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The Passat and the 9-5 Wagons are
quite different cars. The only things
they have in common is that both are
normally FWD and both use 4cyl Turbo
engines.
The engines are however very different. Yes there
are more chip manufacturers for the VW engine, cause
there are more VWs around.
The latest 2.3L lpt engine and the 2.3L HOT engine from
SAAB are both T7 ECU engines. The SAAB engine differs in many
ways from the 1.8L VW engine.
1. The SAAB engine uses a chain not a belt to drive the
camshafts, a chain will last longer if a car is maintained
in a regular way.
2. The SAAB engine is only a 16V not a 20V, this reduces
the number of moving parts and offers simmilar performance
then a 20V design.
3. No SAAB that works wit GAS uses variable Turbo inlet vanes
yet. The reason here is that those can be unreliable and in the
case of the 2.3L HOT engine they're simply not needed as the engine
is throttle by wire.
4. Longtivity. The SAAB engine will outlast the VW engine on average
by at least 100000 miles.
5. SAAB engines car run at full power for 1000 hours, VW engines
only around 300 hours. In every day use that makes no difference
but over time the SAAB engine wears less when you use a lot
of its power every day. Obviously if you tune up an engine the
maximum hours you can run at full power will be reduced.
6. While the VW engine is quite high tech it is not able to
compensate for altitude abouve 5000 feet. The reason here
is that it can only measure relative pressures and air mass.
The SAAB ca measure combustion and at least the 2.3L HOT
will not lose any power at altitude.
In many ways the VW Passat offers more car per dollar spend but
if you keep a SAAB for a long time the cost of ownership of
the SAAB is about the same.
It's a tough choice... as for me having had some experience with
1 VW and 1 AUDI I now avoid em, mainly cause of the price of spare
parts and because I never liked their chasis balance. ESP is also
not my cup of tea... it just kills fun driving.
Last... the one ABT Passat that tried to outperform my 9-5 Aero 5spd
lost in a rather dismal fashion. He could simply not keep up
even so he had 250 HP at sea level. So I was not impressed as
my AERO is stock.
Regards,
Coolknight
, Fri, 19 Jan 2001 10:31:11
, Fri, 19 Jan 2001 03:03:25, Fri, 19 Jan 2001 04:00:48
, Thu, 18 Jan 2001 16:38:49
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