How difficult is it to replace the alternator in an 1993 SL1? When I had my Saturn last in for an oil change and safety inspection, the dealer recommended that I replace the alternator (probably 5 years old) and battery (probably 4 years old), saying that they were both showing up as "marginal" in his tests. The car has 118,000 miles, and is now used as a secondary car, driven once a week or so. I've had the car since new, and it has always done very well. So before giving it away, I was wondering about using it to learn to do more mechanical things on cars, and an alternator seemed relatively safe compared to others. Yes, I would do the alternator and battery at the same time. Any advice or experience? (Including: You're crazy, don't bother, not worth it.) Thanks. Greg Gregory Watson --
How difficult is it to replace the alternator in an 1993 SL1? You must remove the right front wheel and inner fender plastic. It is really not that bad after that but you must have some kind of mechanical ability. Removing some of the fasteners is a matter of feel because they can hardly be seen from the angle you are working from. Be sure to disconnect the battery before you begin. I doubt I would replace the alt until it was defective, not marginal. However I would replace the battery. If your battery could be on the way out, it could over work your alt causing them both to go bad at the same time in the new future. I have an '92 and the battery seems to only last about 3 years and then I get trouble. Maybe because of the case around it, I am not sure. This time I bought an "Interstate" battery instead of a Delco. Maybe it will last longer than 3 years this time. James
Alternator Replacement Procedure: 1. Write down all of your radio station presets (optional) 2. Disconnect negative battery cable (most assuredly NOT optional) 5/16" wrench works well 3. Jack up the right front corner of the car 4. Put a jack stand under the car. 5. Remove the right front wheel 6. Remove the two plastic splash shields (you pull the plastic center pins out of the fasteners to remove). 7. Use a 14 mm wrench to remove tension from the accessory belt (turn wrench clockwise on the bolt in the center of the idler pulley). 8. Move the belt off of a pulley to remove tension from it. 9. Remove the 10 mm bolt holding the splash shield onto the alternator 10. Unsnap the splash shield from the alternator. 11. Unbolt the cable running from the alternator to the starter AT THE STARTER. 12. Carefully pry the clip up from the other alternator connector and remove it from the alternator. Be careful not to break the clip off of the connector. 13. Remove the upper alternator bolt (13 mm) from above. 14. Remove the lower alternator bolt (13 mm) from below. 15. Remove alternator down through the wheel well. You now have the alternator with a 1 ft cable attached. You need to remove this. The Chilton's manual suggests using a 13 mm wrench that is only about 60 thousands of an inch thick to hold the stud coming from the alternator (to prevent it from turning). Such wrenches are quite difficult to find. I removed the cable from the alternator by putting two 10 mm nuts on the top of the stud and tightening them against each other. Then, I used one 10 mm wrench to loosen the nut holding the cable while using another 10 mm wrench against the bottom of the two 10 mm nuts that I put at the top. The bottom line in working without the stud coming out from the alternator is you don't want to put any torque on it with respect to the alternator. It is (ahem) not a robust design. When you get this cable off, put it on the same position on the new alternator and tighten it similarly (using something to hold the stud into the alternator to keep it from turning. Either a very thin 13 mm wrench, or the double nut trick. Then reverse steps 15 to 1 in reverse order.
