Hello from Sweden

Hi all,

Living in Sweden and retired from an occupation as powertrain and vehicle concept development engineer at Saab I am interested in classic motor vehicles. And has always been keen to see development as an extension to restoration.

Consequently, my private vehicle collection includes a Saab Sonett III with a 2 litre Subaru engine, an Austin Countryman (Woodie Mini) with a 1380 cc engine and Cooper S brakes. Further a Velocette LE 1950 with an electric motor invisibly hidden in a mock engine and a lithium battery replacing the petrol tank inside the "body". And a threewheeler of my own design and build in 1920-ies style with a Honda 1000 cc engine.

My first Rover was a Mexico brown 1974 P6 3500 which failed by rusting rear control arms the day after I had sold it!

My present P6 3500 turned up as a series 1 (1970) in Arden green with chrome Rostyle wheels and rust free (as I have seen so far). Rather good condition but seats sun bleached, dry and seams falling apart.

But I was given a pair or virtually new Jaguar X-type power seats in the correct colour which were an improvement over the original, rather dilapidated ones. I did the rear seats in a matching style.

Other modifications include electric power steering (see the corresponding thread) and Saab rear brake calipers fitted behind the final drive with the original calipers serving only as parking brake.

Best regards,
P-G

A warm welcome P-G. Your green P6 looks lovely.
May we see a pic of those X-type seats in place in it?
Also, please elaborate on the Saab rear brake modification. I'm fascinated.
What were your motivations, how did you engineer it, what does it work like in practice, and have you got lots more pics with more detail?!?!
Looking forward to learning more.

^^^ WHS - why the change in rear brakes?

TreeVee said:

And has always been keen to see development as an extension to restoration.

Click to expand...

Plenty of that going on here along with plenty of restoration to original.

I've got some jag brakes on the back of mine, but have had to turn them down as they locked the back up too easily.

mrtask said:

A warm welcome P-G. Your green P6 looks lovely.
May we see a pic of those X-type seats in place in it?
Also, please elaborate on the Saab rear brake modification. I'm fascinated.
What were your motivations, how did you engineer it, what does it work like in practice, and have you got lots more pics with more detail?!?!
Looking forward to learning more.

Click to expand...

Thank you!

Please find pictures of the Jag seats and the adapter frame I made. The original seat body mounts had to be cut as shown for the wider Jag seat rails and also the frames had to be made as deep as possible in the rear. I am 194 cm so the seat adjustment range is set as far back as possible.

The reason for the rear brake conversion was a leaking caliper and pads nearly worn out. The prospect of removing and fixing the rather obscure calipers made me look for a technically more sound and cost effective solution.

Modern sliding single piston calipers with integral parking brake are too large to fit anywhere but since the original parking brake worked fine I left the original calipers for that function only.

But Saab 99/900 (and many other) double piston calipers are compact and clear the de Dion tube if fitted behind the final drive.

The original final drive carrier was rusty and had already been repaired which was another reason for the conversion.

A new carrier was made from 50x30x4 mm tube for the horisontal members and 40x15 mm flat bar for the vertical members. Conical attchment bosses were machined from solid bar.

I have just completed the conversion and has only taken the car for a short spin (winter in Sweden) but it did not overbrake in the rear. Will consider a reduction valve if required.

Best regards,
P-G

Much obliged to you, P-G. I salute your ingenuity.
I'm going to save those pics of the rear brake set up you have devised. That has given me much food for thought...
The front seats look a bit chunky, but very comfy. Do they adjust electrically? Faaancy!!

The front seats could look chunky because the seatbacks are higher but also safer for whiplash. But they fit remarkably well in the space. And the P6 is the only 2-seater 4-door car anyway. They adjust electrically in all directions (except sideways!)

I added a view from below to my previous post to show the de Dion clearance.

quattro said:

^^^ WHS - why the change in rear brakes?

Plenty of that going on here along with plenty of restoration to original.

