Hello and welcome to the 99/90 Register. I'm Stuart Payne and I look after the register for the Club.
In 1965, about 20 years after the preliminary sketches for the first SAAB car were made and 30 years after the earliest SAAB aircraft, the project for the 99 was started.
The initial production 99s were made in the autumn of 1968 and production continued until 1985 giving a total production of 588,643. In 1984 it was replaced by the model 90, a two door saloon consisting of the front half of a 99 onto which the rear of a booted 900 was grafted. In this final form a further 25,378 were produced until 1987.
This long production run is a tribute to the thorough engineering and testing that went into the advanced original design, and to the careful development and improvement that continued throughout its life. This lack of 'change for changes sake' and cost cutting which plagues many modern cars makes the 99 relatively straight forward to maintain and run even today, many years since production ceased. The basic mechanics under the bonnet are simple by today's standards, and the chassis is immensely strong, more than capable of handling turbo power (there is a separate register for the 99 turbo cars)
Of all SAAB models the 99 is the most neglected and as a consequence some versions are becoming extremely rare. The register thus has an important role in recording details of members' cars and also offering advice and assistance to those trying to keep these remarkable cars on the road.
