I spotted an (insert obscure car name here) classic car today! (Archived)

explorerx4

usually you don't spot anything unusual.
i have trying to post ANYTHING for weeks.
it's lame, but was behind a nice corsica lt today.
at least i am on the board now.

merckx

Of all the cars to survive! Often,I'll see a really old,very practical car survive.
I hadn't seen one of those in many,many years....

guss

Four of them in some ones side yard in various states of rusting away. Might have been the largest collection of Opel Gt's left in the world.

explorerx4

yesterday, i saw 2 late model black saab convertibles driving side by side on the highway, they got passed by a 9000.
i saw another 9000 today.

fintail

Probably the only running 9000s in your state. I never see those anymore.

fintail

Send it back home

Malaise muscle

"not a kit car"...wouldn't be worse if it was

Fake 48 Caddy

Commie Fake Packard, same optimistic seller

Send it to Oz, they'd love it

Old timer

Preserved box

Chase the sun, watch for leaks

Gaining a small foothold

Neat little thing

Danny Devito, waterfall, Colombia

Optioned up

The word "Gran" is so 70s

Big blue

I don't buy those claims

Long

A more interesting type of "Suburban"

Miled up

Nice E55

explorerx4

the strange thing is, it is not unusual for me to see a 9000.
the one i saw today had mass plates.
saab na headquarters used to be in orange ct.

andys120

Running Saab 9000s are still seen in New England, maybe not every day, but in NH they're more common than, say, Alfas.

I guy I know has one, his 17y/o drives it.

Mr_Shiftright

I would have thought all 9000s would be in the junkyard by now. To spot one on the road is to witness the unflagging will of the human spirit to overcome adversity and disaster.

SPOTTED: Cadillac XLR --- first one I've seen here in California in months. Not impressive upon closer inspection.

andys120

SPOTTED: Cadillac XLR --- first one I've seen here in California in months. Not impressive upon closer inspection

It's the same car as a Corvette only the Corvette has a nicer interior which is odd since the Corvette doesn't have a really nice interior.

kyfdx

Funny the XLR should come up..

On Saturdays in our local paper, they profile someone from the community, and they talk about what they drive and why...etc...

Today, a local radio personality (syndicated, so maybe more than local) was profiled.... He has an XLR. Said he was shopping for a Corvette and just liked the Caddy more..

Mr_Shiftright

The XLR would be fine if it were priced the same as a base Corvette---it's just not impressive at the price tag it sports.

boomchek

Mustang Cobra: we were just talking about the other unfinished Mustang II with a 100hp V6 who's owner wants the same money. This one does look like it's in nice shape, but it's not a muscle car i'd be interested in anyways.

Baskin (Robbins) kit car thing..... uglier looking than most I've seen. Looks like it's based off a Ford Futura/ Mercury Zephyr? Could be #1 of 1 ever made, and i don't think it would have any more value.

Russian iron: I have a feeling you can buy them for a fraction of what they're listed for if you dig deep enough.

Old Volvo: neat. I only see the rusty ones left. Seems like most owners don't baby them so they look really used up.

Sammy Davis Caddy.... yeah hard to prove that he commissioned it.

Suburban... we looked at it a few months ago here. I remember the misalinged rear hatch.

High mileage Fintail: sometimes I want to buy a miled/kilometered up car just to see how long I can keep it going. I like this one a lot. The battered body gives it it's "charm", and just by looking at the seats, you know they have the typical older MB feel of vinyl on bouncy springs. I think it would be a neat vehicle to own in the cosmetic shape that it's in.

E55, looks just like your Fintail.

Mr_Shiftright

That 230S has probably had numerous cylinder heads. The 230S was a notorious valve-burner.

fintail

I thought the Suburban looked familiar.

And yeah as Shifty says, that fintail has had some engine work over the years. The old school MB I6 seem to have high maintenance valvetrains. I have records for my fintail getting a valve job when it was 10 years old, I had to give it one (along with new rings and other fun stuff) in 1997, and it needs at least an adjustment again.

