The Life and Death of SAAB: RCR Car Stories

another rcr stories another video on the life and death of an automaker but for the completion of this life and death trilogy i'm taking the narrative overseas to investigate the demise of an automaker that may not be as iconic to american audiences as the previous two entries but one that remains etched in the minds and memories of car enthusiasts the world over i'm talking of course about saab one of the most unique automakers to ever exist and while i can admit that at some level i didn't really get it at first i imagine it would be the same way if i were a european trying to make heads or tales of what people miss about pontiac or amc or an american trying to make heads or tales of what people miss about pontiac or amc ultimately it's not really my job to get it even if i feel like i totally understand it now but in the grand scheme of things understanding need only extend as far as the knowledge of how saab came to prominence and how it ultimately fell into decline and eventual death and while i'm sure i'll do other life and death videos on automotive brands i can't think of many that have been this requested and part of the reason if not the entirety of why this has taken so long has been centered on the investigation to find out why it's been so requested what is it about saab that persists so consistently in the imaginations of auto enthusiasts what propelled saab to such highs and what caused its downfall and early death i've been working on this since july 2021 and it's now late april that i'm recording this for release sometime in may and i feel like a narrative has taken hold a tale of passion innovation 11th hour deals a tale of motorsport glory unlikely allies and a battle for control a tale of executive meddling heartbreak and loss share your saab memories in the comments f's in the chat and all of that and sit back as i regale you with the tale of an automaker that started out in a different transport industry altogether this is rcr stories the life and death of saab saab is an acronym for the swedish term that translates to swedish aeroplane limited or swedish aeroplane company or svenska around actiblagen and like most entries in this series we have to go back to the early 20th century the year is 1907 and brothers carl yuan and airlon ogla developed an engineering company by the name of a b spenska yarnbagsvegsterdna or asj for short now while they did eventually get into aircraft the early days of the company focused on railway vehicles boilers loaders and even bus bodies now this is all happening in the swedish city of ling chirping the country's fifth largest city during this period sweden was developing its naval fleet and as a burgeoning force in the engineering and manufacturing sector asj was tasked with spearheading the effort so asj began focusing on submarine production by 1914 the first world war had come to wreak its terrible menace and sweden had been famously neutral in major armed conflicts up to that point but it was still an armed neutrality because you never know and it's best not to get caught with your pants down if you can help it i mean we all saw how well being completely unarmed worked out for alderaan yet while arming themselves didn't seem to be a problem maintaining a conflict-free neutrality was a much taller order because you want to still be able to trade but it's hard to do that without officially declaring for a side or at least appearing to not to go into a whole recap of the first world war i'm not dan carlin god bless him but basically the allied powers of world war 1 were the united states france great britain russia italy and japan and they were locked in a struggle against germany austria-hungary bulgaria and the ottoman empire with such clearly delineated sides any countries caught in the middle had to be very careful about how they proceeded lest they get drawn into the conflict which was difficult enough for sweden but once the allies cut off sweden's trade due to their demand to import without restriction a bad situation grew much worse the allied rationale was that sweden's demand for unrestricted trade would be to germany's benefit which was something they could not allow so in addition to affecting the nation's robust export arrangements with germany this interference created a food shortage in sweden it was a great big mess with the old administration being given the heave-ho and the successors managing to come to a less hostile trade arrangement that would resolve the food shortage and allow the swedish economy to recover the agreement in may 1918 saw the allies giving sweden the green light to import produce in exchange for the allies having access to sweden's merchant fleet there was also an additional proviso that limited german exports in a general sense 1918 was a pretty active year for swedish involvement in world war one despite the pledge of neutrality whether it was the trade agreement or sweden attempting to annex the island islands while finland was engaged in a civil war it's generally pretty hard to avoid some level of involvement in a globally spanning conflict the great war would last an insufferable six additional months after the may 1918 import agreement sweden reached with the allies and although sweden wasn't among the nations that signed the treaty of versailles they did join the league of nations which created a bit of a quandary for their prospects ahead you see all nations in the league were bound by the terms of the treaty whether they signed it or not and the treaty of versailles stipulated that if german disarmament was violated hostilities would resume so that brings us to the big question what does any of this have to do with saab well in the immediate aftermath of the war germany was forbidden from building aircraft but in 1921 the same year the civilian aircraft restriction was lifted a new company was founded a company by the name of svenska aero ab initials saab with the birth of a new aircraft manufacturer german companies had options to get around the restrictions of the treaty of versailles by moving their operations to other countries but svenska aero a b was different it was created by aircraft manufacturers carl clemens bucher and ernst heinkel two german men the purpose to build reconnaissance aircraft and other prohibited vessels and used the company to skirt the rules by making the parts in germany but smuggling them out to sweden to be assembled svenska arrow a b had to keep on the move within germany to avoid the allies catching onto their plot and potentially resuming hostilities simultaneously sweden was demanding a greater focus on defense contracts and so asj had started an aircraft branch developing their own military aircraft the kind that the germans were prohibited from building as a consequence of the treaty of versailles to make an already long story a little shorter svenska aero ab began to suffer financial troubles after it became clear that nobody seemed to want to pay them to manufacture their clientele simply wanted the designs to build the aircraft themselves as a result the company couldn't afford to stay open on their own so svenska aero a b merged with asj retaining the saab name although the birthplace of the joint venture was trollhettan a swedish town whose name translates to trolls bonnet the company's day-to-day operations were based out of asg's aircraft branch headquarters in ningxiraping despite being founded by germans saab was a swedish company and for the next 20 years or so they continued operations in the aeronautical field fast forward and now we're in the middle of world war ii although sweden intended to maintain their neutrality once more the swedish air force still required planes since it's better to have them and not need them than to need them and not have them and so saab built dive bombers like the saab 17 the saab 18 twin engine bomber and reconnaissance aircraft and the saab 91 trainer aircraft created as a way to continue making military aircraft and keep orders high even as the war was beginning to wind down because while the 34th rule of acquisition states war is good for business the 35th rule of acquisition declares peace is good for business and yet as world war ii neared its end sweden was facing another shortage and this time it wasn't produce you see most of the cars driven in sweden were american imports but due to the war car production had been stopped in order to redirect resources towards the war effort and when production finally did resume there was a backlog of demand that resulted in the likely scenario that sweden would be waiting years for new american import models which simply would not do this coupled with the reduced demand for military aircraft meant that there was an opening for saab to slide into the new market and keep their factories churning out products that could earn them tons of green or whatever color swedish money is and so saab made the fateful decision to begin producing cars erecting the saab automobile division in trojeton and kicking off full-scale production on december 12 1949 with the saab 92 and to really get the ball rolling saab's design team was going to need a steady hand to lead a team of men who for the most part didn't have any experience working with cars this is where we meet a man by the name of gunar jungstrom this was a guy who was inheriting a massive task taking an underfunded division and assembling a team of 16 aviation engineers only two of whom even had a driver's license in the first place cars were simply not the specialty of these men but it was up to lyungstrom to lead them and there was considerable pressure on yoong's throne himself considering the weight of the legacy bearing down on him you see he was the son of legendary swedish inventor frederick youngstrom a man with more technical patents to his name than most people have hair on their head past 53. i'm talking patents for steam turbines bicycle freewheeling hubs and technology that gave sweden its first jet engines this in addition to the jungstrum air pre-heater which is responsible for global fuel savings to the tune of 4.9 billion tons of oil thanks to its use in worldwide power stations oh and he also held patents on mechanical automatic transmissions sorry to bury the lead there but this would become important to gunnar jungstrom's future as an automaker since it represented a path into the auto industry for a man looking to do right by the family name as it stood now jungstorm's father cast a shadow longer than a wwe non-compete contract and gunner had to find a way to carve out a legacy of his own of course gennard jungstrom was no slouch himself having studied mechanics at the royal institute of technology in stockholm in addition to being president of the student union he was a pioneer in of all things bringing water skiing to prominence in sweden the only time it's good for a future businessman to skim off the top after graduating in 1932 he worked with his father on a multitude of projects including the development of the aforementioned automatic transmissions before getting into aviation around the time saab was producing military aircraft ahead of the second world war he had a keen mind for aerodynamics and understood the importance of a mechanically sound engine so when he was brought in to lead saab's transition from airplanes to automobiles he seemed to have a pretty decent handle on what he was doing owing to his familiarity with mechanical automatic transmissions and the framework of automotive design despite their relative inexperience and matters of the automotive industry jungstrom's team set to work on the ambitious uersab or original saab additionally referred to as the 92001 or the x9248 by any name it was the start of something big work on the model officially began in 1945 with the intention of creating a small affordable car that still had some measure of style despite its relatively streamlined approach jungstrom and stylist sixteen assassin along with the aforementioned sixteen men got to work building a 110 scale prototype to test in wind tunnels and quickly progress from preliminary drawings to small scale mockups by january 1946 the team was already prepared to produce a full-sized model subsequently the ursab received a new designation project 92 since this marked the 92nd saab creation despite being the first car progress advanced in bursts so that by april 15th 1946 the full-scale model was finally completed despite the color being finished with black boot polish it was still an impressive sight it was a weird car for its time whether it was the covered wheels the tiny rear window that seemed contrary to the industry standard of largesse or the trunk led in this case the complete lack thereof hell it'd be a weird car now but whereas now it would find a fan base with somebody thanks to the diversity of modern car culture saab 92 seemed a harder sell in the 1940s even at a time when art deco wasn't that far removed from the public consciousness and everything looked like it was straight out of the rocketeer yet gunnar jungstrom was adamant that if the car could save a hundred liters of fuel per year it didn't really matter what the car looked like noting that it could look like a frog for all anyone cared the original msrp was around 3 200 swedish krona which comes out to around 369 american dollars which today would be around 5177 dollars the initial ursab utilized an 18 horsepower two-cylinder two-stroke engine by dkw one of four auto companies to comprise the auto union formed in 1932 as a blanket organization to represent the interests of four german automotive brands audi horch wanderer and dkw the german connection was very much baked into those early days of saab although some will argue as to the degree of influence those companies might have had on what saab later became with some stating that the dkw effect wasn't as pronounced as it might have appeared case in point this two-cylinder two-stroke dkw engine as well as many of the components that comprise the full-scale ursab model were salvage finds after all this was for test purposes to see if the ursab could actually function as a front-wheel drive compact of monaco construction even if the later engines had influence from dkw powertrains the team at saab was essentially learning what they could while on the job in order to figure out how to realize the vision swimming in their heads for now the saab 92 had proved capable of regular test driving in the summer of 1946 and so the team began plans for an in-house engine to power the unique little car this in addition to subsequent redesigns led to the project moving back to trojeton with the two later prototypes being driven into the ground in an attempt to destroy these cars as a test of their durability and just like the initial prototype that preceded them the cars remained in good working order with the total mileage across the three prototypes totaling some 329 326 miles or 530 000 kilometers an additional 17 pre-production prototypes were tested before 1949. the year the saab 92 was finally unveiled to the world now the saab 92 wasn't stylistically maverick but it did feature the world's best drag coefficient among all production cars at the time rating a .30 although i've read other sources claim a 0.31 either way a strong number that even some modern cars can't manage and evidence of sixth and sassen's design acumen it was hard-won intelligence as sassin didn't exactly have the easiest time reaching the heights he did particularly in the aftermath of the second world war similar to jungstrom assassin had a lot to live up to born carl sixton anderson in 1912 sassen had a mind for tinkering and for art owing to his stone cutting apprenticeship under his father and his fascination with american comic books as carl sixten anderson he made money doing technical illustrations for various publications before moving to paris to study art and design at which point he ditched the carl and anderson parts of his name kept the sixten and took on the surname sassen after sasson the spanish word for seasoning try it on fried chicken just mix it in with the other seasonings get some adobo in there it's fantastic sorry food on the brain anyway the assassin didn't have nearly enough time to enjoy his stay in france before the world plunged into war and like so many young men of his age sasson felt a responsibility to serve so he returned to sweden and enlisted in the air force where he ended up suffering a life-changing injury after his plane went down the resulting crash left him with a punctured lung that became infected it was a situation that seemed to worsen with each passing day and there was every possibility that he could have died assassin would go on to spend months in the hospital it got so bad that sasson ended up losing that long it was a harsh hand to be dealt as this would mean the end of his aviation career but there wasn't much choice given his condition it was 1939 and with his health prohibiting him from continuing as a pilot sasson returned to his passion for art becoming head of drafting at saab helping design the saab 17 fighter and saab 18 bomber it made him one of the premier names in industrial design and he saw his career skyrocket over the next 10 years once saab decided to get into the auto industry culminating in sasen making his first big mark in the automotive sector when the saab 92 hit the market in 1949 with an initial run of 700 cars not bad for assassin whom you could argue was the father of scandinavian design between his work with electrolux vacuums the innovative handheld modular hasselblad cameras and his accomplishments at saab the saab 92 was ready to meet the public the body was made of stamped sheet metal a single sheet in fact which was cut to make space for the doors and windows given that sweden tended to import luxury vehicles from other european countries there wasn't much of an appetite for a base model so while saab initially advertised a standard model they only produced deluxe versions all with the exact same dark green paint job rumored to be due to an excess of green paint remaining from the war then again it was jungstrom who said the car could look like a frog and still sell so i guess it was time to test that theory saab did eventually succeed in making their own engine for the car once again taking their cues from the dkw design offering a water-cooled two-cylinder two-stroke 764 cc engine mounted transversely the two-stroke engine made 25 horsepower and reached speeds of 65 miles per hour alongside a three-speed transmission with an unsynchronized first gear despite the modest first year production numbers swedish automotive distributor philipsons reported a waiting list of between 15 to 35 000 customers hoping to get their hands on a saab 92 they knew this because philipsons had the exclusive distribution rights to the saab 92 since they had delivered significant financial backing for the production of the car and it turned out to be a sound investment over the first four years of production phillipsons anticipated at least 8 000 units each year saab not only achieved this goal they surpassed those expectations by a thousand units thanks to the eminent affordability of the car costing somewhere in the range of 965 us dollars although nada guides has the number around 1400 so let's just split the difference and say it was affordable even by the standards of the early 50s as even the more expensive number comes out to 16 146 dollars today the saab 92 was a big success that would only get bigger with the saab 92 b arriving in 1953 for the 1954 model year in addition to a new ignition coil that increased engine output to get this you guys 28 horsepower the 92b offered a solex 32bi carburetor and new headlamps to replace the traffic blinding factory lights this accompanied a host of aesthetic and quality of life changes like a larger rear window increased storage capacity a short-lived textile sunroof option and even a plywood bed kit just to name a few but the major selling point was the new colors as the dark green was now accompanied by black gray and blue gray in case you wanted to buy a set of four sobs to headline the when we were young festival saab was getting more aesthetically pleasing more desirable the 92 established saab as an emergent automotive brand at a time when demand was at a high and this would continue throughout the 1950s so that by the time the saab 92 was committed to the graveyard in december 1956 or january 1957 depending on whom you're asking over 20 000 saab 92s and 14 092 bees were produced far beyond even the most optimistic projections the saab 93 would take over as the new flagship model in 1955 and this too was well received a small two-door family car that ran on a three-cylinder 748 cc saab two-stroke engine and a three-gear transmission with a similarly unsynchronized first gear as a saab 92 the 93 was the perfect follow-up to avoid the sophomore slump it's historically significant if for no other reason than it was the first saab to be exported from sweden with most of those exported models finding their way to the united states it was perfect for families and bachelors alike between its affordability and overall durability not to mention it's fairly consistent and reliable performance saab was well on its way by the late 1950s yet while they had earned a place at the table with the 92 and 93 models some might argue that you haven't truly arrived as an automaker until you've made your first performance car it was time for saab to pick up speed the saab 93 marked the company's most successful foray into the rally scene up to that point with driver eric carlson racing a saab 93 to first place finishes at the finland rally in 1957 and the swedish rally in 1959 but the saab 93 wasn't a dedicated performance car no that would require a more ambitious design yeah let's talk about the saab sonnet a car people have asked us to review forever but one which we haven't been able to get our hands on just yet and for understandable reasons the saab sonnet was manufactured twice between 1955 and 1957 and then again between 1966 and 1974. the sonnet 1 only had 6 models ever produced while the sonnet 2 had 258 models produced with a two-stroke engine before the decision was made to move to a v4 the sonnet 3 ended up being the model with the most units produced totaling over 8 000 models from 1970 to 1974. but that doesn't necessarily make them any easier to find in good condition it's a car that's essentially earned its legacy as the ultimate heritage find and don't worry while all three generations aren't covered in this chapter we will go over each one i just like to keep things in mostly chronological order now the sonnet was saab's first entry into the sports car market and at an unofficial capacity it was known as the saab 94. i say unofficially because the number had already been given to an aircraft saab had been working on since big shock saab never actually ceased to making aircraft the initial sonnet 1 was designed as a potential competition car originally envisioned as a two-seater that would bear striking similarities to the porsche 550 spider a cheap plug for the rcr story on james dean and his cursed