General STS thread

[kevm14]

I'm putting the coolant change here because I had become too annoyed to take more pictures. This job was a huge pain in the ass.

The steps were something like this:
- Normally you'd pull off the lower hose from the rad or maybe the water pump and drain that way. Well....guess what. Can't get to the lower hose. So here we go.
- In order to get to the hose clamp, I actually had to remove the fan shroud. That is held to the radiator by 4 bolts. The bottom passenger side bolt is a bitch to get to and is kind of tangled up in ABS lines. Of course it is. I was up, I was down, I cut up my arm reaching down. It was a real pleasure.
- Somewhere in there, I did disconnect one of the upper hoses (this car has an unnecessarily large number of coolant hoses of all sizes) and that gave me better clearance for that bolt.
- After I got the shroud loose I realized there was (guess what) not enough room to pull the whole fan and support assembly out. So....
- Bolt fan assembly back to engine
- Get out my new crescent wrench that I used for the Ram fan clutch and remove the fan from the support bearing. It is a left hand thread. A few whacks with my 2.5 lb sledge did the trick and I threaded the fan off and was able to pull it out (just) by pushing the shroud toward the engine and pulling the fan out between it and the shroud, making nice radiator fin rubbing noises as I went.
- NOW I can kind of get to the lower hose. I struggled to slide the hose clamp back even with better access and resorted to vice grips. Since I couldn't really move the clamp, I pulled the hose off the radiator leaving the vice grips and clamp just sitting there, which was fine.
- The coolant looked fine but looks aren't everything. On these cars the anti-corrosion properties are quite important, as the head gasket issues on the older Northstars was caused by corrosion between the block and head bolts (dissimilar metals).

Fortunately filling was actually, thankfully, easy. I used the pressure tank and it actually just fills the block and radiator. No bleeding nonsense to struggle with.

Once the system was filled I basically put everything back together and ran it to check the level and check for leaks. Everything was good.

Total work accomplished today (in various threads):
- Trans fluid change
- Fuel filter
- Clamped brake booster vacuum hose
- Both serpentine belts
- Coolant change
- Cleaned MAF and realized there is no gasket between the MAF and the air filter housing - thanks previous owner (who changed the MAF with a buddy)
- Oh I almost forgot. I also changed some of the power steering fluid. I probably ran 3/4 of a quart through the system including the new fluid, which isn't that much unfortunately. It amounted to a reservoir flush. But it's better than nothing. I'd like to flush it properly at some point but today was not the day for that.

Total time that I was working on the car, and I am including all breaks, an errand to buy distilled water, staring helplessly at the car while I figured out how to grow longer, thinner arms or invent tools or otherwise will the part to remove itself: probably on the order of 9 hours. Some portion of that was actual wrenching time.

Technically I'm not even done. I preemptively removed the bottom air dam and I actually may not have needed to. But in doing so I removed what I now understand to be plastic rivets. And I don't mean the pop kind that you can remove and reinstall. These seemed to be one time use. So tomorrow I will try Napa to see if I can get some OEM style ones to put the air dam back up - I can't really even drive the car yet. Sigh. I will take my trusty Caprice.

Most of this work was simple but took forever because...fancy car. But I have no real perspective. I think every other car of this type is probably equally sucky to work on. Many FWD cars (that aren't that fancy) also suck to work on. Comparing to my Caprice is just not fair.

And I still have fluids left to do:
- Probably another trans fluid change
- Both diffs and transfer case
- Should flush the P/S system to ensure longest life of the pump and rack seals
- Brake fluid flush to improve feel and ensure longer life of all internal brake components, like seals, lines and the ABS stuff

And I have to do basically all of this on the SRX at some point soon, as that is rapidly headed to 120k with all the driving Jamie does.

[kevm14]

Finally road tested it. Drives great, not much different than before.

[kevm14]

I even washed it today. Again. Second time. Last time I washed a car this much was years ago with the CTS-V. I don't even wash the CTS-V this much. I should drive it...first world problems?

[kevm14]

Technically I'm not even done. I preemptively removed the bottom air dam and I actually may not have needed to. But in doing so I removed what I now understand to be plastic rivets. And I don't mean the pop kind that you can remove and reinstall. These seemed to be one time use. So tomorrow I will try Napa to see if I can get some OEM style ones to put the air dam back up - I can't really even drive the car yet. Sigh. I will take my trusty Caprice.

