Saturn Ion - A Closer Look

Launched in 2003, Saturn Ion is one of the many car models manufactured by General Motors; it came as a replacement for the Saturn S Series, the first line of production since the beginnings of the division. According to statistics, Saturn Ion satisfied customers more than other compact cars available on the American market. This is the reason why it was sold for such a long time, till 2007 when it was replaced by Saturn Astra. This vehicle relied on the famous General Motors Delta platform and it came with a standard DOHC Ecotec I4 engine that gave 140 horsepower.

The position of the instrument panel was pretty striking in the interior design of Saturn Ion, thus instead of being located behind the steering wheel as it happens for most other car concepts, it occupied a frontal position in the center of the dashboard. The Saturn Ion varieties available on the market included the coupe and the sedan. The novelty this car brought came from the gearbox that allowed room for five forward gears adjusted to the regular manual gearbox. The ratios were conceived in such a way so as to improve the acceleration time and make fuel consume efficient. Moreover, with Saturn Ion, heat was no longer a problem for the planetary gear set.

An upgraded Saturn Ion variant appeared in 2004 as part of the Red Line designed by General Motors. The model was planned as a sportier car with a more powerful engine of 205 horsepower, a stiffer suspension and special valved shock absorbers; the LSJ, Ecotec engine was the only one used in the manufacturing of this Saturn Ion variant. In the same year, General Motors also launched a limited edition of Saturn Ion 3 that had all sorts of additional improvements in terms of interior and exterior design. Even if it were more expensive the cosmetic look was surely different. The only colors for this select model included electric blue, black onyx and chilli pepper red.

Until 2007, several additional changes were made in terms of Saturn Ion engine power and cabin decorations. General Motors stopped producing unreliable models like the Aisin which had bad reviews because of various technical issues. It was during this time that Saturn Ion gained a negative reputation because of the bad publicity received from discontented reviewers. A re-modeling of the Saturn Ion had been announced for 2008, and the world wide web was full of pictures for the new model. And then Saturn Astra emerged.