In a nutshell I want to bring Saab back to life to the extent that I can.

Saab corporate may be dead but Saab isn't dead.

I will follow your project with interest.

 

I agree Saab is not dead! In as much as it lives on in the hearts of tens if not hundreds of thousands of people as well as those of us that continue to keep our Saabs alive and on the roads. But let’s be honest. There hasn’t been much life in regard to new things Saab. The things we all used to get excited about Saab as a going concern. New models. Facelifts. New technology. This is specifically the area i want to breathe new life into.

 

I had thought about moving the grille a bit forward as to make it stand out but with the current means available it would be hefting some plastics to it, so I had abandoned this idea. A protuding grille might be a job be a job for a 3D printer.

Don't know about US GM cars but I know that Opel/Vauxhall had offered heated steering wheels for certain models, probably they'll fit your Saab too. Might generally being a good idea to look at the Insignia past-2011.

I could imagine that Saab might have used a curved or even a quasi-3D TFT display for the gauges in 2024, but to realize that...

 

If i knew how to use a 3d printer or design parts on a computer then yes you are 100% correct. I wish i had those skills. What i do have is skills as an artist and sculpting. I also know how to make molds and castings. I used to have my own business where I would make a lot of my own parts in house. I know how modify the bumper without adding significant weight. Plus i really like working with clay like the original designers did. When I was young I would always see those stories of the large clay models and it felt magical.
Thank you for information on the euro cars. Cause almost all I know is US cars.😉 Do you know of any that had the same structure that our airbags would fit into?

 

I have done heated steering wheel to my previous og 9-5 (total 3) and my present 9-3 wagons.
I used Saab steering wheel, carbon fiber heating element and Saab switch.

 

That is great to hear. If you could share with me how you went about it I’d be quite thankful. That will help cut down what is an extremely ambitious project.

 

A 9-5 vert would have been sweeeet. I'd still like to create a 9-5 2dr el camino. !!

 

This is the concept for a 9-5 Viggen I drew up. It doesn’t include what I’m doing in the grill area yet. But gives you an idea of my basic vision. Of note is the inclusion of ice block themes from later Saab work. Also removed a lot of the black plastic that seriously dated the design. I wanted to increase the sense of sportiness while still retaining elegance. I’m not married to the wheels yet. I’m toying with the idea of designing my own wheels. We shall see. I’d really like to hear feedback from the community on this.

 

It looks a little hefty without the "black plastic" giving a break in the body lines.

I did a similar rendering for member skwon when he was doing his car wrap a while ago.

 

Yes it does add to a sense of bulkiness. But after you spend some time with the concept that feeling disappears. Then it just starts to feel modern. Which makes sense as modern cars look more bulky. The thing this generation lacks that more modern cars have is more curviness. Character lines that add visual interest and to some extent cut down on the bulk. I haven’t ruled out making sheet metal changes.

 

HotSaabs had enlargened the lower intake or blackened the upper sector of it which gives the front a more pronounced look.

I have an alternative idea in mind but have to work it out on a different computer as my laptop is not powerful enough and my Photoshop version being too old.

 

HotSaabs had enlargened the lower intake or blackened the upper sector of it which gives the front a more pronounced look.

I was only referring to the rub strip not the Lexus size hole.

 

You can not use clockspring.

 

My inspiration for the lower grill area is not Lexus. It is Saab Aero-X. The form also melds beautifully as an inverted form of the center portion of the middle upper grill area. The original 2004-2005 9-5 Aero bumper is a holdover design limitation, and dare I say lack of inspiration, of the days when the bumper had one function. To be bumped. Originally bumpers were considered to be things tacked on over what the designers really wanted to do. It took most auto designers a long time to look past that and see the front fascia as one cohesive canvas. What I am doing is finding a way to blend Saab inspired themes onto a modern canvas. Now here is the aforementioned Saab based inspiration for my new interpretation of the OG 9-5.

