What is a Saab 96? <\/em><\/strong>It\u2019s the last variant of the \u201coriginal \u201c body shapes that started after WWII when the Swedish airplane company decided they needed to diversify. Their cars\u2019 side view closely matched that of an airplane wing. They also featured front-wheel drive and a two-cylinder two-stroke engine. Not bad for an entry-level utility vehicle. They didn\u2019t want to compete with the posh up-market (and conservative as meatballs) Volvos. It worked and Saab often outsold Volvo in their home market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Like another bottom-shelf front-wheel-drive car, the British Mini, the Saab was also an excellent rally car. Erik \u2018On-The-Roof\u2019 Carlsson was a national hero for his exploits. (You anglophiles may remember he married Stirling Moss\u2019 rally champion sister, Pat.) He also made Saab the overall Monte Carlo Rally victor in \u201962 and \u201963.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By the \u201960s the two-stroke engine was showing its weaknesses and the company was replacing too many of the oil-spewing devices. In 1966, the Ford Taunus-derived V4 began making its appearance in the Saab 96. In a few years the stroker was gone and all 96s were V4s. After a 20-year run, the last 96 was built in 1979.<\/p>\n\n\n\n July 14, Sunday evening. Ottumwa, Iowa. <\/strong>I didn\u2019t want to take I-35 up to St. Paul because I didn\u2019t know whether the 96 was up to a 75 mph 500-mile sprint. Especially in 90+ degree temps. I\u2019ve owned enough Britmobiles to worry big-time about overheating. Plus the 96 is \u201conly\u201d a 4-speed, and there\u2019s no tach so I had no idea how rapidly its extremely smooth V4 was running. (Later research revealed it goes 17+ mph per 1,000 rpms in 4th<\/sup> gear.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Instead I took US 36 to\n63. Both are pseudo freeways. Usually four-lane divided highways except when\nthey\u2019re not. Did I mention it was hot? The temp gauge never got into the red\n\u201cH\u201d zone but it was leaning to the right. More so going uphill and when I\nexceeded 60 mph. The hills were not that steep but they were long. Going\ndownhill was fun. If I took my foot off the gas pedal, the Saab would go into\n\u201cfreewheel\u201d mode.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even at 90 degrees, the\ninterior of the Saab wasn\u2019t that bad. No A\/C but also no transmission tunnel to\nbake the interior. There was a brief shower so I stopped and rolled up the two\nfront windows. That got a little stuffy. So another stop to get them back down.\nIt\u2019s interesting that the Saab\u2019s windows don\u2019t go straight up and down. They\npivot from the front.<\/p>\n\n\n\n (While freewheeling, the\nengine is disconnected from the differential. It\u2019s the same thing as depressing\nthe clutch pedal on a normal manual tranny car. It was disconcerting at first\nsince I assumed we had popped out of gear. I\u2019d push in the clutch pedal and try\nto force the 4-on-the-tree lever even further into the gear it was already in.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n My goal was to get into Iowa before I stopped for the night. Across the Iowa border Ottumwa was the first town that seemed likely to have restaurant and motel. They do but it took many wrong turns to find them. I read the Saab owners\u2019 manual at dinner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n July 15, Mendota Heights, Minnesota. <\/strong>Home after a mega-detour marathon. Do not take Hwy. 63 through Waterloo, Iowa. And after a pleasant root beer float in Spring Valley, Minnesota, 63 had a \u201cno thru traffic\u201d hissy fit. After a 60 mile unguided tour of boring straight cornfield rows, the Saab found a north-going county highway that eventually took us to Rochester and Hwy 52 to home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n -Andy Lindberg – July 14, Sunday morning. On Delta flight 1318 to Kansas City. Why am I doing this? I don\u2019t really need another old…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1153,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mumble","category-on-your-marque"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1150"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1150\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1162,"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1150\/revisions\/1162"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1153"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intermarque.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/intermarque.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/openroadsaab600px.png\")
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