Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

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Crazyswede
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Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Crazyswede » Tue Jun 25, 2013 8:30 pm

I bought a Saab 4 speed rally gearbox last winter and it came attached to a Saab 900 Notchback rally car. The car was never run but was a reshell of a previous notchback that had been retired for one reason or another. The shell has been stripped and reinforced and it did have a cage and a running but not tuned drive line in it.

After resting at a friends place near Seattle for several months I finally got it shipped to Luke's house down in PA. After we ran STPR we decided to run Rally West Virginia which takes place about 7 weeks after STPR. Somewhere in discussion about which car to run the decision was made to prep this 900. We only have to do EVERYTHING to the car to prep it so 6 weeks would probably be plenty of time :crazy:

June 20th I went down and spent all of Friday cutting the old cage out of the car. I pulled the doors off as well as the rear side windows and the windshield. Luke and I went to the junkyard on Saturday and picked up a T5 harness, injectors, DI pack, and sensors, as well as a pair of dark grey doors with interior panels, glass, and mechanical winders. The doors that came with the car were significantly lighter as they were fitted with lexan, had no tracks or window mechanisms, and had a bunch of the inner sheet metal cut from them. However I prefer to have the glass windows that can be wound up and down. Its nice to be able to roll the windows down at checkpoints and transits and it helps the car feel less claustrophobic. The interior door panels also offer a little more protection and the pockets can be handy.

The tubing for the cage was ordered (about 110 feet) and we will be running the 1.75" diam x .095 wall for the main cage structure with the remaining in 1.5". We are not mounting the main hoop as far back as the previous cage but it will still be behind the B pillar. In order to mount the driver's seat in the proper position for my height we need to set the seat and cage back a bit. We will run the appropriate spacers on the wheel and use the existing pedals for now.

Due to time constraints we will likely run the brake master setup that is in the car which is using a booster and an additional vacuum reservoir. I plan to eliminate the bter and go to a dual master setup. I may cut out a piece of the firewall and make an area similar to the 99 to mount the masters in but still have them in the engine bay. In some cases the 900 is great because it has a lot more room for stuff in the engine bay and between the engine and the firewall. However some of the 99 design is very handy with the top shelf of the firewall being great for mounting things.

The car is still using the stock gas tank and will continue to do so for the forseable future. We are changing the fuel lines out with PTFE hose encased in woven SS which is very long lasting compared to the equivalent rubber. As a side bonus there should be no issues with ethanol. I got the stuff from Summit Racing and it was on sale. A 20' roll for about $60. I will post a complete list of parts and prices in a bit.

Seats: The OMP's that came with the car are in ok shape and just needed a good cleaning. Unfortunately they have no FIA sticker so they are not NASA legal though they could be used for Rally America. For now they will end up in a play or street car. I am looking for my own seat and will be trying a few over the coming weeks.

Suspension: The A arms are reinforced and it appears the bilsteins have been rally valved. The suspension mounts look good but the springs look like they are still stock. I ordered some Moog springs to try out but we found a website in Sweden or Finland that offers the S&R equivalent ones.

Skid plate: I am having a 24"x36" piece of 6061 1/4" thick aluminum rolled into shape which will be attached to the car with a frame that is probably Rev 10 of Luke's skid plate frame design. We have looked at some other setups that use very nice setups making it easier to put the thing on and take it off.

New parts.

I am going to have a Chromoly reinforcement piece made up to replace the stock stamped Aluminum piece that spans the bottom of the 900. When we get it done and tested it will be available through the 9 sport performance parts area. The finished piece will be stronger and offer better clearance to the bottom of the transmission.

Coolant tank
Dash

More to come...pictures and time lapse video.
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby SwedeSport » Wed Jun 26, 2013 12:10 am

That is pretty ambitious...

I bet Phil is pretty happy though, lol.
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Luke
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Luke » Wed Jun 26, 2013 9:26 am

The specimen as it arrived off the truck. Although from 20 feet away it looks pretty decent, on closer inspection there were a lot of things that needed addressing. The good news: A rust free, incredibly straight west coast shell, a sport and rally crash box and a 16V NA with solid lifters and individual throttle bodies.

