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I wish I understood what’s going on here a little more, but I can’t find the text of the awards that are being described here. As it’s all in German I’m a little hamstrung.
The brief mail I got from Nick G tells me that the Saab 9-3 has won an award from a group called DEKRA. It’s written up in the 2009 DEKRA Mangelreport. There’s a summary here.
It looks like some sort of reliability award with the Saab 9-3 recording the fewest defects from both 0 kms to 50,000kms and again in the 50,000 to 100,000kms range in the Midsize class.
Other top performers were the Toyota Avensis and Audi A4.
If there’s any locals that can tell us more about this, I’d love to hear it.
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12 responses so far ↓
1 lensaffair
// Dec 17, 2008 at 9:56 pm
You’re right: The DEKRA Mängelreport is a reliability award for cars with the fewest defects seperated in several classes and distances. DEKRA stands for “Deutscher Kraftfahrzeug-Überwachungs-Verein” (something like german automobile surveillance community).
2 Quorcork
// Dec 17, 2008 at 11:46 pm
I think DEKRA results are quite significant as it is one of (afaik) only two major organisations in germany that do the compulsory car/vehicle checkups, that every car has to go through every other year.
This means all cars in germany are checked by either the DEKRA or the TÜV every other year which should give them a fairly good overview.
Although on the other hand it can simply mean that owners of 9-3s tend keep their cars in very good shape, compared to other car owners.
Hmm, i think the last point is very true, i never cared more for a car than my current 9-3…
Quick translation of the first column (car classification):
Minicars / compact cars / middle class / upper middle class/ sports cars & cabrios / offroader / vans
The other columns are:
mileage / 1st / 2nd / 3rd
It is basically an analysis which cars of the given categories had the fewest defects to be found in the regular checkups. Again, this does not exactly mean the quality because you can keep a bad quality car in good shape by tending to it very thoroughly.
Cheers
Silvan
3 albert
// Dec 18, 2008 at 1:43 am
I just sent swade a full translation of the DEKRA press bulletin.
for those of you, who understand German:
http://www.dekra.de/pressemitteilung?_ArticleDisplay_WAR_ArticleDisplay_articleID=2731749
4 Gunnar
// Dec 18, 2008 at 3:35 am
Vas!? Saab’s 9-3 beat Audi’s A4??? What could the Germans possibly be thinking?!? (this is sarcasm, BTW)
5 saab93
// Dec 18, 2008 at 5:06 am
the full story..
http://www.dekra.de/pressemitteilung?_ArticleDisplay_WAR_ArticleDisplay_articleID=2731749
Test has been done over more than 15 milj cars.
6 Mailr
// Dec 18, 2008 at 5:32 am
There are 4 Fords on the list and only on GM car – the Saab 9-3.
7 wilfried
// Dec 18, 2008 at 6:16 am
The Germans only let the saab win in the lower km-range. Strange, I always thought the saabs were good starting at 100000 km & got better onwards … .and right there it isn’t listed anymore.
Lets hope the dekra report has some positive effect on the german saab sales.
TTiD had some good reactions in german press aswell.
Combine that and it should give a push to the sales figures.
(Someone is needed to marketing the hell out of that …)
8 North Toronto Punter
// Dec 18, 2008 at 8:34 am
” Someone is needed to marketing the hell out of that…”
Absolutely! And in North America too.
There is a huge mystique surrounding the ‘Quality’ of Audi, BMW, Mercedes vis a vis Saab in North America ( confirmed anecdotally by my circle of Friends here [Wilds of North Toronto]). Confess: I had bought into it myself and nearly ended up with a C Class [Turbo X in the end
].
Plaster this on billboards, hold a press conference…Hell, what a Golden Egg!
9 Moosex
// Dec 18, 2008 at 5:56 pm
IMHO this statistic tells the same story as the rest of the reliability stats: Early 9-3 were very unreliable (’03-’05, the ones which have now been driven more than 100 000km) . The never ones on the other hand are reliable.
10 Arild
// Dec 18, 2008 at 6:49 pm
I don’t agree with you Moosex. The reason that the 9-3 isn’t in the 100 000 – 150 000 km group, could be because the survey sample for 9-3 Sport Sedans driven more than 100 000km may be too small to be included in the survey. After all, the 9-3 Sport Sedan has only been on the market for 6 years and they don’t sell heaps of them in Germany. I don’t expect that many of them have been driven more than 100 000 km yet.
11 albert
// Dec 18, 2008 at 7:05 pm
Moosex, I don’t agree with you.
As Arild said, there were probably not enough vehicles around to give reliable data.
But I don’t agree with you on the reliability. Taken into the statistics are only relevant problems. So if your car squeeks, rattles and rolls: zero problems. If your cup holder breaks: zero problems.
It is remarkable though that the statistics from another German testing organisation – GTÜ – show the same trend for Saab.
12 Tompa
// Dec 19, 2008 at 2:37 am
This is great news! Go Trollhattan!!!
Ps.. Saabboy1.. Would you like to comment? Ds