Question For Queens NYC Saturn Owners

[Hal97]

Apparently Saturn of Long Island City has gone out of business, closing
their showroom and service center. Where have the records for the
repairs on our cars gone? As for finding a service center in case I
need parts, I did a search on Saturn's website and the closest
dealerships are in Harlem or Bay Ridge Brooklyn. I thought there was a
Saturn Dealership in Jamaica on Sutphin Blvd I think.
When you call the Saturn LIC service number, it just says that the
number is disconnected.
You would think that Saturn would leave some forwarding address where
it's customers can find the closest service dept.
I'm shocked that they closed and shocked that they just left their
customers like this.

 

[shoppa]

Apparently Saturn of Long Island City has gone out of business, closing
their showroom and service center. Where have the records for the
repairs on our cars gone?

All the maintenance done at any Saturn dealership goes into some
central computer repository and any other dealer can call it up
instantly from their terminal. This was pretty nifty stuff 16 or 17
years ago...

Tim.

 

[Chuck]

Apparently Saturn of Long Island City has gone out of business . . .

Another one goes the way of Saturn of Smithtown and Saturn of Sunrise
(Lynbrook).
Doesn't give me a 'warm fuzzy' feeling!

 

[Hal97]

I think it's more than just one. The company that owned that dealership
in LIC also owned some in the Bronx and elseweher in Queens. I'll bet
those are gone too.

what's up with Saturn? Are they going the way of the Oldsmobile? GM is
really doing badly and I'll bet Saturn is suffering form the effects of
that.

I think GM missed the boat on building Hybrids. I think those are the
way of the future. Toyota seems to be doing well with them.

I like my 97SC2 a lot but I would have to think twice about buying
another Saturn if the dealerships are closing down. Also, I would like
my next car to be a hybrid. 60mpg is hard to turn down.

 

[blah blah]

I think it's more than just one. The company that owned that dealership
in LIC also owned some in the Bronx and elseweher in Queens. I'll bet
those are gone too.

what's up with Saturn? Are they going the way of the Oldsmobile? GM is
really doing badly and I'll bet Saturn is suffering form the effects of
that.

GM's is going about some assnine way of shaking up the unions. A 130+
billion dollar company doesnt simply vanish. What they need is
employee's to start paying a copay when they see a doctor etc. You wont
believe how badly GM's benefits get ripped off everytime a GM employee
sets foot in a hospital.

I think GM missed the boat on building Hybrids. I think those are the
way of the future. Toyota seems to be doing well with them.

The way of the future to screw you over. 2 totally different systems
crammed into already cramped vehicles. Oh yeah sure I'll work on them,
the question is are you ready to pay out the ass for them?

I like my 97SC2 a lot but I would have to think twice about buying
another Saturn if the dealerships are closing down. Also, I would like
my next car to be a hybrid. 60mpg is hard to turn down.

The EPA ratings don't exceed 55mph. Hybrid motors do not operate above
55mph. Once you get on the highway and do real highway speeds in a
vehicle thats now 1000 pounds heavier you can kiss those epa numbers
good bye.

Compair any hybrid to its gas only counterpart. On average you would
have to drive 100,000 MILES before you even start saving the price
difference with gas at $3 dollars a gallon. The whole point behind
saving gas is to "save money". Not to save gas. Why no one see's this
point is beyond me. I'll say again, the point behind good gas mileage is
to save money, brand new hybrids sure as hell wont save you a dime. If
you want to save money and get good gas mileage as well, buy a Feiro.
I've seen super looking Feiro's for under a grand. Think of the money
that could be saved!!! You can drive a million miles on those savings!
. . .
Ethanol, Hydrogen, and displacement on demand, those are the future...

 

[IYM]

Saturn of Smithtown moved and is now Saturn of Medford. They closed the
Smithtown store as there was no room for inventory, as well as the road it
was on was horrible. They lost more than a couple of new cars bought by
people not familiar with the car trying to get out on that road for the
first time with it. In Medford they have a huge lot, a brand new building
and their own traffic light. I also believe Saturn of Sunrise moved to
become Saturn of Massapequa, but I could be wrong.

