After going to the 2013 SAAB Owners Convention outside of Albany, NY to see what all the commotion was, we just had to do it again.  Unfortunately this time we wouldn’t be able to load up and drive our SAABs out like before because the event was held all the way on the west coast.  As our plane coasted in for decent into Portland, we noticed two things.  The first was that the state was incredibly beautiful, punctuated by clear sunny skies and rolling green landscape.  The second thing we noticed was that most of that was actually on fire.  We wouldn’t let something like that stop us though, it was time to ‘Get Funky in the Desert’ with some of the most hardcore SAAB owners you will ever meet.

The week prior, we had a skid shipped out with our eEuroparts.com tent, some promotional materials, and a computer kiosk that served a few purposes.  The first was to allow people to sign up for an event only $25 event account credit.  This is something we are quite fond of doing, so keep that in mind next time we are putting on an event!  The second reason for the eEuroparts home base computer kiosk was to run a demo on a new style of diagram we are testing out on the site.  If you’d like to take it for a test drive to get a taste of the future, check it out here, or just click the picture on the right.  We should have most of our diagrams converted to this new interactive format by next year, so that’s definitely something to look forward to.  Back to the convention….

The air was full of electricity and two-stroke smoke on Thursday night when we rolled into the Eagle Crest Resort among a herd of classic and modern SAABs.  The 96’s lined up with the 9-5’s.  Viggens slept with C900’s.  The rare and interesting spread across the entire area.  There’s nothing like being near a line of SAAB Sonnets all starting up at the same time to move out for the group photo (more on that later).  Being an owner’s convention, you could understand that it wasn’t all about the cars, but also the…ehem….owners.  People that have bought, sold, crushed, restored, built, wrecked, and flew SAABs since the beginning were there to discuss and celebrate the car company’s storied history as well as it’s uncertain future.  Luckily some of them were able to donate their time to give seminars on Saturday.  Gary Stottler and Dave Snider discussed B-Motor water pump rebuilds using a hands on demo, helping 99 and early 900 owners climb over the dreaded Achilles Heel.  The best part about this seminar was that they decided to have it in the parking lot, under the shade of some ancient desert juniper pines.

A couple other memorable presentations included one from Peter Backstrom, who traveled alongside the legendary (now 85 years old) Erik Carlsson all the way from Sweden.  He is the curator and head honcho at the SAAB museum in Trollhättan, Sweden, the home of the SAAB factory.  He went over the history of the museum, showing us pictures from the beginning.  Having seen early and current photos previously, I thought without thinking that the museum had moved more than once.  During the presentation you can watch the place morph and change shape, with different levels moving and rising up.  If I ever go to Sweden, seeing the historic collection there in Trollhättan is at the top of my to-do list.  Also, Peter is an amazing personality, maybe he’ll take me for a ride in a Sonnet I.

Dan Comden and Hans Adomeit were their with the Alcan 5000 SAAB 900 DST rally car.  I was used to seeing pictures of this car completely covered in multiple layers of polar dust and strata, seeing it [relatively] clean was kind of a weird feeling.   They are consistently the only two-wheel-drive car to run the rally, starting in Washington state near Seattle and driving north until you couldn’t drive north anymore.  There are two rallies, winter and summer.  Being in it’s natural element riding on ice, they choose the polar rally and do the 5000 mile run in temperatures that can reach -60 degrees Fahrenheit!  Dan mentioned that their car is the only one in their four car team (the others being BMW’s and Subaru’s) that didn’t require the heat to be on it’s max setting while blasting down the polar highways and frozen lakes.  When asked if they would do it again, the looked at each other and said if another SAAB team were to join up, they would.

The car show was a swirling dust devil of history, recollection, and future planning that spanned from epic builds, races, brainbending technical discussions, family road trips…  If you’re into SAAB, and your girlfriend/wife is tired of being your verbal outlet for Trionic 5.5 conversion discussion, don’t miss another SOC.  If you’ve been to a SAAB Owners Convention in the past, you know exactly what I’m talking about.  During Saturday night’s amazing dinner (sidenote: all meals served were out of this world, really unbelievable) Erik ‘Pa Taket’ Carlsson himself took the podium to talk about his excitement about the turnout, then switched over to personal stories from his history with SAAB.  I’m hoping someone recorded them because many have never been published, or at least made it onto the internet.  I will update this post with them if that does happen!  Erik was around stealing kisses from all the ladies and handing out autographs to everyone else.  I got my event badged signed, it was a great opportunity to meet him.

At around 3pm on Saturday, event co-chair (alongside Calye Lacefield and Dan Morley), kilt enthusiast, and JBM press owner Phil Lacefield picked up his bullhorn and started calling out groups of cars to go stage for the annual SOC photo.  First were the race cars, some requiring a tow out to the field (which you will see in my video).  For the rest, it was a good reason for everyone to get into their own groups and roll out as a family.  Imagine a row of 15 900 convertibles followed by 5 Viggens, 4 95’s, 8 99’s etc.  The best was when the row of Sonnets all fired up in unison.  Phil was like a bear shaking a bee’s nest, they all cranked and fired with a raucous delight that most would be able to appreciate, but for us SAAB people, there’s nothing like it.  How often to you really get to see a SAAB Sonnet on the road?  How often do you get to see 7 all in a row?  It was really a great time and a great place to be.

*Edit* I forgot to mention the huge 9000 showing!  Being the 30th anniversary, much love was shown at during all the speeches.  Phil drove down his heavily modified baby from Washington, that pushes huge power to the ground.  I don’t remember the exact dyno number, but it was over 400hp to the wheels.  Traction becomes an issue at this point…ehem..the exterior remains clean and stock, making it an amazing sleeper.  This was just one of many, so well done 9000 crowd for showing up in force.  You know exactly what Peter Backstrom meant when he said the 9000 was one of the best cars SAAB ever made.

You may be thinking, well there were a lot of 9000’s, 96’s, 900’s, 99’s, even 93’s, but what kind of representation did the newer cars have?  It’s got to be said, unlike SAABs@Carlisle, where the 9-5s and 9-3’s were there in force, it seems like the SOC was a celebration of the more historic side of SAAB.  Even with that said, one of my personal favorites was a very nicely done TurboX with a two-tone yellow vinyl wrap.  In people’s choice, it won the 9-3 categories hands down.  A handful of NG9-5’s were also able to make the trip, the longest all the way from Maine!

If you are reading this wondering why you didn’t make it to this amazing event, remember that this is an annual thing.  The location of the 2015 SOC isn’t pinned down yet, but many are thinking the Midwest is the best candidate.  So all of you Chicago and Milwaukee based SAAB enthusiasts, let your desire to host the SOC15 be known!  We love sponsoring these and will continue to do so in the future, so get your Sonax detailing products together and kick it into high gear.  Thanks for hosting this historic event Phil, and we will see you next year!  Click below to watch our short video.