I've got a 1998 Saturn SW2, 125K miles on original motor. As the thread title indicates, it suffers from the oil burning problems that seem to plague 1.9L DOHC Saturn four-bangers. I'm going to mention a few things that I've noticed, to see if it helps anybody who is more experienced to come up with a diagnosis, and ask a few questions about where to go from here.
- I should start by mentioning that because of my job as an OTR truck driver, the car sits for about three weeks at a time, then gets used for about a week before getting parked again. I can't say I've ever noticed oil puddles underneath the car after sitting.
- The oil consumption seems worst on long highway trips. It burned a good half-quart just going from Michigan to Pennsylvania on a recent long trip -- extended periods of 75 mph, 3400 rpm conditions.
- I don't notice any blue smoke or smell burned oil in the exhaust, thankfully.
- When I replaced all four spark plugs back in June, none of them looked to be oil-fouled. The #1 cylinder plug did have a couple of stains on the porcelain, but no obvious heavy, oily black fouling of the electrodes.
- ISTR that when I went after said #1 cylinder plug, the socket came back out of the hole with some oil on the end. This was *AFTER* a Saturn dealer had installed a new cam cover gasket last winter -- maybe something left over from previous leakage?
- I have tools and some mechanical knowledge, and I imagine I could figure out how to get the cam cover off. Two questions about that: how much will it tell me about why I'm losing oil, just by looking into the head, and that's not going to screw up the cam cover gasket Saturn put in it last winter, right? As in, you don't have to put a new one in every time you remove the cam cover?
- Finally, if there is something obvious in looking at the head, what kind of cost should I be expecting to get it fixed?