 

Replying here to get updates

 

Here is my 2nd concept for a 9-5 Viggen. It draws inspiration primarily from the Aero-X and 9-X Biohybrid concepts. I was initially skeptical when I first thought of melding these forms to the OG 9-5 but ended pleasantly surprised with the result. It took quite a bit of work to get them to blend together but I’d say this is now my favorite. The detailing on the sides of the bumper helps to reduce visual weight and blends with the existing black plastic detailing running along the bottoms of the door. Let me know what you think. Do you prefer my first concept or the second?

 

Wow. I had no idea how dead this community had become. There was a time when a thread like this would have had hundreds of responses already.

 

A strong critique from someone that appears to have been here less than a month.

 

I have been at this site since its inception.

That's why I said "appears".

And it’s not as much of a critique as it is a lament.

I live in a city of over one million people and I'd be lucky to see another Saab on the road every two or three months and my local Saab shop that I have been dealing with for over forty years has just shut down.

A separate issue I'm having is that for some reason I can't see your most recent rendering, all I see is a bit of text saying "Tire Automotive parking light wheel vehicle car".

I can see your earlier submissions.

 

Second try for my second concept. Hopefully this is viewable. I used the classic Saab ‘hockey stick” motif in the area around the center grill.

 

Not viewable.

--f

 

Ya i read where a moderator confirmed issues with the site, not showing pics

 

I like the first render more than the second one. I agree with @bob3000 though that I really like what you are trying to do and I am going to keep up with this thread!

 

Thank you for your opinion. And your moral support. It means a lot. 😊

 

I am presenting my “final” concept for a 9-5 Viggen. Details may change as the project develops. The front end I am presenting today is already a slight revision of one posted earlier. Needed to refine some details to unify the front with the rear design.

This is not intended as simply an artist’s day dream but a concept that I plan on actually making a reality. My goal is for this to be Model 1.0 in a series of cars I modify and sell to our community. The objective is to use existing Saabs to create a new generation of Saabs for the modern era. Basically to bring life to our beloved brand. Not to simply maintain the Saabs we have.

When dealing with a brand that is dead as a going concern we have to think about things in a fundamentally different way than the owners of other brands have the luxury of doing. WE are now the company! We have to create the solutions. We have to create the excitement. We have to create the future. The car I am presenting you today represents my vision of a factory quality facelift lead by industry leaders.

I have absorbed many decades of Saab DNA. Everyone will have different preferences, but this is my attempt to adapt Saab concept themes from the mid 2000’s onto a production model. The forms Anthony Lo created during that period are in my opinion the pinnacle of Saab design. It is a crying shame none of his ideas really ended up in a production model.

I have taken inspiration from two Saab concepts in particular. The 2006 Aero-X and the 2008 9-X Biohybrid. Both of these concepts hold up extremely well in today’s automotive design world. They were elegant, sleek, and sexy. Sporty without being overwrought(I’m looking at you BMW). I have been an automotive design enthusiast for most of my life. My #1 dream job has been to be an automotive designer. So I get to live out some of my dreams here with this project.

I hope you can appreciate the tremendous effort it has taken to create this concept. Blending different forms and concepts onto a canvas that was set for you is daunting. Given the goal is to produce this I have to consider so many factors. Can the thing actually be made at all? How much of my time and money will be required for a specific design change? Do I attempt to use off-the-shelf components or create my own custom parts?

What this concept is not. It is not an attempt to create an absolute perfect render. This gets back to me needing to use my resources carefully. Remember my goal is the create a car not just artwork. So reserve your opinions on anything that is slightly in the uncanny valley. Use your imagination to bridge those gaps. Remember that I am a human using my time and money and passion to devote to a brand you love. Please think before you post. What you say affects me. I very much appreciate thoughtful and intelligent comments from the community. If you have constructive criticism of what I am doing I have no problem with it. But make sure it is constructive. As in don’t just say you hate it. Tell me, or even better, show me how you think it could be better. We are here to build not destroy.

