[Classic 99] Is this an acceptable conversion

Jun 29, 2004 5 Replies

One more for those knowledgeable in all matters of classic SAAB. I'll be looking at an '80 99 Turbo (2-door, black - just what the doctor ordered) in a couple of days. Supposedly the car is in good condition and the pictures seem to confirm this, even discounting that all cars and bikes look better in pictures than they do in reality.



Car has a rebuilt 4-speed 'box, but it also comes with 5-speeder from a 99GL. Appearantly the current owner of the car was planning to have this 'box fitted eventually. I can see this making a bit of sense from both a fuel consumption and possibly performance point of view (quieter and higher cruise speed) but this raises two questions:


- Am I going to be slaughtered at the next SAAB meeting for committing sacrilege?


- Does this make sense at all or is this just a good way to blow the gearbox into kingdom come?



TIA,



Timo


Who cares? It's your car, do whatever you want with it. Really. life's too short.

The 5sp isn't as tough, so keep the 4sp as a spare and swap it back in when you kill the 5sp.

You need to find the "5 speed" badge and shifter knob then you are not hurt! ;-) I think in some markets they also introduced the 5 speed 99.

About the box,,, as I know there are plenty problems with the 5th speed gear and pinion that fail often. Don't really know, but construction of the 4 speed box might be better?

You also need to replace the shifter...

SuoTimo _____________________

"Timo @ work" wrote:

SuoTimo was seen penning the following ode to ... whatever:

;-) I think in

Well, they were available here in the UK but not in the turbo...

Right, that knocks that idea on the head straight away.

The 4 speed shifts sooooo much nicer too, well mine did anyway..

Having said that the very late 900 5 speeds were pretty OK.

29 Jun 2004 04:08:17 -0700, skreiv snipped-for-privacy@cheerful.com (Timo @ work) :

M80 99 Turbo was generaly sold with the 4sp gearbox i Sweeden, 5sp was for export to other markets. So if you want to change to the 5sp, is that OK, but change the other details, like the shifter knob and you have to find at "5speed" badge also. But if it was my car, I had keeped the 4sp 'box.

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