porsche 550 spider because i'm shameless yeah as the story goes saab performance engineer ralph melda presented the idea for the car to the higher ups at saab a former rally car driver for saab who'd come in second at the swedish rally just two weeks after the release of the saab 92 melda was met with resistance but he believed in the concept and took it upon himself to assemble a team to build the vehicle in a barn away from the judgmental eyes of the troll heton headquarters this new saab became something of a top secret project with melda emphasizing a fiberglass reinforced lightweight plastic body melda had the assistance of saab designer sixten sasson who is credited with naming the car after a rejected proposal for the saab 92 several years earlier so yeah the old story that it's named after the swedish words for so nice is likely just a myth unless that's the origin for the name for the rejected saab 92 proposal regardless after a series of chassis tests through road trials the car was ready to be presented by mid-october 1955. suddenly after seeing the car in action the higher-ups at saab thought the sonnet was just the sort of car they needed to grab attention at the stockholm motor show which was a mere four months away in february 1956 so what had started out as a secret well remained a secret for the time being as the team continued its work on the sports car behind the scenes but this time with the approval of management this was a car that could reach top speeds of 130 miles per hour owing to its low weight and aerodynamic body running on a three-cylinder two-stroke 784cc engine that made around 58 horsepower over 3 000 miles were racked up in test runs in the months between october 1955 and the stockholm motor show four months later with additional presentations in america scheduled for spring of 1956. meredith's car seemed to be exactly the type of vehicle that would show that saab took their entrance into the auto industry seriously and not simply as some novelty to finance their aviation pursuits they wanted to compete with the big boys not just on the car show circuit but on the race track as well now officially designated the saab 94 orders were approved for an additional five sonnets for a total of six three for racing and three for show but for production the goal was to manufacture roughly 2 000 sonnets per year on a body made of lightweight metal with a similarly light chassis that would make the car as capable on the track as it would be sturdy on the road plans were put into place and it seemed like melda would succeed in getting the concept out of his mind onto a track and into the hands of the buying public it was a solid idea but the fia had other plans the fia which was the body overseeing racing at the time introduced group 3 racing in 1957 and this threw a giant wrench into saab's intentions as the category suddenly put the sonnet out of its depth basically the new rule allowed the regular saab 93 to compete so long as the necessary modifications were made to bring it up to the category standard and so out goes the sonnet well for now anyway i can only imagine this was a disappointment for melda who had been head of testing for several years by this point and had been instrumental in establishing saab's motorsport identity initially pitching the idea as a way for the company to show off its in-house engines hell under his tenure saab entered and won the famed riksbokalen motor rally and they did it eight times by 1961. saab had all the makings of a potentially great motorsport wing but for now they were pivoting away from a sports driven mentality in their production cars in favor of a more conservative approach because really if you're in the auto industry you're eventually going to end up in the family hauling business which is more or less what happened with the introduction of the saab 95 a car that lasted 19 years beginning in 1959 it was a two-door station wagon that offered a seven-seat option from factory but looked from the outside like it couldn't seat any more than four now the idea was that it would use the saab 93 as its basis but that model was shelved in 1960 the very year the car won the finished snow rally and a year after it finished second in its class at le mans this wasn't going to be developed with rally aspirations in mind and so a different approach would need to be taken in the saab 95's development it was essentially a hodgepodge of components from different saab models including future offerings the engine was from the upcoming saab 96 while the gearbox was from the 93 all put together with the freewheel transmission introduced on the 93 and further refined on the sonnet 2 later that decade in its totality the car made for an alluring purchase since in the absence of six passengers the foldaway bench seat made this a hell of a car for storage and transport maybe not for huge stuff but it would transport more than your average car and this car was the type of dependable daily that was attractive to consumers mass production on the saab 95 began in 1960 with the car getting an 841 cc three-cylinder two-stroke engine but into the 1960s demand grew for more vigorous engine options resulting in saab offering a ford sourced four-stroke taunis v4 later in the decade the saab 95 appeared to be a daily that both families and discerning drivers would enjoy between its uniquely sob styling and its robust features in fact i almost forgot to expand on the four-speed manual transmissions freewheeling mode which is basically the overrun clutch that had been used previously by brands such as rover and chrysler but unlike those companies saab's two-stroke engine made particularly good use of the freewheeling mode as explained in an issue of popular mechanics author alex markovich writes quote an odd feature is the freewheeling device that automatically disengages the engine from the transmission and allows it to drop to idle speed whenever you lift off the throttle with the old saab 2-cycle engine freewheeling kept the engine from starving for oil on the overrun on the v4 it cuts down on air pollution eliminating the need for an air pump also it saves fuel and in a skid a freewheeling car is easier to control end quote but for now we're still early into the 1960s with the saab 96 rounding the corner nearly as soon as the 95 was released since part of being an automaker on the rise is constantly churning out shiny new products and with the saab 93 on its way out the company needed a new offering to fill the gap the 96 was an intersection between the 93 and the 95 just with more room easier accessibility and an even bigger wrap-around rear window like the 95 it was conceived to solely take the 841 cc three-cylinder two-stroke saab engine but would later be offered with the ford taunis v4 the aforementioned four-stroke 1498 cc option the car also offered a four-speed transmission with a synchromeshed first gear to replace the three speed and as with the 95 this also had the freewheeling mode even on models that weren't running the saab two-stroke engine it was a sophisticated car considering it came across as a marriage of different design and engineering philosophies the contrast between domesticity and sport performance but the saab 96 was less famous for what it offered consumers than for what it offered saab in sheer publicity this is where we come back to the titan known as eric carlson a great big linebacker of a man given to driving very small cars born in trolheton in 1929 carlson showed remarkable ingenuity throughout his racing career with saab since the two-stroke engine was prohibitive when it came to sheer power meaning he had to keep rebs high as a result that meant learning how to become the king of left foot breaking while taking high speed corners of course even with all that practice carlson still occasionally rolled his car onto its roof earning himself the nickname carlson on the roof after a children's story of the same name hey it could happen to anybody while he'd made a name for himself with wins in the first three rac rallies of the 1960s it wasn't until the 1962 monte carlo rally that carlson's legend was firmly cemented basically the monte carlo rally had become world renowned for being among the more challenging motorsport events in the world as it featured different starting points throughout europe culminating in the finish line at monte carlo asab 92 had previously won the award for highest finishing lady driver awarded in 1952 to norway's own greta melander co-driver helga lundberg greta molander was one of saab's first works drivers and she developed a reputation as one of its best drivers overall competing in such widely regarded races as the tulip rally the midnight sun the lisbon rally and events that would collectively earn her the european rally championship and she would continue to occasionally drive for saab after going into semi-retirement in the early 1960s while she didn't always place high her grit determination and skill could never really be denied she would go on to write several books detailing her travels throughout the world even illustrating children's books and translating the works of her friend renowned humorous pg woodhouse into english molander later got chrysler to fund her cross-country road trip throughout america and she even worked as a stunt driver in movies she would pass away in 2002 at the age of 94 having lived more in one lifetime than a lot of people probably could in two i genuinely wish i could find more about her than the slim outlines i did because she sounds like the type of person who deserves an entire video of her own as a force of a woman who made monte carlo an attainable dream for saab naturally it was awesome that saab had a monte carlo ladies championship to their name but they wanted the press that came with a monte carlo men's title and for that they once again turned to eric carlson who entered the monte carlo rally for saab alongside co-driver gunner hegboom see we're in 1962 the age of the two-stroke engine a good five years before the saab 96 even had the option of the taunus v4 yet the two-stroke was a reliable engine despite the issues the freewheeling mode was intended to solve notice i said reliable but not durable this is because saab recognized the fallibility of their two-stroke but also saw its accessibility over the years saab's warehouse in the united states have become positively loaded with two-stroke engines due to their decision to implement a lifetime engine warranty as a method of selling more of these engines it would wear out yes but it was also easy to swap out as were so many parts of the saab 96 really there's an amusing anecdote about a uk rally in which carlson was competing once while driving his car suffered a malfunctioning support arm on the rear axle yet he didn't have the right components to repair it surely enough along the route was a parking lot with a brand new saab 96 just sitting there as if destined for carlson's notice long story short he and his mechanic basically started removing parts from the car to replace the issues with carlson's own saab 96. there are conflicting reports on what happened next with one account stating that the duo left a note under the windshield wiper explaining to the owner why his car had been jacked up while another states that the owner arrived and was understandably furious as anyone probably would be you know that is until carlson's co-driver promised the man a new car since they obviously had a working relationship with saab and could totally hook him up regardless of which account is the true one carlson was able to finish the rally and presumably remained good on the promise of a new car since he and the original owner of the parking lot saab 96 supposedly exchanged christmas cards for years afterwards and so it was that carlson gradually earned his reputation as mr saab to go along with greta molander's rep as the best-known women's saab driver as co-driver gunner heigh boom would explain in a subsequent recounting of the mythic 62 monte carlo rally both he and carlson were looking forward to the potential for snow since they knew their little red saab 96 would be more formidable in the elements than their competitors vehicles but as the race loomed carlson grew despondent over the lack of snow in the days before the race he was worried that the roads would be bone dry and they would have no advantage over the competition after all but this would change as their car reached chamberlie france on the big day higgboom recalls quote a sudden shout of joy woke me that morning it was eric who had cheered and when i sat up and looked out of the car i understood i could see the mountains and they were covered with a welcome blanket of snow sparkling in the morning sun when we reached chambery we had a half hour in which to check the car change the tires and eat perhaps the last meal before monte carlo we never had time to finish our meal as soon as the car was ready we went over the map once more i left eric alone in the car we went out into the night and looked up the officials ahead of us we had 25 miles of a special test the first on curvy mountain roads over two mountain tops cold de graniere and cole de cucheron chambery is an altitude of 900 feet cold granier is about 3 500 feet thereafter there was a steep downhill road to 1800 feet and then upwards again over cold decouched alone at 3 400. the finishing line was on 1500 feet end quote now to the uninitiated the monte carlo rally was a race like any other yet that wasn't exactly the case to anyone who'd been following the sport for some time palmy then secretary general of the swedish motor federation wrote a quick blurb for a publication celebrating the rally expanding upon the challenging nature of the event namely through the unique special tests that came with each annual competition sort of like how every 25th hunger games has some sort of weird stipulation quote while certain details have changed the rules for the monte carlo have been basically the same since its inception the competition is a long distance drive with special tests built in at the end of the competition over the years these special tests have evolved from a straight test of speed over a closed track to time speed distance driving over narrow zigzag slippery mountain roads where it is necessary to pass both open and secret checkpoints at precise predetermined times one element has remained constant the crushing pressure exerted on each driver's skill and physical condition as the cars are put through their grueling tests end quote so yeah eric carlson and gunner hegboom would have to be in top form to actually win this thing with focus that was sharp as attack higboom gives the play by play as he and eric carlson undertook the daunting task ahead of them quote finally we were starting after 900 feet came the ice pretty soon we saw our competitors in front of us we passed one another somebody tried to follow us but had to give up pretty soon i looked at the odometer because of the spinning of the wheels it was not accurate we had to orient ourselves by means of the map and various markers in the geography i looked for them with the searchlight and found them one after another greyhouse turned left straight 1500 feet to the right sharply we passed another few competitors eric was now driving at the top of his ability he utilized masterfully all the characteristics of the car slid elegantly over the ice controlled skidding did not let up on the accelerator a second too late faster faster apart from my monotonous speech turn again slowed down nobody said a word we passed another few cars it was simple as if we were playing in a hairpin curve we spun out for a second the rear of the car ran away from us and we went backwards into the curve in the middle of it eric straightened up the car when we left the curve he had perfect control of the car again i took a deep breath and glanced over at eric did he seem shook up or was i just imagining things end quote as the night further darkened hegebome recounted the challenges the team faced particularly at the start of the second special test a daunting uphill climb from 1 000 feet to 56 feet on the one hand it was at this point that the saab drivers realized they were likely in the lead on the other hand they were being pressed by rival driver eugene boringer and co-driver peter lang in a mercedes-benz 220 se the competition between the german and swedish drivers was symbolic of the earlier connection the two countries had shared in the creation of that first saab 92 prototype and the creation of the company itself yet there was no spirit of cooperation or influence between the two in this race just a clash of motorsport drivers on terrain grueling enough to test even the most skilled drivers however hegeboom's confidence in carlson didn't waver yes they were using dunlop sp tires without spikes but this turned out to be the right call or at least not a disastrous one since they ended up only using the brakes twice over the course of 10 miles this is also due in part to the scouting their team had done since the mountain they were ascending could be viewed from a distance with binoculars such that in the day time the road and any of its obstacles would be clearly visible as hegebomb puts it nothing was left to chance yet the third test was far more demanding as it was ten miles of downhill driving from an altitude of six thousand four hundred feet to three thousand three hundred feet with a series of straightaways and nine ice-covered hairpin turns for all intents and purposes this should have been where carlson and hegboom lost their lead yet the curves actually proved to be to the team's benefit as all that time spent mastering high-speed corners paid off for carlson hegboom writes quote i don't believe any mortal man could have followed us through there when we reached saint alban eric patted his car affectionately and murdered good going old chap end quote not too long after carlson and higbone crossed the finish line for the first half of the rally resolving to improve upon their already great performance the next day but the mounting pressure of such a public competition coupled with the looming threat of mercedes driver eugene boringer cutting into their narrowing lead seemed to put carlson on edge higbone recalls quote at eight o'clock the next morning the start took place there was a hush over the whole starting area everybody's eyes seemed fastened on the little red saab and the big swede eric seemed embarrassed by all the attention once again he checked the wheel bolts then he looked towards boringer and his car the german scuffed the asphalt and absent-mindedly kicked his tires he appeared to be in deep concentration he knew he still had a good chance only about 40 seconds still separated the two cars after having driven 2500 miles during day and night only 40 short seconds which could rapidly disappear during the next four rounds on the monte carlo gp track end quote eric carlson took a strategic approach recognizing the threat that not only boringer posed to their lead but also the threat borninger's teammates posed as a potential spoiler for their chances because shaking one mercedes is hard enough but it's another game of ball all together to have to shake three heck boom details the final leg of the race as weeks and months of preparation came to a final showdown quote eric was the first to start he was afraid of getting boxed in by the three mercedes one of them driven by boringer when the starting line was passed the first time they were four seconds apart then the cars raced away to the true test four rounds the red sob was still ahead after the first round we knew that we couldn't lose more than 10 seconds per round to the much bigger and faster mercedes next round the german was ahead but eric was only five seconds behind on the straightaway the german pulled away from the swede but on the curve the swede caught up the little red car kept close to the german when they flashed over the finish line eric had lost a total of 17 seconds the car was taken apart and inspected at 10 30 pm the deadline for protests had arrived no protests when we went home to the hotel newsreel cameras recorded every step we took reporters from almost every country in the world inspected our car from stem to stern people ran up to present flowers or deliver telegrams one of the first wires was from prince burto son of the swedish king eric pinned it up over his bed and then we went out on the town end quote they had done it saab had won the monte carlo rally carlson hegboom and the saab 96 were celebrated by the media covering the event french daily paper figaro proclaimed carlson a giant at the wheel and stated he won not only because he had faith in himself he also turned out to be a strategist evening publication francois declared a big man and a small car were a good combination and surprise victors logically this is the rally for cars with big engines french motor publication leykeep wrote the little saab was fast as a rocket in the test in monaco eugene boringer in his big mercedes could not shake the swede until the third round but perhaps the most glowing write-up and a piece that stood as some truly excellent publicity for saab came from the swedish weekly magazine s.e the write-up states quote if there wasn't much interest in saab in foreign countries before there's plenty of it now somersault carlson won the monte carlo rally in asab and the little swedish wonder car has caught the fancy of the entire automotive world robert glenton for example writes in the london sunday express one of the nicest liveliest cars i have ever driven why haven't we met before there is a rumor that a member of the royal family is waiting for his sob saab couldn't score any higher in england than having a member of the royal family select a swedish saab congratulations to the factory end quote so saab had ended the 1950s putting the kibosh on the first iteration of the sonnet performance car that seemed overdue yet they entered the 1960s with a car that illustrated both character and dynamics with a driver who was a personality all his own and you know what in addition to the rac rally wins and the monte carlo victory in 1962 carlson would go on to repeat at monte carlo the following year in a saab 96 sport the saab 96 may not have been what rav melda initially conceived when he made plans to bring saab more confidently into the performance space but it was a car that made believers out of countless doubters and showed the true scope of saab's potential now all they had to do was realize that potential now you would think saab would go even sportier in the years following their monte carlo success and we kind of saw that in 1967 when the ford taunis v4 engine gave saab owners the option of a more powerful athletic vehicle but saab actually dipped into a larger class with a car that would come to be among the most iconic in the fleet the saab 99 it was a compact executive car that in addition to being larger than the saab 96 would take a different approach with the engine bypassing that old ford taunis v4 in favor of a triumph sourced 1.7 liter slant 4. why triumph well other than why not the story goes that