1994-2002 [Subscribe to Daily Digest] |
Just reporting back a little success story. I had a problem where a few months ago I heard a terrible grinding noise coming from under the battery. There is a secondary air system under there fitted to US models to pump cold air into the exhaust for a couple minutes after a cold start. It's not serious if it doesn't work, so i ignored it for a while. Later I developed a new version of this problem. The grinding sound was gone, but on cold starts the RPMs would dip and rise, audibly and visibly (not just the rpm needle, but the lights all dim then bright then dim then bright), quite bad looking/sounding.
I thought i might have an airleak as someone here suggested, and i replaced various vac hoses that looked so so. Most looked fine. This didn't help.
I also cleaned the throttle body and IAC and probably most importantly, the purge valve, which was operating correctly once I had it out and applied 9V bat power to it. (see: http://www.saabnet.com/tsn/bb/NG900/index.html?bID=104449 for instructions).
I checked the little plastic valves leading to the SAI from a vac line off the fire wall. They seemed to work correctly. That really only left the SAI module itself. I got one off a wrecked car for $10 to try it (indie wanted $400 to replace it with a rebuilt one).
I didn't see any easy way to increase my access to it once my car was up on ramps. I think you would have to take off the bumper to get clear access to it, but, i was (barely) able to remove it by: a) unbolting the 3 botls, b) unplugging the wire harness and c) removing the 2 hoses, first one, then the last hose was long enough to be able to pull it out of the tiny opening under the bumper before undoing that hose too.
Swapped for the other SAI i had, and pushing it back in was 5x harder than taking it out. I found I had to do it by only plugging in the wire, then not attaching the hoses until it was popped back in through it's tiny opening. Otherwise there isn't enough maneoverability. But that way there was. BARELY.
If you ever have to do this, you might want to take the bumper off, but it can be done without doing that. I just did. And guess what? My idle surge up and down (along with RPM and lights dimming/brightening) are all fixed. Wasn't an air leak. Was a failing SAI.
Possibly clogged? I don't know. Maybe I should take apart the old one to figure it out and/or repair it? Thoughts/Comments?
Hope this helps someone in the future.
TomL
posted by 67.189.111...
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