Hunting the Volvo. 9/26/2006
Volvos used to be, at one time, the bane of a motorcycle rider’s existance. Big, chunky cars, driven by drivers who didn’t seem to give two hoots about the traffic around them. As Big Ben put it, self centered assholes. But he applied it to Mercedes drivers. Which I completely agree with. But, somewhat to my surprise, I found myself, today, driving one of these things.
A Volvo V50 T5. Means nothing to you? Meant absolutely nothing to me until Paul Tan offered me a test drive in one. He had been invited by Volvo to give the new V50 T5 wagon a spin, and he kindly asked me to come along. I didn’t hesitate, mainly because I am in the market for another car. The truck, while being fine and dandy for everything I need it for, tends to be a bit of a pain, fuel wise. So I decided to take this opportunity to see if the new Volvos are everything some people said they were.
I got into the car with Paul, and the first thing I noticed was the low roof. Neither Paul nor I are small guys, and I’ve sat in supercars with more overhead space than this. Maybe it was all in the interest of aerodynamics, but I miss my old Landcruiser, which allowed me to wear a hard hat while driving when on site. The interior was rather spartan, which surprised me considering the price of this top of the line V50.
Only the driver’s seat was electrically operated, with memory pre-sets for 3 positions. Which is pretty good, if you’re sharing the driving duties with someone else. The seats were nicely firm, if biased more towards being comfortable, rather than sporting. Now, I wouldn’t use the word sporting, especially with a V50, but this car did have a little bit of get up and go. Well, the get up part was just fine, first gear giving us a reasonable kick in the butt, but the 2.5 liter turbocharged engine ran out of grunt rather quickly thereafter. She would go, but it would take a fair amount of dedication to do so. Paul and I discussed this, and I reminded him, and myself, that this car is being targetted to a specific market, i.e. the executive professional, who needed a car to haul him and his family around, safely.
There, I’ve used the “s” word. Volvos are, first and foremost in my experience, safe cars. I personally know someone who rolled his 240 Volvo into a ravine, and walked away with only a scratch on his elbow. Think I’m kidding? I visited the accident site, and walked down to where the car was lying. I looked up at the top of the ravine and it was an easy 130 feet to the top. Volvo are really trying hard to move away from the stodgy, boxy image of the 80s and 90s. I’m sorry to say they haven’t yet made a car that made my blood boil, and would consider a chick magnet. Well, the P1800 was it, but nothing else from Volvo since then. Sorry guys, but that’s the way it is.
Dual airbags, 6 disc CD changer, cruise control, dual climate controls, steering controls for cruise and volume, a trip and fuel computer in the instrument cluster, and a rather mysterious something that told me I had no messages when I pressed the button. Everything was there really. Certainly it was well thought out, with the instruments in clear view. One thing I have to give the Volvo engineers credit for is that the instruments on the stalks fell to hand easily, even though you couldn’t see them from my specific driving position. Someone had obviously sat down in the driver’s seat, and designed everything from a driver’s point of view.
The rest of the car has followed on from Volvo’s styling cues for their V and S cars. Some people like it, some don’t. A bit like Ducati’s change from the 916 to the 999. I could live with it, I think. This car wasn’t bad, certainly. Wasn’t good either, and I do not mean that in a negative way. What I’m trying to say is this. The Volvo V50 T5 is a competent car, designed to be a general purpose family vehicle. It’s designed to be safe and comfortable. You could carry a reasonable amount of junk in the booth.
Split seats, tonneau cover, cargo divider in the rear booth space. There were even a pair of tie down hooks in the rear wheel wells. Like I said, competent. You would find very little to complain about with the Volvo V50. Is a biker praising a Volvo? Yes, if what you want is a Volvo. Unfortunately, this car faces some stiff competition in this price range. The choices are fairly wide, for the amount of money you are going to dish out.
In parting, I would like to ask a question. Could someone in Volvo please tell me why their logo contains the symbol for masculinity, when I read somewhere that the purchase decision on family Volvos are made by the female component of the family unit?
- Posted in : On the road
- Author : thesnark
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Quote from Volvo website:
“Before it adorned the first Volvo car in 1927, it was used as a brand name for ball bearings. The symbol for Volvo’s cars was the sign for iron – a circle with a diagonal arrow. The idea was to associate with Swedish steel, renowned for its durability.”
Ball bearings, iron steel, i guess that pretty much explains it all.
Volvo in latin means I rolling,copuled over the symbol for iron,put the two together and you get rolling strenght,ah the old P1800,now that was a volvo made of iron.later…Dom
That explains it. Thanks guys.
I like the P1800, but don’t think i can afford maintaining it, sigh….
Aha… my dream car. Cool!
A family friend has a P1800. One owner from new. I’ve got first right of refusal if time ever comes when the family wants to sell it.
I nearly bought a P1800 way back before I bought the bike. For the same amout of $$ then, it was either a P1800, Alfa GTV (clover leaf, mind you) or de bike. The rest is history i guess….
Snark, forget the volvo. Theres a 96 model E34 520i M50TU 24V single vanos for sale…. keen?
Bikerwannabe : I consider anything under 3 liters to be for wusses
Snark: Tell that to me again when they revise the fuel price… heh heh…
Sometimes I drive an old boxy volvo. Those things are huge, but I suppose I can’t complain - the first car I ever had to drive around in was a turbo ford station wagon and those things were seriously huge.
so, I take it as, rich people aren’t wussies? tiuuuuu lei larrrr….
After finding this biking blog, I find it’s otherwise sane, erudite, biker fiend/friend/comrade driving that (as you admited) stereotypical bane of all bikers everywhere, the V*lvo. I am almost lost for words.
However, I was was only ever knocked off by a Daimler, so I forgive you…although it’s a tough call.
You could change and remap the ECU unit for more BHP, i think it is about 300bhp and then change the suspension to a self-leveling one for the rear and the front for more stability.
A sports car… like the 850T5….
don’t mess with this car…
DV : 300 horses from this package? You might as well go for the Audi RS4 and be done with it. And you get quattro to boot. Paul told me that there’s a 4WD version on this platform.