saab first approached uk-based engineering firm ricardo and company about developing a new 1.2 liter inline-four for the saab 99 since engine development is expensive as hell and saab didn't have the means or the factory space to build from the ground up ricardo which also operated as a consulting group put the company in touch with triumph who were looking to build a similar engine themselves it was basically a stroke of serendipity that the two companies were in a position to help each other out and so it was that saab came to an agreement with triumph that would see roughly 50 000 engines produced each year for the saab 99 in the meantime sixteen sassen was hard at work putting together the design after the board decided to build a larger saab that was less of a niche product than the sports car they'd been trying to make it was a decision passed on april 2nd 1965 on a swedish holiday known as goodman's stay on the old swedish name day calendar this is why the project was initially known as the goodman project and it was an all-hands-on-deck situation from input by experienced men like rov melda to an up-and-coming prospect in the world of automotive design at the young age of 19 apprentice designer bjorn inva assisted sasson in settling on a look for the project his role became pivotal as sixten assassin developed health problems into the mid-1960s related to only having one lung as a result of his plane crash 30 years earlier anval's responsibilities mounted as he was needed to revise grill designs and general amendments to the front and rear lights which would be a tall order for anyone much less a 19 year old apprentice to one of the titans of scandinavian design but focus inevitably turn to how the car could innovate and this was achieved through industry firsts like side impact door beams headlight wipers seat heaters and carbon cabin filters along with an extended windshield so that if your head is propelled forward in a crash it has a better chance of not breaking on through to the other side like jim morrison but there were more innovations to take into account for example as jason kamisa explains in his excellent video for hagerty the saab 900 turbo was the tesla of its day go check it out the 99 was a particularly inspired bit of aviation adjacent engineering using load paths that were similar to airplane fuselage including quote a one inch thick reinforcement that goes over the top of the a-pillar in a perfectly straight line right down to the base of the chassis to protect you in a roll over end quote this was a car that could be dropped from over eight feet in the air which saab actually did as part of its safety tests and the car barely registered the damage meanwhile the concave rear was an attempt at controlling wake turbulence which the federal aviation administration describes as quote a function of an aircraft producing lift resulting in the formation of two counter-rotating vortices trailing behind the aircraft wake turbulence from the generating aircraft can affect encountering aircraft due to the strength duration and direction of the vortices wake turbulence can impose rolling moments exceeding the roll control authority of encountering aircraft causing possible injury to occupants and damage to aircraft end quote now obviously this would apply differently to cars but the principle was more or less the same as saab engineers recognized this during wind tunnel tests and sought to mitigate the effect of wake turbulence in their vehicles ultimately the car was to have the triumph slant form mounted backwards in the engine bay which i would think has something to do with allowing them to have front wheel drive layout and a double wishbone suspension at least from what i've read it was also decided to use a widened saab 96 body for testing these cars were known as padan or toads and are an interesting callback to gunnar jungstrom's claimed that the saab 92 could look like a frog as long as it ran and like the 92 the new saab 99 seemed poised to deliver on its promising beginnings but sadly it would move forward without one of the key figures in saab's early success on april 1st 1967 in sona municipality sweden 16 assassins remaining lung failed and he passed away at just 55 years of age leaving behind a legacy of influence and ingenuity to rival american automotive design legends like harley earl dick teague and bill mitchell his passing came nearly two years to the day of the start of project goodman it was a tragic loss yet the project had to march on development of the saab 99 was too big to be contained to troheton alone and so saab reached out to finland by this point i'd imagine the whole skirmish over the aland islands in the first world war was water under the bridge since saab 99 variants were also completed at the finish foundmet automotive assembly starting in 1969. the aforementioned 1.7 liter triumph sourced slant 4 was finally ready to be put to the test by today's standards it probably sounds weird to praise an engine that produces 86 horsepower at 5500 rpm yet this was the basis for a car that would be praised for its comfort agility and overall accessibility to drivers of all types mass motorist magazine proclaimed the car to be quote comfortable well-made satisfying to drive and well-equipped end quote in addition to declaring that the 99 had the advantage over competitors like the bmw 2002 and the alpha romeo julia as the article for the uk-based magazine states quote the saab 99 shows tremendous potential for development and is very different in flavor to offerings from lancia alpha and citrone those other cars for men with exotic tastes the general engineering setup of disc brakes and front-wheel drive in a monaco chassis has been honed to good effect the empty roads around trolhetan afford numerous opportunities to assess the modest understeer excellent grip and high level of comfort afforded by the 99 it should be noted that it took a fair amount of provocation to unbalance the car meaning that the performance can be enjoyed up to speeds well above the norm prevalent in england end quote the saab 99 was up and running but continuous with that car's production was the final shot at truly bringing the saab sonnet to sustainable life as a proper production car you see at around the time eric carlson was winning glory for saab on the racetrack plans were being put into place for a two-seat roadster that would be saab's first production sports car it would essentially exist as a potential saab 97 and it was an idea that had the hallmarks of good sense mostly taking things that already worked in their rally cars like the freewheeling mode the two-stroke three-cylinder 841cc monte carlo engine and three single-barrel carburetors it was intended to be excessively sporty in ways the rally capable 96 wasn't and upon initial production it did quite well at least in racing circles as this went toe to toe with the austin healey sprites of the world but the car that would come to be known as the sonnet 2 would be hindered by two stipulations that became more of a nuisance than anything else for one the car was disqualified in sports car club of america racing events for failing to reach the minimum production number of 500 units as only 230 models were produced for its debut year in 1967. adding to the hurdles were u.s emissions standards that tightened around auto companies like a dam boa constrictor even prior to the oil crisis of the 1970s the united states government required stricter emission control which meant the classic two-stroke was out the window this was another impetus for the implementation of the ford taunis v4 engine no more two-stroke for 1967 this was now the sonnet b4 and just about every model was exported to the united states for a price of around three thousand eight hundred dollars which is about thirty one thousand dollars today it was sporty and safe with its three-point seat belts high back bucket seats and roll bar and the famous freewheeling clutch and a column mounted shifter because hey let's just do things why not who cares for saab get on our level but the car's exoticism was both its draw and its downfall as the sonnet 2's front wheel drive layout didn't catch on with sports car enthusiasts in the late 1960s nor did the column mounted shifter or the car's overall styling approach which seemed equal parts curvy and jagged owing to a fiberglass body on a box chassis sure it was a fast car that handled like a proper sports car and if saab had more of a reputation in the united states prior to the 1960s then perhaps they'd have been able to get away with something avant-garde that perhaps the american public wasn't ready for but might have been open to trying however name recognition is worth a lot in these parts and consumers simply went with the prestige of other brands resulting in a production run of just 2 000 units for the sonnet 2. only around 230 of which ever had the two-stroke three-cylinder engine making this one almost as rare as its forebear one wonders to what extent the shortcomings of the sonnet factored into the pivot towards the saab 99 as saab seem to have trouble with their sports cars it can be difficult to conjure the necessary fear of missing out that keeps so many people buying teslas and corvettes cars that have captured the zeitgeist and taken on a very real cultural capital in this regard it seemed like the saab 99 was the safer bed on the subject of the saab 99 the car would see considerable changes over time as the design influences of the 1960s gave way to the emergent trends of the 1970s by this point former head of development gunnar jungstrom had retired from saab leaving it better than he found it despite whatever difficulties they might have been facing in the late 60s and early 70s and it was evidenced in how the company had evolved embodied in the changes to the saab 99 in addition to an upgraded interior with new steering wheel center mounted shifter an aluminum exhaust system and a two-door variant with bosch d jet fuel injection called the saab 99e the car went through a host of other evolutions such as an increase in displacement for 1971. this latter detail marked the end of what had to that point been a short but fruitful partnership as saab ultimately decided to end things with triumph and move production in-house to deliver the in-line four-cylinder saab b engine in 1972. why did they do this well it doesn't seem to have been a case of being dissatisfied with triumph's work you see 1972 marked the beginning of engine production moving to a recently acquired division of saab back on september 1st 1969 a vehicle and industrial manufacturing company named sconia merged with saab a b to form saab sconia a b this was a game changer for saab because it meant they didn't have to import the triumph engine anymore they could just use sconia's facilities and over time the 1.8 liter saab b gave way to a two liter version eventually the sconia acquisition would do more for saab than i bet even they anticipated as this steel would give them the freedom of manufacturing that allowed them to start experimenting with turbochargers a path that would make them true innovators in the automotive sector this is the era in which saab really seemed to be hitting its stride emboldened to take new risks or in this case old ones in the auto industry i don't know how often the old phrase third time's a charm actually applies but it certainly did with the saab sonnet 3 a redesign of the previous iteration by italian designer sergio kojiola but with a restriction by saab against changing the center portion of the car kojiola's design was accepted and then tinkered with by saab designer gunner ah shergren because it really seems like everyone in sweden gets to have cool ass names like gouna ah so jealous the car also needed a new interior design philosophy to appeal to u.s consumers the sonnet v4 was an athletic little piece of swedish exoticism but the column mounted shifter prevented it from ever feeling like a natural racer so this was corrected with the sonnet 3 among other improvements to come as mark j mccourt details in the december 2007 issue of hemming's sports and exotics quote inside the 3995 dollar sonnet 3 a properly sporting floor mounted shifter was standard as were corduroy vinyl high back bucket seats with integral headrests and clever adjustable lumbar support pads the leather upholstery was included in the luxury model and all got a standard leather-wrapped three-spoke steering wheel on a collapsible column three large dials faced the driver and offered gauges for speed rpm temperature and fuel the 1498 cc v4 engine was carried over and with a 32 millimeter single barrel auto light carburetor and 58.9 by 90 millimeter boron stroke it made an sae rated 73 horsepower at 5000 rpm and 87 pound-feet of torque at 2700 rpm sharp handling long asab trait was accomplished with the three's manual rack and pinion steering a transverse wishbone independent front and tube axle rear suspension both coil sprung with telescopic shock absorbers dual circuit breaking was handled by 10.5 inch lockheed front discs and 8-inch rear drums and 155 sr15 tires rode on 15 by 4 inch steel or optional tuna vercan alloy wheels the car's curb weight climbed to 1785 pounds offsetting the body's wind tunnel advantage while the price remained the same the sonnet 3's v4 received a different crankshaft for 1971. the 90 millimeter stroke was complemented by a new 66.8 millimeter bore and with 8.0 compression the engine made 65 din rated horsepower at 4700 rpm and 85 pound-feet of torque at 2500 rpm with a 4.67 to 1 final drive ratio the little sportster could hit 60 miles per hour in 11.5 seconds and top miles per hour end quote now this was all combined with a blistering drag coefficient of 0.31 beating the sonnet 2's already impressive 0.35 and matching the drag number of the saab 92 this was a car that could stand as something new with a hint of familiarity with the previous cycle you had a small bonnet hatch that allowed engine access for repair and maintenance while the trunk was accessed through the glass tailgate which sounds like an impediment but this trunk was actually larger than the previous model with space for tools to be stored with the spare wheel and the battery this along with the strut tower brace that also served as a coolant reservoir through the magical engineering of the swedish they also featured padded fiberglass seats and an overall more aggressive look than the sonnet 2. unlike the previous two iterations this sonnet would have the benefit of a much larger consumer base in the united states about 8 300 sonnet 3s were produced and of those exported to the us every last one of them sold according to a report by auto week this was perhaps thanks to the combination of the swedish italian design that favored a more classical wedge appearance than the previous model or maybe it was the more generous fuel economy rating 26.4 miles per gallon in tests by road and track the initial 3995 dollar price tag would come out to around 28 000 today not prohibitively expensive but not as cheap as the market probably would have preferred and you could attribute the price to gradual annual model change like a grill refresh or the triumph tr6 style black painted rear panel or newly designed alloy wheels or the infamous us safety regulation mandated impact bumpers but 1973 also brought a new flat windshield wiper design along with a system for diverting rainwater away from open windows just in case by the car's final model year in 1974 sales had proven to be better than the sonnet 2 but they still weren't enough to justify continuing to make them particularly in the wake of all the regulations by which saab had to abide regulations that both curbed style and performance for the model and so the saab sonnet was put out to pasture but it remains one of the rarer more in-demand sobs out there at least that's what i've been led to believe from the sheer volume of emails asking us to review one over the years and the amount of saab enthusiasts i've seen who treat it as a holy grail of sorts which is not a judgment because i kind of see it that way too i can appreciate why this is so special and i'd love to get my hands on one i ultimately think the saga of the saab sonnet is one of enthusiasm and passion as reflected not only in those who helped bring it to light but in those who continue to help keep them on the road and in the larger fabric of car culture altogether and really the 1970s were all about saab trying to inspire enthusiasm and passion whether it always made sense financially or not the 1970s was an integral decade for saab and arguably their high point owing to the company's merger with scania and its confidence as an automaker they certainly were comfortable taking risks even if their plans didn't always come to fruition for instance you're probably wondering why we skipped over the saab 98 and it's because saab ultimately did as well originally designated the x-14 the 98 was put into planning stages only two years after the saab 99 entered production yet the prototype never entered production itself like the sonnet 3 it was a swedish italian collaboration at least in the design phase as saab designer bjorn ainval and sergio kogiola brought the idea to life of a concept that lifted from the layout of the saab 95 it introduced the notion of the combi coupe merging the look of a hatchback with the comfort of a family car but saab recognized that the 95 had already been positioned to serve the same market space thus making the 98 redundant but even while the 98 never made it past the prototype phase the combi coupe was an idea later applied in 1974 to the saab 99 which itself would be the delivery system for an innovative change in the auto industry in a lot of ways saab was a pioneer in the mass marketing of turbochargers sure other companies did it first like bmw chevy and porsche but saab optimized the process thanks to a man by the name of par gilbrand an engineer recruited from volvo in 1964 who developed saab's turbochargers and became so synonymous with that contribution that he developed the nickname mr turbo his motivation for getting into the turbocharging business well as gilbran put it it was sort of a why not proposal figuring that since engines have fuel pumps oil pumps and water pumps it made all the sense in the world to add an air pump which was more or less what a turbo actually is for yield brand it was odd for an engine not to have one as a heming's featured article by george matar explains gilbrand was ahead of his time quote most will agree that about thirty percent of the energy released when an engine burns fuel goes down the tube or in this case the exhaust pipe but gilbrand and other saab engineers came up with a bypass valve to control boost pressure buildup fitting this turbo to the saab 99 gave it 23 percent more maximum horsepower and a 45 increase in torque which is the engine's pulling power under acceleration other refinements by yield brand include anti-knock control which he engineered by using electronic boost control he also designed the 16-valve cylinder head for saab and led the development of the company's direct ignition system with each spark plug carrying its own coil end quote the 99 turbo made for a compelling new offering with its bosch jet fuel injection and power ratings in the neighborhood of 135 horsepower and torque somewhere around 174 pound-feet which is significant because saab essentially became the first automaker to tune a turbo for low-speed torque on a sedan rather than tuning for power so that what you ended up with was a daily driver that could handle bigger loads stop laughing and make greater horsepower at low rpms the 99 turbo also had a drag coefficient capable of rivaling a citron ds and offering 0 to 60 time just under 9 seconds although i found test drives that have 0-60 at around 7.8 seconds of course i list a bunch of factoids but the truth is that saab had different goals with the turbo it wasn't so much about achieving raw power so much as finding a way to deliver the high-end torque of a bigger engine without sacrificing all the positives of driving a car with a smaller one because let's be real this wasn't necessarily about being all over the cover of magazines saab was way more focused on safety and reliability without making people feel like they were being cheated out of a more versatile driving experience as was often the case with family cars the saab 99 became one of the first family friendly vehicles in the world to get a turbo charger which critics seem to love wheels magazine based out of australia stated it's quote almost as fast between 60 kilometers per hour and 160 kilometers per hour in fourth gear as any five-seater in the world end quote meanwhile modern motor expressed amazement that quote such a seemingly endless surge of strong acceleration is possible from a two-liter engine in a far from lightweight car end quote it's all indicative of saab's focus on turbochargers putting them in a privileged class among automakers as you couldn't generally get this type of sophistication and precision at an affordable family saloon car price point in an interview with automotive news in 2014 former saab engineer and pr director steve rossi claimed saab pioneered the commercialization of turbocharging he would go on to imply that it wasn't simply adding a turbocharger that was the game changer but the accessibility to the average consumer relative to other luxury brands in addition to saab's strong focus on safety these were the elements that motivated saab's commercialization of the turbocharger quote saab was able to do that because they were a niche player and they could charge a premium for it but saab was driven by a lot of social conscience from the swedish culture and society gasoline was already inordinately expensive in relative terms back in the day in sweden so they were dealing with that and saab had a strong ethic for safety and performance so the car needed to be nimble and fun to drive which is why a four-cylinder turbo instead of a big engine made a lot of sense end quote throughout the 70s the 99 would evolve and change such as with the move to mechanical fuel injection on the ems variant which stands for electronic manual special basically an electronic fuel injection manual transmission it was cool for 1975 yet the ems designation would go on to raise a few eyebrows due to the apparent misnomer of keeping that name for future models like the saab 900 since one it would have bosch mechanical k-jet injection so it wasn't electronic two it received an automatic transmission so it wasn't manual and three it was built on the pre-existing saab 99 platform so it wasn't even really that special but i'm getting sidetracked i'm sorry it's really hard not to when the brand has such an intertwined history with itself which to be fair isn't all that different from a lot of automakers but usually i don't find the intertextuality of auto brands interesting enough to talk about in the first place whereas i just find saab's choices so delightfully intentional the ems variant was followed by the introduction of a self-adjusting clutch in 1976 and even a limousine version built in 1977 known as the