What's Saab and when did it start making cars?
Saab Automobile was started in 1945 by Svenska Aeroplan Aktiebolaget (Swedish Aeroplane Corporation), or Saab. With plane demand tailing off after World War Two, Saab diversified into cars, its first model - the 92 - arriving in December 1949. Initial cars were all green as there was a job lot of camo paint left over.
Saab merged with truck maker Scania in 1969 and came under the authority of Sweden's powerful, filthy-rich Wallenberg dynasty. A deal with Fiat saw a lot of rebadging activity in the Seventies, but the firm's iconic 900 model arrived in 1978 - over a million of them would end up getting built.
Saab was separated off in 1989, 50 per cent each for General Motors and the Wallenbergs, then GM bought the lot in 2000. This era meant sharing bits with Vauxhalls, but GM never got to grips with its Swedish offshoot and the company went into administration in 2009. Koenigsegg stepped in, but the deal fell through. Saab was sold to Dutch sports car outfit Spyker in 2010, then Chinese and Russian investors got involved and GM refused to continue providing its engineering. Saab died in 2014, and despite the efforts of a Chinese consortium in the late 2010s, remains firmly expired.
What's the cheapest car that Saab builds... and what's the most expensive?
Sadly you can't buy yourself a new Saab anywhere what with the company having gone out of business a decade ago, but a quick look on car buying website Auto Trader sees some very nice 9-3 convertibles for sale around the £500 mark. You can't expect anything too fancy, though, and also don't expect to find too many parts around these days unless you're prepared to root around in scrapyards. A 150,000-mile model from 2002 in black caught our eye in Manchester, although the advert does say that the clutch is slipping.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة May 2024 من BBC Top Gear UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة May 2024 من BBC Top Gear UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
HEAD TO HEAD VANTAGE vs 911 TURBO
For as long as we can remember the Porsche 911 has been the default best sports car money can buy. Does the new Aston Vantage represent a changing of the guard?
BOSS LEVEL:PART TWO
In a world exclusive, three makers of the world's most powerful hypercars are cordially invited... to drive each other's creations
THE THEORY 0F EVOLUTION
Ridged bladder seats, an inflating steering wheel and an AI track day coach... has Lotus hit on the supercar's future, or gone mad?
Koenigsegg Jesko Attack
The Jesko Attack drives like a conventional supercar. Brakes like one, turns like one, grips like one. But it doesn't accelerate like one.
STIC LAPS are back!
It's a 1.75-mile figure of eight on an old Canadian Air Force base just south of Guildford. Hardly Monza, or the Mulsanne straight, and never in a million years - you'd think a place that would become one of the most sought after performance benchmarks in the motoring world.
URBAN OUTWITTERS
Does the solution to city motoring lie in designs from the past with powertrains from the future? TopGear goes in search of answers... at rush hour
FUTURE FERRARIS
If you thought Ferrar's past was colourful, wait until you see what it's cooking up next. The future's bright, the future's rosso
DIRTY DOZEN
Ferrari's new super GT makes no secrets about what's under the bonnet, but can it swallow five countries in just a few hours? Better get on with it...
MYTH BUSTER
\"ADAPTIVE DAMPERS ALWAYS NEED TO ADAPT\"
The S2000 from a parallel universe
Meet Evasive Motorsports’ Honda S2000R, the car the Japanese firm should have built itself
