Two problems related to manual transmission have been reported for the 1997 Saturn SC2. The most recently reported issues are listed below.
We bought a used Saturn 2 years ago from a dealership. Since the day we got the car home we had transmission problems. Mainly when my wife would drive it to get our small children to day care, and she would go to work. When the transmission warmed up it gave her a hard time getting it into gear. Countless times of sitting in the middle of the intersection waiting to turn the light turned red and the opposite traffic got green and started heading toward her honking, she was franticly trying to get the car into gear. Then she would have no choice but to have to injure her hand to slam it into gear to get out of the way as my little ones were crying in the back and she was shaking and upset. We have had vehicle in repair shops countless of times complaining of it, but the extended warranty refused to repair the problem because it was still drivable, according to them. Now as my wife drove our kids to the baby sitters so she could go to work the transmission snapped. About 1 week ago found out the extended warranty expired, and they refused to help. They said we should have filed a report of the problem before it expired,. We explained that we did so many times and they were denied. We have proof from dealerships, but they refused to let us fax the proof.
The transmission was very hard to shift into 1st, 2nd and 3rd gears, very hard to get into 1st gear from a complete stop almost impossible. The sunroof has stuck open to about 10 times, it has never seated into the roof correctly the back sticks up about a 1/4 inch in the rear of the sunroof expecially the driver side rear corner they said they completly replaced it but it still will not seat completly. The brakes make a whining sound all the time. ( dot number: tire size: 19560r15 ).