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Hey, I'm generally new to the site, my name is Darcy, and I am customizing a 2002 Saturn SL.
Honestly, I just bought this car back in July 2004 for it's claimed 53mpg hwy. I slowly started to fall for my Saturn, and research into the unique processes these vehicles went through compared to many other vehicles.
ANYWHO..
Modifications to date
- ST Sport Lowering Springs
- NGK spark plugs + spark plug wires
- BWD ignition coils
- 7" touchscreen dvd deck
- Alpine speaker system
- Alpine 800W amp
- Alpine 12" type-r subwoofer
- Blue LED Gauge conversion
- Third party foglamps
- Glasspack custom dual exhaust
- 15 inch eagleeye rims with bf goodrich low profile tires
- tinted taillights
- 6000k HID Headlamps
- SL2 interior swap (carpet, seats, belts, door panels)
- Painted dash
Near Future Modifications
- spoiler (probably a SL2 spoiler)
- Window tint
- DOHC 1.9l engine swap (donor car is just sitting here)
Distant Future Modifications
- Drilled Brake Rotors
- rear disc brake conversion
- supercharger somewhere down the line.
MY ULTIMATE GOAL IS FOR THIS CAR NOT TO LOOK RICEY, JUST A NICE DD
.. and onto the storyline.
You know, you can tell a lot from an exterior of a car. It can be clean and well kept, or it can be flashy and demanding attention. I decided that the only time the words Saturn and Rice will be together is when I go shopping. Nope, it's the clean look for me. I'm going for a really clean and sleek look with my car, my ultimate goal is having the taillights, side marker lights and windows tinted, black paint, sitting low on respectable rims. I'm a little more than half way there. Start at the top and work your way down to hear the story of the exterior of my Saturn.
It's another day at the Chevrolet dealership I work at. I'm about 16 and own a black base model 1995 dodge neon. The only modification on it is it's extra resonator as a muffler. God it's loud. I roll into work and put the car into park and head out. It's pretty early, and at the start of the day, my manager tells me I have to move all the cars off the used car lot to a field, so the lot can be cleaned, then drive it back. No problem. Half a day goes by, and it's lunch time. I decided to grab pizza from a few blocks away, so I start my neon, and it half dies. Now it's running on two cylinders. Great. I got so fed up with it I started looking at cars in my used car lot.
Fast forward a week. Surprisingly my parents were supportive about buying a new car. I took a look and had a choice between a black 2000 Grand Prix GT. 165000km on it, and already a service engine soon light. Then there was a nice blue 2002 Saturn SL with 45000km for the same price. The only disadvantage is the Saturn was base, with manual mirrors, windows and locks. But it was standard. I personally find automatics pretty boring to drive. So after deliberation, and the quoted 52MPG on the window sticker, I traded my neon, put down 2000 dollars and bought my Saturn for $10000.99. No idea why the extra $.99 was there. Damn dealerships.
(picture: not exact car, mine had different hubcaps.)
Fast forward to winter. The car proved much better and agile in the snow, which we get a lot of, but it tends to get stuck once in a while. But a bit of a rocking motion, and it's back out. It's a fairly quick little car for 100hp, and light as a feather. Although I never liked it's rear end the car started to grow on me. Being a guy into cars, and having no money at this point, and wanting some form of personalization to the car, I decided to paint the hubcaps black, which surprisingly did a lot to the appearance. Also at this time I bought another stereo, a Sony deck, with a small LCD screen. Never got the point to the remote though, who is lazy enough to reach for a remote when they can reach the button.
(picture: painted hubcaps)
Fast forward to the next winter. Just got new shiny hubcaps from wal-mart, as I was tired of my painted hubcaps. Remember, this Saturn is a poor mans Saturn! Waking up early, I remembered I had to drive my girlfriend to school. Booking it to her house, I got there in normal time, so I knew I didn't have to rush anymore. Made it all the way to the end of her street onto the main road, where I am stopped at a stop sign behind a van. The van started to go, so I looked both ways as I was moving forward to check for cars and an opening onto the road. Looking forward again, I see the van suddenly stopped again, and I slid on thick ice into his rear bumper. A beige Toyota Sienna as I recall. The guy was friendly, and knew it was just a mistake, so he let me off easy, but sure enough time to make a visit to the insurance adjustor.