I forgot to follow up on this. Napa had the bigger style (maybe 3/8") that are pretty common on the SRX. This particular panel seemed to want the smaller 1/4" ones and I wasn't satisfied with the selection at Napa or Advance Auto. So I drove up to Herb Chambers Cadillac in Warwick and got the right ones. All he had in stock was 6 and I bought those for a bit over $1/ea which seems too expensive. I needed more than 6 it turns out but I'll tell you what - ever been under a car with those air dam panels and wished you could just install all of the missing push rivets but never have any or feel like obtaining them? Well it's exactly as satisfying as you'd expect when you start to fill blank spots and better secure those panels. I could probably use another 3 or 4 in some spots but it is pretty solid as is. The SRX needs some, too. One annoyance is they aren't all the same so you can't just buy 50 in bulk and be good.

[kevm14]

Some combination of the brake booster hose clamping and new fuel filter seem to have restored the cranking time to fully correct and the same as the SRX.

If I drove this car as it was when I bought it and immediately again the way it is now I think the difference would be quite noticeable.

[kevm14]

I'm putting the coolant change here because I had become too annoyed to take more pictures. This job was a huge pain in the ass.

This is kind of hilarious but in thinking about this job and comparing it to my Caprice, there is one small detail that makes a big difference to the difficulty of this job: the hose clamps. My Caprice uses the special green silicone 9C1 hoses with worm gear clamps. The STS and basically all other vehicles ever use those spring clamps. The thing about it is, the spring clamps are a pain to deal with unless you can get right on top of them. There are probably better tools that would have helped me. But the point is, if it was a worm gear clamp, I MAY have been able to loosen it from the top with a long extension and simply pulled the hose off of the radiator. I wouldn't know for sure unless I look at it again but this is interesting.

[kevm14]

Went to go drive the car this evening - loaded the family up. Starter went *click.* lol

I broke out my new in box 1 gauge 25 foot jumper cables that I ordered in December 2015 for only $60. Jump started it off the Caprice (didn't even bother starting the Caprice). I now have the STS on my Battery Tender from the CTS-V. I think this happened when I vacuumed it. The dome lights were on a bit. The battery is really quite marginal and I will fully admit that the previous owner even told me as much when I was polling him about potential issues with the car. He said he ran it down a bunch of times from letting it sit and that it probably needs to be replaced. He wasn't wrong. I'll probably drive it to work tomorrow anyway, but I need to scout out a replacement.

[kevm14]

It takes a GM special size called Group 101 which is, you guessed it, more expensive. I think my CTS-V takes the same one though.

This morning my plan was to disconnect the charger and drive to work. But when I opened the hood and looked at the charger, it was still in the bulk charge mode, which suggests that the battery was pretty low. I don't think there is an alternator issue but what I might do is let it finish and drive it for a while. Maybe I can milk some more life out of it. It seemed alright just with like no reserve at all (i.e. leave some lights on and it quickly discharges).

[kevm14]

To continue the conversation that this car is too annoying as a daily driver, when it isn't exactly an enthusiast vehicle:

That's why you get this instead: https://boston.craigslist.org/bmw/cto/6179655288.html

It's not like is is less reliable or harder to maintain. In the case of the CTS-V, the V is actually MORE reliable than the V6 base cars. With the STS-V, it is RWD only so there's less complexity there. And you're getting a lot more performance. On the other hand, you are still paying a lot more up front to purchase the car so....

[Bob]

I'm putting the coolant change here because I had become too annoyed to take more pictures. This job was a huge pain in the ass.

This is kind of hilarious but in thinking about this job and comparing it to my Caprice, there is one small detail that makes a big difference to the difficulty of this job: the hose clamps. My Caprice uses the special green silicone 9C1 hoses with worm gear clamps. The STS and basically all other vehicles ever use those spring clamps. The thing about it is, the spring clamps are a pain to deal with unless you can get right on top of them. There are probably better tools that would have helped me. But the point is, if it was a worm gear clamp, I MAY have been able to loosen it from the top with a long extension and simply pulled the hose off of the radiator. I wouldn't know for sure unless I look at it again but this is interesting.

I usually just use pliers on spring clamps. Generally they aren't too bad to deal with, but I guess in a tight area they can be a pain.