Wednesday Snippets
The guys at Speedparts have just put another piece of silverware in the trophy cabinet with the awesome 9-3 Turbo XR they built with PA Johansson winning the award for Best Performance Street Car, 2008. The award was presented at the Bilsport Action Meet at Mantorp Raceway over the weekend.
This 800+hp and 775Nm monster is the latest in a long line of high-power Saabs from Speedparts and PA and the award’s a well deserved tribute to the work they do. Click here for more info on the Turbo XR and here for some video of it at Kinnekulle Racetrack.
Congratulations!
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Saab are apparently ramping up production of the TTiD powerplant due to excess demand in the UK market. It seems that the TTiD is such a favoured option for the company car market that Saab GB are now quoting seven week delays before orders can be fulfilled.
Saab GB head honcho Jonathan Nash:
“There is a six or seven- week delay on new orders. You don’t want to keep customers waiting. If you can get it down to five to six weeks that would be acceptable. Beyond that people will say they are not going to want the car anymore.”
Mr Nash said Saab had, to an extent, been a victim of its own success.
“The TTiD is perfect for fleet,” he said. “At the moment it’s the hot car and we could do with some more of them because the corporate team is doing a good job of selling them.”
Now that’s some good news!
If they can figure out the physics and get the TTiD engine to combine with XWD hardware, they’ll have a waiting list for that, too, I’m quite sure.
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A brief lesson on how the internet works:
Last week, based on a report in Telegraaf that Albert VDB was kind enough to translate and send through to me, I reported on the possibility of a Saab 9-X convertible concept being shown at the Paris Motor Show later this year. I deliberately used a whole bunch of question marks as at that point (and still, today) this story was a rumour, at best.
Yesterday, citing “Saab enthusiast sites” without actually linking to them, Channel 4 in the UK state that Saab is expected to show a convertible concept that may hint at the next 9-3, based on the 9-X BioHybrid concept.
Today, Autoblog cover the same story, saying that the cars will debut in Paris and that their tickets are booked, their appetite for pasta is at fever pitch and they’ll be covering the event from Italy in October.
Why not just cover it from Paris where the motor show actually takes place?
A game of Chinese whispers, anyone? Or maybe a geography lesson?
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In all seriousness, though, one commenter at Autoblog is now expecting that the concept car we might see in Paris will be a forerunner to the next 9-3. This is a prime example of how these things can go pear-shaped if Saab doesn’t get the right message out.
The reasoning behind this, of course, is that the 9-X BioHybrid was touted as being designed for GM’s Delta architecture, which the 9-1 was originally going to be built on.
Since the 9-XBH was built, Saab have changed tack and decided to build the next 9-3 on Delta. Hence, in the mind of the Channel 4 and Autoblog reporters, concept on Delta now means Saab 9-3. The fact that they would have started work on these concept vehicles long before these model decisions were made doesn’t seem to factor in at all. The 9-XBH is not a glimpse at the next 9-3. Nor will this convertible concept (if it shows) be a hint at it either. They haven’t even started work on the next 9-3 yet.
It’s quite likely that the recent decision on the 9-3 and the 9-1 have turned the 9-X BioHybrid and this possible convertible concept into lame ducks. Nothing more than design studies.
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Perhaps Autoblog don’t have much of an appetite for “escargot”? Come to think of it, neither do I. Then perhaps they just need a geography lesson!
Escargot? Or S-Cargo!
Escargot? Or S-Cargo! I haven’t tried either and don’t really want to. Actually I meant to type “Then perhaps they just need that geography lesson!” but I got distracted.
Swade: If you’re going to Canada and you get across to Montreal, I hear they serve quite good escargot there.
Not to sound like a broken record, but get the freakin’ TTiD over to the US already. You want to see sales increase - well here’s how ladies and gentlemen.
Mark, we’ll be staying on the left coast, so Montreal will be out of the picture for us. Hope to get there some time in the near future, though.
Joemama - welcome to my world (that of the broken record).
