Saab Session Slovakia 2013 date announced

The Saab Session Slovakia, which quickly became the largest slovakian Saab event, has it's date for this year. It's the 11. - 13. October 2013.

Please find the Saab Session Slovakia 2013 program and all details. 

Last year 50+ Saabs attended, from Slovakia, Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Romania and Switzerland. A couple of pictures are here.

Automotive News Europe : Saab ready for production restart

The Automotive News Europe issued yesterday (21.8.2013) after an interview with NEVS's spokesman Mikael Oestlund an article about the Saab plans. He said that the factory in Trollhattan is "practically ready" to restart the production this year. NEVS hired about 300 people recently and repeated messages around the internet are stating about arrangements inside the factory like machine recalibration etc.

He confirmed, what was told on the Saabfestival in the summer : it will be a slightly facelifted 9-3, close to the 2011 version. There will be a combustion engine and electric version. He didn't revealed any engine or chassis details.

The electric version, which will come later, will receive a more comprehensive facelift. The batteries will come from the sister company Beijing National Battery Technology, which builds batteries for city buses.

Good ? Yes, of course. New ? Not really. Looking forward what will come from the production belts.

Source : Automotive News Europe

Print ads

Jalopnik has a recent story called The ten best automotive print ads of all time. A couple of very nice car ads from the history. Saab 9000 included.

Two questions unrelated to Saab were raised by this. Firstly, it's so strange how long is the ad text on the white background. Today nearly nobody would read it in whole. So I am wondering if in the time of this ad (late 80ies ?) people actually were reading the text.

And a second question is about the whole Jalopnik story, all the top ten print ads are from the past, relatively long time ago. The newest one is from mid-nineties, the rest is older. While understanding and liking the retro wave, does it mean we are recently in the dark age of bad car ads ? I don't think so ...

Elfstedentocht

A wonderful photo circulated around the net. The Netherlands. But where ? The bridge is pretty standard dutch, it can be anywhere. The signs on the right side could reveal more. So where ?

This is the question I've asked a dutch friend Rudy, who maintains the Save Saab Museum facebook site. He asked and got the answer. It's a shot from Elfstedentocht.

Elfstedentocht (eleven-cities-tour, english wiki) is a ice skating tour in the dutch province of Friesland, which is in the northern part of Holland. In both of the links is a map of the tour. It is almost 200 km long and has thousands of participants. It's happening, when the natural ice in the dutch grachts is thick enough, they say 15 centimeters. OK. So somewhere in Friesland.

Btw. re depth of the grachts : we've been once to a wonderful tour around the dutch channels on a houseboat. One of the papers on the boats stated, that when you fall from the boat into the gracht, before you get into panic, try to stand up. Most of the channels are so shallow, that you can walk out.

So the nice black Saab 96 is from the Elfstedentocht. The Saab is from 1960, the photo from 2011.
A bit more photos are located here, the official photos are made by a magazine called Autovisie. The title page can be found here when you go to the last side "De held van 1963".

A short little story which pleases the heart of a Saab fan.

100%

It's always nice to see this message.

Wheeler dealers : Saab 96

In the Wheeler Dealer series appears a Saab from time to time. This is a part with Saab 96 in Sweden, even attending on a Saab gathering somewhere near Malmö.



You have to jump to the right segment - starting on segment 3 and continues in segment 4. Click on the number 3 on the right side of the video window. For people in Slovakia and the Czech republic, there is also a dubbed version available.

Btw. here is a classic Saab 900 turbo Wheeler dealers episode.

source : streetfire.net

The boat ride

A couple of days ago my phone ringed and a friend says: "there is a possibility to go for a boat ride on the Danube through the city and around, for a couple of hours, do you want to go ?". Of course. These kind of trips are rare chances. Danube has strong magic powers, I've never been on such a trip, even when I live in the city. There are not many possibilities. Strange ? Definitely yes. Why ?

Well there are good and bad reasons for the fact, that boating isn't developed here as it could (and should) be.

The first good one is that Danube has a relatively fast stream (~10 km/h - 5 knots) and for this you need skill and stronger boat engine than the small 5 HP ones. The second good reason is the nature. If too many wild people would boat around, all the nice and quiet places on the Danube banks would fade away. It's partially protected area, so only conscious people respecting the environment should do this. The third good reason is that a good boat is expensive and this is a part of Europe, which still need time for development. A lot of very poor people are living here.

The bad reason number one is, that many people become stupid after wearing a uniform. The power they get with the uniform is enlarging their ego and than they behave like having IQ50. Not only the river police, but also the bureaucrats who write the rules for boat owners. For example how the mandatory two paddles helps you in a 5 knots stream on a boat when the engine fails.

Despite of all this, the trip waked up an old daemon in me saying "i want a boat on the Danube". Let's see if I will be able to sleep him again.

... a couple of trip pics

380 km on roads like this. Summer. Convertible. Yummy.

Another example

A small but very comfortable Saab meeting. A couple of friends...

As every year, the pub is always very stylish. And the beer was great. Small brewery, no eurobeer.

The seniors with us.

Saab 9000 CDE. A long one. Not often to see. Very likeable.

A detail from the Saab 96

The art of improvisation

The Saab weekend on Lipno, a huge lake in southern Czechia, is organised by the guys from Saabinfo. We were there again. On the top photo is a damaged intake pipe from a friends 9-5 2.2 Tid. The diagnostics what is with the Saab was short. But to repair this, about 200 km from the closest service, which could have this on stock on a sunny Sunday, is something completely different. You have to improvise with what you have available.

Many people came to watch, talk, advise and whatever you can think of. A great advantage of a Saab meeting is, that you always find some tools in some trunks and skilled people to fix things.

Some "tools" had a different nature and were not very Saab conform. But back to the point. What to you use as a replacement for that pipe for at least coming 300 km home ?

A can of coke. It's an advert / sample can, the thinner format than the usual one. Yes, this looks very strange. But it worked. At least for the drive home. Well, the most of it. This worked for about 250 km, than it got a hole in it, but the guy and his two sons could return back home. Of course a normal service garage visit is necessary now, but to pull the Saab home on a top of a service car would be much more expensive.

A kind of MacGyver :)  

... a moment

It's very hot outside these days. Sometimes beyond the convertible tolerance. In spite of that I enjoy that. It's much better as when it's freezing outside.

When the autumn comes, the wet and clean air in the mountains will be desired :) As on this photo. A bit cold, a bit wet, a bit foggy but nothing beyond the uncomfortable.

Back to the roots

It's always great to have some photos hidden somewhere in the darker side of the harddisk. Just for coming back after months or years, to enjoy them. This is one of them.

Technically far from ideal but still it has a lot of atmosphere. A good friend of mine, Eva, a photographer shot it. Just as an experiment. It was a cold March, it's on the parking place on the hill above the village Hainburg an der Donau in Austria. A photo flash is used as light source and some games with shutter times, appertures, ISO and things. This is what left. I like it.

It's already a timestamp from the saabish era.