(first posted 7/24/2012) The full-size three-row station wagon was the stereotypical American family hauler until the rise of the minivan. Just yesterday we wallowed in the luxurious personal automotive space a family with more than 2.3 kids was afforded in 1967, even if the third seat faced rearwards. So today’s task is to compare it to a comparable European vehicle. The list is very short indeed, especially when it comes to rear-facing third seat station wagons. I’m undoubtedly missing someone out there, and you’ll undoubtedly clue me in, but tonight, here’s all I can come up with: the Saab 95. I guess having ridden in one has something to do with that, and surprisingly, it wasn’t as cramped as one might expect. Maybe not cramped enough.
The Saab 95 technically appeared in 1959, but production really didn’t get underway until 1960. Of course, it was based on the classic popcorn-popper two-stroke Saab 93/96 (CC here).
Now the one I rode in looks like this one; no, no; I mean piloted by this one, this very fetching Swedish brunette. She reminds me way too much of the mom who drove us to orchestra practice occasionally, when my regular ride didn’t materialize.
They were grad students, and lived in one of the numerous and vast quonset hut ghettos that the U of Iowa threw together to house the thousands of post-war married students. You wouldn’t believe how cramped and primitive they were, especially by the mid sixties; they were each divided into two units. Insulation? They made the Saab wagon seem downright commodious and comfortable.
Anyway, I had more than a bit of a crush on this mom, even if they weren’t actually Swedish. Piling in their faded green Saab wagon the first was a surprise even for me at that age. Memories of clown-car antics in my god-father’s Lloyd came to mind.
But lo! The second row wasn’t as bad as one might expect, thanks to the then almost-unheard (in America) advantages of front-wheel drive.
And in the way back was a legitimate third seat, with a deep footwell. Not bad, for a car about the size of a VW Beetle. No wonder fwd was seen as such a big deal. As a packaging freak, I always did wonder where the spare in the Saab 95 went; there was just no obvious place. But look up one picture, and there it is, under the second row seat. Those clever Swedes. The Saab’s dropped solid rear axle helped make it possible. Now where was the gas tank?
But my favorite seat in that 95 was the front passenger one, not just for the obvious reasons. It gave me chance to sit quite close to Gordon’s youthful and athletic mom, and watch her in action as she worked the column-mounted fours-speed stick through the gears, while the little “Shrike” 841 cc triple spluttered on each upshift. But that was only part of the attraction, as the thigh on her left leg flexed and relaxed each time her foot worked the clutch. “You’re such a good clutcher, Mrs. Stevensen! I’m learning so much from watching you so closely”
And then there was her smell…combined with the ever-present tinge of oil made a ride in the Saab 95 the equivalent of an aromatherapy session while holding an adult magazine in your hand: eroticaromatherapy.
Like the 96, the 95 was also treated to the stubby little Ford V4 starting in 1967, and within a year, the Shrike shrieked for the last time. US-bound 95s and 96s got a low-compression emission-compliant 1700 cc version, while the Europeans did with a sportier 1500 cc job.
Saab tested a number of engines in a hush-hush project to find a four-stroke alternative, but they must have counted their lucky starts when the ultra-short Ford Cologne V4 appeared. If it looks a bit like a half of a Ford Windsor V8, it’s because it was originally designed in the US, for the ill-fated Cardinal fwd compact, at about the same time. The V4 and related Cologne V6 were 60° units, which made a balance shaft a necessity for the V4 to try to tame its intrinsically unruly ways.
Ironically, the Saab 95 was configured very much like the Ford Cardinal would have been, had Ford chosen to build it instead of sending it to Germany.
But the Ford 12M was even roomier. It made quite a sensation in Europe, given just how spacious it was for its class; it made the VW Beetle feel like a torture chamber, and even put the Opel Kadett A to shame. I’m quite certain a third seat was not available; it would have been embarrassing to the much larger Falcon to have a smaller wagon with a third seat, eh? But if the Saab 95 made it work, I’m sure Ford could have too. Just needs a bit of wood planking.
If the Saab 95’s sales are anything to go by, maybe Ford did the right thing: Americans were not interested in space-efficiency, especially when they were still living in fairly small houses with plenty of kids. But the Saab 95 showed what was possible. And enjoyable, under the right circumstances.