$4300 of insured repair later, I was stuck driving a 2000 Cavalier for a week. Upon driving by the repair shop on my way to Tim Hortons, (I know Tim Hortons is THAT addicting), I seen my car, so I decided to snap a shot at it, half way through repair. Ouch
(picture: Half way through collision repair)
I guess at this point I have not mentioned that decal on the hood. At this point there was a decal on each side rear quarter panel and front hood, named the Winnipeg Speed Stars. For all you Initial D fans, yes this was an adaptation of the Akina Speed Stars. Me and two friends decided that when we got cars we would make a car club called the Winnipeg Speed Stars. Up to that point, I had the only car in this car club. Lucky me.
Anywho, getting the car back I decided to head to the local custom ordering shop, and ordered a pair of 6000k Nokya Arctic White bulbs. They promised a HID look, at a fraction of the cost. Damn I was cheap. At this point the front plate was not installed and I decided I liked the look of the non-plate. However in my province, it's illegal to not run with front plates. So you can be sure I got pulled over a few times. Also got rid of the wal-mart hubcaps and ran without hubcaps, which I didn't mind. Bought cheap LED bulbs from the custom ordering shop, and they didn't look half bad. I installed them on my brake lights, and you could not tell the car was a Saturn anymore from far away at night. Also installed a Canadian Tire brand "Tuned" exhaust muffler. Being young, I thought it looked and sounded cool. Looking back, wow.. I'd go back to punch me in the face.
(picture: 6000K Nokya bulbs, "HID comparable")
(picture: Car club, Winnipeg Speed Stars)
(picture: LED brake light + "Tuned" exhaust)
Fast forward to next fall. Put on the front license plate. Other than that, not much has happened look wise for the car, not much at all. Except one day decided to add chrome strips to the car, which didn't look bad, but fell off after time. Only one that stayed on was the front, and it wasn't even straight. Great. Also wired in some $5 superyellow foglamps from the local Princess Auto. They were fairly bright, but the next day it snowed, and the hot glass lens and cold wind didn't mix and shattered them the first day. What a waste.
(pictures: somewhere between winter and that fall)
(picture: Nokya 6000K bulbs + superyellow foglamps)
(picture: Nokya 6000K bulbs + superyellow foglamps from distance)
On that same day
Fast forward to mid-winter. Was following a semi-truck down a highway, and a HUGE brick of ice fell from the top and hit my bumper. My bumper that wasn't even a year old. How sad, back to the insurance adjustor, and $2400 later got another bumper. Goodbye chrome strip, but hello new HID-imitating foglamps that were included in the estimate! (FREE)
(picture: new HID imitating foglamps)
(picture: after repair)
(picture: shiny new!)
Sure enough after a fresh unexpected snowfall in April, my bald front tires on P 185/65 R14 motomaster tires slid when trying to turn on a road and went right into a pole. My god. This is the third bumper, however I am not going to claim it. The bumper bounced back, so instead when I get a new paint job it will all be fixed. It's only minor paint damage anyways. Not letting this get me down, I decided to ditch the "tuned" exhaust and explore new options. This option, is called.. Dual Exhaust. It is a fully custom, never before made dual exhaust, using glasspack mufflers and chrome tips to create my Saturn's dual exhaust. Looks FAR better. Also had new lowering springs installed from ST Sport Suspension. Rides lower, nicer, hotter
(picture: minor paint damage on passenger side front bumper)
(picture: dual exhaust + Echo Autosport window decal)
(picture: lowered)
(picture: my car, and my friends car in an underground lot.)
(picture: custom dual exhaust)
(picture: custom dual glasspack exhaust)
You will notice on the above pictures, there is no Winnipeg Speed Stars. No, with the loss of my flashy muffler I ditched the flashy logos and decided to rename the car club, Echo Autosport. The club now hosts 13 cars from Winnipeg, and is growing, with more and more sponsors each day.