Swade: I was trying to go to Quebec on the way back from the UK two years ago, but a planned 4 week holiday turned into a 2 week one and it didn’t happen. I’ve only been to Vancouver once.
Lovely place!
Speaking of Canada, maybe the Canadians could introduce the TTiD engines and give the Americans an example to follow? After all their cars aren’t exactly US spec.. They have speedometers in Km/h.
I’m sure it would cause a bit of an uproar if they did, but Canadians aren’t usually afraid of that!
How did he get 800+hp and SAAB only gets 280? Now 280 is enough for me but most people want to be able to yell out from the rooftops they have over 300+hp! Did he completely gut the car and build a new one?
I think for the 800+ hp mark, the would have to change a lot… But I think the internals of the 2.8 are good for around 400 hp mark. Granted, that’s with upgraded intercooler and radiator as overheating seems to be a problem. I’m not sure of the hp tolerance on the turbo. This would be probably make a great post for Tedjs to speculate on.
Those 800 hp’s are not with the 2.8 V6 engine, he uses the 2.0 cast iron block….
And yes, the car is a total custom build, they started with a reinforced 9-3 shell and have built the car from the ground up. The engine is mounted along the length of the car and partially inside the passenger compartment. I think they boost somewhere around 35-40 Psi….
Hm, on the 9-3 TTiD, isn’t this quote very promising?:
(from the same link!)
“Mr Nash also promised heavy revisions to the 9-3 before the new version arrives in around three years’ time.”
swade,
I sent you some emails the last week. Did you get them? I had another person who didn’t recieve my mail from that account, so I was wondering if maybe something’s wrong with gmail… As usual, no need to reply to them.
The problem with the V6 and huge hp numbers is the location of the turbo. You would need to move anything that is capable of melting far away from the turbo, and there isn’t any free space to move it to.
I guess putting the battery in the trunk would free-up some space.
I think that you would also need to repaint the hood (bonnet) every other week right above where the V6’s turbo sits…
I don’t think that the Canadian market is big enough to justify a diesel Saab. VW used to offer some more diesel variants here than in the US, but they have a long history with oil burners, and a core market.
What I would like to see in a 9-3 update is a direct injection turbo 1.4 putting out 200 hp on E85 (and 185 on pump gas). This would be especially sweet if they could get the car to loose 100kg or so.
Each time I’ve had a new company car over the last ten years or so it’s always taken at least eight weeks to arrive, so if a new TTiD only takes six or seven then that seems OK - at least to someone steeped in the expectation of the poor service we often accept in the UK.
But there’s a serious point here. My colleagues and I are lucky enough to receive a company car, and part of the fun is going through the options list and creating exactly the car you want. And a car that is built to order is a more profitable one, because it is likely to be ordered with options like a premium stereo or heated seats which have much higher margins than the basic car itself. And in any case, you’re more likely to pay more for a car which is exactly as you want it, rather than one which has extras you don’t really want or is in a colour you don’t like.
So if Saab GB are selling more TTiDs as company cars which are built to order, I hope that also means that they are making more money on them. Jonathan Nash is right to ask the factory to give priority to the cars that have been specially ordered, rather than to churning out standard cars which as we’ve seen can take some keen incentives to get off the lot.
If Saab were to advertise the TTid’s 180bhp/260ftlb properly ie in a style that would befit a sporty brand like Saab and add a punchline something like “Saab Turbo. 45mpg!” That could open a few eyes!
In Trollhättans local news paper,there are few more pictures:
http://www.ttela.se/?article=41193
(click on “nästa bild” )
Zippy you’re quite right that those figures need to be brought to people’s attention. But speaking as someone who’s had to make do with reading about this car rather than driving it (as I live in India), I can immediately put on my anorak and say that the figures for the TTiD are actually 295 lb ft and 50.4 mp (imperial) g. And the 149g/km of CO2 is pretty impressive too!
Congratulations on your new Saab too - very jealous…