My 1991 turbo saab convertible, 109K miles, needs a new roof. Rainwater doesn’t leak into the car – it pours into the car. I can still hear water sloshing around in some deep unreachable crevice from last week’s rain. Cost of repair $1100.
BUT, the car stalls intermittently. Two mechanics (including dealer) cant find the problem – probably something electrical. The mechanics said that it’s a hard problem to find, but probably fixable if it is found. They both suggested to bring the car back when it starts stalling every day. So far, stalling has occurred infrequently (every other month - except last week it was twice in one week), but in semi-dangerous situations (ie, it has stalled while I’m driving at slow speeds on highways).
Other than leaky roof and stalling, car is in good shape. A few minor dings. New tires, brakes, blah blah blah.
What would you do? Sell car? Sell car with new roof? Keep car? Keep car with new roof?
I am 32 and I practically grew up in a convertible and had one up until last year. I don’t know much about saab though, but for a foreign car that doesn’t sound like alot of mileage. My advice is to replace the convertible top. The top I bought for the last car I owned was $500, but we knew the guy and it did have glass in the back window instead of plastic. It could be that $1,100 for that type of car is a good deal. I’m not sure. I would think that you could get one a little cheaper. Does the top have plastic or glass for the back window? Ask them to price it without the glass they may be trying to charge you for that when you could just use the old one. So price around and go with someone trustworthy.
You didn’t say if you have a garage to park your car in? If you do, keep it in there when not in use. If you are out and it looks like rain, you look for a parking garage or some other safe haven for the car. If those options aren’t available do yourself a favor and buy a cover for the car. Yes, they are a pain in the butt, but they are a lifesaver in the end. It beats dragging the wet vac out everytime it rains doesn’t it? I’ll give you 2 words that any garageless convertible owner doesn’t want to hear “It’s hailing”. That was always my nightmare. You can prevent the rain from seeping in, but you can’t stop the hail from ruining that brand new top.
Is the stalling happening around the time it rains or after? Could you be getting some moisture somewhere? We used to have a cadillac convertible (old one) that collected moisture under the distributor cap that wouldn’t run if it got left out in the rain. All in all, fix the roof, fix the stall, and enjoy yourself because summer is almost here baby! Oh and I’ll be the car that is flipping you the bird, because I’m jealous.
I am 32 and I practically grew up in a convertible and had one up until last year. I don’t know much about saab though, but for a foreign car that doesn’t sound like alot of mileage. My advice is to replace the convertible top. The top I bought for the last car I owned was $500, but we knew the guy and it did have glass in the back window instead of plastic. It could be that $1,100 for that type of car is a good deal. I’m not sure. I would think that you could get one a little cheaper. Does the top have plastic or glass for the back window? Ask them to price it without the glass they may be trying to charge you for that when you could just use the old one. So price around and go with someone trustworthy.
You didn’t say if you have a garage to park your car in? If you do, keep it in there when not in use. If you are out and it looks like rain, you look for a parking garage or some other safe haven for the car. If those options aren’t available do yourself a favor and buy a cover for the car. Yes, they are a pain in the butt, but they are a lifesaver in the end. It beats dragging the wet vac out everytime it rains doesn’t it? I’ll give you 2 words that any garageless convertible owner doesn’t want to hear “It’s hailing”. That was always my nightmare. You can prevent the rain from seeping in, but you can’t stop the hail from ruining that brand new top.
Is the stalling happening around the time it rains or after? Could you be getting some moisture somewhere? We used to have a cadillac convertible (old one) that collected moisture under the distributor cap that wouldn’t run if it got left out in the rain. I am not a mechanic so not sure. Just fix the roof, fix the stall, and enjoy yourself because summer is almost here baby! Oh and I’ll be the car that is flipping you the bird, because I’m jealous.
My mechanic would say to get rid of it, that once stuff starts going wrong on a car that age, it’s not going to get better. On the other hand, what’s the impact upon you financially? Is it cheaper to make the occassional repair on an older car or plunk down cash for a new one? And I’d replace the top if it would allow you to make enough on re-sale to cover the cost.
Also I would keep looking for a mechanic that can find the stalling problem. At the same time you could buy the repair manuals for the car and try to find the problem yourself while looking for that elusive mechanic, look at it as a puzzle.
Repairing an older car is lots of times cheaper than getting a new one. Plus it sounds like you really like this car, so keep it.