Fast forward to this spring, I decided to try and see what rims would look like on my car, and, well.. take a look.
(pictures: trying out one of the four rims for sale)
I was set to buy these rims, however the guy who was selling them sold them to someone else, which didn't really matter because another friend was selling his 15" rims on low profile tires as well, so I went with those. Also decided to tint my taillights and my side marker lights and man does that ever make a difference
(pictures: new rims + taillight tint)
Not long afterwards, I found myself parked beside a Saturn SL when I walked out of a shopping mall, had to snap a shot to see the difference.
(picture: My SL vs stock SL)
Not long passed before I got my new 6000k HID's from MaxcarR. Man do they look nice compared to those crap Nokya's.
(picture: HID's hells yeah)
(picture: Sits nice.)
(picture: HID's ftw baby)
And the next day, it's first car show! You can see work done to the interior as well, go to the next page for details!
(picture: first car show for my Saturn)
You have reached the end to my story. Or have you? There is lots planned for my car so keep checking back. Even though you have reached the present state of my car, there is much more to be done!
INTERIOR MODIFICATIONS
When I got my car it came with a Kenwood stereo deck, no rear speakers and stock front speakers. This changed to a Sony deck with Alpine Type-S rear speakers and stock front speakers. Now it is changed to a DUAL XDVD710 DVD/IPOD/XM/PS2/FM/CD/EVERYTHING. I don't mind it but it is a bit noisy.
(picture: DUAL XDVD710 stereo system)
Not much changed in the interior, ever. Except for blue flame floormats, and a black/carbon fiber steering wheel cover that badly needs replacing.
* pic to come soon of floor mats *
* pic to come soon of steering wheel cover *
One day I decided, why not do something durastic. Lets do something big. Let's start the progression of changing the interior from black/beige to black/white. And so it begins, with the dash and the middle console.
(pictures: painting process of dash, middle console and vents)
(pictures: Finished product. So far)
NOTE: black interior carpet, seat belts, seats have been switched from SL2, pics to come
Honestly, I just bought this car back in July 2004 for it's claimed 53mpg hwy. I slowly started to fall for my Saturn, and research into the unique processes these vehicles went through compared to many other vehicles.
ANYWHO..
Modifications to date
- ST Sport Lowering Springs
- NGK spark plugs + spark plug wires
- BWD ignition coils
- 7" touchscreen dvd deck
- Alpine speaker system
- Alpine 800W amp
- Alpine 12" type-r subwoofer
- Blue LED Gauge conversion
- Third party foglamps
- Glasspack custom dual exhaust
- 15 inch eagleeye rims with bf goodrich low profile tires
- tinted taillights
- 6000k HID Headlamps
- SL2 interior swap (carpet, seats, belts, door panels)
- Painted dash
Near Future Modifications
- spoiler (probably a SL2 spoiler)
- Window tint
- DOHC 1.9l engine swap (donor car is just sitting here)
Distant Future Modifications
- Drilled Brake Rotors
- rear disc brake conversion
- supercharger somewhere down the line.
MY ULTIMATE GOAL IS FOR THIS CAR NOT TO LOOK RICEY, JUST A NICE DD
.. and onto the storyline.
You know, you can tell a lot from an exterior of a car. It can be clean and well kept, or it can be flashy and demanding attention. I decided that the only time the words Saturn and Rice will be together is when I go shopping. Nope, it's the clean look for me. I'm going for a really clean and sleek look with my car, my ultimate goal is having the taillights, side marker lights and windows tinted, black paint, sitting low on respectable rims. I'm a little more than half way there. Start at the top and work your way down to hear the story of the exterior of my Saturn.
It's another day at the Chevrolet dealership I work at. I'm about 16 and own a black base model 1995 dodge neon. The only modification on it is it's extra resonator as a muffler. God it's loud. I roll into work and put the car into park and head out. It's pretty early, and at the start of the day, my manager tells me I have to move all the cars off the used car lot to a field, so the lot can be cleaned, then drive it back. No problem. Half a day goes by, and it's lunch time. I decided to grab pizza from a few blocks away, so I start my neon, and it half dies. Now it's running on two cylinders. Great. I got so fed up with it I started looking at cars in my used car lot.