finlandia which was a custom job by a finnish industrialist as a gift to the president of finland who didn't have a driver's license and wanted something similar to the big american sedans that chauffeured other heads of state around but without all the garishness and self-importance of those cars basically make me an american car but without all the america that goes with it anyway by the time the saab 99 turbo hit the market in 1978 it was a car destined for international reach a grand total of 10 607 saab 99 turbos were made with 4233 of those units being exported to north america while not the kind of blow away number that would propel and import auto brand to the top of the north american car market the saab 99 turbo provided saab with momentum going into the next car the iconic 900 which again took the saab 99 as inspiration and why not the 99 put saab and its turbocharging capabilities on the map in fact the 99 was the first turbo to win a world rally championship as stig blumquist won the 1979 swedish rally in a saab 99 boosted by garrett t-03 turbo in short the 900 would have to deliver on performance failing that it would need to be aesthetically appealing barring even that it would have to be safe if nothing else the 900 would be the car to lead saab into the 1980s and a future as exciting as it was uncertain with the saab 900 we really start to see saab's emphasis on safety above other considerations owing in large part to u.s standards of the time the national highway traffic safety administration had been formed in 1970 and by the end of the decade they had overhauled crash test standards by conducting their own by 1979 the national highway traffic safety administration was publishing the results of their own crash tests for new vehicles in order to get automakers to be more safety conscious so saab began to focus more intently on safety which is not to say they weren't already more safety conscious than most you can see how saab began to privilege safety in the same breath as performance by looking back an entire decade earlier in a 1969 presentation by gunnard jungstrom just prior to his retirement from the company jungstrum who had been head of development during saab's infancy detailed the actions the company could take to integrate safety more completely into their design philosophy moving forward quote how our current cars are designed is well known i just want to emphasize some items we think are essential front wheel drive provides major advantages during difficult conditions front wheel to improve driving on slippery roads maximum grip is immediately achieved when the throttle pedal is released the steering gear positioned as much as possible to the rear to avoid pushing the steering column against the driver in a collision the fuel tank in a protected position strong a pillars withstanding high loads in a rollover handbrake working on the front wheels as on the 99 brake system with two circuits diagonally split which we introduced already in 1964. end quote i mentioned earlier that when saab introduced the 99 the a-pillars were reinforced to redistribute impact force and keep passengers safe in rollovers along with the curved glass windshield to protect your head if you should be pushed forward on impact what i didn't mention was the implementation of heated seats now why was this important for safety well you have to remember that saab's tended to be built with swedish winters in mind and so this innovation was necessary for the comfort of the driver which also meant it was important for safety on the premise that a comfortable driver is a safe driver and it was an effective approach for the 99 with that safety forward design philosophy being adapted onto the 900 in the form of the seat heaters returning alongside pillars that now formed a z-shape to accommodate the us-mandated longer wheelbase pillars that were no less effective in offering reinforcement to drivers in front impact collisions it was saab going back to their airline routes to create load paths that were reminiscent of the vehicles they started out making and i'm going to say they went back to their airline routes a lot because saab as a company could never fully divorce themselves from that aspect of their history although that's not necessarily a bad thing hitting the market in the fall of 1978 for the 1979 model year the saab 900 featured an engine that like the saab 99 was installed backwards drawing its power from the front mounted crank while the transaxle that served as the transmission mounted to the bottom of the engine as a result the power from the front moves on down the line to the transmission by a rube goldberg machine of chain driven gears and down to the front wheels my research assistant and overall saab guy jake told me that quote asking what primary gears should i run is the 900 owner's equivalent of asking what oil should i use just to give you some idea of the complexity here it was a setup similar to the mini which had employed a similar layout to positive results albeit with the difference that the oil was shared between the gearbox and engine on the mini whereas the 900 gearboxes had separate sumps for the engine and gearbox there was also more choice on offer here in the engine department as the saab 900 gave you multiple engine choices from which to select like the 100 horsepower single carb gl engine the twin carbureted 108 horsepower variant the 118 horsepower bosch k jetronik ems and gle versions or the 145 horsepower turbo unlike the 99 turbo 900s were made available from the jump an important distinction if you were as hyped about turbos as saab was hoping you'd be chief designer bjorn anval's goal for the 900 was a car that was quote built to a target not down to a budget end quote and so we got a design that like so many sobs before it privileged the aviation aspects of the brand's history with less of a thought towards expense and more towards driver capability in some ways the 900 was the apex of saab's integration of aviation into its car design not just with the pillars that mimicked airplane fuselage but through the curved dashboard and lit gauges all arrayed in order of most frequent likely use like the radio being placed high on the dash so that even if you had to momentarily take your eyes from the road they weren't completely diverted thanks to the curved windshield and the angle of the instruments the switches and knobs were also ergonomically designed rather than being a collection of sliders like many cars of its time it was an interesting way of allowing drivers to access control features without having to turn their eyes away and as was tradition for saab at this point the 900 had great aerodynamics averaging a drag coefficient of 0.36 for the hatch and fuel economy for the manual in the ballpark of 21 city and 30 highway in 1980 although 1984 would be the fuel economy high for not just the 900 but the saab brand in general as a 2-liter turbo matched to the 5-speed manual could go as high as 37 miles per gallon but the 900 also offered some nice deviations from standard automotive design that didn't necessarily hark back to planes which you see here with yet another in a long history of design choices intended to keep water and dirt out of the cabin in this case the low end cut of the door made a more complementary coupling with the undercarriage so that debris and water were less likely to breach the cabin as well as reducing the amount of dirt to get in thanks to a lower foot clearance you didn't have to step over a needlessly high sweep now it was probably unnecessary from a cost-benefit standpoint but it's one of those little quality of life improvements most probably wouldn't think to ask for yet i think would be pretty glad to have at least over time however saab was now moving headlong into the 1980s and needed the 900 to lead the charge which is more or less what it ended up doing as saab would go on to produce nearly a million units of the 900 over the course of the late 70s and mid-80s it was the best-selling saab ever made in addition to being its longest-running model surviving in one form or another for 25 years and attaining a pop culture life that exceeded even that i mean it's literally the car the car in the recent best picture nominee drive my car the titular car that's that's a saab 900 and the 900 continued to sell well as the 80s ramped up proving a word of mouth gem among loyal customers this along with advancements over time like the arrival in 1981 of the saab h engine which wasn't really an h engine at all let me explain if the b engine was a substantial redesign of the triumph slant 4 the saab h was a complete overhaul of the b engine despite not being horizontally opposed what the h signified was high compression yet the engines retained b designations such as the important 16-valve b-202 engine released in 1984 which came equipped with self-adjusting lifters and a much higher power output its management system was also fairly noteworthy its self-combining aspects of bosch lh jetronic fuel injection with saab's automatic pressure control system or apc this latter development was important in managing the 900 turbo as it controlled boost pressure by detecting any frequencies that would signal the presence of engine knock below certain rpms and lower the pressure to avoid damage it was so successful that saab licensed it out to maserati who used it for their own bi-turbo but that's not all it did this was the system that allowed you to essentially run any fuel grade you wanted to maximize power without risking blowing a piston it really can't be overstated how big a deal apc was it was another design innovation brought to the table by mr turbo himself pargiel brand whose engine expertise was invaluable as he was instrumental in modifying triumph's slant 4 to go in the saab 99 yet it was this engine that was being replaced by the b-202 and for good reason bh engines strengthened saab's reputation for reliability there are anecdotal examples of b202 engines lasting for a million miles and their durability was a selling point for the 900. so yeah it's easy to see why these sold they were celebrated maybe not to the extent enthusiasts would today but it was mostly regarded as one of the safest cars of its era and basically existed as an automotive swiss army knife occupying the intersection between family wagon hatchback sports car and compact executive even without a turbo you were getting great road handling and acceleration and a car packed with odd little features that made it unique among competition of course for all its sophistication the saab 900 wasn't the easiest car to manufacture for one the whole engine fiasco from its bulky pistons to its triplex chain trans axle the hood line lowering angle of the engine and the fact that the engine and trans axle didn't share a sump due to equal length drive shafts it's also hard to imagine that the safety and comfort refinements were in any way cheap yes i'm talking stuff like the automatic lumbar and heated seats but also the hatch designed to accommodate the six-foot five-inch president of saab who indicated to bjorn ainval that he and his wife should be able to go camping in the back of it while he sipped coffee on the bumper and took in the view sure enough inval took this advice on board but did the president one better the bumpers were now self-repairing a design quirk unique to saab these bumpers sat on a steel rail and had a plated strap in the center all of which was fastened to beams under the front that would absorb the brunt of the impact these bumpers would take the hit and then return to shape albeit sometimes with the driver having to order a replacement chrome plated strap it wouldn't completely eliminate damage if the collision was anything more substantial than a low speed fender bender but it was a decent bit of forward thinking and automotive wizardry that put saab ahead in innovation for its time hell their slogan in the 80s was the most intelligent cars ever built and yet for all the advancement the costs were beginning to catch up saab had enjoyed a reputation of steady production that mostly satisfied its customers even if it didn't totally reach the entire market the way they'd hoped but sometimes being steadily successful is better than having a short burst of wild manic success followed by a steep and sudden decline like amc did yet no high lasts forever and while the 900 was the pinnacle of saab's fleet sales were beginning to decline and unfortunately it kind of says a lot when your highest selling car of all time isn't enough to really move the needle but this is the position in which saab found themselves struggling due to a commitment to quality over just strict profits like with amc it was always a matter of sales failing to meet the burden of production costs which isn't exactly unique to struggling automakers or any struggling business really success is measured by profits covering expenses that's literally business handshakes and everything yet saab was at a crossroads and things were starting to look pretty dire salvation would require thinking outside the box which is precisely what saab usa president bob sinclair set out to do bob sinclair was a philadelphian native who began his auto industry career in 1958 when saabs were just hitting the united states according to sinclair he was only the second salesman hired by saab's u.s division focusing his efforts on the new england territory covering his ground in a saab 93b he quickly became indispensable rising to the role of sales manager under ralph millett the man responsible for founding the u.s wing of saab after having dinner one night with the president of the company the future chairman and president of the automobile importers of america millet was an aviation man through and through owing to his degree in aeronautical engineering from mit and his service in the us army air corps as a lieutenant colonel but like saab he'd changed his focus to cars and became quite successful in that sphere helping the company plot out the u.s distribution of saab's early offerings it was the type of meteoric rise most people dreamed to achieve in their careers and once millet was in charge and he hired sinclair sinclair quickly rose through the ranks from sales to a managerial role in the form of handling all of saab's advertising and public relations in the united states sinclair had ideas about moving the brand upmarket and getting away from saab's everyman image in europe he just didn't have the power in the company to have anybody recognize that vision yet there was every indication that sinclair planned to attain a higher position at saab so that he eventually could get people in power to listen to his ideas that is until saab made plans to move their us office from new york city to new haven connecticut it was 1961 and sinclair didn't want to uproot his family to connecticut and so he accepted a position at volvo the other big swedish automaker where he began as their u.s advertising manager in six short years sinclair would be promoted to president of western u.s distribution so that by 1967 he was an established name at the national level while with volvo sinclair tried to execute his earlier saab idea to move away from the conventional foreign import image and more towards an upmarket family car identity but he ran up against a bureaucracy that resisted straying from what they felt had worked in the u.s market up to that point the aversion to taking any real risks came back to bite volvo such that they had to reduce their focus on the united states by the time the oil crisis was in full swing from 1973 to 1974. sinclair explained his conundrum in an interview in the november 2006 issue of hemming's sports and exotics quote volvo downsized their u.s presence in 1974. in the process i picked up everything west of the mississippi river but lost my finance and legal departments and i became in my eyes sort of a paper tiger i stayed in that mode for a couple of years because we had six kids to raise end quote this was fine for the short term but sinclair couldn't stay there forever expressing his dissatisfaction to the president of volvo in 1978 declaring quote this job is not fun anymore i've only got one life to live and i don't feel like doing what i'm doing he said why don't you come to the head office you can be vice president of marketing in charge of sales advertising public relations distribution product specifications the whole bag end quote it was too big of an offer to turn down so sinclair gave volvo another year of his life but it just wasn't the type of job he wanted he wanted to have a meaningful effect on the direction of a company not do the same type of public relations work he'd been doing since the 1950s that's when sinclair received a very fortunate phone call from his old boss ralph millett with saab looking to stake a real claim in the u.s market millett needed his best guys and sinclair was arguably the key acquisition sinclair recalls quote he asked if i would consider coming back to saab i told him i'd consider it under certain circumstances if i were president and ceo answerable only to the board of directors and had a free hand to run the us operations he replied that's exactly what we have in mind end quote and so bob sinclair left volvo return to saab usa and became president in 1979. so what does this have to do with the evolution of the saab 900 well when sales began to decline around the early to mid 80s bob sinclair was at a loss he had helped shepherd the saab brand to greater prominence in the us than it had ever known previously championing the brand's turbocharging efforts creating the first ever saab owners convention in 1983 and sponsoring the open wheel racing series founded by legendary race car driver skip barber a fellow philadelphia native who conceived of using naturally aspirated 1600cc dodge engines before turbocharged saab engines burst onto the scene at which point sinclair made sure to hook barber up with all the saab equipment he needed as well as an engineering assistant flown in directly from sweden these were all approaches that helped raise saab's profile in the united states but with the fleet performing below expectations sinclair went back to his original idea for saab to move up market and away from the comparatively safe image they'd occupied previously it all started when the bosses over in sweden asked sinclair to accept allocation of poverty spec 900s which sinclair roundly rejected since some of these cars didn't even have the most basic amenities like ac or crank windows so the bigwigs asked sinclair to provide them with a spec list of what he wanted sinclair quickly returned to them a spec sheet with a request for the saab 900 to be given a convertible top considering saabs were initially created with harsh winters in mind the concept of a convertible top was completely contrary to what any of the executives in sweden would have imagined for their brand or for enthusiasts for whom it was difficult to conceive of a non-hatchback becoming one of the flagships of the brand so yeah sinclair faced pushback to say the least yet he was able to convince the company to give him a shot at producing one himself and they agreed but on one condition the american division would have to produce this prototype on their own dime sinclair was essentially being challenged to put his money where his mouth was but he was experienced enough in advertising to know what they could afford to allocate to the ad budget and what they could afford to divert from the till and so the annual ad budget had its numbers drastically reduced in order to pay the american sunroof company to design a prototype convertible now obviously saab hasn't always been risk-averse as evidenced by cars like the sonnet but this was bold even for them moving the company away from its carefully constructed niche yet it was a move saab had to make and sinclair was the man to make it when the design was completed sinclair submitted it for approval from the executives in sweden and sure enough they loved it when the car made its debut at the 1983 frankfurt motor show bob sinclair was vindicated as if symbolizing his decision to go with saab over his previous employer people at the show were standing on the hoods of volvos to get pictures of this new convertible saab 900 it was surprisingly successful and so two more prototypes were produced by lynx motors and then another by saab's own department in trollhettan led by bjorn enva based on the three-door hatchback version of the 900 however the model saab ultimately went with was produced by the foundmet plant in finland crafted from the two-door version for a sleeker more marketable look although saab didn't have high expectations for the production run orders were stronger than anticipated so that by the time the car was launched in 1986 it had rehabbed saab's u.s sales considerably such that the company could look ahead to the next addition to their fleet the saab 9000 but could the saab 9000 turn things around or would it only serve as a temporary solution to an inescapable problem this is where the saab 9000 enters the story debuting the same year as the 900 convertible despite moving up into the executive class the saab 9000 was cheaper to build than the 900 had been thanks to being co-developed with fiat lancia and alfa romeo using their open source type 4 platform the agreement actually predated sinclair's return to saab as the companies entered talks in 1978 to create a shared platform that would minimize production and development costs on high-end saloon models together they created a front-wheel drive platform with optional four-wheel drive and four-wheel independent mcpherson strut suspension well except for saab who went with a beam axle rear suspension in fact the saab 9000 differed in other more significant ways that ultimately became an issue as time went on more on that in a bit but for now let it suffice to say that the 9000 extends the legacy of our guy bjorn enval who designed this body with italian design legend giorgito gugiaro the man behind the vw golf mark 1 the lotus esprit and the freaking delorean the 9000 was shorter than its immediate predecessor but featured a longer wheelbase its addition of nearly 56.5 cubic feet of interior space with the seats folded down got this thing rated as a large car by the epa a distinction shared only by the rolls-royce but hey america loves largesse so it kind of made this a more us-ready car than perhaps anything saab had offered in the united states before it eliminated some of the weirder features of the 900 i'm talking stuff like the key tumbler formerly near the center console to prevent the key from jabbing you in a collision now being repositioned back to the steering column i would also be remiss if i didn't mention saab's trionic system which was something of an evolution of the automatic performance control or apc while apc governed boost control trionic was more of a three-pronged system as evidenced by its name try because it controlled three functions fuel injection ignition timing and boost ambi ionic is from the use of spark plugs as knock sensors which is done by measuring the ion current between combustions in order to