Mr_Shiftright

Probably it's due to the fact that adjusting the valves is critical and requires a special tool and so few owners did it once they bought a fintail cheap.

fintail

Is there a schedule for it?

andre1969

I did a lot of running around today, and saw a few oddballs here and there. First, I went past a house that, back in the 1980's, had a '57-58 Chrysler 300 hardtop under its carport, but as of late, had something under a tarp, and a late 70's LeSabre coupe in the driveway. Well, today the tarp was off, and I saw what I think was a full-sized 1965 Mercury convertible. It was red with a black top, and looked like it was in pretty nice shape. The LeSabre was still in the driveway, too. The 300, alas, has been gone for ages. Shame, because I imagine it would be worth quite a bit these days.

A bit later, an auto carrier semi ran a red light in front of me. It had a few fairly new Benzes on it, as well as a Ford 500, and oddly, a red 2nd-gen Corvair 4-door hardtop, which looked to be in nice shape.

I also saw not one, not two, but THREE Ford Mavericks today! One was a beat-up red 4-door sedan out in a rural area, and the other two were coupes.

Yesterday I saw a white '81-86 Monte Carlo, which looked like it had taken a mild hit at the right front. Looked like it was in nice shape, otherwise. I think I might have seen this one before, but I didn't remember it having damage.

For a couple minutes, I was also behind an '85-89 Aries 4-door sedan. I also spotted an '81-84 Maxima yesterday, so it must have been 80's day.

Mr_Shiftright

I'm sure. In Germany there is a schedule for EVERYTHING.

fintail

Speaking of the 80s, today I saw a Peugeot 505 diesel doing pizza delivery duty. Good luck with that.

fintail

Maybe the schedule is: when it starts smoking = adjust the valves

fintail

And another 80s relic today, a second gen Sirocco. Not a prized maintained relic or a tuned racer, but a car that looked like it had been on the road every day for the past 25 years

fintail

And another relic...a while ago a mid-late 70s Datsun 810 wagon drove down my street...I noticed it because the horn was stuck on. It actually looked to be in excellent condition, apart from the noise. When I was little my uncle had one identical to it, he was proud of it because he claimed it had the same engine as a Z-car.

explorerx4

and all the cars were gone the next day. today i saw an ad in the paper that the former customers could bring their cars to their buick dealership in the next town.
i was curious if the chevy's were really gone or just moved over to the buick store(not).
anyways i saw a 65 seafoam green 4 door bel air for sale(probably in running condition), a 56 crown vic(fancy chrome trim dividing the front and back for the roof), an amc eagle sx4(kind of faded looking), jag xj6 which looked like the only time it will ever move again is to be hauled away.

Mr_Shiftright

The Crown Vic might be worth some money. The AMC Eagle is an odd duck---some people like 'em, if you don't mind the rather tepid acceleration and appetite for gasoline..... The shabby XJ6...well, we know that's doomed. Maybe somebody will want some parts off it.

jrosasmc

What is wrong with the Saab 9000? I always thought they were nice-looking, fun-to-drive cars. Well, at least until you had to repair them, which was quite frequently.

Also, I don't think older '80s or '90s Saabs will be a future collectible like, say, early '90s Mazda Miatas or RX-7s.

andys120

I can answer that question having owned two 9000 Turbos.

-The electrics were suspect, I recall having to replace numerous switches , particularly for power windows and an A/C compressor (ouch!). These are minor annoyances compared to the agita caused by the crappy transaxles and clutches on these cars

It was always a mystery to me that even though Saab had been making FWD transaxles longer than anyone except Citroen and DKW, they couldn't get them right, at least not on the 9000.
I experienced leaking clutch slave cylinders, exploding clutch discs and bad transmission bearings, problems I've never had with most of the many manual
shift cars I've owned including our '96 900S (Opel Vectra-based).

As for becoming collectibles, that's highly doubtful since very few four-doors have much value to collectors. The Turbos are fun to drive even if they have bags of understeer and torque steer. They're great highway cruisers and superb in bad weather but the only potentially collectible Saab would likely be the 900SPG which are sought after at least by Saab fanatics.