Fast forward a week. Surprisingly my parents were supportive about buying a new car. I took a look and had a choice between a black 2000 Grand Prix GT. 165000km on it, and already a service engine soon light. Then there was a nice blue 2002 Saturn SL with 45000km for the same price. The only disadvantage is the Saturn was base, with manual mirrors, windows and locks. But it was standard. I personally find automatics pretty boring to drive. So after deliberation, and the quoted 52MPG on the window sticker, I traded my neon, put down 2000 dollars and bought my Saturn for $10000.99. No idea why the extra $.99 was there. Damn dealerships.
(picture: not exact car, mine had different hubcaps.)
Fast forward to winter. The car proved much better and agile in the snow, which we get a lot of, but it tends to get stuck once in a while. But a bit of a rocking motion, and it's back out. It's a fairly quick little car for 100hp, and light as a feather. Although I never liked it's rear end the car started to grow on me. Being a guy into cars, and having no money at this point, and wanting some form of personalization to the car, I decided to paint the hubcaps black, which surprisingly did a lot to the appearance. Also at this time I bought another stereo, a Sony deck, with a small LCD screen. Never got the point to the remote though, who is lazy enough to reach for a remote when they can reach the button.
(picture: painted hubcaps)
Fast forward to the next winter. Just got new shiny hubcaps from wal-mart, as I was tired of my painted hubcaps. Remember, this Saturn is a poor mans Saturn! Waking up early, I remembered I had to drive my girlfriend to school. Booking it to her house, I got there in normal time, so I knew I didn't have to rush anymore. Made it all the way to the end of her street onto the main road, where I am stopped at a stop sign behind a van. The van started to go, so I looked both ways as I was moving forward to check for cars and an opening onto the road. Looking forward again, I see the van suddenly stopped again, and I slid on thick ice into his rear bumper. A beige Toyota Sienna as I recall. The guy was friendly, and knew it was just a mistake, so he let me off easy, but sure enough time to make a visit to the insurance adjustor.
$4300 of insured repair later, I was stuck driving a 2000 Cavalier for a week. Upon driving by the repair shop on my way to Tim Hortons, (I know Tim Hortons is THAT addicting), I seen my car, so I decided to snap a shot at it, half way through repair. Ouch
(picture: Half way through collision repair)
I guess at this point I have not mentioned that decal on the hood. At this point there was a decal on each side rear quarter panel and front hood, named the Winnipeg Speed Stars. For all you Initial D fans, yes this was an adaptation of the Akina Speed Stars. Me and two friends decided that when we got cars we would make a car club called the Winnipeg Speed Stars. Up to that point, I had the only car in this car club. Lucky me.
Anywho, getting the car back I decided to head to the local custom ordering shop, and ordered a pair of 6000k Nokya Arctic White bulbs. They promised a HID look, at a fraction of the cost. Damn I was cheap. At this point the front plate was not installed and I decided I liked the look of the non-plate. However in my province, it's illegal to not run with front plates. So you can be sure I got pulled over a few times. Also got rid of the wal-mart hubcaps and ran without hubcaps, which I didn't mind. Bought cheap LED bulbs from the custom ordering shop, and they didn't look half bad. I installed them on my brake lights, and you could not tell the car was a Saturn anymore from far away at night. Also installed a Canadian Tire brand "Tuned" exhaust muffler. Being young, I thought it looked and sounded cool. Looking back, wow.. I'd go back to punch me in the face.
(picture: 6000K Nokya bulbs, "HID comparable")
(picture: Car club, Winnipeg Speed Stars)
(picture: LED brake light + "Tuned" exhaust)
Fast forward to next fall. Put on the front license plate. Other than that, not much has happened look wise for the car, not much at all. Except one day decided to add chrome strips to the car, which didn't look bad, but fell off after time. Only one that stayed on was the front, and it wasn't even straight. Great. Also wired in some $5 superyellow foglamps from the local Princess Auto. They were fairly bright, but the next day it snowed, and the hot glass lens and cold wind didn't mix and shattered them the first day. What a waste.
