Saab 9-5 Aero Estate | Shed of the Week

The treat? Manual 9-5 Aero wagons are still Shed money. The trick? You're already too late...

By Tony Middlehurst / Friday, 31 October 2025 / Loading comments

One of the few posters on last week's Duster Shed of the Week thread who wasn't firing pelters at Shed said that the Dacia was actually a refreshing change to what they saw as a stream of Saabs and Volvos in SOTW. Semi-fair comment: we have had more than a few Saabs on here over the years, and plenty of Aero estates too, and now here's another one.

Thing is, what's a Shed to do? It's hardly his fault if 260hp Saab manual estates like this can now be picked up for under £2,000. Shed will admit to maybe favouring Saabs a little. In fact, he's only recently stopped running a 1963 two-stroke Saab 96 after the village bobby gave him a final warning about the clouds of exhaust smoke that were forcing Tuesday afternoon domino club members out of the village hall with their hankies over their faces.

Moving on to more global matters, a year after GM unloaded Saab Automobile to the Dutch outfit Spyker in 2010 Saab had to file for bankruptcy, GM having popped up from beyond the grave to block the onward sale of the brand to a Chinese consortium. Supposedly (not to mention ironically) that was to prevent tech transfer from the US to China, a funny-sounding idea now. National Electric Vehicle Sweden (NEVS) had a go at blowing on the Saab embers and actually managed to start up a petrol 9-3 production line in 2013, but NEVS's valiant puffing ceased a few months later when they lost their licence to build Saab-badged cars. All told, Shed feels that Saab has had a raw deal, so when he sees what looks like a nice Aero in the classifieds he'll try to bung it up on SOTW in the hopes that one of you will buy it and help to keep the brand going.

The last Aero estate we had here in July was a compact executive 9-3 2.0 T, a model aimed at the compact executive who might otherwise have been driving a 3 Series or C-Class. The Aero you're looking at today is a 9-5 2.3, a comfy, commodious, and in full-fat Aero guise rapid barge aimed at full-sized executives who would normally have been swanning lightly in a 5 Series or E-Class. Company car rebels who went Swedish instead of German at the time our 2007 Shed was built might have thought they were buying into a classy proposition, only to find that GM's commoditisation of the brand after its full takeover in 2000 had watered that down somewhat.

Nevertheless, some classic Saab traits remained happily intact, for example the genius Night Panel button that dimmed out most of the dash lighting for fewer late-night distractions, and the old-time thrunge of a strong, smallish, heavily boosted engine. Who didn't enjoy watching the needle in the TURBO gauge furiously swishing left and right? Not the postmistress. She's always savoured the sight of a pointy white thing swinging back and forth. The well-named DIC (Direct Ignition Cassette) system must have sounded great in Saab's boardroom at one stage but owners soon learnt to despise its unreliability.

Luckily all you had to do to keep your Saab going, albeit with occasional interruptions, was to keep a spare DIC in the back, something that Shed has always recommended. The oil sludging that used to kill these cars off shouldn't be an issue in our '07 example, as Saab had recognised the problem three years earlier and sorted it out with a revised PCV system. It's still a good idea to run synthetic oil, though. Throttle bodies, coolant bypass valves, fuel pumps, water pumps, crankshaft sensors, head gaskets and vacuum pipes will all need monitoring, as will climate control systems, SID LCD displays and windows.

It's fair to expect stress in the suspension and engine mount departments, too. Sure enough, one of the two advisories on this car's September MOT ticket was for slight play in the nearside front ARB, but from the MOT history we can see that some suspension fettling was carried out two years ago. As Shed will tell you, a little bush work will often enhance your 9-5 life. The other main mechanical weak spot, Saab's automatic gearbox, is not present here so that's one less thing to worry about if 260hp seems depressingly feeble to you.

Karl at NoobTune near Nottingham will map a new smile on your face for as little as £90, and he'll do it by post too. Remapping should improve fuel consumption as well as performance, the figures for which as the car stands are (or were in 2007 at least) 0-60mph in 6.9 seconds and an average fuel consumption of 31mpg. The vehicle tax payable in the UK seems to be an almost sensible £430pa, but as always Shed absolves himself of all responsibility for the accuracy of that, bills in the mirror can be bigger than they appear etc.

Here's the full ad