of the trans when I split it apart. Not too bad, a bit greasy. It cleaned up nicely, but I forgot to take a picture of it looking clean.



here we are dropping the motor in. You can see the new endplate on the CE side, it is an off the shelf bolt on (many bolt hole options) mounting plate with a foot. I like that better than the clamp that was on there before. I had measured the angle of tilt that ended up working to pull the motor out, and set it to that before starting. Motor/trans dropped right in with the help of some guiding hands. :)



this is more or less the motor's final resting spot. you can see the strap up to the hoist still holding up the motor end, the string tied between the strut towers, and the angle gauge. I still need to make the final connection between the new end plate and the existing rubber mounts which will be simple, two angles welded together. I can cut and fab the parts, but will have to take them to someone to be welded together. Oh, you can see the intake cover on the motor for the blower in this pic too. It does not enter the motor in the most ideal spot from a mounting/routing point of view, but it will work fine.



time to get ready for some soccer games, I hope to swing by the hardware store and pick up some angle iron later today and mess around with the mount. I also bought a sheet of HDPE to make my component shelf, I have to transfer all my components and wiring over to that too.
 
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