catch instances of knock and engine misfires among other things saab boasted about the system in its own brochures at the time by connecting its technology to that of the moon landing saying about the trionic that quote it is the only system which can control fuel injection ignition and boost pressure all at the same time as a result you have increased performance lower fuel consumption and lower exhaust emission the saab trionic is built up around a microprocessor with a greater computing capacity than the computers they use to take the first man to the moon this adaptable system learns and stores information about driving conditions while you are driving the saab trionic uses this information to adjust the engine's operation allowing it to run independently of the external conditions the whole time at maximum efficiency in fact the system is so effective that the car's exhaust fumes are often cleaner than the surrounding air end quote here we see that saab ultimately found a way to implement this new technology while saving some money in the process since this sort of newfangled microprocessing unit presumably wasn't going to be cheaper than simply not having it at all so how did they save some money doing this well okay the trionic made its debut on the saab h engines which were redesigns of the successful b engines yet retaining the b designation so while the creation of the b204 engine was compelled by the desire to get something up and running for the saab 900 the 9000 was designed so that it could also fit the b204 it was a cost-cutting measure since it meant saab essentially got an engine that could power two cars manufactured for the price of one this was also done with a subsequent b-23 engine which got a long block version and a short block version both in the 1990s as a consequence the saab 9000 ultimately ran on three separate engines in its lifetime the initial b202 used on the saab 900 the b-204 for the next generation and the b234 which was split into low pressure turbo and full pressure turbo variants utilizing a garrett t25 turbocharger the turbos were really the biggest reason to get this car even beyond the safety considerations as the performance was rally worthy as evidenced by its record-shattering world-famous run at talladega on october 7th 1986 three saab 9000 turbo 16s rounded the alabama international motor speedway at talladega for nearly 20 consecutive days of continuous driving 20. that is absurd the cars were unmodified outside of the addition of a roll cage for each one as well as six point safety harnesses for the drivers who would be operating them for what came to be known as the long run stunt was intended to display the performance and reliability of the saab 9000 turbo and a big deal was made of the fact that these were just three cars off the factory line chosen at random under the supervision of the federation international do sport automobile or fisa they were in no way specifically fitted for this endurance test they were just standard sobs across 62 000 miles and maintaining an average speed of 132 miles per hour the three cars were operated by a total of 25 drivers over the course of the nearly three week test although i've seen some sources claim as high as 31 separate drivers were at the wheel but either way it took a whole team to bring this together including sponsors which saab was luckily able to secure in the form of pirelli which supplied some 400 tires shell who supplied some 100 000 liters of fuel and lube and garrett supplying their own engineers to troubleshoot any issues with the turbochargers the tires were changed at 12 and 24 hour intervals 12 for the front and 24 for the rear while maintenance was performed every 12 000 miles which averages out to every four days of driving the long run resulted in saab achieving 21 international records and setting two world records no i don't know what the difference between international and world is while the steep curve of the track resulted in the engine suffering fuel starvation at low levels and exhaust valves burning out after 15 days due to the fuel pump taking in air when the fuel would shift to the lower end of the tank both were remedied with a spare head replacement with the mechanics being closely watched by fisa officials there was no way saab could game the system so when it was discovered that the turbochargers were in great condition and none of the chassis work needed to be replaced it was an amazing feather in saab's cap the oil didn't even need changing with saab claiming that each car was lubricated for life title of my sex tape the engines were also in great condition and other than the head replacement the only issue was visibility after the track conditions and the strain of continuous operation was purported to have left windshields and headlights sandblasted but for ordinary everyday driving it's hard to imagine you could ever do better americans were interpreting saab as a luxury brand when that hadn't previously been the case but this was a situation where anything european benefited from the presumption of that luxury and having that identity in the united states seemed like something saab would have been able to parlay into long-term growth that is if they hadn't essentially shot themselves in the foot by being ethical you see while the idea of the 9000 was that saab would make something bigger and more appropriate for the us market they kind of got sidetracked by those safety italian companies presented their crash test figures as having been quote perfect but saab didn't agree declaring they were quote not good at all and so saab took it upon themselves to rework the design to their own specifications such as having the aforementioned beam axle rear suspension thicker steel and including side impact protection improvements and a transverse mounted engine to improve economy of space over previous saabs but the end result was that a car that was initially supposed to be a badge-engineered italian luxury vehicle ended up sharing only seven interchangeable elements with its italian cousins in effect saab ended up eating expenses they weren't intended to on the one hand the saab 9000 was a car that grew year over year in the first few years of its production following its launch in 1984 rising from an early high of 97 units in 1986 to 11 858 units by 1988. even upon its decline into the 1990s it was still doing respectable numbers at least relative to saab's typical us figures with just under 9000 units sold in 1990 and then bouncing back in the middle of the decade with nearly 11 000 sold in 1995 but the cost of production meant that every saab 9000 was sold at a loss money was a clear problem and the sad reality was that saab could not continue without significant financial backing they simply no longer had the capital to develop anything new it was the end of saab's age of independence as the search for a buyer began in earnest 1990 was a crucial year for saab as they reported losses of 848 million dollars for the fiscal year which averages out to a loss of roughly 9 000 for every car sold so saab needed to find a partnership that would hopefully go smoother than their collaboration with italy's finest but finding anything more than a match of convenience would be easier said than done the time had come for a new phase for saab hopes were high but that only meant there was farther to fall saab ended the 1980s by testing the waters for a buyer while the saab 9000 sold well enough it still ultimately lost money for the company to this end one of the companies considered as a buyer was of all possibilities ford and it kind of makes sense since the two companies already had a previous partnership with the ford taunis v4 engine used in previous saab vehicles like the 95 the 96 and the latter two versions of the sonnet bob sinclair leveled with his employees by revealing that early talks with ford were underway however the ford discussion was soon overshadowed by rumors of a return to italy when automotive news published a cover story on saab potentially re-teeming with fiat the rumors were so widespread that they required addressing directly by sinclair in a memo dated november 17 1989 sinclair stated quote by now i'm sure that most of you have seen or heard about the front page article which appeared in the november 13 1989 issue of automotive news it addressed a possible cooperative venture between saab scania a b and fiat lancia spa and was written by an italian correspondent with well-informed sources please understand that no announcements other than what you previously received regarding the ford talks along with one that is attached to this memo have been released by our parent company whatever else appears is speculation as indicated to the dealers any information that we do receive from saab sconia a b concerning such discussions will be shared with you immediately the goal of publications such as automotive news is obviously to sell newspapers our job is to sell and support saab sconia products in the u.s market and i therefore ask that you do not allow such speculation to stand in the way of the fulfillment of your own responsibilities end quote naturally the deal with ford would have been a huge boon to saab in the united states as the company's sales had taken a precipitous drop from their previous highs losing in the realm of 120 million dollars in the first half of 1989 alone with analysts of the time predicting a loss in excess of 300 million dollars for the year the thing primarily keeping saab afloat was the scania side of the equation as their truck division was the most profitable side of the business the issue seemed to be a case of the chickens coming home to roost with the more exotic approach saab had taken in recent years appearing to be luxurious and european is all well and good if the market supports it but it's pretty well summed up by analyst jennifer torra who told the new york times in 1989 that quote the sort of turbocharged cars they make are bought by yuppies and as torah would go on to add this was a market that quote has never picked up since the 1987 stock market crash end quote and so the four deal would have represented a branding pivot towards young professionals with the 909 000 models boosted through ford's extensive dealership network and distribution platforms the anticipated revenue such a deal would generate could be expected to help underpin the future costs of development because the candle was burning at both ends by this point with saab announcing their intention to sell off some of their factories and lay off over half of their workforce in the years ahead a reduction of some 11 500 employees down to just 2 000 a nearly 83 percent reduction they needed a partner to avoid having to continue amputating their own limbs the saab sconia president and ceo at that time would tell the new york times quote my basic view is that we would achieve bigger volumes faster through collaboration with a suitable partner by a suitable partner i mean a manufacturer who complements saab and offers collaboration leading to higher competitiveness and expansion and thereby increased employment end quote now believe it or not the primary competitor at the time for the saab deal was volvo which draws an interesting parallel to saab's advertising history you see saab continually boasted in their commercials that their cars were developed by a company that made jet fighters however the jet fighter often displayed in advertisements was actually powered by a volvo engine so yeah okay as the bigger of the two world-renowned swedish car companies volvo seemed like the ideal choice for a merger so much so that the swedish metal workers union petitioned the government to force a merger as a means of preventing mass layoffs but you see the thing about pairing with volvo is that it would have been unlikely to increase saab's reach and influence in the united states ford was the way to go so naturally saab ended up partnering with general motors let me explain about two weeks before bob sinclair's memo about the fiat rumors ford had purchased jaguar for 2.5 billion dollars this despite the fact that it wasn't exactly a secret that jaguar was hoping to land with general motors but ford made a far higher bid than anybody was anticipating the reason for ford choosing to go for jaguar well they had a vested interest in acquiring the brand name in hopes of finally establishing a european luxury import line after they failed to get the murker mark off the ground merker merker i'm not sure if i'm saying that right at all but well it didn't get off the ground and the name jaguar carried with it a far more positive and far-reaching awareness than saab such that ford's higher-ups felt they couldn't justify the one billion dollar asking price saab had put out considering their sales numbers and production costs which is not to say that 2.5 billion dollars isn't way more expensive but rather that ford saw greater earnings potential in one company over the other of course ford's reason for not choosing saab is nearly identical to the reason gm ultimately didn't go with jaguar even for as badly as they wanted to as gm explained through a statement quote after an extensive review of jaguar's products and plants and in view of the losses currently being sustained by them together with jaguar's significant future cash and other requirements gm concluded that the maximum value that could be assigned to all of the jaguar shares was very significantly below the eight dollars and fifty cents being offered the premium of approximately 1.3 billion dollars over book value at year end 1988 could not be justified end quote by this same token if they couldn't justify spending one billion dollars for jaguar gm sure wasn't going to spend that amount to satisfy saab's asking price and so they went to saab with the 600 million dollar figure in a two-for-one shot acquire a european automaker and potentially stick it to ford by getting the brand they'd been eyeing up but for less money and it was a deal for both gm and saab saab gets its necessary operating capital and gm saves two billion dollars on a potential deal with jaguar even if it wasn't the same billion dollar valuation saab had established it was almost too good for the company to pass up and so the deal was made official on december 16 1989 almost 40 years to the day from the saab 92 entering production saab was restructured into an independent company as the automotive division of saab sconia became saab automobile a b with general motors acquiring 50 and splitting the other 50 with swedish investment firm investor a b run by the imperius wallenbergs a banking dynasty that stood as europe's most powerful business family theirs is a story far too broad for the scope of this tale but needless to say the wallenberg businesses were responsible for employing roughly 40 of sweden's workforce in addition to being responsible for 40 of the accrued worth of the stockholm stock market of the 1970s yeah they had their own issues but to say they were flush with resources would be putting it so mildly you'd never get heartburn from putting it on your burrito ultimately gm provided a cash influx of 600 million dollars on the condition that they could buy the rest of the shares by the end of the 1990s so that the american automaker could own saab outright but there was every hope that if anyone could revitalize saab for the 1990s it could be gm i mean it was a deal bob sinclair talked up in the media as a means of heading off any concerns the public might have had just one month after the partnership was made official sinclair told the chicago tribune quote the most important thing about the partnership and i want to emphasize it's a 50 50 partnership is that it relieves us of the increasing pressure on small producers to meet the cost of developing new products as a niche marketer we find it increasingly difficult to meet the legislative requirements and the changing tastes of consumers when we need a long production run to amortize our development and production costs we needed a big partner and now have a good one gm bought two things one was production capacity which they needed we've just made massive investments in new plants when you build a new plant you don't build for small incremental volume increases you build for the volume you'll need over the next five to ten years so we have excess capacity now gm bought access to our excess capacity and will build cars in our plants they also bought entry into the upscale more prestigious segment of the market which they've had difficulty penetrating according to what they say gm doesn't carry the same kind of distinction in europe that saab bmw or mercedes does so they see this as a way of penetrating the european market which they've been unable to do successfully with their own opel division in europe end quote sinclair would go on to address concerns that the partnership would affect consumers the most important thing for the u.s consumer to keep in mind is that saab cars will continue to be designed engineered and developed by saab employees in saab factories and continue to be imported by saab scania and sold exclusively through saab dealers so i don't think they'll notice much of anything at the outset as time goes by we certainly have the capacity now for much faster and more dramatic product development i think the underlying fear the ghost behind the trees is that the saab brand integrity is going to disappear or become homogenized one thing that gm saw is so attractive in saab is the soul of the automobile saab is a unique car no other auto has the characteristics i'm talking performance carrying capacity utility versatility and sheer fun to drive the 9005 door with fold down rear seats is the only car in the world that will go 140 miles per hour with a sofa in the back it would be silly of gm to homogenize saab they want to preserve the culture and soul of saab not change it end quote and while this has the distinct air of famous last words sinclair seemed sincere in his hopes that the saab gm partnership could be a fruitful one but it would take a while for their first collaboration to hit the market i'm talking nearly four years you see rather than allowing saab to do its thing and simply cover the tab gm wanted its hands in the pot for the creation of a new saab 900 so yeah i think it was bill bradley who said ambition is the path to success persistence is the vehicle you arrive in well for gm persistence looked a whole lot like an opal in essence what happened was the transfer of the saab 900 onto the gm 2900 which gm had introduced in 1988 as a mid-sized transverse engine front-wheel drive platform for use on the opel vectra a and the vauxhall cavalier mark iii the move kind of exposed gm's luxury import aspirations it was as if they didn't value saab as its own entity but simply viewed it as a means to see opel fully realized sure gm was instrumental in saab cutting costs as the average build time for a saab in 1989 was 110 hours prior to the gm partnership afterwards just 30 hours this was in part the result of the culture of the scandinavian auto industry as 900s were assembled at stations rather than on an assembly line it was a point of pride that each of these cars was practically hand built there are videos you can find online showing the actual process of the 1989 saab 900 being built in the malmo plant in sweden the change in financial stability necessitated a change in production methods the tragedy here and it's something you can date back to bob sinclair's time shepherding the u.s wing of the company was that for all of saab's gains in the luxury car market through its convertible offerings and the performance of their turbocharged engine they ultimately weren't a luxury car company they resisted being folded into gm europe they wanted to keep making cars the way they always had been but they no longer truly had the independence to do so in short saab had a gm shaped ball and chain strapped to their ankle and gm's own reticence was nominally due to the cost of everything saab wanted to do yet who's to say that saab's pricier ideas might not have paid off i mean you're either a luxury brand or you're not you can't really do half measures you know as explained in a 2016 motor biscuit article titled why gm's reinvention of saab failed quote for a corporation that defined a top-down management style saab bristled against gm's orders from detroit and struggled to make cars the way it always had instead of treating saab like a separate entity gm pressured the company to begin badge engineering already existing european gm cars for future models much like the crossover between buick pontiac oldsmobile models in the american market gm wanted future saabs to be little more than rebadged german opals end quote no matter how nice saab would struggle to compete with the mercedes benzes and bmws of the world automakers with a more prevalent instantly identifiable luxury name than saab or general motors and rather than pivoting to account for that disparity in public image gm simply continued onward with their plan for saab the gm funded saab 900 known as the saab 900 ng for new generation debuted on july 21 1993 in front of a crowd of 35 000 in trojen the reception was so strong that saab fielded some 3 000 orders for the car within its first two weeks after the unveiling with variants that included a four-cylinder turbo and non-turbo models in body styles that included three-door five-door and convertible layouts saab even released a talladega version after the company returned to the site of the historic long run to set some new world records 10 years on the ng 900 stuck with the usual engine options either the 2 liter or 2.3 liter saab 16 valve b204 and b234 naturally aspirated or turbocharged but this time a 2.5 liter version of gm's 54 degree v6 engine was made available albeit not in every territory as this gm option was for europe the ng900 also had the more traditional transverse mounted engine over the longitudinal arrangement of the original 900. it wasn't what saab purists might have wanted but it came across as exactly the sort of thing that would catapult the brand back into the public consciousness hell 1995 proved to be the first time in seven years that saab turned a profit and it was largely on the back of the new 900 but saab purists didn't really view it as a proper sob and they weren't exactly thrilled about the future under general motors the 900 had small hints of saab's innovative tendencies like the sensonic clutch that came on the turbo models but the reception was mixed as the sensonic added a microprocessor in place of the clutch pedal on the premise that it can control the clutch faster and more accurately than a manual driver but a manual without a clutch pedal isn't a manual no matter what the guy down at the auto zone tells you this system was particularly wonky since the clutch master cylinder could only be released when you engage the throttle while in gear otherwise the car would warn you and you'd have seven seconds to do something before the engine would shut itself off however one cool feature that seemed to get a bit of a warmer reception by nature of its optional use was the black panel later