For the last two to three years my wife (you may call her Ms Red) keeps telling me, that when we have some extra money she would love to own a convertible. In march of 2011 we decided to make a rational choice and we decided to buy a low power diesel 9-3 Griffin Sedan. It should have been a black Vector Griffin with nice full leather seats, but this car was never build. Because of our family plans, and because no new cars are being build in Stallbacka, we forgot about a new car.
Myself and Ms Red kept talking about the convertible thing. We assisted this year at the IntSaab 2012 in Spa(Belgium)and she saw cars like these.
and these
and she kept dreaming about a convertible, knowing that she was too rational to say yes to buying a convertible.
Then in Autumn, we drove to Trollhättan to assist to the Octoberfest, and there we saw this beauty.
The guy in the picture actually build this car. He told us after checking the VIN. Currently he is commuting to Norway for Job reasons, so I hope he can once again build Saab cars in Trollhättan.
That car was for sale and it was almost brand new. My wife felt in love with the car, and we got in touch with the guy selling the car. After a couple of e-mails me and the seller decided to stop discussing as we would never agree on the price, I had a limited budget and it was lower than what he wanted.
After that we started thinking about a low budged option, like a 9-3 I conv, but we did not find no car that both of us really liked, at least looking at the on-line pictures. But in November, when I went to my Saab dealer to put the winter-tyres on he told me that he was getting a 9-3 convertible in the next weeks.
Just before Christmas and after making two test-drives, we decided that Ms Red should own her own Saab, and this time it was a non rational model, it was an arctic white 9-3 convertible Aero MY’08 TTiD with automatic transmission.
It has almost almost all extras available at that time.
It has even Hirsch sport springs, but it has no Hirsch power update or a Hirsch rear diffuser. Those are the winter alloys, the summer alloys are ALU73 if I remember well.
This is Ms Red new Saab. She owns the car since January 2, and me and my wife are since then waiting for a day with sunshine, as it seems like 2013 is a rain only year, at least here.
What are the slightly changes I may do on this car? i would like to change the front grill with a Griffin one, only the upper Grill, and also change the silver bar in the back with the blue rondel for a Griffin bar with the SAAB wording. Then I’m also thinking about updating the interior, replacing all the silver bits with something different. And at the end of the list there is a rear diffuser.
Regarding the engine it is a stock engine with only 180 bhp and 400Nm, I may send an E-mail to MapTun and then connect my mapTuner to the car to have a little bit more torque.
My family thinks that I’m crazy to buy a Saab in 2013, but I don’t think so. Saabs are still very reliable cars, that still look incredibly fresh and at least here in Germany they are unbeaten price wise. I’ve compared the price of this car with any comparable 4 seat convertibles available in Germany, and there were only 3 different models with comparable dimensions, engine, equipment, mileage and age.
The Volvo C70 the Audi A4 and the BMW 3 series. The C70’s I’ve found have similar prices but the hard-top is a no-go for me, the 3 series has also a hard-top and costs 5.000 € in average more than this Saab and the Audis I’ve found were all 3.000+ € more expensive than this Saab. I could buy a comparable 120d convertible for that money, but it is a smaller car and my wife also doesn’t like that car.
This is fantastic news and I wish the sun to shine.
Yes the “Griffin” grill would be a choice for me too.
Well done both of you.
hallo,i have also the same story about this but i wil also a new gril for mine saab convertible artic white from 2008!!!
he was also showing in saab intil 2012
thanks and regards scheepers guy belgium
Congratulations with your new car!
I am planning a switch to a my2008 convertible this year, preferable in electric blue!
It is just a fantastic car, not as rational as my sport sedan but way more fun.
Some nasty people say the 9-3 is a dated car, I couldn’t disagree more when I see this beauty. Congrats to you and Ms Red.
Great choice, I had the same (crazy) idea last fall and I bought the same car, a 2008 Aero Ttid convertible, but in black. Maybe we can team up at a meeting the would look great along side, black & white.
I was also thinking about the same update concerning the grill and tailbar,
where can you find this, just at your local Saab-parts dealer? Any idea about the price of these items?
The Griffin Grille is hard to get at the moment. But let me know if you want one via PN. I have a couple of them left.
Congrats and have fun with the new car! We love our MY 2007 convertible and also waiting for the first day in January with sunshine to let the top down!
