The Saab EV-1, also known as the Saab 900 Turbo EV-1, was a design and future study built by Saab and shown at the Los Angeles Auto Expo in 1985. EV-1 stood for Experimental Vehicle Number One, and the car was never intended for series production, unlike a cabriolet study Saab had displayed at the 1983 Frankfurt IAA that was planned to reach production at Saab's Finnish plant in 1986. The EV-1 was a fully functional, roadworthy 2+2 sports coupe with three doors, built on the platform of the three-door Saab 900 and based mechanically on the Saab 900 Turbo 16. Only six months passed from the initial drawings to the completion of the finished car, a project carried out by a small internal team. Saab's technical director, Gunnar Larsson, described the EV-1 as an important contribution to revitalizing innovative thinking across the whole organization.
The design, led by Björn Envall's studio, produced a flowing wedge shape with a drag coefficient of 0.32, with priority given to the form itself rather than to minimizing aerodynamic resistance alone. The entire upper cabin was glazed, with the roof blending seamlessly into the hatch, whose window contained barely visible heating filaments just 0.015 mm thick. Only a section of the large door glass could be lowered. The removable roof panel above the front seats carried 66 solar cells, feeding a patented automatic ventilation system for the cabin. The steeply raked front air intake was split into the brand's characteristic twin vertical sections, flanked by vertical slits, while a spoiler edge rising from the beltline behind the doors aided airflow and downforce. Front and rear bumper sections, along with the lower body trim, were finished in a contrasting color and integrated with specially designed flush-fitting Ronal alloy wheels, which included internal channels directing brake heat outward through three openings.
The bumper shields, front and rear, were made of aramid-reinforced plastic, covering the grille and headlamp housings at the front and the inward-sloping lower body section at the rear; they were lightweight and could deform under impact before returning to their original shape without cracking. The EV-1 was the first car to use Hella's new compact headlamps with a lighting aperture of just 7 cm. The doors incorporated protective beams made from combined glass-fiber and carbon-fiber layers, less than half the weight of steel equivalents yet able to meet strict American side-impact crash requirements.
Inside, the leather-trimmed cabin used injection-molded plastic for the seat frames and backrests, cutting seat weight in half. All four seats had power adjustment for position, height and backrest angle, while the front seats also offered electric adjustment of seat angle and side bolsters; all seats were heated, and the front seats featured integrated pretensioning seatbelts with sensors. Saab worked with VDO on new instrumentation, including an analog speedometer without a odometer display that used a black-panel design and fiber-optic lighting to illuminate only the speed range currently being driven.
The 2-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine, with DOHC and 16 valves, was boosted from 175 hp to 285 hp at 6500 rpm and 335 Nm at 3500 rpm, achieved through a larger turbocharger, enlarged intake and exhaust systems, boost pressure raised to 1.1 bar, compression lowered from 9.0 to 7.2:1, forged pistons and reinforced connecting rods. This gave 0-100 km/h in 5.7 seconds, 0-1000 m in 24.8 seconds, and a top speed of 270 km/h, while retaining a favorable torque curve. The car measured 430 cm long, 169 cm wide and 123.5 cm high, with a 252 cm wheelbase, front/rear tracks of 144/145 cm, and weighed 1150 kg. Although the EV-1 suggested a follow-up EV-2, none appeared by the end of the 1980s. Other "Saab Specials" were later built at Mellberg Custom in Nyköping, the same workshop responsible for the EV-1's bodywork and paint.
