Date: Mon, 04 Oct 1999 08:46:00 -0500 From: Gavin Haslett <thumper_svxnopsamo.com> Subject: Re: Saabs?
Chappy wrote: > I've always liked the look and the handeling of the the Saab 900's but > I've never owned one. Can someone please give me the low down on there > reliability and safety. I'm considering picking up an early 90's model > (if it makes a difference) Well... it might depending on how early/late in the '90's you wish to go. The NG (new (next?) generation) 900's came about around 1992 in Coupe/Sedan and I think 93 in convertible. Really it's 6 to 1, half a dozen on the other in my opinion because as far as driving feel the only things that really changed were the fact that the engine was mounted a little differently giving slightly different weight distribution. As for reliability... well in any used car you take your chances. Any early 90's Saab is probably going to be around that 100K miles mark already, and how it was maintained during that period is going to make a BIG difference in how long it will survive beyond the magical 100K mark. However, Saab's are pretty easy to work on so if you're mechanically minded you can easily work on much of it yourself... however like any car in its class parts can be expensive. I'd suggest using a service like CarFax to make sure you're not picking up a salvaged 900 before you buy... the 20 dollar fee they charge is worth it because it gives you a couple of months of unlimited report requests... it'll also tell you how many hands it's passed through. In my experience a lot of hands usually means a lot of problems that earlier owners didn't want to deal with. High mileage with one owner and no salvage is usually a keeper... but I prefer doing private sales to the dealers lot... simply put if you go with private sale then you can get an idea of the personality of the previous owner and thus get an idea of how well your purchase has been maintained. Car lots are often easier... but they're also very anonymous. Safety? Well, at least by US standards the Saab 900 is at least as safe as a Volvo or Mercedes... and a Saab is a more fun car to drive then either of them. No that's not flame bait... merely my personal opinion. I've known at least one friend of mine (who I posted another message about recently) who had an older model 900 that had a slight disagreement with a semi travelling the opposite direction on a relatively high-speed road. Even knowing where it happened I wouldn't have expected him to walk away from it... but he got out of that crash with merely a few bruises, scrapes and a broken bone or two. Yes, a certain amount of luck was involved... but after surviving that crash he's sworn never to buy anything but Saabs again. I also know other people with much the same opinion. If you're looking for a daily driver that's going to be reliable and dependable... actually your best bet is to lease or buy a new Saab. I've gone out this weekend and bought a new (non-Saab) car for myself to drive at work because (a) I want to keep the Saab as long as possible and don't want to rack the mileage up too bad, and (b) because maintenance is expensive... on any car... not just Saabs. At least with a new car I'm getting 36,000 miles of warranty... plus I'll buy an extended warranty in the new year on the new one. It's also an American-built car so parts are easy to come by... and powered by a Buick 3800 V6 that anyone and their brother knows how to fix. The point is though that a used car has a relatively unknown (to you) history... a new car you know what's happened to it since the day it first got out on the open road... at least in theory. Take note though that I'm a picky owner. I've been through several cars in the last few years... the first was a Pontiac I got rid of because I had a gut feeling there were going to be problems (tranny failed three weeks after I got rid of it), a Subaru that was wrecked by a local tire shop while having an alignment and the maintenance started to get away from me rapidly after I got it back... and finally my Saab. In that time I've also had a Subaru Loyale and Ford Probe for various stretches of time. Now, the Saab to date has definitely been the most fun car to own... but I have to admit to missing my Subaru SVX (the one that was wrecked). It's a blast on twisty roads... powerful enough to outrun just about anything... feels like it will accelerate forever (0-80mph and still feeling like it's got plenty of breath left)... and actually a very good highway runner that gets relatively good gas mileage for its class (about 21-23mpg). It's also got a wonderful cockpit-like interior design that puts everything in easy reach of the driver... and while some have complained in the past that the seats were hard, I find them firm but good on my back on long drives. I'm fussy with my back because I was in a wreck in my teens that messed up my spine pretty good... I'll probably have back problems for the rest of my life but I've found them a lot less of a problem since I got the Saab than when I had any of the previous vehicles. It remains to be seen if my new car can hold up. Sorry for the long missive... but if you have any other questions about what it's like to own a Saab then this NG is definitely the right place to be... plus you'll get opinionated and verbal people like me :) -- Gavin Haslett thumper_svxnopsamo.com http://home.earthlink.net/~hackrat "Ahhhh... Mountain Dew... nectar of the geeks!"
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