Mr_Shiftright

I had 3 Saab 900s, which are a bit different than the 9000s but just as troublesome from what I've heard. I recall Saabnet (who are, if anything, Saab lovers) reporting about an 8% failure rate on head gaskets. That's a LOT. I also had exploding slave cylinders, which is no fun because the slave cylinder is inside the bellhousing. The automatic transmissions totally suck--you'd be lucky to get 40K out of one--the transmissions are weak, the electrics glitchy, and the leather interiors of very sub-standard quality. The convertible top hardware cuts through the fabric (fun thing to do---look at Saab 900 convertibles for a hole right above the left rear window). The cars squeak and rattle like you wouldn't believe. Built by blind men IMO.

For the 9000s, I also recall their ignition coils burning out regularly due to poor design from oil leakage.

Actually a 900 5-door hatchback, if it had a different engine and transmission in it, (or ones that were highly modified and strengthened) would be a great car to own.

To be fair, Saab engine bottom-ends are pretty strong.

You can tell these cars will not be collectible by the paltry resale value they have right now.

oregonboy

Actually a 900 5-door hatchback, if it had a different engine and transmission in it, (or ones that were highly modified and strengthened) would be a great car to own.

Strangely, my girlfriend's renter has just such a car, only the transplant engine is an Isuzu V-6 diesel (!) He was short on details and I have only seen the car from the outside, so I don't know much about it, except that it has an automatic tranny... I think the original Saab unit.

Mr_Shiftright

well perhaps that automatic will survive longer with the pokey diesel engine.

that's kind of a neat rig, aside from the dreaded automatic. Those 5-doors are so spacious, you could move a piano in one, and they are still fun to drive. Quite a few people invest many thousands of dollars to buy an old 5-door and restore it with more modern 16V engine--even convert them from automatic to 5-speeds, with improved gear ratios (the transmission is chain and pulley driven, so you just change the pulleys, like a bicycle!). They'll spend $10K-$15K to get these "improved" 900s on the road again.

I had so much trouble with all 3 of mine. It was constant, relentless repairs on all three. Most demanding troublesome cars I ever owned, out of 100+ in my lifetime.

jrosasmc

And this is why I stick with Volvos.

When I was much younger, I had a friend whose mom used to shuttle us back and forth between school, soccer practice, and the like. She had two Saab 900s- first an '82 Turbo, then an '89 900S. That was my first experience with Saabs and I can still remember my dad picking up my friend's mom from the Saab mechanics' shop on a constant basis (how about three times every two weeks?). Heck, even mid-80s Chevy Camaros (F-body) were ten times more reliable than 900s, even if they were never as well-built as Saabs.

In contrast, my other friends' parents who owned Volvo 240s never had one bit of trouble with their cars. I guess 240s are built much stronger and use more reliable mechanicals than Saabs of that era. The only complaint my Volvo-loving friends had were that the cars were just a little too slow on the highway, and most of these were not turbos.

fezo

A little too slow? I had a Volvo 142 and if it were any slower it would have been going backwards! It got replaced with a Saab 99 which was a race car in comparison but not really all that fast. And, yes, it spent a lot of time in teh shop. Oddly this seemed more because of mechanics - including the dealership - that didn't know what they were doing. Once I found a guy who did know it got better.

xrunner2

So, is Saab in the riunning for worst car in the world (quality/reliability) and could it wrest that title from Yugo or Trabant?

boomchek

Maybe in reliability and cost to repair dept it's a worst car. However a Saab is better engineered than a Trabant in terms of safetry, comfort, and technology.

Mr_Shiftright

I never owned a Yugo or Trabant so I don't know.

But if you meant *mainstream* cars sold in America, yeah, older Saabs are certainly at or near the bottom of MY list at any rate, right down there with Land Rover, Kia and (gulp) VW.

I think the newer Saabs, year 2000 on up, are much better.

