Alternator replacement

May 09, 2005 7 Replies
E

Well, my alternator passed to the great beyond as I was exiting a freeway. Fun stuff. It had foul electrical smelling smoke coming out of it.



Now, I have changed out a few alternators in my time, but never on a Saab. Looks to me like the upper motor mount needs to be removed. Which is fine, because the upper mount appears to need replacing anyway. This may possibly be a bigger job than I want to take on, but I gotta try.



I note that EEurpoarts has a $79 R&R tool for the motor mount. Yikes. $79 for a tool to do something that I will probably never need to do again concerns me. Is this tool a requirement? How is the engine supported when the upper mount is removed? Should I just suck it up and send her off to a shop? I HATE to do that, because I have found most Saab repairs to be remarkably easy so far, and there is that whole "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" thing, too.



Any advice is greatly appreciated.



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C

What year and model is your Saab? In mine (80's 8V C900's) the alternator isn't a big pain to get out but there are lots of other items in the way (A/C compressor, hoses to/from heater valve inside the car, etc.) and they all need to be moved.

Haven't seen that - wonder what it is.. Will take a look now that I'm curious!

Regards,

Craig.

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E

Man, what a dope am I. It is a 1992 9000 2.3L Turbo hatchback.

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P

Yes I can see that'll be a trickyish part to replace. I was quite pleased when the noisy bearing I could hear on my 9000 turned out to be simply the water pump and not the alternator !

What's a " 2.3L " btw ? Your idea of a CS as opposed to a CSE ?

Graham

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V

I'm right in the middle of doing the same with my '94 9000 CS turbo. Do a search of this board, first:

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Now, if together we can actually figure out how to get beyond just unscrewing the top and bottom alternator bolt, we'll be home free....

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E

I gave up and paid a shop. I needed to replace the motor mounts as well, and that did require a $79 press tool to do. The car has 130K on it, if it makes it to 260, I'll consider buying the tool then. :-) I actually know the mechanic involved, and he said there is a fairly specific order to getting that sucker out. I figured my daughters already know too many swear words.

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P

Sorry. Figured it out after posting. Don't normally see ppl put the L there - in fact to be pedantic it should be lower case - that's probably what confused me.

Graham

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