Anyway, like I said the just built Saturn of Medford last year, and I was
there getting a service 3 weeks ago and asked why they had two used Mercedes
in the showroom as well as the Saturns. The sales guy showed me the lot and
said they ran out of inventory and were expecting a new delivery that day,
so they needed to throw something in the showroom and they had a couple 2
year old coupes that were just traded in as well as a Hummer (my guess is
the owners overextended themselves or something). I had been there only a
week before and the lot was full, so the product is moving out from there I
guess...

Scott

 

[Chuck]

I was just looking at the April Consumer Reports - not one domestic car
in their Top 10 picks! First time that has happened. The "Big 3"
better smarten up real quick. I know people who said PanAm couldn't go
under. There was also a "dollars & sense" analysis of hybrids in this
issue. You will NOT be buying a hybrid after reading this article. And
don't be holding your breath for those fuel cell vehicles. Re: Saturn
- we still have three S-series in the family - I don't think they are
building them that well anymore. If you look at the Consumer's
reliability ratings, Saturns have many more black spots than the
Japmobiles. If they do away with the polymer body panels I won't have
any reason to buy another Saturn. And trying to bring Saturn back into
the "fold" was a VERY bad idea. (Note: Saturn of Sunrise did NOT move
to Massapequa.)

 

[Mark T.B. Carroll]

I was just looking at the April Consumer Reports - not one domestic car
in their Top 10 picks! First time that has happened. The "Big 3"
better smarten up real quick. I know people who said PanAm couldn't go
under. There was also a "dollars & sense" analysis of hybrids in this
issue. You will NOT be buying a hybrid after reading this article.

To counterbalance that, 2 of CR's 10 top picks were hybrids - the Toyota
Prius and Highlander Hybrid. And, in the printed magazine issue, they
got the math wrong in that analysis by figuring depreciation in twice or
something. On the website you'll see they've corrected it.

And don't be holding your breath for those fuel cell vehicles. Re:
Saturn - we still have three S-series in the family - I don't think
they are building them that well anymore. If you look at the
Consumer's reliability ratings, Saturns have many more black spots
than the Japmobiles.

(snip)

Yes - I think some older ones still come out as reasonable used cars,
like our '98 SW2, but current Saturns seemed to do pretty unimpressively
against the competition from CR's point of view. No doubt there'll be
plenty of people disagreeing, though.

-- Mark

 

[satyr]

GM's is going about some assnine way of shaking up the unions. A 130+
billion dollar company doesnt simply vanish.

And a ship the size of the Titanic could never sink.

GM has a market cap of about $13B, about the same as Campbell Soup. GM
is a $22 dollar stock that lost $15/share last year. They have huge
debt and are now paying big time interest due to their junk bond
credit rating. If this is a master plan to save money by eliminating
debt through bankruptcy, they are right on course.

What they need is
employee's to start paying a copay when they see a doctor etc. You wont
believe how badly GM's benefits get ripped off everytime a GM employee
sets foot in a hospital.

If I was in charge of GM I would put all of my diminishing political
sway behind universal health care. Might not be enough to save you
but at least you would be fondly remembered.

 

[Chuck]

And, in the printed magazine issue, they got the math wrong in that analysis by figuring >depreciation in twice or something.

Even with the correction, most of the hybrids still leave you in the
"red" after 5 years.
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/...tPageIndex=1&resultIndex=1&searchTerm=Hybrids
And the ones that don't are virtually a "break-even" investment.
U.S. News has drawn the same conclusion . . .
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/050509/9hybrid.htm
I don't like buying a conventional vehicle at the beginning of a new
model year because of the wrinkles that aren't ironed out yet. I think
it will be at least 10 years before I have enough confidence in hybrids
to take the plunge. And they better be better than a "break-even"
scenario by then.