Winter Hack- one of Trollhatens finest

[Glasgowrob]

So after finding myself carless other than whatevers sitting in the yard at work I thought it might be a good idea to go buy a cheap fun fast car for over the winter.

que lots of looking at small hatches clio1X2s not looking at E36s as there seems to be no 6 pots under 5 grand left, vans and all manner of cheap cheerful crud I settled on buying a Saab.

Quirky fast and cheap what could possibly go wrong? so I set about scouring the classifieds until I found a bit of a bargain, a 2005 Saab 9-5 Vectors Sport 2.3 T fast enough lots of toys and a big comfy barge for over the winter. went our had a look slight bit of bubbling on the back arches 4 ditchfinders but a years ticket and apart from the brown leather rather unoffensive. all for the princely sum of £600

so lots of smugness all round and it seems like its putting out a few more than the 220 bhp it should be putting out so all good.
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For a Day.

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we have a err Minor issue, new engine required.

bad news is its a terminal engine failure,
Good news is I've already sourced a B235R to replace it so a few more horses to be liberated.

Bad news only spare car sitting is a Toledo diesel,
Good news, really couldn't bear the thought of driving a diesel so brought the Omega out of storage after 7 years off the road. 4 replacement doors fitted headlights rebuilt and spiders removed belts fluids and brakes and we're ready for a MOT.

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this is going to be a bit of a joint project thread going forward as I really didn't plan on resurrecting the big Mig this year but needs must and the saabs a trip to blackpool for an engine and a days work from being back among the living.|https://thumbsnap.com/zhI4n2nB[/url]

Edited by Glasgowrob on Friday 21st September 12:10

[danllama]

Fun fun fun!

Pics not working though!

[Glasgowrob]

fixed now,

their as broken as the saab

[anonymous-user]

Terminal damage? Done well how did you manage that? I abused my Aero and only ever managed to blow a turbo.

Probably the comfiest car I've ever owned though. I want to try and fit a pair of Saab seats in to my camper.

[Glasgowrob]

OpulentBob said:

Terminal damage? Done well how did you manage that? I abused my Aero and only ever managed to blow a turbo.

Probably the comfiest car I've ever owned though. I want to try and fit a pair of Saab seats in to my camper.

best part is it managed less than 15 miles in my ownership

signs the mounts had been disturbed so i'm assuming a bit of seller fkaboutery before sale.

never mind onwards and upwards

[Darren1101]

Glasgowrob said:

best part is it managed less than 15 miles in my ownership

signs the mounts had been disturbed so i'm assuming a bit of seller fkaboutery before sale.

never mind onwards and upwards

Good effort that! I managed 206 miles and 4 days in my Megane R26. CBA rebuilding though. Broken for parts.

[Mr Tidy]

Well you can't help thinking it was cheap for a reason!

Good luck with the Omega - I've always liked them.

[Jimmy Recard]

Bad luck, that's a damn shame about the Saab.

I love Omegas. There's one on ebay right now that I really want but I'm considering my storage options - they're pretty limited

[Mr Tidy]

Glasgowrob said:

que lots of looking at small hatches clio1X2s not looking at E36s as there seems to be no 6 pots under 5 grand left,

Just curious, but why would you want a rust-bucket E36 anyway?

I sold an E46 325ti Sport within "Shed" budget in March this year, and replaced it with an E91 325i for just under £3K - both are 6 pots and well below £5K!

Sorry to hear about your Saab though - I thought they were the next best thing to a K11 Micra cockroach. Maybe not.

[99t]

Shame it died quickly, got to suspect the seller knew exactly what he was offloading. If it was that close to letting go, I'm surprised it wasn't immediately obvious that it was on its last legs though?

235 engines seem to have two main failure modes, sludging which is well documented and ring land failure when running extra boost on standard pistons.

Although perceived wisdom seems to be that the standard pistons are good up to around 300hp, there have been a few failures at less than that. I suspect it only takes a minor fueling issue to push them over the edge when running even slightly higher than standard boost.

Make sure you drop the sump before fitting the replacement engine and maybe send your ecu to be checked by Karl (noobtune) to make sure the mapping is ok if you think it is non-standard??

[davepoth]

Your new Saab engine will bolt up to the gearbox in the Omega. Just saying.

[Jimmy Recard]

davepoth said:

Your new Saab engine will bolt up to the gearbox in the Omega. Just saying.

that's actually what I was thinking

[Glasgowrob]

but it would also be missing 2 cylinders,

and i'd still have a broken saab.

now if i could find a b308 V6 turbo i would be sorely tempted

[Jimmy Recard]

There was a turbo and manifold for one on ebay recently, I look out for those. Ultimately you'll get more from general tuning than from the asymmetrically driven turbo, I think. Camshafts, Y26SE/Y32SE exhaust manifolds and so on. Or a four cylinder turbo swap - Saab or Z20LET

Not relevant since you like the V6 though

[Glasgowrob]

the Omega is such a sweet setup car for putting sideways. could do with another 80-100 horses though.

think theres certainly scope for getting decent power using a 3.2 lump and the right heads to get the compression up a bit. change of cams and facelift manifolds should hopefully see a cheap engine making 260 horses

[Janosh]

Someone recently built an omega estate with a charged LS1. Fits well and is very naughty!

[Glasgowrob]

Opel did actually look at putting a 5.7 into the omegas back in the day before canning the idea

The Aussies went ahead with it though 😂