A complaint of no heat in the 9-5 resulted in me driving it to Akron and back in the snow this week. On the trip I discovered that the heat really was not working. I also found that the car never got up to temperature.
Since the water temperature could have been the problem with no heat, I decided to tackle that first. With some help from the SaabCentral Forum and EconMancer.com’s writeups on the 9-5 I was able to determine that the problems were only mildly related.
The 9-5 blend door fix that I had done over the summer was a botched job. Due to the fact that I did the repair in 100 degree heat, I didn’t notice that I had merely jammed the blend door into the “cold air” position. After last night though, I could actually tell you how the whole thing works. Clocking the arm and the gear on the motor properly fixed my no heat problem.
I am still having an issue with it taking a long time to warm up. I found that the 9-5′s temp gauge is not really a gauge at all though. It simply tells you when things are cold, normal, or bad. If the car doesn’t come up to temp in a given period of time (I think 15 min) the needle drops to cold to tell you something needs fixed. I had replaced the thermostat over the summer when it was stuck closed. I used one that sticks open when it fails. I think it failed already because around town I don’t have an issue, but at highway speeds that car cannot maintain water temperature. I also bought a coolant temp sensor to replace while I’m at it.
With this done and some other little things fixed the 9-5 should be a great commuter for a while to come!
