1989 Mercury Sable Reviews - Page 2 of 3

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28th Aug 2003, 23:13

Hate to break it to you, it's GM's 3.8 that has that hp, your car only has 140, 5hp more than the 3.0. But the torgue is awsome on that motor, at 200lb/ft.

1989 Mercury Sable LS 3.8 from North America

Year of manufacture	1989
First year of ownership	2000
Most recent year of ownership	2002
Engine and transmission	3.8 Automatic
Performance marks	6 / 10
Reliability marks	3 / 10
Comfort marks	8 / 10
Running Costs (higher is cheaper)	9 / 10
Overall marks (average of all marks)	6.5 / 10
Distance when acquired	110000 miles
Most recent distance	140000 miles

Summary:

A great comfortable piece of crap

Faults:

This could go on forever. The heater core leaks, makes the whole car smell like hot anti-freeze. Gross. Like smelly jock strap.

Motor mounts went out replaced at 114,000 but probably went bad at about 80,000.

Head Gaskets Blew, twice. Continuous crap heads.

The mounts for the rockers that are cast into the heads broke off. Who knows when. Metal chunks just clunking around the valve covers.

Broke a sway bar mount in the rear 110,000.

It clunks really badly over bumps. The rear suspension sucks. You can't line the thing up without taking the shocks off and cutting new mounting holes. Oh yeah the rear can't be adjusted. You have to buy a kit from the dealer. So it has pulled to the right since about 60,000 I have been told.

The speedometer cable rattles, drives me nuts.

The radio crackles.

The power antenna is cheap.

The rims peel.

There is a hesitation in the engine. Who knows, I am an auto mechanic and it confounds me and my buddies.

Distributor and cap. Twice.

The idler air inlet thing. Whatever it is a black thing right over the throttle body that lets the air in when it idles. Well it went bad at 116,000. Idled at 3000RPM and 37mph. That was fun to stop at stop lights.

I am done this car is not worth any more time.

Had it painted, had no paint of it's own, cuz it all peeled off who knows when.

General Comments:

Car would be so awesome if it wasn't breaking something new all the time. Is a great car, but on self destruct. If your rich and love cars that make you look 70. Buy this car. Really I have it for sale.

Would you buy another car from this manufacturer? Yes

Review Date: 13th July, 2002

Comment on this review

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22nd Mar 2003, 17:12

My oh my how right you are these cars are really bad. have so much invested? in ours that it like a ground up restore. maybe I will get lucky someday and it will get hit and that will be the end of the sorry merc sable story.

8th May 2003, 10:11

I as well used to have a Mercury sable, I actually took mine to a junk yard and paid the guy $100.00 dollars just to see them flatten and compress it into a small block of metal, after that, I went out and bought a Jag. X type, Mercury and or Ford should be a responsible party and fix all recalled defects to there own cars. period. D.G.D.

13th Oct 2003, 20:43

I have a 1999 Mercury Sable. It has been a pretty good car up until now. I have started having problems with loud nosies coming from the car, one of the windows has stopped rolling up and down, the paint has started peeling off the back bumper, and the service engine now light stays on all the time even tho the car is serviced regularly!

14th Sep 2004, 17:09

It's best to get any of these sables with the larger 3.8L Engine combined with the Heavy Duty Transmission rather than the 3.0L and less reliable lighter duty transmission.

Have one of these 1989 Sable LS approaching 170,000 miles with neither the engine nor the transmission ever having been apart.

Very Good winter/snow car.