2006 Saturn Relay Exhaust System Diagram

04-01-2012, 08:20 AM

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col_dude190 has a spectacular aura about

Join Date: Feb 2006

Location: Erie

Posts: 633

2006 VUE Red Line

2004 ION-3 Quad Coupe

Default Re: parts availability for VUE's??

Your mechanic is giving you the run around. This is by far one of the things that irritates me the most about being a Saturn owner and dealing with uninformed mechanics. Everyone from the guy at Firestone who recently did my alignment to the guy at the exhaust shop that fixed a small midpipe exhaust leak on my '06 has felt it necessary to tell me how "Its getting really hard to get parts for those Saturns" and "I don't know how long you're going to be able to keep that thing on the road with Saturn gone".

I have had absolutely no issues getting any parts for my Vue. Almost every essential part (suspension items, brake parts, wheel bearings, etc) are either stocked by dealers or local auto parts places (Auto Zone, Advance, etc). As far as dealer only items, I have found them no more difficult to get than before Saturn went away. The entire parts operation system at GM hasn't changed since Saturn went away. GM still stocks its "special order"/non-stock items at warehouses spread across the U.S., which are then shipped to a dealer within a few days when needed. I recently ordered a wiper transmission and motor through gmpartsgiant.com (a Chevy dealer based in California) and I had my parts within a week (3 days to get to the dealer, another 3 for them to arrive at my door via Fedex). Not bad at all IMO.

The whole getting parts for Saturn's being difficult thing is largely a myth for the North American built models (Vue, ION, Aura, Outlook, Sky). If you owned an Astra, which was built in Belgium, then there are some parts availability issues, but that's because the Astra is a European model that sold under 15,000 vehicles for one model year here in the States. Parts availability is simply not an issue for 90% of the Saturns on the road. I'm not sure what "dealers" your mechanic was dealing with, but he should have had no issues getting a bracket for your rear differential. It may have taken a few days to have it ordered as there is no way that most dealers would stock an obscure part like that, but he should have been able to get it. The fact that he was able to find a weird part like that stocked at any dealership is amazing because that is a part that I would expect would need to be ordered from a warehouse as I have never heard about the brackets on the RDM failing. Going forward, parts availability should not be an issue for your Vue. Furthermore, the Vue shares A TON of parts with Chevy Equinox and Pontiac Torrent, so there should be lots of parts available for the Vues.

As far as the issues with getting parts for the SC1, most of those cars are getting up there in age. If this was an original SC1 (early 90's), those cars are around 20 years old, so parts availability issues can be expected, especially if it was a weird, specific sensor. While I have never heard of an issue like this with the S series as they went largely unchanged for the 11 years they were on the market and they have a lot of support from aftermarket companies, I don't find it surprising that such an old model would have issues with parts availability. That is simply one of the issues of long term vehicle ownership and has very little to do with fact that it is a Saturn. The Vue is a much more current model than the S series and it should be quite awhile before you start seeing issues with parts availability.

Last edited by col_dude190; 04-01-2012 at 08:30 AM.