Thanks for filling in a blank spot. I was overseas for most of the time these ran and missed them here. Possibly clutching lessons like that would predispose one to manual transmissions. Hard to say.
You wax poetic, Paul. Or erotic, perhaps? I find it fascinating how cars and sensuality can make such everlasting memories. Perhaps it’s something about an information overload that makes it stick together?
On the 95, I hope you didn’t miss the in-built rear spoiler? It has to be an industry first. Though it was not made for aerodynamic reasons, but to direct the air-flow over the rear window, keeping the window free of sludge. Or so was the thought.
On European three-row station wagons, I think only the french were into that with their Familiales. As you should know, being into Peugeots and all. The three rowers were usually faced in the same direction. I know that the standard Citroen DS Break had two in-bult side facing jump seats in the back. But the Familiale had three rows, were the middle row were three seats of fold down collapsibles, while the two seat rear bench was actually screwed into place. Thus, they couldn’t fold to make a flat luggage compartment like in the usual Break. With the middle row folded, it made for a limousine-like experience. Very french indeed…
Kids live fully in the moment, eh? Something we have to work at as adults.
I was specifically referring to rear-facing third-seat wagons.I have given the Peugeot wagons plenty of coverage: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/automotive-histories/the-worlds-greatest-wagons-peugeot-203-403-404-504-505-an-illustrated-history/
Yes, the integrated spoiler; leave it to Saab to get that. And I didn’t know that about the Citroens. I assumed that all the seats folded flat.
The seats on the standard Break folded flat, the Familiale didn’t. The car has a rather narrow track at the rear, that’s why the rear bench is only two (well upholstered) seats. I don’t know why it doesn’t fold, but it seems the back rest has nowhere to go if folded, because of the wheel well protrusions. Here are a few shots of a true Familiale. Notice how the luggage compartment is fully upholstered.
http://www.rafs.nl/?page=car_detail&id=19
Thanks for that picture. Well, that makes some sense, as the Citroen was so long, there was still a fair amount of room behind the last seat.
Yes, it really is like a limousine, with a nice back seat and little fold-up seats in the middle. And it explains why there were two versions.
Paul,
Are you sure you’re not the guy who invented the term MILF?
Absolutely love the car.
It is amazing how things work out on CC with either cars I’ve just seen popping up in an article here or seeing something I haven’t seen in ages right after it is featured here. In this case it wasn’t a 96 but a 95 that raced at the 24 hours of LeMons Pacific Northworst event this past weekend. The more interesting thing that I didn’t figure out until after I got home was that it was built and raced by our resident old and odd micro car enthusiast commenter MDHarrel and it won the coveted IOE award. He had it all decked out with period rally gear on the inside too.
Got to love the smell of a 2 stroke in the pits. Maybe if we are lucky he’ll share some pics of it or you can head over to Murliee’s site and the Uber Gallery from that race to see it in action as well as the cool rally gear.
I’ve always been crazy about the Saab 95, ever since seeing one as a kid. Is there another wagon that is so sharp and clean? Perfect success of form and function.
I even tried to get a used 93 or 95 as my first car but they were just not around. Ended up with one of the countless $500 VWs available in 1970. Ford’s Cardinal would surely have failed in the early 60’s US market. I was a disappointed little guy after following all the teasers in the magazines.
It is incredible how hyped the Cardinal was to pull it from the US market at essentially the last minute. I don’t think it would have been a big failure if they had brought it to market. The imported Fords didn’t do too bad considering they were sold through very few dealers. Had they been available at the regular Ford dealers I think they would have done much better. So the Cardinal presuming it was handled at all or at least the majority of Ford dealers I think it could have done pretty good, but of course it probably would have cut into Falcon sales.
The 1962 Ford Cardinal would have been the first mass-market FWD car in North America. Would that have accelerated the shift to FWD over here? Would a FWD Toronado have been more likely (proven) or less likely (no longer novel)? Grist for the what-if mill.
And the reason the Cardinal was pulled? Ford decided to put its bets on something called the Mustang. While it may have done OK, I don’t see the Cardinal pulling the kind of sales numbers that the Mustang got. So it probably was a horribly boring and smart decision – Americans are suckers for un-innovative engineering masked under exciting styling.
And I remember the major article in Popular Mechanics, really got excited (at age 12) that Detroit was finally going to make one of those “foreign cars”.