The way I have pitched this to my wife is that I will create my dream car. If others value what I’m doing and show their support by taking the car off my hand at the end of the project then I will continue to make more and more models. Ultimately I’d like to make an electric version down the road. But if it turns out I’m the only one who likes what I’ve done then I will keep the car until I die. It’s my dream car after all. This is probably a bit ambitious but I’m hoping to have it done for the Saab owners convention in Portland this year.

Let me know if you do not see the two pictures posted below. Edit. Adding a link to the pictures on my photography website just in case the Saabcentral website doesn’t show the pictures properly. Pictures are here.

 

I have taken inspiration from two Saab concepts in particular. The 2006 Aero-X and the 2008 9-X Biohybrid. Both of these concepts hold up extremely well in today’s automotive design world. They were elegant, sleek, and sexy. Sporty without being overwrought(I’m looking at you BMW).

I thought I'd add links to the two cars in question that served as inspiration for your design. I hadn't revisited the 2006 Aero-X and the 2008 9-X Biohybrid in a while, so your taking up this project made for a great trip down memory lane.

I hope you can appreciate the tremendous effort it has taken to create this concept. Blending different forms and concepts onto a canvas that was set for you is daunting. Given the goal is to produce this I have to consider so many factors. Can the thing actually be made at all? How much of my time and money will be required for a specific design change? Do I attempt to use off-the-shelf components or create my own custom parts?

Absolutely, having dabbled a little bit with designing stuff, I understand and appreciate how much time/effort this takes. I loooooove the front end (and front 3/4 view). The bumper seems like a perfect modern take/evolution of the shark nose (04-05 Aeros). The rear 3/4 too, looks modern. The rear for me is trickier aesthetically, I have always felt that the 9-5 wagon's rear was a little too visually "heavy"/bulky, and using the black component to visually separate it from the rest of the rear hatch is a great idea. The wrap around taillights look fantastic .

I know this kind of a project can take an incredible amount of time/work, so I wish you the very best. Please share incremental successes (and failures ), no matter how trivial the update. I would be interested in how you approach this as a project, how you divide up tasks/mini-projects. Basically, whatever you can share, when you can share, is welcome.

 

I thought I'd add links to the two cars in question that served as inspiration for your design. I hadn't revisited the 2006 Aero-X and the 2008 9-X Biohybrid in a while, so your taking up this project made for a great trip down memory lane.


Absolutely, having dabbled a little bit with designing stuff, I understand and appreciate how much time/effort this takes. I loooooove the front end (and front 3/4 view). The bumper seems like a perfect modern take/evolution of the shark nose (04-05 Aeros). The rear 3/4 too, looks modern. The rear for me is trickier aesthetically, I have always felt that the 9-5 wagon's rear was a little too visually "heavy"/bulky, and using the black component to visually separate it from the rest of the rear hatch is a great idea. The wrap around taillights look fantastic .

I know this kind of a project can take an incredible amount of time/work, so I wish you the very best. Please share incremental successes (and failures ), no matter how trivial the update. I would be interested in how you approach this as a project, how you divide up tasks/mini-projects. Basically, whatever you can share, when you can share, is welcome.

My approach in its broadest sense is first principles. Having a background in art as well as industrial design and manufacturing on a small scale I try to blend all the areas of my knowledge base. When I latch on to a project it is an all in approach. I eat sleep and breathe my work. So as I go through life I’m constantly asking what lessons can be learned by the automotive designs around me. Can I use this part in my design? What makes something look modern? How does it make me feel? I toyed with adapting some tail lights from other vehicles but made the final determination today that a wholly Saab approach on the design side would be easier and better. I ended up deleting my other design explorations earlier today. As I mentioned before one of the considerations is can this even be made? Modern automotive design has moved away from bumpers being explicitly displayed. The whole front or back of the car is being used as a unified canvas. For this project I am basing it on a car (2004-2005 9-5) that had prominent bumpers front and rear. As you can see in my renders I am attempting to reduce this as it does lend a more modern look. The front is a little easier. But the rear required me to examine what physically could be accomplished to reduce the rear bumper protrusion. As in, was I limited in my design by underlying structural elements? There is a lot of stuff like this that I have to consider.