I've got some jag brakes on the back of mine, but have had to turn them down as they locked the back up too easily.

Click to expand...

For the rear brake conversion rationale - see my reply to mrtask above.

Hello and welcome Treevee
Unlike you, Im at the bottom of the planet
I like how you have improved your P6. Those seats look oh so comfy and the Power steer unit looks like a great improvement over the original unit.
Look forward to hear more from you and your lovely P6
Odd we both drive Viking emblazoned cars - must be our ancestry- my paternal grandmother came to NZ and could not speak English. Apparently there was a famine in Sweden and thousands left?
Gerald

Hi Gerald,
Your connection to Sweden is interesting. True, we had a famine in the 19th century and over a million left the country. Most of them to America but people were offered tickets and land in NZ on the condition that they paid back when they had got settled.

The Jag seats and power steering with a smaller steering wheel in a, for me, more comfortable position further back really made the car more enjoyable.

Regards,
P-G

Welcome. Fully in awe of your ingenuity!

Always liked SAABs particularly the 96. Pity the car side of the company is no longer.

Thank you!

I hope I have learned something from my old SAAB colleagues, some of them who had been part of the 10 man team who developed the 92 on which the 96 - and the Sonett - is based.

The only positive side of SAAB closing is that many of the engineers now have helped Volvo to become a decent handling car.

TreeVee said:

Thank you!

I hope I have learned something from my old SAAB colleagues, some of them who had been part of the 10 man team who developed the 92 on which the 96 - and the Sonett - is based.

The only positive side of SAAB closing is that many of the engineers now have helped Volvo to become a decent handling car.

Click to expand...

Our 10yo V50 handles reasonably well, but I thought that was more due to the Ford/Mazda chassis commonality.
Thought that Volvo is now Chinese owned by Geely

MikeMelb said:

Our 10yo V50 handles reasonably well, but I thought that was more due to the Ford/Mazda chassis commonality.
Thought that Volvo is now Chinese owned by Geely

Click to expand...

You should not take my comment too seriously, more as an expression of friendly rivalry between Swedens two automakers.
True, Volvo is Chinese as was Saab and what remains of it. Not the brand name though.

Haha my 98 V70 is fantastic through the corners. It does have B6 Bilsteins all round, delrin subframe bushings, poly bushed control arms, strut brace and camber bolts running 1 deg negative though
Jim

Great to see your modifications, P-G, and the seats definitely don't look out of place! My car came from (the U.K. first, via) Sweden for half of its life before Norway around 1990 when it was (rather badly) converted to LHD and PAS.

Hello P-G,

Welcome to the forum! You have a very nice Rover, and I must say that I am very impressed with your rear caliper modification.

I hope that you really enjoy the time that you spend here.

Ron

Hi Ron,

Thank you for the kind words. I am sure there are and will be lots of interesting topics in this forum.

As to the rear brakes, I am surprised to find in old in old Rover publications, that the calipers were mounted facing forward and fully accessible for servicing and pad change. Therefore, it is not easy to understand why Rover went to the peculiar solution of putting unbelievably complex, tilting calipers in the worst possible location on top of the final drive.

But that is maybe one of the reasons why the P6 is such a fascinating car!

Regard,
P-G

Hi P-G,

Maybe the answer to the location of the factory swinging calipers lay with a graduate mechanical engineer. As graduates, we often try and impress the more senior engineers with a complex novel proposal, and sometimes that idea is accepted and implemented. It is only with experience that we realise that the idea of our youth was not so clever after all. I know that Rover desired to maximise the unsprung mass, so mounting calipers about the differential is the ideal location, just a pity that the graduate's idea wasn't overruled.

Thinking about it some more, it may well have been the result of the tendering process. With multiple tenders submitted, it often comes down to the manufacturer that can deliver the required volume of components at the cheapest price.

Ron

Hi, The other car that had same caliper, Ford Zephyr/Zodiac MkIV, which was out by the wheel had a much harsher working environment.

Swings and roundabouts.

Colin