1979-1993 & 94 Conv [Subscribe to Daily Digest] |
I've got one of each.
The NG is a totally different car than the C, and has lost all of the 'airplane' qualites of the older saabs- it's basically just another car.
Some complaints about the NG900:
Sightlines suck from the drivers seat, you are trapped in a round pod, and have huge blind spots.
the seats are terrible and will kill your back (at least in the base model).
the cable clutch is terrible, try to find a 97 with a hydraulic clutch.
you can't fit anything in the back, and the hatch leaks.
the alarm/radio system is funky (at least on my car- I've had to disconnect the alarm, and the radio periodically loses the CD changer, and the dash has a non-DIN radio slot).
the SID is gross and has half of it's pixels working at the moment, the glove box is useless, and the window visors have plastic arms and break off surprisingly easily.
you can't open the back windows in the 3door, and there's no hot&cold at the same time, so the car is much 'stuffier'.
some good things about the NG900:
the ride is much smoother and less tractor-like, which I suppose is less 'road feel' but is way easier on the passengers, the car feels much tighter then the older style, the modern molded plastic dash is rattle-free and squeak-free. The 2.3L NA with a 5 spd is a torquey motor, with lots of pep. It's really easy to change brake light bulbs on the NG. Oh, and it's easier to parallel park (a bonus in NYC, which is where I live) because all the corners have been rounded off, especially the nose of the car, even though you can't see.
As far as working on them goes, and reliability in general, they're both cars, you know? I've found some things easier on the NG, some things easier on the C- different motor layouts mostly. The NG is actually laid out pretty sensibly, the only nightmare so far was changing the alternator- I stripped out the head of the most inaccessible allen head bolt ever, that sucked. But was it worse than changing the crank pulley on the C900? Not really.
But you should definitely test drive one, or a couple, before you buy one. I actually went and got another C900 just recently- lots of reasons, but not the least was that the NG900 just isn't a Saab, or at least not a Saab as they used to be.
So now I'm back in a turbo 89, and I love it. Both my '96 and the '89 have around 130k miles.
I drive the 89 every day now.
Hope that helps, I gotta get back to AutoCAD.
-Q
posted by 216.211.2...
, Tue, 6 Jan 2004 20:24:49
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