 

Creative! Can we see a rendering of a 9-5 viggen vert? Saab should have done a 9-5 2dr!!!!

 

I admit that would be a fun project. For me to do a proper design analysis and render we are looking at probably 120 hours of work. Given limited resources it will have to wait. I’d love the challenge though. 😁

 

In line with amartya’s request I am going to try to give you a more stream of consciousness approach. Today I am doing a little course correction. I started out my first post in this thread with a shot of early modeling attempts. My eagerness had me getting ahead of myself. I used traditional clay to get my ideas from my head into reality as soon as possible. The problem is this stuff drys and cracks. In an effort to freeze my sculpting work I coated it in epoxy. But I quickly realized I need a clay more like what actual automotive design firms use. So I’ve been researching this a bit the past few days. Think I’m going to go with Chavant Y2 Klay.

There may be a better approach but here is how I plan to attack creating what is essentially a one-off concept car. Instead of creating an entire bumper from the ground up I am using the existing bumper cover and will modify it. Step one is to create the actual forms sculpted on top of the bumper as is. At least for the portions that represent positive or protruding forms beyond the current form. So anything that sticks out past the current surface. Anything of a negative form will require cutting and removal of the current surface. Anyways I digress.

Positive forms will be molded and casts created that will act as grafts that are applied on top of the existing structure. Similar in approach to the way human face transplants are done. I do have experience with mold making and casting my own parts. So at least I‘m not starting at ground level here. But I’ve never done this exact application or dealt with large parts like I will be working with here. Trying to nail down the materials I use for the mold and castings.

I am also working concurrently trying to figure out how I want to fabricate the rear lights. Specifically for the clear cover whether I want to use existing cast acrylic and heat form it over a mold or create a casting. I’m leaning towards heat forming with acrylic because I think I’d end up with a better quality part. The difficulty is trying to create a deep pocketed compound surface structure.

 

I got some well thought out constructive criticism when I posted my concepts on Facebook. That the headlights needed redesigned to better match the rear. Here is a rough draft of the redesigned headlights. First off I decided I needed to use a donor vehicle for the main functional part of the headlights. After going through a metric crap ton of lights I decided on the lights from a 2012 Volt. I like the projector housed a little higher in the headlight aperture as it gives a subtle aggressiveness. I need to give you a description so you understand what is going on in this picture. The lower orange element is depicting the turn signal in the on configuration. That is a custom piece that will be either clear and crystal like or have a frosted surface to aid in lighting uniformity depending on the needs and how I feel it looks. The lighting elements are meant to float inside the headlight. Running flat along the bottom is green tinted acrylic that will be lit from back under the floating area and emanate outwards using the acrylic as a light guide. The edges of the acrylic terminate in a frosted edge to create the edge lit border that accentuates the nicely designed (in my opinion) original lower headlight lines. Of course the two pieces that made up the original 9-5 turn signal and headlight are being combined in a far more modern single piece. Even though I am still utilizing the same amount of vertical space I designed it to feel less vertical and more horizontal which in my eyes gives it a sleeker less bulky feel. One other thing to note is that the rear of my design in practice will be a bit brighter than the render would suggest. So it should in practice have a similar feel. Let me know what you think.

 

Let me know what you think.

Echoing @Germaniac's post, the headlights look great. I am a little unsure about the green tinted acrylic, but that's okay. This is shaping up really nicely

 

The headlights do look very nice.

 

Look forward to the cutting

 

Looks great, nice work!