Comments on: Report: GM has no plans for Saab Kappa roadster

By: Bush

Bush — Mon, 04 Sep 2006 18:09:01 +0000

This car with the V6 they use with rear drive would have been a nice addition. Certainly more in keeping than that joke they have called the 9-7.

By: Jonas

Jonas — Mon, 04 Sep 2006 02:24:35 +0000

A Kappa Saab would be a failure due to it not being up to snuff on the safety front. Saab still has a rep for safety and GM as a whole does not (See Blazers, Dustbuster vans, Chevy Aveo, Cavalier, etc…)

Put another nail in Saabs coffin please. The brand hasn’t been right since the 80’s and has been bleeding money since GM took over. Nobody gives a crap about Saab and ESPECIALLY when they become just another hackjob GM product.

By: British_Rover

British_Rover — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 22:26:38 +0000

Saab cannot have a RWD vehicle. They just cannot so it does not surprise me this never happend.

By: More Tea Vicar

More Tea Vicar — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 20:52:35 +0000

Saab is for cool people with european sensibilities who ski Mammoth Mountain or Breckenridge or Telluride. Saab should not be competing with Volvo but be more of a VW-Audi cross

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 17:30:23 +0000

Agreed, GM has not been any help for Saab. If Toyota, VW or Ford (for example) had bought them years ago they’d be making better cars now for sure. Its a joke that the 9-5 has no replacement anytime soon, the the 9-3 is just a more expensive Vectra.

By: Northeasterner

Northeasterner — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 17:02:06 +0000

9-7x was based on Chevy TrailBlazer, not Suburban. And yes, GM did effectively ruin SAAB’s reputation. Come on, what’s up with that born from jets commercial? We all know where 9-7x came from, so the commercial should say “born from Chevy”! Jets or jet engineers had NOTHING to do with 9-7x.

I personally lost all respect for SAAB in last several years.

By: Renton

Renton — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 15:39:29 +0000

“The worse thing in Saabs history is the GM take over. How much can you dilute a brand only GM will know.” — Stuart

Agree 1000%

Instead of diluting Saab, they should have taken what Saab did best. FWD, turbo fours, and safety.

They should have used Saabs turbo fours all over their product line. Those motors were pretty great in the late 80s early 90s .

The Saab 9000 sedan was a great big highway cruiser that innovative and fast .

Today they are nothing more than rebaged Opels.

Ford did a better job with Volvo.

By: al

al — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 15:19:02 +0000

GM is really stupid!!! they could make a lot of money on a saab within the kappa architecture… i repeat REAL stupid

By: Stuart

Stuart — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 12:21:15 +0000

Why make the Sky???? And cadillac ain’t exactly the best of companies. Last time I check they had nothing special about them and find it hard to sell outside of America.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 11:38:16 +0000

Just how big do you whiners think the market for 2 seat spors cars is?

By: Jon'O

Jon'O — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 05:46:25 +0000

The mistake was the Saturn sky. They now have two very similar roadsters. They should have built one cheap roadster (solstice) for their “excitement” division and then built another greatly enhanced version for Saab, to compete against the Z4, Boxster, SLK, and TT maybe. They can’t seem to get brand differentiation correct can they?

By: Mike

Mike — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 02:53:01 +0000

phhhh look what happened to cadillac

By: Stuart

Stuart — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 02:37:23 +0000

The worse thing in Saabs history is the GM take over. How much can you dilute a brand only GM will know.

By: Momentum57

Momentum57 — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 02:22:20 +0000

I’m pretty sure if GM never bought Saab a lot of people wouldn’t even know about them….

Sarcasm is really hard to read so I will ask. Are you joking? Probably don’t remember the history or are not old enough to remember the 80’s 900.

By: Enzo

Enzo — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 01:18:12 +0000

Saab has a lot of potential in making a sportscar like this…just the kind of 911/SL competitor that GM could use in its line-up..or where-ever else in the sportscar market it could go. This is a great looking car, and when GM, god forbid, designs a cool car, they should put it straight into production because they could use as many sales as they can get

By: Brian

Brian — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 01:08:55 +0000

Actually, I think GM is stupid for not building this. This would be a GREAT high-end priced car, one that would be of higher quality and _UNIQUE_ design than the Sky/Soltice versions. Just because it’s a 2 seater coupe doesn’t mean it will compete with it’s platform mates. Price it 10k over the Sky and give it base engine of a LS2 proportions and it’ll sell.

The only real problem is where to build it, considering that the current plant is running over capacity as it is.

Furthermore, the Kappa *PLATFORM* is a great platform, making this car would be no more of a rebadge than Nissan’s use of the FM platform for 1/3 of their cars. Using great platforms to make unique cars is SMART BUSINESS.

By: Thing2

Thing2 — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 01:07:11 +0000

big mistake. I agree with digitalzombie, this would have been in a price bracket a little above the other two roadsters, no cannobalization would have happened. It would have sold well and would have been nice to see that great looking car on the road.

By: digitalzombie

digitalzombie — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 00:04:27 +0000

Makes a lot sense since they don’t want their product to compete with each other. They already have 2 roasters. But if they made the Saab Roaster more luxurious and price it higher to compete with Z4 and etc.. it would have been a better move on their part.

By: deerbourne

deerbourne — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 22:53:28 +0000

The Saab roadster would sell like hotcakes. It’s vastly better looking then the Sky/Solstice, not even in the same league. No competition there.

By: Gabe Rupp

Gabe Rupp — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 22:28:07 +0000

As I understand it, GM will not be building another variant of the Solstice/Sky for good reason…the factory where they are built does not have the capacity to build another variant. However,seeing as it was built as a design showcase, it is almost certain that the Aero X styling will be seen on the next gen 9-3 and 9-5, and other Saab’s as well.

By: chris2

chris2 — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 22:20:16 +0000

The 9-7 has nothing to do with the Suburban.

Saab would be out of business and a footnote in history if GM had not bought it.

By: Adam

Adam — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 22:09:44 +0000

I’m pretty sure if GM never bought Saab a lot of people wouldn’t even know about them….

By: Global_Lightning

Global_Lightning — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 21:52:35 +0000

Further evidence that GM need to be taken behind the shed an put out of its misery. According to GM, its OK to slap a name associated with performance and technology on a glorified Chevy Suburban (the 9-7). Take a flagship platform and giving it a sophisticated engine (like the SAAB 2.3t), now who’d want to buy that???

Please GM, sell off SAAB while people can still remember the days before you raped the name.

By: BAMF

BAMF — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 21:43:07 +0000

lol excellent complaint

By: Madcapp

Madcapp — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 21:18:23 +0000

Dammit, now that Oldsmobile is gone the only way to have the same car rebadged across 5 nameplates is to include some oddball like Opel, Saab, Vauxhall or Holden.