What Volvo's previous V70 turbo wagon lacked in looks, it made up for in terms of performance, and achieved numerous successes on the racetracks of the world. Adrian Burford put the latest version through its paces.

Styling and Concept

Volvo is on a mission – a mission to engineer in some driver appeal to go with their traditional blend of safety and strength.

To speed up that process they’ve applied typically Scandinavian logic, engineering three cars off the same platform thus saving millions in development costs too. While there are differences in wheelbase and overall length, the S80, V70 and the new S60 sedan are all underpinned by the same basic hardware.

Interestingly though, there is no S70, and the V70 wagon is a unique vehicle – rather than being a wagon version of a sedan.

The result is a wagon with presence, with an instantly recognizable face.  It is big by any standards, with a 4 710 mm overall length and a 2 755 mm wheelbase. It is wide of body at 1,8 metres excluding the mirrors and the track front and rear is generous too. The near vertical tailgate – flanked by those massive rear light clusters -- and conservative sheet metal suggest that this is a loadlugger of note, and luggage capacity bears this out.

However, in T5 guise Volvo has positioned it as a “sportwagon”, by fitting the potent turbocharged 2,3 litre five-pot. In test guise it was fitted with the five-speed manual, but a two-pedal version with the same number of ratios is also available.

Next to the outgoing V70 it looks positively svelte, but most people didn’t consider it particularly handsome. Rather, it remains workmanlike it true Volvo fashion.

Ambience and ergonomics

Once again the national characteristic shines through in the cabin. It is cool, understated, straightforward. You don’t feel dazzled or overwhelmed when you slide onto the well-padded chair, but nor do you feel unimpressed. You feel immediately confident and relaxed.

There are a number of touches to take the load off the driver: these include electric windows with a one-touch function, split rearview mirrors, good oddment storage, cupholders aft of the gearlever in the centre console, a coat hook on the side of the passenger headrest,  and Volvo’s trademark plastic clip to affix papers to the inside of the windscreen.

Surprisingly, doors don’t lock automatically, though the driver can do so at the touch of a button. The driver’s seat is electrically adjustable, and there’s a three-position memory, but it doesn’t incorporate the setting for the steering column which must be adjusted manually.

Accommodation and Space

The V70 boasts an overall length of 4 710 mm and a wheelbase of 2 755 mm so it is a fairly big car. To put it in context, a 5-series Beemer has a 2 830 mm wheelbase and a 4 775 overall length, but the Volvo somehow looks bigger when you see it out on the road.

Being front-wheel drive also means that it has been packaged with a view to giving  free rein to the maximum amount of space, and it has a volumous cabin by any standards. With the rear seats folded, there’s 1 850 mm of load length – more than six foot in Imperial measure. While the load area – rated at a maximum of a massive 1 641 litres – is king, a number of touches suggest that comfort front and rear has not been overlooked.

For example, the rear seat back can be set to two positions – one for comfort and another to enhance the load area. While there isn’t a big difference between the two, reclining the seat back just a few degrees makes for a significantly more natural posture, and complements the comfortable seats and the generously proportioned rear footwells.

The test car came fitted with the optional child booster seats (intended for youngsters  between the ages of three and 10) which easily flip up to facilitate the correct positioning of the safety belt and the  headrest.

This same attention to detail can be seen in the wide, flat luggage area with the Swedes paying particular attention to the securing of your load, whether it be your farm fresh eggs or your pets. A number of options are available to personalise the vehicle to your needs.

Front seats are plush and lavishly upholstered in soft leather, the driver able to find an ideal position thanks to the wide range of adjustment available.

Ride Integrity and Safety

The first time you tackle the twisty bits confirms that the Volvo is a car of considerable girth and length, and it certainly doesn’t respond like a nimble sports car. Nor would you expect it to, what with a kerb mass of  1 620 kg and a fair proportion of that over the front axle.

But what disappoints in the Volvo once you start to press on is the general inertness of the steering, and its vagueness at the straight ahead position. 

do make their presence felt and sometimes heard.  The low speed ride is on the lumpy side, with occupants being made aware of most irregularities – especially thanks to the lightly laden, firmly sprung rear that a front-drive station wagon is invariably burdened with.

Build Integrity

Volvo has still got a way to go if they’re going to take on the Germans toe to toe. Switchgear and stalks are merely average for a R280 000 motor car, we felt, while fit and finish is very good but not exceptional. And the dashboard makes a terrible hollow sound, when you give it a good thump in the area of the central speaker grille.

Performance and economy

This is a remarkably fast car, yet it delivers its 184 kW punch with surprising decorum. Get the performance down cleanly (which is relatively easy) and it’ll launch itself down the test strip with ever-increasing pace. Switch the traction control off, and get the revs up too high, and you’ll leave loads of expensive 205/55 ZR16 Michelin rubber behind.

The 0 – 100 km/h dash is dispatched in a fraction over nine seconds, but it is the pace at the end of the standing kilometre which is so impressive. Just 29,2 seconds after starting the 1000 metre dash you’re travelling at 190 km/h and still in fourth gear. Flat out, the Volvo is good for a deceptive 239 km/h. By comparison, a Beemer 330i (a sports saloon if ever there was one) exits the kilometre at 191,6 km/h.

The traction control works hard on anything that isn’t bone dry, and doesn’t always hide the torque steer, but other than that the drivetrain is impressive, though not everyone enjoyed the languid action and wide gate of the manual shifter.

While there’s loads of grunt, the turbo-ed five pot does sometimes leave you flat footed. It needs around 2 500 on the tachometer before it wakes up which is does briskly if not furiously in the higher gears. From there on it builds progressively, thanks to an even 330 Nm of torque between 2 400 and 5 200 revs/min.