IMG_2387.jpg


The cage was suprisingly tight fitting, too bad it was build from 1.5" tubing and was missing a lot of required elements. If it had carried a logbook, it might have been ok for some events for now, but would likely need updating soon anyway, so the decision was made to start fresh.

IMG_2397.jpg


Seth attacks the cage, luckily for us it was only welded to the body shell in 27 locations (no kidding)
IMG_2452.jpg



A weekend worth of work leaves the car seemingly further away than when we started, have to crack an egg to make an omelet i guess.....

IMG_2451.jpg

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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby DrewP » Wed Jun 26, 2013 11:05 am

Do you guys break / bend that aluminum crossmember?
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Crazyswede » Wed Jun 26, 2013 11:59 am

We have seen them break on stock cars. Though the skid plate will not be mounted to it. .. it is still an area that needs reinforcement.
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby DrewP » Wed Jun 26, 2013 12:58 pm

Good to know. One of the... lesser informed.... guys out here used to run his LeMons C900 with the crossmember removed completely, on the assumption that the extra negative camber from the front wings flexing out with no triangulation was a good thing....
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Crazyswede » Wed Jun 26, 2013 2:15 pm

DrewP wrote:Good to know. One of the... lesser informed.... guys out here used to run his LeMons C900 with the crossmember removed completely, on the assumption that the extra negative camber from the front wings flexing out with no triangulation was a good thing....



On 99's this piece is integral to the body and people usually reinforce it. Removing the stock piece from the car and running nothing...eek scary. As you see it holds the bottom of the car together.
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby hutch » Wed Jun 26, 2013 5:30 pm

That thing is awesome looking, is it too much to ask for a Swedish flag on the roof?

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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Crazyswede » Wed Jun 26, 2013 7:28 pm

you can ask for a Swedish flag on the roof but it will not work very well with our planned paint scheme.
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby airsweden » Wed Jun 26, 2013 8:22 pm

how bout like the red white and blue road race 900 at the saab museum?
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Crazyswede » Thu Jun 27, 2013 8:43 am

We talked over several different color schemes and ideas concerning how we could use the existing color but break it up a bit. We looked at that red white and blue car in the museum and in the end we decided on an altogether different approach. I ordered the paint yesterday and we will post photos when it is done.

Red, White, and Blue car being referenced:
Image


Some other details about the car:

All motor mounts are solid steel
The transmission has its own cooler
There is an engine oil cooler
Beefy heater core assembly.
All of these are plumbed in with industrial hydraulic hose and corresponding fittings. Someone must have had access to the parts and equipment for these lines. Shouldn't be any worry about them bursting. :huh:

Luke and Josh are hard at work pounding out the new cage and they made some excellent progress last night:

Image


I am working on a couple of small projects to try in this car. 2 of these are around LED lighting and I picked up (4) 1' long LED strips to use in various parts of the car. 1 or 2 will get stuck on the inside roof for overhead lighting. The others will get placed as ideas and need requires. I also picked up (2) 3 watt LED's mounted in aluminum housings to try out as replacements for the 900 2/4 door rear lights. My thought is to remove the bulb holder entirely and replace with LED. The 4dr style rear light assemblies always have trouble with dust, loose bulbs, and grounding problems so I plan on going all LED.

Image


I am headed to Lukes tonight and hopefully towing the rally shell back to Jon Williams place Sunday. I also plan to go to http://www.rallylights.com on Friday to test fit a few seats and pick up some parts I have on order there.
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Luke » Thu Jun 27, 2013 9:09 am

airsweden wrote:how bout like the red white and blue road race 900 at the saab museum?


I liked the white roof look like the old ice racer had...

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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Crazyswede » Sat Jun 29, 2013 11:39 pm

pictures and videos to follow

we had a successful weekend off roll cage building. Most of the cage is finished and we have lots of small stuff to finish up Sunday morning.
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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby Luke » Sun Jun 30, 2013 12:16 am

Day 4 of the chassis prep ended with cage nearly complete.

Image

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Re: Saab 900 Notchback Rally Car

Postby DeLorean » Sun Jun 30, 2013 8:05 am

wow, now THAT is a cage.
Less brake more gas!


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