The peril of long lead times. The Cardinal (which probably wouldn’t have been called Cardinal had it made it to market in the U.S. … I think “Redwing” was the leading contender) would have been the right car for 1958, but not for 1964.
I’m guessing frugal McNamara liked the Cardinal, but Henry II (CEO from ’60) hated it. Just look at today’s ’71 Ford CC.
Wow, what a weird styling, a rounded front is mated with a pointy, sharp-edged rear. Looks like two different designers worked on the front and rear of the car, and they never talked to each other. Still, that blue/white two tone one is pretty.
As a lover of all things wagon, how could I not love this little Saab? Although I am not sure I would want to drive it everyday, a 2 stroke car would be sort of fun. I imagine that it smells like my old Lawn Boy (with its 16:1 fuel mixture) and is followed by the same little blue cloud. Also, I have always wanted to drive a 4 speed column shift, just because.
I miss Saab. I mean the real Saab. The company that did everything just a little strangely.
Had one of these (in beige) in the mid 80’s.
The attached photo is of the gas tank
(which I still have)
So it must have been under the third seat, just behind the spare? Had to be…
Yes – exactly where it was. Same basic spot as in the 96 sedans. They were inside the car, above the floor pan. The floor went front to back. Great for skidding over rocks and such. The only thing exposed undrnieth was the exhaust. Even the rear axle was tucked up in a little tunnel.
Montego! no not Mercury, Austin. The BL Austin Montego was arguably less ugly in Estate Car form and did a US-style 3rd row. With a bit of parts swapping you would even be able to have an MG.
Plus my beloved Volvo turbobrick 745 wagon has a foldout rear-facer. Does it qualify for sportiest 3rd row hauler ever?
A Montego mentioned on CC! I love obscure cars! We got the Montego here in NZ too (Dad worked for a BL dealer at the time), and I totally agree re it being arguably less ugly than the sedan! A friend had one throughout the 90s, was actually quite ok but the steering was possessed by the devil…and the metric-sized wheels required scarce and expensive metric tyres too. Still see a few of them around here though, so I guess some folks liked them. Didn’t BL they do an MG wagon version too? If not, quite correct, some part-swapping would sort that problem out in a jiffy!
During the summers in high school I ran an impromptu car detailing business in my parents’ driveway. Remarkably enough, complete strangers (within a 3 mile radius of home) actually let me drive their cars to my house and return them when I was done. I left my bicycle as collateral. This was in the early 70’s.
One customer had a 95 and a 96 (both V4 four stroke) and I got to drive (and wash) both of them.
Talk about killer torque steer!
The scary thing was that we lived in a sort of hilly area and they used their cars in free wheeling mode (I guess for clutchless shifting). The first hill felt like a roller coaster ride.
– Chris
That’s so cool, to get to drive real Saabs and get paid for it.
Didn’t realize until recently the real reason for free-wheeling in Saabs. Engine braking is very tough on two-stroke engines that get the oil mixed in with the gas. With the throttle closed and a braking load, it’s starved of oil on the surfaces that bear the load. Why’d they keep it with four-strokes? Why not, Saab drivers were used to it.
The benefits of freewheeling at that point were the fuel mileage you could get from endless coasting and,once underway, the ability to shift without using the clutch. Just lift off of the gas, shift and tip in to continue.
I can remember seeing signs on summit roads warning people to disable their overdrive before descending, since they were freewheeling before the unit would shift.
I’ve heard that Saab kept free-wheeling with four-strokes (including the early 99s) because their rally drivers used it in ice driving.
I did the same thing in high school. My favorite part was the variety of cars I would get to drive.
i remember as a kid going to hebrew school in nj, one of the israeli teachers drove a saab 95. it really stood out in the parking lot. it had the first see thru headrests, i had seen plus, if memory serves the side windows were plexiglass.
this video may have been referenced here before. it’s a great demo on how to drive a 2 stroke saab at highway speed:
http://youtu.be/DKKudxE1wGA
Side windows were not plexiglass, but at the top rear corner there was a small little triangular plexiglass piece that served as a wind-break for the rear passengers. Those aircraft engeneers thought of everything!
I just went looking for a Saab 95/96 owner’s manual and came up with a complete shop manual! Saab 95-96 Manual 1964
Exploded diagrams of everything, including the engine’s seven moving parts. Page 87 shows where the 95’s gas tank is.