renamed the night panel which was again inspired by saab's aviation history with green backlighting similar to an airplane instrument cluster the night panel essentially darkened all the individual gauges except the speedometer until such a time as they required the owner's attention such as low gas or high rpms for example it's a nice idea that in theory would keep the driver's attention focused squarely on the road that's certainly how saab a b described it quote this function blacks out the instrument panel apart from the speedometer this reduces the risk of distraction while driving at night all the systems still work in the background and the appropriate gauge or lamp will light up when the driver's attention is required end quote i could imagine it would be obnoxious if you're someone who likes keeping an eye on gauges but then you have the option of simply turning it off it was basically a dimmer taken to the next extreme my research assistant jake personally vouched for the night panel's usefulness noting quote you don't know the strain interior lights put on your eyes till you try night panel end quote it keeps in line with the production philosophy of providing features you might not have thought to ask for but are glad to have regardless of course for a while the 900 was all saab had to offer in the 90s as far as new cars went while sales seemed to be better under gm saab's uniqueness was getting smoothed out in the bargain although it wasn't as bland as some of its contemporaries the 900 ng didn't seem to share much in the way of visual flair with its previous saab brethren it was just a run-of-the-mill aspirational luxury vehicle i mean the convertible is nice but there's nothing here that compels the memory it looks like any other nice 90s car it's like a camry made love to an infinity j30 yet it also kind of force sages the direction a lot of cars would take in the late 90s and into the 2000s with the softer lines and an appearance that occupies a world between comfort and performance another work of sob designer bjorn inval the 900 essentially bears out the notion held by his colleagues that bjorn enval was fundamentally misunderstood in his own time because he was always a good five years ahead of it but there's only so much you can do to move things forward if the world isn't ready yet and so the 900 gradually faded into the background in favor of a new offering to close out the decade the saab 9-3 launched in 1997 for the 1998 model year celebrating saab's 50th year in the automotive business but it was evident from the jump that the car was simply a rebadged saab 900 ng which gm didn't exactly try to hide to be fair i mean it would have been pointless to try the two cars looked more or less the same outside a few cosmetic differences like an overhauled grill or the third brake light being moved to just above the rear windshield to improve visibility to other drivers i suppose the mechanical differences were more pronounced what with the saab active head restraint system which was very innovative for its time serving as sort of a pivoting headrest that would prevent whiplash in collisions just another in saab's long line of safety innovations but most of the saab 9-3 changes were under the hood like a tighter suspension and stronger crash zones as well as the same electrical system that was to be used in the saab 9-5 by the time gm was finished over 1100 changes had been made but it didn't really seem to inspire confidence among critics of gm stewardship over saab yet it wasn't all bad particularly when you got into the vegan trim the vegan was inspired by the internal decision to outsource halo cars to the england-based tom walkenshaw racing group which had previously helped develop the jaguar xj220 the aston martin db7 and the holden special vehicles brand twr group developed two dope-looking show cars that made their first appearance at geneva in march 1996 creating enough of a buzz to inspire a high performance line for the 9-3 utilizing a 5-person team to head up saab's special vehicles or svo the idea was to create something that could be a worthy successor to the 900 turbo maintaining saab's unique design identity while offering performance that could rival its high-end luxury competitors yet no sooner does the team get to work with twr group then saab executives get cold feet about outsourcing production and shelve the project for a number of years but the team didn't give up and pushed for saab to take the risk the executives later relented but there were conditions such as having to use the 2.3 liter turbo plan for the upcoming saab 9-5 rather than the performance-tuned 260 horsepower 2-liter turbo 4. granted the 2.3 would offer more sports-like throttle response thanks to ecu remapping the development was still outsourced to twr group but with greater involvement from saab engineers yet even then there was still some internal resentment over the notion of putting so much time money and effort into a saab that wouldn't truly have been built in sweden ultimately it was engineering head magnus johnson who was crucial to seeing the project through spearheading a positive working relationship between saab's own engineers and the team at twr group and it would need to be a very delicate process since another one of the restrictions put in place on the development of the vegan was that the teams were prohibited from making changes to the body a decision which drastically limited steering and suspension alterations so they made up the difference with springs dampers wheels exhaust and the braking system with approval needing to go through senior management the vegan was tested at gm's hot climate proving ground and received cold climate testing in sweden proper while high-speed testing was conducted in spain and performance testing occurred in germany with additional tests being carried out at proving grounds in the uk and the findings ultimately illustrated issues with the restrictions put into place you see the glorified gm opal layout of the 93 platform prevented the front end from handling the chuck norris nut sack amount of torque that the 2.3 liter high output turbo engine delivered whereas a 2-liter turbo 4 with a lower torque rating could have kept the front suspension from being put under a strenuous load that it wasn't really equipped to be able to handle from the swedish word for thunderbolt and sharing a name with the saab 37 fighter jet the vegan was a potentially game-changing car that was unfortunately hampered by executive meddling yet it wasn't exactly hobbled ride and handling were improved over the 9-3 along with more sport aligned exhaust tuning the car kept the 93's open differential but for the most part it had the hallmarks of a more refreshing offering something familiar but new but i don't think it'll surprise you to hear that there were other problems ahead by now saab had moved actual manufacturing in-house but found they couldn't actually spare any space on the production line for a low volume variant and so the team was kind of stuck that is until it was proposed that the finland-based fallmed take over manufacturing the car smart work around right well not so much as it turns out falmet's assembly was primarily used for convertible bodies which meant that three door and five door bodies would need to be transported to fomet rather than pressed there directly which increased the risk of the metal corroding in transit the solution saab chose to deliver those bodies unpainted inside containers that were dehumidified initially only sending three door bodies to measure interest and it worked but it increased the cost of manufacturing substantially production was a modest 2 500 units per year a niche offering to drivers for whom the 93 turbo just didn't get it done when the car debuted in monaco in the spring of 1999 the press loved it it was a sob through and through the car only lasted until 2002 but it sought to compete with the bmw m3 and the mercedes-benz amg with 20 psi boost on the turbocharged 2.3 liter four-cylinder making 225 horsepower and 252 pound-feet matched to a 5-speed manual and improvements on the 93 in not just the capacity size of the intercooler but the higher flowing exhaust stiffened suspension performance ecu and a factory 0 to 60 time of 6.5 seconds it was a car designed for high rpms and long highway pools despite only lasting three short years it was arguably the most sob of all the gm saabs would it have been nice for the saab 93 vegan to have succeeded a little more substantially than not at all of course but there could have been worse outcomes considering how much saab and its partners put into the making of this thing at the very least it seemed more promising than what was coming down the pipeline you see concurrently with the unveiling of the saab 9-3 was the release of the saab 9-5 itself introduced in 1997 for the 1998 model year and to be fair to a period of saab's history that was less than stellar the 95 has a lot to boast in its favor beating the drag coefficient of its four bears with a lean .29 with the station wagon turning at 0.31 jeremy clarkson himself would state that the 95 offered faster passing than a 911 turbo which would make you think it was an unruly beast on the road yet it listed as the safest car on the road in sweden by the swedish-based folksome insurance it had an odd development cycle as saab had to use scale models in the wind tunnel because money was so tight in the late 90s and early 2000s that they couldn't afford to put actual models into the tunnels the development also gave saab a unique window into ionization currents the brochure on the 95's development which features comments from engineer lars tegnelius states that information on combustion quality during engine operation was measured through currents passing between the spark plug and combustion chamber as a result ionization currents took the place of traditional noc and camshaft sensors as tecnelius himself would explain ionization currents quote open entirely new doors for us to see exactly what is actually happening inside the engine while it is running for instance it turned out that what we for a long time thought were measurement errors under certain conditions are actually misfires end quote of course i would be remiss if i didn't mention that all of this nox sensor and ionization currents business was accomplished through the use of a direct ignition cassette a system that replaces the distributor cap distributor rotor and the spark plug wires not many cars use full cassettes as opposed to individual coils but this is more or less on brand for what saab aimed to accomplish through the application of various streamlining techniques and similar to previous efforts the company introduced new features to entice buyers through improvements of convenience like a sliding load floor for easily loading and unloading whatever you're hauling the 95 was the first car to have ventilated seats not even an s-class had those yet also the car came with asymmetrical turbo charging a first for the production line it was the car that led saab into the 21st century and deepened gm's commitment to the brand as it bought the remaining shares and became owners of saab outright in the year 2000 in for a penny in for a pound as they say yet controversy would take hold with the 95 and with its cousin the 9-3 the 9-3 would be re-engineered to get it away from the 900 ng but by the time it launched in july 2002 for the 2003 model year it seemed even more alien to saab enthusiasts than the car that had come before it and a lot of this has to do with something the 93 and the 95 shared while both cars would begin life on the 2900 platform both would inevitably be transferred onto the gm epsilon platform the very same that gave us the chevy malibu and the pontiac g6 now while the 2nd gen 93 kept the convertible body style and added a sport combi they axed the hatchback design presumably in an attempt to appeal to more high-end sensibilities this is also where gm opted to use their own ecotech engine rather than relying on the saab age although saab did the engine management and tuning by way of the trionic 8 the latest upgrade of their engine management technology yet the gm influences were a knock against the idea that these were true sobs case in point the second gen 9 3 had an optional 5-speed centronic which sounds awfully close to saab's own sensonic such that it wouldn't have been surprising if people who bought the car were expecting saab's clutchless manual transmission however the centronic was an automatic transmission that's pretty much it seems like kind of a lateral move but whatever here we are mathias holwig of the university of cambridge and nick oliver of the university of edinburgh published their findings on the decline of saab in their 2011 report for the university of edinburgh titled who killed saab automobile they detail some of the issues as follows quote the 9000 replacement the 95 was introduced in 1997 and was also built on a vectra platform like the 1994 saab 900 this did not help the reputation of the vehicle with a perception among purists that the new models were not real sobs and lacked the strength and body stiffness of earlier generation saabs important attributes of the saab brand sobness was increasingly seen as cosmetic conveyed by minor details such as the location of the ignition key by the gear stick the dashboard display and other identity items the 2003 saab 9-3 took this further being designed mainly by gm's european subsidiary opel and losing the company's distinctive large hatchback design however output did increase and was sustained at 120 to 130 000 units from the late 1990s until 2008 when it declined sharply unfortunately increased volume did not bring profitability and in 2000 investor a b exited selling its 50 stake to gm for 125 million dollars a quarter of what gm had paid for its first 50 10 years previously in 2003 saab's engineering department was merged with gm's european operations at russelsheim germany this meant the loss of 1 300 engineers and designers at saab and effectively signaled the end of saab's ability to develop its own products end quote i cannot stress how big of a change it was to lose the hatchback a defining aspect of the saab identity it was too far afield from what people were used to and it created a distance between saab and the people who supported the company even through the gm years as the demographics for saab weren't exactly changing the way the higher ups had hoped rather than reaching the young professionals with good credit scores saab was a representation of what a report by the economist described as quote eccentric individualism saabs were quirky and you were likelier to encounter your non-tenured adjunct english professor driving one rather than the youngest lawyer to ever make partner at smith smith and smith gm used their own platforms and engines to save money but the designers and engineers at saab still wanted to make sobs imagine that yet you couldn't do any of that cheaply and even if you could saabs had already acquired a reputation for quirkiness that would have been hard to shake when you have your engineers still fighting for the viability of key tumblers between seats it was a symptom of a larger problem you can only go in circles for so long there was an essential disconnect between the mentalities of both gm and saab and it would only become more pronounced as time went on something had to give sooner rather than later gm was already concerned about saab's profitability but couldn't afford to unload the company on someone else since saab helped co-develop and manufacture some of gm tech like the global epsilon one platform and the f-35 transmission introduced in the 1980s and used on the supercharged and turbocharged versions of the cobalt ss this in addition to a double clutch transmission for a mid engine version of the corvette c7 a model that gm ultimately opted not to make more on the corvette's march to mid engine in the rcr story of the same name cheap plug but anyway these things all cost money saab didn't really have and gm couldn't really afford to use saab was drinking up a lot of gm's milkshake and even if they shared some of that blame something had to change and look i get why gm was so concerned about finances in the mid to late 2000s another cheap plug i know but my previous rcr story on pontiac goes into their over-reliance on badge engineering to keep ahead of bankruptcy as the company was taking one loss after another the aveo the monte carlo the sun fire the g6 the uplander the hhr the aztec it was a nightmare in every sense so that by 2005 gm posted losses totaling 10.6 billion dollars those losses would climb to 38.7 billion dollars for 2007 alone and one could see how gm might point the finger at saab even if the catastrophic decision to rebadge more recognizable cars and slap the saab name on them was ultimately a gm decision that's what happened in 2005 with the saab 92x and the saab 97x exclusive to the united states these cars were gm's attempts at porting saab into the suv market at the expense of everything that made saab what it was the 92x was really only possible in the first place because gm owned a 20 stake in fuji heavy industries the parent company of subaru and this was seen as a fortuitous opportunity for everyone involved subaru needed the cash influx and gm needed someone for saab to collaborate with in an attempt to capture the same market toyota was pursuing with the scion brand to this end plans were put into place for an entire host of different vehicles that would theoretically play well across every level of the automotive market from a compact executive sedan to a sporty all-wheel drive wagon or hatch a similarly outfitted suv and a hybrid sports car oh and an ultra compact that i guess would serve as something of a loss leader you know just get people in the door peter augustine the president and chief executive of saab at the time expressed excitement over the joint effort quote the saab 9-2 is a result of a collaboration between two like-minded brands we both have a special aircraft heritage and a successful history in rallying and our cars are known as dynamic safe and fun to drive it makes a lot of sense for us to combine our strengths in creating the next saab and bring it to the market quickly we see an emerging segment in the us for a premium small car below the saab 9-3 sport sedan end quote now this was all well and good except for the central problem that saab and subaru couldn't really get along it was another case of saab engineers wanting to run their own playbook rather than their partners and i get it saab was like a small locally owned restaurant that makes really great food at a loss because fresh ingredients are expensive as hell and word of mouth and marketing just haven't caught up yet whereas the franchise eatery down the road is making money hand over fist just microwaving frozen food and presenting it in an interesting way with savvy marketing and strong word of mouth of course this is kind of a bad comparison because subaru is actually good or at the very least they're way better than say olive garden but the comparison here is essentially that saab wanted to design a brand new car from scratch and give it to subaru to modify whereas subaru just wanted to skin over the 2nd gen impreza and like a guy who sides with his new girlfriend over the boys gm sided with subaru and i mean like like how could you we were boys i held you while you drunkenly sobbed about rachel making out with that crypto vet bro over spring break do i mean nothing does our friendship mean anything to you of course i suppose if you're going to make a saab with a subaru base there are worse choices you can make than to use the impressa as that foundation but the 92x was basically a badge-engineered version colloquially called the sabaroo saab's designers and engineers did get a chance to overhaul the front and rear fascia modifying the hood and tailgate and adding additional carpeting and seals so that the only real visual similarities with the impreza were primarily the doors rear quarter panels and the roof when it came to north america it was available only in wagon body style so it at least looked like a saab for better or worse but the fact remained that it was still largely a subaru first gone was the aviation aviation-esque instrument cluster in favor of the impreza's design while this was the first saab to give us all-wheel drive it comes across as more of a faustian bargain hardly worth what was sacrificed to get it naturally saab purists were less than enthused as this latest 9-2 variant clearly lacked any of the quirkiness that made saab's such interesting little vehicles but then this is precisely what gm wanted to get away from all those signifiers and yet it didn't really work because even with subaru's rebadge approach the 92x still wasn't cost efficient because saab insisted on using better materials on such things as the insulation kit which included heavier insulation on the fender and under the shift boot acoustic treatment on the roof trim and ceiling on the rear quarter trim this along with a new aluminum hood to accompany the aforementioned front and rear redesigns as well as a nicer interior with upgraded two-tone cloth seats optional leather interior and metallic trim around the gauges it was a nice car but it strayed too far from the affordability that was intended with its creation as the price started at twenty three thousand dollars and could climb towards thirty thousand if you optioned it out the equivalent impreza was a good five thousand dollars cheaper so you weren't winning over subaru fans and you were failing to reach saab loyalists who didn't view these as proper sobs anyway by the time the 92x had come gm was ready to sell its shares in fuji they didn't even seem to care that they would be selling at a loss part of the reason at least from what i could gather is that it was a way out of a deal gm had actually failed to satisfy since they didn't make any of those other planned collaborative cars that the deal had set forth they had only used the impreza design to make a car that didn't sell so gm was held to the terms of their arrangement and gave subaru some of their saab engineers to work on the saab 96x a midsize crossover suv with the caveat that subaru would use gm drivetrains rather than going fully in-house but the project went disastrously over budget and over time so gm pulled out leaving subaru holding the bag with no money to redesign the suv from scratch subaru slapped an h6 engine on a saab prototype and that's how we got the subaru tribeca a car that would go on to sell fewer than 7 500 units a year yet somehow stuck around until 2014. the 96x had all the potential in the world to be something more than what it was as one of the engine options under the saab subaru partnership was an ls v8 but it was a failed partnership which seemed to be par for the course during the gm years a time rife with bad ideas and questionable execution case in point the 97x which was a rebadged chevy trailblazer with an eight cylinder it was a sob in name only as the american influences were more evident here than on any other