Congrats Mrs. Red!
No better time to buy a convertible than the dead of winter.
Why does everyone immediately wants to mod their new car, just drive the d$%& thing!!!
I am so happy Ms Red finally got the car she was so keen on to get.
Having been part of the discussion in Trolhättan during the Octoberfest I understood how decided she was.
I am sure both of you will enjoy this beautiful car, certainly once the top can be put down during sunny days or weather without rain.
Congratulations !!!
That is a stunning car Red….bet you and your lady can’t wait to get your top off! The car I hasten to add…. hehe.
Congratulations, it’s a very good looking car, even in white 🙂
If SAAB had built a hard top I would got one for myself. That’s something you have to think of when you only have a garage for one car and temperature variations of 45 degrees Celsius.
Dave, the actual roof of the Saab convertable is just fantastic, much better than a hard top and very strong. Saab would not be wise to built a hard top while they have one of the best roofs in the market for their convertable.
Stronger than a hard top ? hum… how is that possible? I also think they are noisier and the color starts to fade after a few years exposed to the elements. For me, hard tops look nicer. But the truth is that much more expensive cars still use the conventional soft top. There must be reasons for that…
AFAIK, you will see less and less hard-tops on the roads on the next years.
OPEL will offer the Cascada with a soft-top instead of the hard-top Astra convertible.
VW will replace its hard-top EOS with a slightly larger soft-top convertible.
BMW will keep the hard-top, but Audi and Merc have always been soft-top, and the Volvo C70 is no more.
Hard-tops have some advantages over soft-tops, like noise and thermal insulation, but they add a lot of weight to the wrong part of the car (top) and when folded they use almost the whole boot space.
Regarding the structural strength, I think hard tops are stronger in the back, that’s why a Saab convertible has the roll-over bars in the back, but in the front the A-pillar and the head rail will take all the impact and not the roof.
At the end of the day, hard tops have no real advantage versus a modern soft-top, and it depends on the personal taste.
yep. Builders seem to be moving away from hard tops…Congratulations once again. Love the wheels
What a beautiful car! Congratulations to Ms Red …. can I borrow it for the summer? 🙂
Great choice – great colour too! I saw a white 2008 9-3 only yesterday – the first I’ve seen in Ireland and it looked absolutely brilliant! And the 9-3 was the best choice. The C70 is rubbish, I’m sad to say…And the others don’t count. 🙂
Congrats.
How about Hirsch instead of Maptun?
As you can see Hirsch offers -50% of upgrades.
Great looking car in white. Enjoy.
Like you we recently grabbed a 2007 2.8 v6 convertible in black for my wife. Cant wait for the rain to stop in Scotland so we can get the roof down!
I’ve ran a TTid Aero Sportwagon as my daily runner for the past year covering 35,000 miles with no problems at all. Just put the Hirsch 10 day trial on today. Definitely pulls better from c.1800 revs. Not tried the Maptun upgrade, be good to hear how you get on with that if you decide to go that route.
Congratulations! I suggest that you buy a strut brace as well, trust me, it make a big difference to the feel and handling.
Congratulations. And there is no rationality in buying a convertible. You buy them because you want them. 😉 I have a 2006 Aero V6 myself which I purchased about 2.5 years ago.
Nice car !! This is kind of uncanny, tho’ … I’ve just fitted a griffin grille to my 2010 conv. (last Saturday, so I’ve not updated the avatar yet) & I’ve already covered my gear shift surround with red leather & had the glovebox trim sprayed laser red. I’ve actually got some white “carbon leather” look vinyl Iwas hoping to dye red & use for the surround, but it wouldn’t take the dye – if you’d like some, let me know & I’ll send it to you — it may look really good on Ms Red’s car.
congratulations, it will bring a lot of joy ! And I am so glad, that my convertible -> the black one in the middle on the second picture (IntSaab 2012) – was one of the cars that kept Ms Red dreaming about convertibles 🙂
I would think about the “kind of blue” griffin headlights. and strictly recommend the maptun front strut brace.
The lamps are quite expensive, as I need the adaptive xenon lights.
Maptun is askin 8.995 SEK for the pair.
that’s about 1000€, ouch. ok than. I’m replacing the silver things in the interior as well. It goes slowly, but progress is there. If you dont have windshield, this is a must have as well as the strut brace. good luck and have a lot of fun:)