As for engineering, I don't know as I would call older Saabs the "best" engineering, but certainly eccentric. Putting the engine in backwards so that the drive belts face the firewall, and putting an ignition key in the floor.....well, not my idea of the best solution.

They did pioneer turbocharging for mass-produced sedans however, so let's give them credit for that.

My favorite Saabs are the old two-strokers. I love those things.

xrunner2

Many years ago, I knew a guy that owned a Saab 99. He was always fixing it. He showed me the tiny engine block on his garage bench when he was rebuilding it. When he drove it, the engine sounded like pop corn popping and the car left a big cloud of blue smoke. He seemed happy with his plight. I guess some guys just like to tinker and fix things, maybe an escape mechanism to be in the garage.

One thing about those old Saabs was durability. Recall that they were very popular with Fin and Swede rally drivers in European rally/races in the 60's. The cars would easily survive rollovers and when righted the driver would just continue on.

Mr_Shiftright

Yes very durable suspensions, although the 900 turbos ate front tires like you wouldn't believe. 10,000 miles tops.

The 95s and 96s had the two-stroke, then the 96 got the V-4 Taunus engine from Germany. The Saab 99 inherited what I think was originally a Triumph design, so you can predict how that turned out.

The 900 engine had a very sturdy bottom end, nearly bullet-proof, but the turbos suffered from severe head gasket maladies. The 9000 I think was a GM engine, wasn't it?

fezo

The killer is when it was running I loved that Saab. And I liked the ignition on the floor. Of course I'm eccentric (well, I don't have enough money to be eccentric so I'm crazy) so it makes sense.

My brother has an 02 Saab 9-3 with about 150K on it which he bought new and has had almost trouble with. Go figure.

Mr_Shiftright

As I said, the post 2000 cars are much better. Had he bought a Saab 900 you'd be rescuing him frequently. A 9-3 is a good buy...they are practically free in the marketplace these days.

Yes the ignition in the floor is great for catching debris, jamming up and sending the Saab mechanic's children through private school.

berri

Jerry drove a Saab on Seinfeld along with his all too familiar mechanic!

explorerx4

key between the seats and in reach of a curious child, not a good thing.
one of my kids turned the car off while my wife was driving.
only once, though.

merckx

I can easily believe all these stories about how troublesome Saabs can be. The odd thing is that I still admire them when i see them on the road...especially the 9000. And although I hear from everybody how bullet-proof Accords are, I tried to buy one in 1993 and 2001....i just couldn't get interested in them.

The few times i've driven Saabs i've really enjoyed them.
I hear so many stories about how troublesome so many European cars can be, yet these are the brands that i find most interesting...

Mr_Shiftright

the ballerina always looks more exciting than the librarian :P

merckx

I just hate to see the ballerinas always getting trashed by the boys who couldn't ever get a date with them....

explorerx4

they are sort of like someone who has dyslexia. they have a good answer, but can't translate it into what everyone expects.

xrunner2

I'll take Marian the Libraian. Somehow ballet not very desirable with current puke rahm.,

fintail

I saw an early 80s Audi 4000 (quad headlights) moving under its own power today, looked to be in reasonable condition.

oregonboy

Wow!!!
A post. It seems like everyone disappeared.

I saw a Chevy Citation 5-Dr hatchback in a mall parking lot in WA.
I have to assume that it drove there under its own power.

It was beige, with a beige interior..
:P

fintail

Hit a lot of birds with one stone

Collection of compact cars

Dashing old beast, price is a little silly

Old time fender bender

Early one

I could see Shifty in this

These all survived it seems...I actually don't mind the color on it

"FAST AND FURIOUS"

Bustle

Fancy Volare

Sense of humor

Like a CHiPS flashback

Another top of the line fintail

This survived pretty well

Early slushbox survivor

It's so restrained and elegant

Lemko's next hooptie

Mr_Shiftright

Wow look at those bids for the Fiat 500!!

Pope-Hartford -- I doubt even the low bid is real. This is after all a former bicycle manufacturer. Not a particularly successful car, it was only made for 10 years.