(pictures: somewhere between winter and that fall)
(picture: Nokya 6000K bulbs + superyellow foglamps)
(picture: Nokya 6000K bulbs + superyellow foglamps from distance)
On that same day
Fast forward to mid-winter. Was following a semi-truck down a highway, and a HUGE brick of ice fell from the top and hit my bumper. My bumper that wasn't even a year old. How sad, back to the insurance adjustor, and $2400 later got another bumper. Goodbye chrome strip, but hello new HID-imitating foglamps that were included in the estimate! (FREE)
(picture: new HID imitating foglamps)
(picture: after repair)
(picture: shiny new!)
Sure enough after a fresh unexpected snowfall in April, my bald front tires on P 185/65 R14 motomaster tires slid when trying to turn on a road and went right into a pole. My god. This is the third bumper, however I am not going to claim it. The bumper bounced back, so instead when I get a new paint job it will all be fixed. It's only minor paint damage anyways. Not letting this get me down, I decided to ditch the "tuned" exhaust and explore new options. This option, is called.. Dual Exhaust. It is a fully custom, never before made dual exhaust, using glasspack mufflers and chrome tips to create my Saturn's dual exhaust. Looks FAR better. Also had new lowering springs installed from ST Sport Suspension. Rides lower, nicer, hotter
(picture: minor paint damage on passenger side front bumper)
(picture: dual exhaust + Echo Autosport window decal)
(picture: lowered)
(picture: my car, and my friends car in an underground lot.)
(picture: custom dual exhaust)
(picture: custom dual glasspack exhaust)
You will notice on the above pictures, there is no Winnipeg Speed Stars. No, with the loss of my flashy muffler I ditched the flashy logos and decided to rename the car club, Echo Autosport. The club now hosts 13 cars from Winnipeg, and is growing, with more and more sponsors each day.
Fast forward to this spring, I decided to try and see what rims would look like on my car, and, well.. take a look.
(pictures: trying out one of the four rims for sale)
I was set to buy these rims, however the guy who was selling them sold them to someone else, which didn't really matter because another friend was selling his 15" rims on low profile tires as well, so I went with those. Also decided to tint my taillights and my side marker lights and man does that ever make a difference
(pictures: new rims + taillight tint)
Not long afterwards, I found myself parked beside a Saturn SL when I walked out of a shopping mall, had to snap a shot to see the difference.
(picture: My SL vs stock SL)
Not long passed before I got my new 6000k HID's from MaxcarR. Man do they look nice compared to those crap Nokya's.
(picture: HID's hells yeah)
(picture: Sits nice.)
(picture: HID's ftw baby)
And the next day, it's first car show! You can see work done to the interior as well, go to the next page for details!
(picture: first car show for my Saturn)
You have reached the end to my story. Or have you? There is lots planned for my car so keep checking back. Even though you have reached the present state of my car, there is much more to be done!
INTERIOR MODIFICATIONS
When I got my car it came with a Kenwood stereo deck, no rear speakers and stock front speakers. This changed to a Sony deck with Alpine Type-S rear speakers and stock front speakers. Now it is changed to a DUAL XDVD710 DVD/IPOD/XM/PS2/FM/CD/EVERYTHING. I don't mind it but it is a bit noisy.
(picture: DUAL XDVD710 stereo system)
Not much changed in the interior, ever. Except for blue flame floormats, and a black/carbon fiber steering wheel cover that badly needs replacing.
* pic to come soon of floor mats *
* pic to come soon of steering wheel cover *
One day I decided, why not do something durastic. Lets do something big. Let's start the progression of changing the interior from black/beige to black/white. And so it begins, with the dash and the middle console.
(pictures: painting process of dash, middle console and vents)
(pictures: Finished product. So far)
NOTE: black interior carpet, seat belts, seats have been switched from SL2, pics to come
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