car produced in the gm partnership with engine options starting with a 4.2 liter vortec inline 6 all the way up to the 6 liter ls2 v8 now the idea of a saab suv isn't necessarily a bad enough idea to be dismissed out of hand but if you're going to do that you kind of have to let saab do its own thing of course the problem is that for as cool as that car would have ended up being probably it also probably would have cost a boatload of money because they were not about to cut corners and making it ultimately i'm not sure saab was ever cut out to be ported over into the american suv stratosphere i mean if anything this was largely created to replace the oldsmobile bravada already not a great car in its own right but gm had left a gap in their fleet when they discontinued oldsmobile in 2004 so it was kind of a desperation move and it shows in how this was the least touched of the badge engineered sobs with saab only getting to redesign the front fascia to look more like the rest of the saab fleet as a result it ended up being among the least safety conscious vehicles to ever bear the saab name which is borne out by the number of recalls the 97x would face over its lifetime from a recall of 258 000 units over short circuits creating a fire hazard to fires being caused by moisture entering the door and messing with its electrical system gm would patch this up with a plastic cover but this was a cheap solution far removed from the low end rain repelling doors saab utilized in the early 1970s and yet for all that cost cutting the 97x still managed to be gm's second most expensive luxury suv ever at that time only the cadillac escalade cost more to produce yet its competition largely had the 97x dead to rights as gm aimed this squarely against its own swedish competitor the volvo xc90 but this was not the volvo killer gm would have hoped however the model did last around 5 years which is longer than one would think given the relative lack of imagination in its build but it was still ultimately a failure at a time where the brand needed real change yet there can be no change without learning and there can be no learning without failure for now gm needed to restructure owing to all the brands they had to keep dry under their massive umbrella at this time they had eight different brands buick cadillac chevrolet pontiac gmc hummer saturn and saab it was time for the octopus to start cutting off some damn limbs except unlike actual octopi these appendages weren't going to grow back an internal memo stated the necessity for quote eliminating dozens of near-duplicate models dumping unneeded brands making realistic sales assumptions and negotiating a better union contract end quote the memo also suggested hummer and saab as the two most urgent closings with a predicted bankruptcy by 2008 without a major restructuring and sure enough when 2008 arrived the hammer landed hard that said everyone was hit hard in 2008 when the global recession came and car sales plummeted exponentially leading to such poorly thought out programs as cash for clunkers another cheap plug check out the rcr story on that but gm really took it hard in quarter one alone the company would lose approximately 3.25 billion dollars and i doubt things would have gone better for saab had the ford deal actually gone through as ford now found themselves having to offload jaguar and land rover selling to tata motors for 2.3 billion dollars for gm though 2008 was a relentless string of hardships from multiple plant closures to mass layoffs honestly it's hard to imagine jim would be around today at least as we know it if not for the 2009 rescue package from the u.s government which according to a 2014 reuters article quote spent about 50 billion dollars to bail out gm end quote it was an investment later converted into 61 equity stake plus preferred shares and a loan either way gm had a little more breathing room to operate yet a restructuring would still be necessary to move forward as a result gm announced that saab would be put under review either for closure or sale thus they fielded inquiries on companies and firms that could potentially take saab off their hands but much like the potential ford deal two decades earlier these plans did not come to fruition and saab went into chapter 11 bankruptcy well the swedish version of bankruptcy anyway this granted saab a measure of independence to try and begin finding a new partner and they really didn't have to wait long to find one by the summer of 2009 koenigsegg was on the map ready to take saab off of gm's hands this was all made public on june 16th in a consortium that included a pair of norwegian business magnates and chinese automaker beijing automotive industry holding company limited or baic yet by the fall of 2009 the deal started to fall through and if you're wondering why look no further than the fact that koenigsegg was ready to go in june yet still didn't have an answer by october despite receiving a loan from the european investment bank to cover saab's outstanding debts and coordinating with the swedish national debt office there was a lot of foot dragging from gm the banks and even baic which prompted koenigsegg to announce on november 24th that they had reached the painful and difficult conclusion to move on from the planned acquisition their statement noted that quote the time factor has always been critical for our strategy to breathe new air into the company unfortunately delays in the completion of the deal have resulted in risks and uncertainties that stop us from carrying out the business plan end quote however although the deal fell through with koenigsegg chinese manufacturers baic bought the rights to saab's powertrain technology and tooling as well as the intellectual property rights for the saab 93 and 95 sedans for roughly 196 million dollars intending to create three overall vehicle platforms two engine technologies and two transmission systems the goal would be to aim for launch in 2011 with 100 000 self-developed vehicles according to a report by reuters but for now saab had until the end of 2009 to find a buyer or risk being closed forever as 2009 neared its end gm entered into talks with dutch automaker spiker cars but the bid ultimately wasn't enough and on december 18th 2009 gm europe executive nick riley announced quote an orderly wind down of saab operations adding that the company regrets being unable to complete this transaction with spiker cars while debts would be paid and cars would continue to be service for all those who owned them the deal itself was no longer viable this was a sentiment backed up by gm vice president john smith who expressed frustration at the inability to reach an agreement with spiker he told bbc news quote we reached a point of impasse we decided to deal with it and move on end quote making matters even more hopeless was the swedish government refusing to step in and bail out saab in the way the u.s government had done for gm and yet despite gm having a hard deadline of shutter saab by the end of 2009 they continued accepting bids that could potentially save the swedish automaker through january 7 2010 the most interesting of these offers was a bid from controversial formula one head honcho bernie ecclestone who joined forces in the bid with private investment company jenny capital based out of luxembourg the connection well jenny capital had interest in the formula one sector having previously invested in renault's team with the public backing of ecclestone jenny capital declared they would quote aggressively work towards a successful closing of the transaction with all the relevant stakeholders of the company end quote now there were other bids such as the one leveled by a swedish consortium that included a former sconia executive and a former saab aerospace executive there was also one familiar face in the lineup spiker cars who had amended their deal to take another run at acquiring saab spiker ceo victor mueller told news outlets that saab had a wealth of potential and that the company hoped to close a deal as soon as possible now you wouldn't think it would be a good fit considering spiker mostly manufactured supercars and they also had a very slim workforce of just 133 people oh and spiker had only produced 43 cars in the previous year so what exactly made them a good fit for saab it seemed as though the answer was nothing save for the immense passion for saab shared by mueller the 50 year old dutch businessman in charge at spiker who admitted he wasn't sure what the stipulations of a potential deal would even entail but that he didn't particularly care he just wanted to be a part of saab he would tell the press quote i only knew saab was for sale and gm was threatening to shut it down i didn't know how much money it would cost or what the business model was like i was an outsider but i thought it was obscene that this brand might go down end quote it was agreed that every bid would get a fair hearing but spiker was just so different from what saab was known for and yet sometimes the opposites attract so saab was sold to spiker cars for 400 million dollars the 400 million dollar deal included 74 million dollars to gm funded completely by russian banker and entrepreneur vladimir antonov on behalf of mueller and spiker cars this plus 54 million dollars upon finalization of the deal in february 2010 and an additional 24 million dollars in june as well as a 150 million dollar line of credit and additional loans for funding in addition the company would be rebranded as saab spiker automobiles nv or saab spiker the european investment bank would also have veto power on any future ownership concerns by virtue of having loaned sob 400 million euros that they needed to confirm but the european investment bank having veto power on future ownership wasn't very concerning since the swedish government did a 180 and vowed to guarantee the loans so there was no real reason for that power to ever need to be exercised in the first place and hey gm didn't get shafted in the bargain either they would keep some 326 million dollars worth of saab shares just like that the gm partnership had come to a close except for the shares which gave gm some voting rights and the potential to make a lot of money if spiker succeeded in their unlikely goal of turning this franchise around those were pretty long odds though especially if a well-funded big three american automaker couldn't do it then again was gm ever the right fit for saab i suppose you could point fingers for why the partnership with gm didn't work whether it's gm's attempts to put its own stamp on a brand that didn't need it or saab's reticence to change as mentioned earlier attempts to fold saab into gm europe had been unsuccessful as the bigwigs at saab wanted some degree of autonomy in their design process for example saab overhauling the vauxhall vectra to improve safety after gm explicitly told them the only thing they could change was the body yes gm saabs had far less imagination than the original article but the lack of true synergy created a void where scale is meant to go gm was merely the atm to fund saab's r d which isn't what gm intended and it wasn't really going to work for saab either because what they truly needed to penetrate the u.s market was a pivot towards american notions of accessibility they did it right by making some of their models bigger and offering more safety and performance features but the styling was still too foreign too exotic and by the time gm forced the square peg saab into the round hole of american automotive design they had already been passed by any number of foreign automakers who had already made more substantial gains in the united states from volkswagen to bmw brands whose offerings didn't look instantly as dated off the line as some of those gm subs there was ultimately nothing truly complementary about gm and saab's business models other than the fact that they both produced cars and sure other mergers have succeeded without apparent compatibility for every fiat chrysler there's a nissan renault but with gm and saab what we had were essentially two companies nominally working together but still trying to implement their own ideas which often conflicted you can't just throw money at a problem and hope for the best unless that problem is dead and the only way that problem really gets solved is if you resolve to change your practices such that you don't end up in debt again in lieu of true compatibility the two companies needed to work out a concrete vision for a brand identity but that didn't really happen as holwig and oliver describe in their edinburgh report on the death of saab quote to gm's credit it supported saab despite making losses in nearly every year of its two-decade ownership but gm europe's configuration as a high volume producer of economy to mid-range cars sat uncomfortably with saab's individualism and technological sophistication and saab resisted gm attempts to standardize end quote maybe gm was the wrong fit for saab but victor mueller at the very least seemed optimistic that spiker could get the job done after reaching the deal with gm and prior to its finalization on february 23 2010 he expressed hope for a bright future telling the media quote we are very much looking forward to being part of the next chapter in saab's history the next task is for saab to become profitable in its own right and that's not an easy task but it is one that i think can be achieved end quote yet for as prepared as he was it's hard to envision that even mueller could have known just what was ahead with general motors agreeing to supply spiker with saab engines and components it was possible to get the ball rolling on some new cars the plan was to forge ahead with a new version of the saab 9-3 an updated saab 9-5 intended to run on the gm insignia platform and another stab at the suv market with the 94x a rebadged cadillac srx that would be assembled in gm's mexico facility on saab's behalf for the most part spiker gave saab the creative breathing room they didn't really get from gm as the goal was to keep spiker in its own realm while saab would be quote repositioned towards an independent performance-oriented niche car company with an industry-leading environmental strategy end quote mueller himself would go on to assure enthusiasts that saabs would be sobs again and that production would exceed 100 000 units per year however this number was reduced later in 2010 to between thirty thousand and thirty five thousand units spiker needed time to get the total heton plant up and running again after gm had shut it down which meant production couldn't reach its pie in the sky numbers for the year but the goal at least from an october 2010 report by bloomberg news was to get that number up to 80 000 units in 2011 and 120 000 units in 2012. once the company could get past the transitional instability related to the cost of acquiring and relaunching saab in the first place 2010 had started out rough but it did see the release of the 2nd gen saab 95 which hit dealerships that june trims would include the turbo 4 which is more or less what it sounds like offering a generation 3 1.6 liter turbo or an ecotech 2-liter turbo both 4-cylinders you could also have the turbo 4 premium trim which got you tech features like parking assistance memory seats and keyless entry the turbo 6xwd which featured a 2.8 liter turbo v6 with all-wheel drive and the arrow which included a sport-tuned suspension with real-time damping a multi-function information display and a nicer interior some of these options like the generation 3 1.6 liter turbo were only available in europe but it felt like a car that could get american audiences back into the fold for saab the problem as was unfortunately becoming tradition for saab was that the company simply wasn't generating enough revenue to sustain itself by early 2011 it was clear spiker would have to act quickly to generate money to keep things moving along and so on february 25th spiker announced that they had come to an agreement to sell their sports car wing to dedicate all their financial and mental energy to saab there were hopes for production to begin on the revised saab 9-3 sooner rather than later while simultaneously building hype for the saab phoenix concept which was unveiled at the geneva motor show in march 2011. the 93 or the new 900 would have a bmw sourced 1.6 liter turbo but also feature a hybrid drivetrain option along with an e-all-wheel drive system in partnership with aam or american axle and manufacturing based out of detroit with the plan going so far as to create their own joint venture known as e-a-m it could have been exactly the thing saab needed to turn things around but to get there they had to actually make the car and the revised 95 just wasn't bringing in the dough the 9-5 may have gotten a decent reception in comparison to the gm years but it was still mostly middle of the road reviews from such publications as autotrader whose three-star review mentioned poor interior quality and a general inability to hold value and the car wasn't making up sales enough to be a difference maker in the first place despite the bright attitude with which mueller took control of saab the reality was far more grim as the company was unable to maintain relationships with suppliers due to the inability to pay them barely a year into the new partnership the strategy of letting saab do their own thing was kind of failing saab was losing money quicker than the coffers could be replenished and this was due in part to manufacturing costs but then you'd think if anyone was actually buying the new 95 or expressed genuine interest in the forthcoming 94x and 93 models there would be some movement in the market in saab's favor but the brand had the distinct appearance of damaged goods a tainted name injured in the press by association with all the chaos of the gm divorce by march 30th suppliers were not getting paid prompting many to miss deliveries to the revived trollhattan factory production was halted in april as workers were at risk of losing their jobs with saab being unable to pay the salaries of blue-collar and white-collar employees alike a last-ditch effort to secure funding from chinese car maker ha-tai in may 2011 ultimately failed when the company opted not to get into bed with saab which is why it was likely so aggravating for employees to learn that attempts to remedy the situation by russian businessman vladimir antonov who'd partially funded spiker's acquisition of saab in the first place were denied by the european investment bank or eib the measure would have seen antonov take a personal stake in saab by offering operating funds in exchange for the company but the eib exercised their veto power and denied his ascension essentially to be approved as the new owner antonov would require approval from the eib the swedish government and gm who still held shares in the company the swedish government's debt office felt that with regards to antonov's offer there was quote no reason to say no end quote even gm offered their approval but two-thirds isn't good enough so let's investigate this why did the eib have such an issue with antonov well there had long been rumors that antonov allegedly had ties to russian organized crime and that these enterprises had been interwoven with his business practices in fact these allegations were such a concern for the eib at the time of saab's initial sale to spiker that it was built into the deal as eib spokesman par isaacson told swedish news outlet tt quote the eib is confirming that a loan to saab was given under the condition that vladimir antonov was not given the opportunity to take ownership in saab end quote in response antonov's spokesman expressed frustration at the decision and announced intentions to pursue legal recourse by filing a report with the european commission over the eib's decision quote the eib and the government have pretended for months to consider our application to let antonov in this charade has probably cost saab a billion kroner end quote however antonov spokesman would later suggest to sweden's tv for west that antonov had moved on quote we have intensified efforts to find alternative financing solutions and let this process for approval by the bank and sweden go because it's completely meaningless end quote this situation had dissolved to catastrophic levels for employees who were mostly employed in name only as they hadn't been paid in months seriously months with no pay it's like doing no nut november except it's with your finances and it started in april by september things had gotten bad enough that workers unions were moving forward with a plan to invoke a provision that would have forced the owners of saab to place the company into bankruptcy the provision dictated that in such an event the employers would be paid through state funds in short getting saab to close its own doors was the only hope these employees had of getting their paychecks and obviously this was devastating for victor mueller the ceo of saab at that time a person by the name of yon okayonsen abruptly left the company leaving mueller as the sole person at the top of the food chain to answer for the calamity mueller who was fighting like hell to save the company despite all the roadblocks continually put in his place and look maybe he wasn't the right guy to have ever gotten saab in the first place but i doubt even he ever thought it would get to the point that the workers wouldn't be paid or that he'd meet up against this much resistance over a sale yet things had taken a drastic and unfortunate turn saab spiker was becoming as desperate as its workforce but help was around the corner you see rumors had hit the media that chinese group jejung youngmin lotus was getting ready to make a bid youngmin had spent nearly as long as antonov trying to get a stake in saab they would be joined in their negotiations by pangda automobile trade group limited another chinese-based dealership network together the offer was too rich for spiker to ignore as it would allow them to pay their workforce and potentially get production rolling again by now it was nearly december with this latest deal being the only end in sight to what had become a mess that had swallowed up nearly the entire year for everyone involved from the lowest worker on the totem pole to victor mueller himself the deal with young min and pang da would be worth 140 million dollars with young men taking a 60 stake and pangda taking the other 40 but even then any deal represented a potential for the company to bounce back that's exactly what these chinese investors were offering once again saab had been saved sure they would be absorbed by chinese interests but that had already happened before when beijing automotive industry holding company purchased the rights to saab's technology and intellectual property prior to the spiker sale leaving them to utilize gm tech for their own cars but the only thing that really mattered was that saab would be able to continue on against the odds victor mueller breathed a sigh of relief in a conference call with journalists after a deal was reached quote we had been struggling for the last six or seven months to the extent that many people had given up on