This Finnish Saabisti has a neat site.
That’s quite a fascinating site alright, thanks for alerting me to it! The shop manual made for interesting reading too.
There were a lot of these when I was growing up in Eugene. At the the time, I thought these cars were ugly and slow. Now, I’d love to have one just for their quirkiness. Go figure.
They ARE ugly and slow.
I have always been a Volvo man so only the 900 Turbos ever appealed to me – even after driving a 96 V4. But now that I read this and watched these images I really want a 95. Ideally I would swap in a small diesel and upgrade the suspension – I remember not liking the handling at all. That would be fun.
I’ve never seen the front end of the red 1960 model before. The way the bonnet line swoops down between the headlights and grille is actually very very pretty, and the entire car looks gorgeous in red and exudes some serious cool factor.
Never heard of the Cardinal, so I look forward to researching that over the weekend!
Well hello Mrs. Cleaver, what a pretty your have on. Thank you Eddy. Ward!!!!!!!!!!!
Watched the video Safe As Milk recommended- fascinating!
If the clutch is still engaged the weight of the flywheel will keep the momentum up- I noticed he was slowing down pretty quickly though. However the engine will run lean without the throttle down- surely this will tend to make the engine run hotter?
I guess these cars have some kind of pressure fed oil system so low revs/low throttle will not starve the engine of oil?
Black was a rrrreally rare color on these…noice!!!
They all had the 1700 by 1971.
Fun fact #2 – On the wagons only, the rear shocks were knee-action!
Top ’em off with jack oil once in a while and they last for years.
My dad bought a sweet looking light yellow ’67 in ’72, and me and both brothers had probably 30 or 40 of these things over the period of several decades.
I still have a huge pile of parts in my basement.
My oldest brother just finally got rid of his rusting hulks last year, and my other brother still has about 6 of them!
Hey Paul, got any interior pics of U of Iowa graduate housing?
@toffee: The U of Iowa (“SUI” then, it seems) has its yearbooks online; ’50s-’60s pics of Married Student Housing are both exterior and interior. From the photos, it seems that that postwar housing (that lingered into the ’60s) included some of the half-round “quonset” type, and then also a great many made out of that same galvanized/corrugated metal, but with conventional look (like ranch homes, basically). You can start your search here: http://digital.lib.uiowa.edu
With Paul’s indulgence, I’ll post a pic of one young MSH mom (early ’60s), plus a curious young lad at lower right of the page:
Quite true. There were a number of these “parks” at SUI. Finkbine Park was by far the largest, and was all of the conventional-style units. Finkbine had a touch of third-world refugee camp feel to it 🙂
Quonset Park, not surprisingly, was all Quonset huts. There were a few smaller clusters too here and there. These units had no insulation, and thus were brutally hot in the summer. A single gas wall furnace kept them reasonable warm in winter.
One more yearbook image, Paul:
Our 67 had the 2 stroke.
Their safety reputation was well deserved. My Dad got rear ended by a large American sedan. He was doing 45, the drunk in the other car 70. The police officer said he saved the other guys life by preventing him from flying off the road into the ditch or woods. The big car was totally disabled, but the Saab drove fine though the hatch was essentially crimped shut. Took a month or more to get a new hatch from Sweden though.
We traveled through Finland in summer 1968, and seems that everyone had a Saab with the 2 stroke pop pop pop engine.
My first ever car was a red ’68 95 V4, VIN 54433. That was before the Feds started requiring all sorts of information to be coded into VINs.
I once picked up a group of 5 or 6 hitchhikers, so the 3rd seat got some use. When it was folded down, there was still some space in the recess for it, so it was possible to stow things that you didn’t want seen by the smash-and-grab brigade.
You could get a Volvo 245 with a rear-facing third row seat. When I was in the Boy Scouts, one of the Dads had one that got some use as transporation to trips. I logged quite a few miles in that third row.
The modernization of the 95’s looks did it no favors. While it looks less old-fashioned than does the original styling, the original somehow managed to look harmonious and sculped. The update looks like a late 60’s nose on a late 50’s tail (which is, I suppose, what it was…)
Best wagon ever, unless you could afford a Mercedes 300TD-T, which also had a rear-facing 3rd seat.
