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2001 9-5 hard start, not as much power as there should be

830 Views 6 Replies 4 Participants Last post by  Skipshot, 
D
I recently purchased a 01 9-5 just as a beater. It has the 3.0 v6, and came with a ton of receipts. I'm not familiar with the v6 saabs, so my father took it for a ride with me and said it doesn't have as much power as it should. When starting it cold, it generally stalls the first try, but sputters with some light black smoke breifly after starting a second time, but it stalls out if you touch the throttle. Once it's warmed up, the car runs nice and smooth. After running it for a while, the oil light will come on, but flickers very lightly as if it was barely being triggered. Shut the car off and start it again, and the light goes away. I noticed faint rainbow swirls along the passenger side of the car, but I couldn't find any obvious oil leaks. It has plenty of oil in it. The receipts that came with the car go back to 2010, including regular oil changes and such. There were also plenty of receipts from a reputable Saab dealer in my area for oil pan gaskets, valve cover gaskets, oil filler neck, and even a complete "steam clean" of the engine and oil pan. The oil pan and valve cover gaskets were done several times through the years. This car was owned by a older lady who had maintenance done religiously. Considering how often the oil was changed and how the oil pan was all cleaned about 20,000 miles ago, I kind of ruled out the whole sludge problem I heard about with these motors. The check engine light is not on, so I'm at a loss. I noticed even if you go WOT, the turbo gauge never goes up more than half way. I don't know if it could be a dud gauge, or a lack of pressure from the turbo, or what. It doesn't appear to smoke when warm. Hopefully this wasn't too confusing, and you guys can help me out
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K

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#2 ·
Is there a receipt for a replacement turbo in there somewhere? The GT17 low-pressure turbo on that engine is not very robust and the bearings will fail. Pull the short rubber pipe off the throttle body and check for oil in it. If there's more than a little misting of oil inside the pipe then you know the turbo needs fixin'.

The "turbo" gauge is run by the ECU and is more of an engine load indicator than a vac/boost gauge. If you don't have the transmission in "Sport" mode then it's rare to get that gauge more than half way into the orange band since the ECU and TCU are running the "economy" program.

If the engine is high-mileage then the low oil pressure usually means the oil pump and/or bearings are worn. Moving up the oil weight scale might help you; I run 15W-40 in my son's V6 with 180k miles. There were no real sludge issues with the V6.
 
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Discussion Starter · #3 ·
I just pulled off the rubber hose at the turbo, and there's oil everywhere. I didn't think it would be the turbo because there wasn't any blue smoke. I have a 1999 9-3 se 4cyl behind my house as a parts car. I know that the v6 turbo is smaller, but is there a way I could put the 4cyl turbo on or is it completely different?
 
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#6 ·
The B308 V6 turbo does not have a waste gate and only puts out about 6psi at most so none of the B235 turbos will work. You can get a new CHRA for $200 or so (cheaper if you go for the ones made from Chinesium, like I did on EBay). You'll have to pull the front exhaust manifold to rebuild the turbo.
 
Skipshot

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#7 ·
Reviving an old thread. I had my car stall at start up intermittently and after the third time I took it to my mechanic. He plugged a Tech 2 in and he couldn't find a clear culprit so he checked vacuum lines and found a disconnected one and plugged it back in to solve the problem.

I'd say this was the car's third problem with vacuum lines disconnecting, but at least it is a cheap and easy fix.
 
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