us end quote mueller would suggest that under youngmin and pangda quote there will be stability there will be funds and there will be clarity for the future of our business end quote mueller hadn't been kidding about people having given up on saab fellow swedish auto brand volvo had sold some 57 000 vehicles in the u.s for the duration of saab's financial woes in 2011 whereas saab comparatively had failed to top 5 000 units by october this deal couldn't have come soon enough for saab spiker all that needed to happen was for all parties to sign off unfortunately this time it would be gm that would pump the brakes on a change in ownership you see the consortium of youngmin and pangda represented the creation of a new competitor for gm in short and i guess to be fair to gm the deal did represent a conflict of interest given their partnership with saic motor core limited formerly known as shanghai automotive industry corporation a state-owned multinational corporation for gm the deal with jungmen and pangda would not benefit general motors or its shareholders and might actively hurt their interests on december 6th gm spokesman jim kaine issued a statement on the rejection of the deal quote although general motors is open to the continued supply of powertrains and other components to saab under appropriate terms and conditions gm will not agree to the continuation of the existing technology licenses or the continued supply of 94x vehicles to saab following the proposed change in ownership as it would not be in the best interests of gm shareholders end quote mueller and the rest of the saab spiker brain trust scrambled to come up with a workaround that would allow the current ownership structure to remain in place and would instead have the chinese investors taking 50 ownership of a subsidiary company but gm rejected any proposal that involved chinese investors to the complete bafflement of mueller who told the press quote gm said over the weekend whatever happens come hell or high water we won't support a deal with young men end quote gm's interference also effectively killed any hope for the 94x and while i don't know how many people would have been excited for a rebadged cadillac srx i would imagine it had every possibility of doing well in the united states with the right push but that was no longer on the table whether or not that's a good thing is entirely up to you of course yet it was committed to the pile of discontinued projects like the trailblazer inspired 97x and the subaru tribeca-based 96x concept which itself was killed by gm pulling out of business with subaru they had just essentially done the same thing with saab except unlike subaru saab would be unlikely to survive without that partnership the only hope mueller had rested on the possibility that someone would want to revive saab after bankruptcy on the premise that they would essentially have a clean slate to work with which is an optimistic assessment but not exactly true because any prospective buyer would have to get gm's permission to make any more 9 3s 9 4s or 9 5s and they would also have to get permission to use the brand name from saab a b the aerospace company that was now unrelated to the automotive brand it was just too tall of an order i mean there's having the deck stacked against you that's one thing but this is more like competing at le mans on foot and both your feet are tied together and you're wearing a blindfold for some reason keeping saab alive was a task worthy of sisyphus and so on december 19 2011 victor mueller filled out the paperwork to make saab's bankruptcy official for all the justified anger by the workforce over saab spiker's failure to pay them they still applauded mueller when he addressed them for the final time on that miserable monday quote this is the blackest day in my career and probably also the blackest day in the history of saab it makes me extraordinarily sad devastated but it also makes me very angry because i know this was absolutely unnecessary end quote a report by car and driver would detail the moment between mueller and the 3 400 employees gathered at the trollhaton plant where so many of the icons of saab's fleet had been manufactured muller the now former ceo of saab spiker became emotional expressing to the employees that he'd failed them mueller himself stated that gm essentially abandoning the company was quote basically the last nail in the coffin of this beautiful company end quote mueller would go on to add quote we did the best we could now the only thing that people will remember is that we failed end quote just like that it was over after spending the better part of three years fighting that good fight it looked like the end for saab well barring a miracle and saab wasn't exactly unfamiliar with miracles considering the sheer number of times they'd staved off death but this would be different from other close calls there usually wasn't this much infighting even when it came to potential bankruptcy you see in the wake of its financial troubles earlier in 2011 saab had been issued a court appointed administrator a guy by the name of guy lofalk to keep saab from being hounded into the dirt by creditors until they could secure some kind of viable future but lofalk was already a controversial figure within saab often clashing with victor mueller over lofolk's alleged heir of superiority with regards to his position as lofalk had gone as far as to try and put an end to saab's attempted restructuring in what mueller alleged was a plan by low falk to quote force swedish automobile to sell saab end quote swedish automobile or swan for short was saab's parent company during this period and it's alleged that lofalk was trying to decouple saab and swan in furtherance of finding a new owner yet low falk was said to have taken things way too far his odd behavior is backed up by lars holmquist the ceo of klepa the european association of automotive suppliers who stated that lofalk quote has acted like he either had assumed that he was the owner of the company or that he was the liquidator of the company and none of it's the case that in his role as administrator to act on their own and thereby interfere with sensitive business solutions it only shows that he has misunderstood his role and he does not have a clue how to handle these things in our industry end quote low falk and saab spiker came to the apparent mutual decision just before the bankruptcy filing to select a new administrator as this clearly wasn't working out for either party as the calendar crossed over into 2012 saab was still in a nightmarish purgatory neither alive nor dead parties from china india and turkey were still expressing interest so that by march 12th there were viable offers on the table one of the offers was from tata motors whose 350 million dollar bid probably could have been better spent making a more usable version of the nano another bid was from the combined financial strength of indian automotive conglomerate mahindra and mahindra and the persistent fighter in this conflict youngman but even with interested parties on the line companies looking to get into bed with saab would be climbing a steeper mountain than they might have realized you see with a debt of approximately 1.3 billion euros on a brand whose assets were barely a quarter of that number saab would struggle to ever be profitable barring some huge explosion in value like i don't know having a saab 900 turbo featured as the main car in a fast and furious movie it certainly didn't help that the owners of the saab name were the aerospace and defense organization saab ab who expressed in may 2012 that they would block sale to any company intending to move development and production out of sweden so it made all the sense in the world when an offer was placed on the table that would keep saab local in a manner of speaking on june 13th 2012 it was announced that saab would be sold to a chinese group under the name national electric vehicle sweden or nevs yet even with the likelihood of saab remaining at least partially domestic saab a b refused the rights to license the saab trademark just as gm had refused to license the saab 95 and 94x suv saab was still at a major point of transition as the nevs acquisition had yet to be finalized as of october 2012. now you would think by this point spiker would be completely out of the picture but victor mueller wasn't entirely done making his case just yet you see mueller blamed guy lofalk for costing saab the 2011 deal with youngmin and pangda muller had alleged that lofak misled the chinese with regards to their chance at sole ownership these companies could never own saab 100 because gm would never have allowed it the best they would have been likely to get was a 54 stake and low falk supposedly knew that yet he allegedly got youngmin and pangda to believe they could have it all and once you think you can have it all you won't settle for less than everything both general motors and guy lofalk himself have vehemently denied what mueller is supposing which makes sense it seems fishy that gm would be okay with youngmin and pangda owning 54 if they were so strongly opposed to them owning any percentage you don't refuse an offer for 100 just to counter with 54 controlling interest in this sense mueller becomes a contradictory figure he had allegedly been furious with gm for blocking the chinese deal yet he blamed lofolk for blowing up negotiations yet in august 2012 mueller would point the finger back at gm as spiker would sue general motors for three billion dollars the supposed value of saab had the deal with youngmin and pangda been allowed to go through in the complaint filed in the u.s district court of the eastern district of michigan speicher states that quote gm never intended to allow saab to compete with it in china end quote the complaint goes on to allege that gm scuttled the deal through the publication of false information and misleading statements such as allegedly encouraging the deal only to put the kibosh on it at the 11th hour which at least somewhat lines up with mueller's claim that gm was initially in favor of the deal until lofolk got youngmin and pangda believing they could own it lock stock and barrel but gm spokesman dave roman no relation stated that the claims were quote without merit end quote for his part mueller asserted that this was a suit gm had coming as gm had expected saab to die but didn't account for spiker surviving long enough afterwards to take them to court for it the suit continued for the better part of a year with spiker alleging that gm's movement to block the sale was illegal with the lawsuit stating quote indeed it was gm's intent by whatever means necessary to quash any financing or investment deal that could save saab from liquidation because gm simply sought to eliminate saab from competition particularly in the chinese automobile market end quote it was a lawsuit whose efforts were effectively overshadowed in the media by the latest news on saab's fate on september 3rd 2012 the acquisition by nevs was completed as an agreement had been made that would allow nevs to use the saab name but not the logo yeah it was the death of the griffin i always liked that logo didn't you like that logo that was a pretty great logo and i mean it was bound to happen since any vs wasn't going to divest itself of chinese financial backing and sure north american and european models would still be made in trolheton but the notion of saab as a purely swedish automaker seemed to be a fantasy of the past similarly spiker's hopes of being paid three billion dollars were put under the dirt when a federal judge dismissed the case in june 2013 asserting that gm didn't break any laws with their block of the sale just two short months later on august 12 2013 employees returned to the troheton plant to begin setting up for the latest round of production yet all the cockeyed optimism of late 2013 and the plans to resume selling to saab 93 were dashed when production had to be stopped due to one of nevs's chinese investors failing to provide the financing they had promised if this all sounds familiar it's because no matter how safe saab may have seemed like a person who fakes being religious to get with the preacher's daughter they were never truly saved just one year removed from the acquisition by nevs the company filed for bankruptcy protection a situation compounded by saab abs decision to revoke their license to the company due to nevs financially cratering any vs made saabs but they could no longer sell them as saabs the company was back in debt because again making new cars even refreshed versions of cards you already had all the components to make cost significant financial capital and if you don't have the money to make cars you probably won't have the money to pay your workers and if you can't pay your workers then you don't really have a company it got so bad that the owner of nebs was essentially paying out of his own pocket to keep saab afloat which says a lot for the passion that saab inspires from the average joe to the executive but even the wealthiest people aren't made of money now i could say that they continued fighting to keep saab alive but that wouldn't be entirely true national electric vehicle sweden would live on in the years ahead with a rededicated push towards electric vehicles as their name indicated with their spokesperson stating that the goal was to quote create a pure ev for the chinese market based on the saab 9-3 end quote nevs had announced plans to renegotiate with saab ab to reacquire the name but after two years of trying to find new chinese partners to shore up their investments it became clear that a new vehicle bearing the saab name would never again hit the streets on june 21st 2016 nevs made it official they would no longer pursue a license to use the saab name and while they would still base their upcoming electric car on the saab 9-3 it would not be branded as such saab was finally conclusively ended and a swedish automaker renowned for innovation and eccentric design passed into automotive legend saab had passed on and sadly so had many of its visionaries gunnar lingstrom had passed away in 1999 at the age of 94 nearly 30 years after his retirement from the company while ralph millett the man who shepherded the saab brand in the u.s and lobbied in washington as a representative of the automotive import industry died in 2002 at the age of 85. groff melda who helped bring ford's v4 engine into the saab fold passed away in march 2009 at 87 years of age shortly after pioneering saab usa president bob sinclair succumbed to cancer at the age of 77. mr saab eric carlson passed away in 2015 at the age of 86 while mr turbo par gilbrand died a year later at the age of 82. tom walkenshaw whose twr racing group helped bring the viggen to life passed away on december 12 2010 61 years to the day of saab entering production on its first car and look i don't report all of this to be a downer but rather to say that most of these men lived to ripe old ages having a lifetime of accomplishments under their respective belts leaving behind a legacy represented in a brand that people eulogize all the time as evidenced by the thriving saab enthusiast community and people who are just discovering this wonderfully unique brand saab was very much a collaborative effort and it's hard to imagine the history and legacy being what it was without the contributions of so many different minds working together saab was revolutionary in so many ways and the company doesn't get nearly enough credit for the innovations it introduced to the industry whether it was turbo charging on a passenger car asbestos free brake lining freon free air conditioning front and rear crumple zones collapsible steering columns headlight wipers heated seats ventilated seats or the direct ignition system co-developed with software and systems firm micelle a b in 1985. so yeah to say saab was ahead of its time doesn't properly do justice to how forward thinking its engineers were the guna lungstroms the sixteen assassins the bjorn anvils and par gilbrans of the world and countless others sung and unsung alike they made their mark on the auto industry even if saab ultimately didn't make it could a pivot towards electric vehicles have been the move giving them a head start in that realm or would a more focused downsizing have worked allowing them to focus on fewer but more market-friendly options i'm not sure we can ever know for certain the truth was that saab always struggled to stand on their own two feet without outside help a lot of automakers get that sort of assistance over time through collaborations and part sharing among other avenues of cooperation but saab reached a crossroads between their desire for independence and the reality that they would need to be fully incorporated into another entity in order to survive a truth that precluded their ability to remain as independent as they were accustomed to being under gm saab didn't evolve in a way that kept pace with the changes of the auto industry of its time i wouldn't necessarily say they stagnated because that would sort of imply they didn't try and they most certainly did try and wanted to try harder but it was beyond their means to give a better effort than they did and it did seem that saab couldn't achieve what they hoped would be possible either through their own reluctance to change their methods or through an incompatibility with the vision gm had for them would an earlier partnership with the chinese businesses have saved them would a bailout by the swedish government have put new sobs on our roads just more what if questions without definitive answers to succeed saab had to be allowed to be saab yet it wasn't economically viable to remain a small scale automaker in a niche market you can't be the best kept secret in the auto industry and hope to survive you need to expand the plan to achieve broader appeal came up short and so saab's domain is now that of the cult classic real ones know but that's about as far as it goes unfortunately yet it really feels like there are more saab fans than ever these days there are any number of blogs or forums dedicated to preserving the history and legacy of saab there's the saab club of north america the annual saab owners convention which is scheduled this year to be held in sturgis south dakota which is home to the saab heritage museum there are even saab dealerships and garages still standing dedicated to keeping saabs on the road it's an incredible community of passionate motorists in many respects success in the auto industry isn't always measured by units sold or cultural penetration it's the extent to which you can endure in the minds of the people who love what you do despite being depicted in everything from james bond novels to seinfeld episodes to best picture nominees i can't really say that saab was ever mainstream in the way we might think but it very much owns a corner of international car culture maybe saab couldn't survive as a company but it's still here one way or another there are still sobs on the road attracting new eyeballs and honest hearts to the preservation of something unlike anything in the auto industry before or since and honestly there are worse legacies to have oh boy where do i even start um thank you so so much for listening to this if you made it all the way through and even if you didn't and just sort of skipped around to parts that interested you i am so thankful for you listening to this this has been in the works since july 2021 and it was supposed to be out last month but editing took so much longer than i thought it would um honestly i need to thank my research assistant jake my other research assistant kyle these are people without whom i don't know that i would have gotten this done in the time frame that i did their research and proofreading help was invaluable and they also uh offered some of the footage that you saw and images that you saw in the video and for that i am immensely grateful i know it's been a while since the last rcr story and it's funny because when i did amc i said i was never going to do a project that long again and now here i am with another video that's almost twice as long and you can kind of tell in my voice i think that the strain is taking its toll because you know even if this is like a four hour video it still took eight hours to record because i did all the stop starting and i also did um a lot of uh having to get down the pronunciations for which i have to thank robert i'm not saying their last names uh because i don't know if they want me to or not yet i i meant to reach out to them and i guess i sort of forgot but um if they do want me to credit them in some other way i'll put that in the video visually but either way these are people without whom i wouldn't have gotten this done in the time frame that i did it and with robert he had a very helpful pronunciation guide for me because obviously i'm not swedish and so i tried the best that i could um i don't know if that necessarily comes through but i did want to be respectful in some way of the pronunciations and so i hope i didn't drop the ball too badly and i also need to thank brian because he's shown remarkable patience in all of this because it's taken way longer than i intended it to and he's been really cool and really supportive and he i mean he always is but it's still something that i feel like i should shout out this will go up as a podcast i don't know when that will be it will be at least two weeks until then because if you haven't noticed the rcr podcast has been down because shout engine went out of business and it just basically obliterated all their rss feeds and that's where our podcast was so i'm currently trying to uh get all the backups of the previous podcasts and rcr stories so that i can then upload them to a new rss feed and basically get everything up and running online get the podcast started again and be able to post this to our rss feed so that people can start enjoying them through whichever means they use to listen to podcasts whether it's itunes spotify whatever so i'll keep you up to date on that just follow me on my twitter or instagram both are at the roman nick i just want to say that this has been a very intense project to do and i don't know when the next rcr story will be or what it'll be about i'm just pretty sure it won't be on the life and death of an automotive brand i'm sure i'll do other ones but i just want to focus on a different story for the next one and so i'll figure out what that is but for now i just want to thank you once again for listening to this or watching this i could not do any of this without all of you so thank you and have a great rest of your week whenever you're listening to this

Channel: Regular Car Reviews

Views: 1,013,640

Keywords: Regular, Car, Reviews, Regular Car Reveiws, Car Review, Car Satire, Mr Regular, RCR, Keywords: Regular, Roman, Saab, Saab Automobile, Regular Car Reviews, Death of Saab, Life of Saab, Why did Saab die?, Saab GM, GM, Saab General Motors, General Motors RCR Car Stories, RCR Stories, RCR Saab, RCR GM, RCR General Motors

Id: lwhxH9SB9h8

Length: 216min 50sec (13010 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 06 2022