My wife loved my 1985 Saab 9-3 and is now thinking about one of her own. Problem is she drives about 40K annually and I am concerned that the turbo won’t go the 150K that she expects from a car.
Find a shop that works on Saabs and see how often the see them in their shop, how long they live, and how much is spent on them. In this small town, far away from anywhere, I wouldn’t touch a used saab purely for the lack of serviceability here. So, if you can’t easily find a shop that considers Saab normal fare, that would be a clue also.
Hi Ken. Thanks for the advice. I was not very precise in my original question (blame multi-tasking!) She’s thinking about a NEW 9-3 combi-sport - mostly because she liked my old 9-3 (LONG since discarded to the scrap heap).
Any thoughts about a new one holding together? She drive’s 40K per year - mostly highway, but with a fair amount of city driving
A friend of mine has had a SAAB for over 10 years, and it still runs great. He is an engineer, and maintains it meticulously!
There is a SAAB record somewhere in Wisconsin where a guy put over 800,000 miles on one. SAAB actually bought it back from him, I believe.
I have no doubt the SAAB will go 150,000 miles, but the maintenance and any repairs will be more expensive than on other more common cars! And SAABS need to be maintained by the book, I believe. You can’t ignore it like you would a Crown Victoria.
Agree with previous poster that you need a SAAB oriented mechanic; otherwise I would forget it.
Concur with Docnick, Saab is a good brand and 150k is really not very much these days. Consider the lifespan of service in your area and go from there.
Maintained properly and not abused it should go even farther than 150k miles. As an ex-SAAB tech and past/current SAAB owner I love the cars. My current Turbo has about 210k on it now with no problems.
Some reading material for you.