Can someone redpill me on first gen Saturn Twin-Cams? I'm looking into one as a first car

Ive got a 90 sitting outside in my driveway you dipstick. I know damn well how dependable that truck is because I have done all the work on it for the past 10 years. I'm not knocking older cars, hell I love late 80's fords for christ sake. But a 16 year old corolla can be bought for 2500-3k and probably less. Newer means typically less wear and tear and less miles.

>you should give up on being an enthusiast
No. I want the older car.

Ok fine buy one. Just don't be such a shithead

Wait so are you the OP ? Shit talking people for trying to redpill you???

Dude do you even look at who owns these cars now? It's all college students and low-income families who run 'em until they're burning more oil than fuel.

They're great cars, but there's no getting around the fact that they're 20+ years old and generally haven't had the best maintenance.

Ignore this dude:I'm the OP, i didnt mean to cause a shitshow. Thank you all for your opinions. Yeah, I was looking for a beginners car to wrench on since these were in the category of "old enough to be rare and unique, new enough to still have spare parts".

Look I know Corollas of the same vintage are 100x more reliable but I always liked the look of first-gen Saturns and want something with a little more personality. Thank you to the user who defended old cars and thank you to the user who reccomended a Corolla. Who knows, maybe I'll just get the best of both words and get a Prizm.

Confirmed for living in the mid west

I bought a corolla with the 1ZZ engine and have found it very easy to wrench on. I repaired an oil leak on the timing chain cover and was very happy with the amount of room to work and the simplicity of the engine. This comes from someone who used to wrench for a living and owns a F150 with a 300I6 ( One of the easiest engines to work on and keep running). But If the Saturn is in good shape and drives good pick it up those were great cars.

*worlds

Both of you had valid viewpoints. To clarify, I would drive it to school and work for an average of three miles a day.

Thanks man, Corollas are tanks. Is there any performance/reliability difference between trim levels? E100 Corollas are the beater of choice over here on the Northeast since they seem to resist the rust well or just have good parts. I reccomended one to a friend becuause of that.
I'm in no rush to buy a car at the moment but just wanted the opinion of Veeky Forums. Thanks man.

I had one, pure garbage. And that was years ago when it was still kinda new.

What about it was garbage? I heard they have the turning circle of a landbarge and burn oil.

Can't say about the E100 but I picked the 8th Gen(E110) because I didn't want to dick with a timing belt. In the 8th gen the drivetrain is all the same except 3speed non overdrive transmissions can be found on some CEs and Geos.

Burning oil is about the only thing Ive seen with them and if you manage that and fix any leaks is not any different from any other car.

I had one for a first car. was a 94 sl2 or w/e auto.
heat worked. crank windows, manual locks, no ac. literally no options.

I was 16 and walked to work for a month and then bought the saturn for $400. Was in 2010. It needed tires and brakes badly. I did the brakes with the cheapest parts from rock auto - like $10. Threw in some wal-mart oil with a $2 oil filter so it'd have a fresh change + at the time I was actually stoked on the car.

Drove it with the bad tires refilling them every week through the winter. Spent $50 on a set of used tires with like 70% tread halfway through winter.

a year into owning it my passenger rear window fell and shattered going over train tracks. I cut a piece of plywood to fit it and stuck it in and taped it up to seal it as best as I could.
Start of my senior year almost 2 years of owning it we got hail and it beat the crap outa the car and broke my windshield. I got one out of a car bein parted out on CL for $30, put it in myself. Leaked like a bitch id just keep filling all around leaks with epoxy until finally it never did more than drip on my dash.

I graduate HS. Move out of parents. Buddy and I moved to colorado where we are now (about 10 hours from home) and we drove the saturn all the way here. Went to a community college and delivered pizza for a job. Went into a ditch one day during a blizzard delivering. Literally had a pizza fly out of the box and smash my dash, cheese/sauce everywhere. To this day there's still hard dried sauce in little cracks in the interior or in the air vents where you cant really get a cloth to clean it. Busted the shit out of the front bumper. Lights and all still good though.

Eventually it started running on 3 cylinders. Checked all the usual culprits, plugs/wires/injectors/etc. Fuck it kept driving it.

Started overheating my last year of college. Found it was just burning through coolant at that point. Head gasket going bad. Burning white. Drained oil, was milky.

I'll have to reasearch a bit on them. Corollas are great cars but I think I might go with the Saturn while there are still somewhat good examples still on the market. When I'll be in the market for a second, newer car (2022-2027) Saturns from that era will be next to non-existent. Corollas were designed with a longer life expectancy so I would be more likely to find a 25-30 year old Corolla than a 30-35 year old Saturn. Thanks for your input, Corollas are now on my radar.

buddy/roommate who i moved to colorado with worked at oreillys. He just started saving used oil jugs customer would bring in for disposal and I'd just dump it in the car and drain the oil every couple weeks to avoid too much water mixing with oil since at this point too i was just filling the rad with straight water.

I graduated, and about 3 weeks later was on the way home from an interview cruising at 50mph on 3 cylinders when suddenly it downshifted and felt like i hit a brick wall until it slowed down. Lost 3rd and 4th gears. did about 30mph until I was home in 2nd gear.

Trans fluid was burnt as fuck. Next day I got the job I applied for.

My little saturn, I feel like it was simply at a point where it said "I got him where he needed to go... it's time for me to leave..."

I tear up thinking about it.

I still drove it in 2nd gear 10 miles to my new job until I got my first paycheck which was $1150. I went and got my current dd with that money, my 98 toyota camry that is luxury to me with a/c, heat, cruise, power windows/locks with 190k.

The saturn still sits behind our house covered with a tarp and now storage to a bunch of fire works, wasp nests, and misc tools.

GF wants me to get rid of it but I just can't bare it but it's definitely not worth to ever bring to life again. Granted it'll still sputter along at 20-35mph in 2nd gear if I put a battery and gas in her.

Thanks for sharing your experience man, I screencapped it along with a few other posts in this thread. If your GF ever forces you to get rid of the car, take off a piece as a memento whether it be the steering wheel/emblem/etc.