I believe the 3rd row in the Mercedes was only an option, as we had two of them (1979 naturally aspirated and 1981 turbo) and neither had a third row. Mercedes in those days often had “options” that I would read about in car magazines and when I’d mention them to my Dad, he’d say that theoretically it was an option, but no dealers carried them that way. Maybe the third row was rarely available…
SAAB was a “Swedish VW” not a luxury make, and all these old pics show it.
These Saab wagons are cute – but would have looked so much better if the headlights had been moved outboards to the tops of the front fenders with sharper lines. They did have wonderful packaging and space efficiency I must say that!
My parents started their married life in similar quonsets at Iowa State Teachers College, now Uni of Northern Iowa. I was born there, so I don’t remember the place but heard the stories. The partition between units was just one sheet of masonite. Winter was no better than summer. The heaters were oil with external tanks, and the oil lines froze up in serious cold. BUT: the education was free thanks to the GI bill, so a little discomfort was worth it.
People have mentioned the Volvo 245 and 740 wagons, but the 145 was also available with an optional rear-facing 3rd row seat. I had an English teacher in high school who drove a V4 96 and I got rides from her occasionally. I didn’t have a crush on her (unlike my 3rd grade teacher with the red ‘63 Pontiac, sigh …) but she was a great teacher and a very nice person. I was very surprised to have her husband as an engineering prof a few laters in college, and they couldn’t have been more different. I seriously considered a 96 as my first car and even test drove one used 2 stroke model, but went for a Volvo 122S instead. With 40+ years hindsight, a 2 stroke Saab would be nice to have on my fairly dull COAL List. I’ve owned a few 2 stroke motorcycles, but never a car with 4-on-the-tree, though I’ve actually driven more 4-on-the-trees (the Saab, Peugeot 504, Mercedes 190) than 3-on-the-trees (Ford F100, maybe a Maverick).
Another oddity my family had when I was a kid was a ’67 95 wagon that happened to have the Monte Carlo engine. Loved riding in that car but never in the way back as I was (and still am) very susceptible to motion sickness.
I love that this little SAAB wagon strongly resembles a clothing iron in profile. IKEA should jump on that, it they haven’t already.
I commuted to college in the only new car my family ever had, a 1969 96 V4. Dad liked the 95 but could’t justify the additional money. The 96 was a superb winter car and had only one teething problem we had to sort out–the water heated automatic choke thermostat didn’t like our miserable New England winters. Eventually a hand choke conversion did the trick. Many mornings when I arrived for early classes, the college parking lots hadn’t been cleared of snow, so I’d “break trail” by toboganning my little car over the snowbank on its smooth, strong belly pan. All the fragile bits were mounted inside the car along the rocker panels so you could safely slide over snow. The tall, skinny 15″ tires and the front weight bias made the SAAB (still an acronym , not a name yet in ’69 I believe) an unstoppable rig, like the old VW’s exept with the SAAB’s you could steer as well as go! A wonderful vehicle indeed, which I really miss. It had many virtues, and no real vices that I can remember. With the rear seat back and cushion removed, and the passenger side front seat removed also (which was very easy) the space was quite cavernous and anything you could fit through the doors and the trunk lid was fair game, so it was not only a car but a cargo carrier on occasion. When it finally succumbed, Dad found a ’72 96 for himself and my mother (who by the way wouldn’t drive anything else by then!) and that was their car until they couldn’t drive any longer. By that time I had married and, of necessity, graduated to a four door passenger car and a 4X4 truck with snow plow, but I can’t say I didn’t look back frequently and longingly at the SAAB.
” I’m quite certain a third seat was not available”.
You are quite right. In those days, wagons were regarded as workmen’s vehicles in Germany and most other parts of Europe.
I love the look of these but my SAAB experience is confined to a 99 my Dad had when I first got my driving licence. Looking back he was very brave to let me loose driving it on my own.
The 95 lost the third row of seats when it got the rubber 5mph bumpers, which is a shame.
I don’t know if it’s true, but I thought that 2 strokes were popular in Scandinavia because they were easier to start in very cold weather as the engine wasn’t churning thick oil round the sump. Anyone know if this is true?
We had a model 95 and 96, both 3 bangers. Great cars. Then 2 model 99s…..not so great….too many days in the shop. And, a wonderful 1992 Toyota Camry wagon that actually had a third row rear facing seat. That Camry wagon was a favourite for me.