Not all of our overtaking or tractability tests make exciting reading, mainly because in fourth and fifth gear you’re below that crucial 2 400 revs/min barrier at the start of the test and need to wait patiently for engine speed to build and for the turbo to kick in. But 80 – 120 km/h in 8,6 seconds in fourth is scorching by any standards, and in that particular test the tacho needle scribes an arc from 2 400 to 3 500 revs so you’re in the powerband all the way.

Even so, you need to keep a hand near the gearlever if you’re not to be caught out in the ebb and flow of traffic, but then that’s the case with many turbos – especially at altitude.

The V70’s brakes are well up to its rapid acceleration and significant top speed, and in ideal conditions it’ll return to standstill from 80 km/h in a little over 25 metres – a figure of which even the most talented sports cars would be proud. Our test unit – which had fairly high mileage by press car standards – suffered from mild brake judder in normal operation, giving the impression that the front discs had been hammered on more than one occasion.

Fuel consumption is not the engine’s strong point however, and the car returned an average of 14,24 litres/100km, which included a large percentage of open road cruising.

Equipment and Features

As with all Volvos, the list of safety equipment is a long one. As well as the standard crumple zones and safety cage common to most well-designed modern cars, the Volvo V70 also features the Side Impact Protection System, anti-whiplash front seats, dual stage driver’s airbag, front seat side airbags, and Volvo’s Inflatable Curtain – which bursts from the headlining and protects the head and neck. There is no passenger frontal airbag, Volvo citing the location of portable child seats in that area as reason not to fit a SRS as standard.

In addition, all five seats have headrests, seatbelt tensioners, and an anti-submarining design. The front seats also have force limiters and automatic height adjusters – the latter feature not universally popular with our testers. 

The cabin certainly has all the bells and whistles, many housed in that formidable centre console. Here you’ll find a large format, fully integrated sound system with CD front loader, with the climate control below. Both feature clearly marked, chunky controls and the sound from the former is to Volvo’s usually high standards while the latter is intuitive to use.

There is plenty of equipment, and as a result there are a number of controls, those for the cruise control fitted to the four-spoke steering wheel, while you can also change volume and channel from the same location. Stalk controls are easy to use too, with wipers one side of the steering column (adjustable for both rake and reach) and high beam/indicators on the other.

Conclusion

How many people need a wagon that can travel at 240 km/h? Not many we suspect, and those who do, would probably want something which is more overtly sporty. Despite its obvious performance capability and T5 nomenclature, the V70 just doesn’t look the part of the sporty estate – it still like a good, old-fashioned station wagon.

But for the few who need the combination of massive power and equally massive space, we would suggest the two-pedal version instead, with Volvo’s excellent auto box a better companion for the turbo engine. Either way, they’d both get the family to its destination in double-quick time, it’s just that the auto would be slightly less tiring.

Viewpoint

If you're needing to lug the family and half of your house off to the timeshare resort or holiday home for a week or two, few vehicles could better cope with the load.  Similarly, when it comes to passenger comfort while on the go, the Volvo is right up near the top of the class. The cabin is sumptuously furnished and combined with its velvety five cylinder engine and impeccably smooth ride on the highway, it is certainly a very pleasant place to while away the monotony of a long journey. Provided the engine revs are kept over the two and a half thousand mark, acceleration is breathtaking and overtaking a breeze, all the better to reduce the stresses associated with holiday traffic. At R277990 you get an awful lot of performance, and in terms of size, an awful lot of car.

But all in the entire package is not flawless. Two chassis variations are available. The V70 T5 is fitted with the sport variation, which on dirt roads transmits plenty of noise, vibrations and bumps through to the cabin, and it is likely that sustained gravel road use will bring out the rattles to stay. Probably the 2.4 or 2.4T with the comfort setting is the better option under these conditions. On the other hand, the all wheel drive XC is probably best for that job.

While most of the requisite safety equipment is there, the exclusion of a front passenger airbag is in my opinion, a serious omission. While Volvo claim that this is in the interests of the safety of children occupying the passenger seat, other manufacturers provide a switch to disable the airbag if a child seat is installed, or better still, more recent launches include a sensor to automatically take care of this. Another issue is the fact that although the front seatbelts have an auto-height adjusting mechanism, shorter drivers will find the seatbelt uncomfortable around the neck. The omission of mod cons like auto-headlights-on and a rain sensor from a modern car selling at well over a quarter of a million rand is disappointing.

A strange deadness of steering in the few degrees either side of, and in the straight-ahead position, an almost truck-like gate to the manual shifter, a big steering wheel and a huge turning circle do not really marry well with the sporty aspirations of the vehicle. Despite this the Volvo handles exceptionally well and a spirited drive through some tight Mpumalanga hairpins soon revealed that the average motorist is likely to lose his nerve long before the fine chassis loses its grip, yet the vehicle still feels more like a utility wagon than a sport wagon to drive.

There are four possible choices in this category. The Audi A6 Avant at a substantially more expensive R317600, the Mercedes-Benz E320 Estate at a whopping R428 700, and the Saab 9-5 2.3 T at R262 000 (Prices valid at 15^th January 2001). On performance alone, The Volvo has them all beat while only the huge Mercedes offers more space. The Saab might nose in ahead of the Volvo in terms of build quality, turbo response and steering feel but can’t match the pace or space of the Volvo, and if it’s pace and space you’re looking for, the V70 delivers both in generous measure.

Herman Bernitz