Hello!

[krazy Dan]

Hey everyone. My name is Danny and I am brand new to this forum but not to forums in general. So i am familiar to how they flow.

About Me: I'll admit when I was younger I was quick to jump in my hopped up z28 camaro and burn more fuel in an hour then most people burned in a week. But now that I have some age on me I know the importance of keeping my dollars in my pocket and not in the fuel pump!

My Car: My current commuter is a 1997 Saturn SL2 dual overhead cam 1.9L 4 cylinder with a 5 speed manual trans. This is the 3rd one I have owned in the last 10 years or so. They are really cheap cars and can get great miles per gallon. I'm averaging 28-32 combined miles per gallon on my current car with 169k on the clock.

I am joining this site in hopes to learn some new tips and tricks on how to up my gas mileage and hopefuly give out some valuable info at the same time!

[bobc455]

Welcome aboard!

I had a '94 SL2 for many years - the car is no longer mine but I know whose it is and love it.

In fact I think I have a brand new set of floormats around that I've never used... And a valvecover gasket set...

I'm sure you know about the temp sensor issue by now.

Does yours burn oil? Mine used to go through a quart every 1k miles, but I was able to get rid of that problem.

-Bob C.

[theholycow]

Originally Posted by bobc455

Does yours burn oil? Mine used to go through a quart every 1k miles, but I was able to get rid of that problem.

Wait, how did you get rid of that problem? I thought it was usually a ring job...

[krazy Dan]

Wait, how did you get rid of that problem? I thought it was usually a ring job...

On a Saturn forum that I am a member of many people claim that just simply changing the type of oil that you run (brand & thickness) has a huge effect on oil burning in the 1.9L. Next oil change I'm going to try this because all three of the Saturns I have owned burnt oil with mileages ranging from 80-180k.

Check this forum out. Its a great place for all info dealing with Saturns!

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[bobc455]

Yeah, the problem was with the rings - but you don't need to replace them, you only need to free them because they get "stuck" with carbon buildup.

My solution was this simple: Get some "engine oil system cleaner" from your local parts store, and run it through before an oil change.

That freed up my rings, and my oil consumption dropped so that I never had to add oil in 4000 mile change intervals (although it would drop about a quart through that 4k miles, down to the "add" line).

Call it snake oil if you want, but I can prove it worked for me and I still use it on occasional oil change on all of my vehicles.

-Bob

[bobc455]

It's also worked on every other Saturn I've tried...

(I learned this in my days as a tire monkey at one of those national tire places)

[theholycow]

That's actually very cool. I thought the problem was that the rings wore out. In that case, it seems like not a big deal at all.