On Wheels by Brooks Peterson

Saturday, April 28, 2001

Introducing a new line Volvo: Only a slash is left

David Adame/Caller-Times

With the introduction of the S60 T5, Volvo has abandoned its box-like cars in favor of a slithery sedan that offers up to 247 horsepower.

For those who cherished the perpendicular, box-like Volvos of yore, the new-for-2001 S60 represents the final stake driven right through their hearts. Particularly when tricked out in glittering, stygian black paint and wearing flashy chrome wheels and low-profile rubber, this slithery sedan betrays its stolid forebears only in the trademark diagonal slash across the grille.
   With the introduction this model year of the S60, Volvo has completed the cleansing process that began with the deep-sixing in the early '90s of the dowdy (but well loved) 240 sedans and wagons.
   The new model has made possible the retirement of the old S70 and V70 (sedan and wagon respectively), which clung to the old angular look even while offering the front-wheel and/or all-wheel-drive format.
   (Note: Just for the sake of keeping things interesting, Volvo has kept the V70 nameplate alive - on a station wagon based on the platform of the up-scale S80 sedan. Everybody thoroughly confused? Good.)
   As has been the case with the other Volvo lines, the S60 is available in different configurations, each of which has a subtly different personality - except in the case of our top-of-the-line, sporty T5 tester, which is not subtle at all.
   168 to 247 horses

David Adame/Caller-Times

The trunk of the S60 T5 is huge, but the limited legroom for back-seat passengers makes one wonder if a compromise favoring people was possible.

   Your price-leader is the base S60, with a naturally aspirated (read: no turbocharger) version of the 2.4-liter five-cylinder engine that Volvo's been refining since the last ice age. This gives you a respectable 168 horses - and, we are pleased to announce, comes with a five-speed manual as standard equipment (an automatic is optional). Since there were times when it looked as though Volvo was going to turn its back on manual gearboxes altogether, this is Good News.
   Next up the line is the 2.4T, with a low-pressure turbo and intercooler unleashing 197 horses and your choice of two automatic boxes.
   And, finally, we arrive at the one that's had you salivating all along: the T5, in which more emphatic turbocharging frees up 247 Scandinavian ponies.
   'True Volvo sedan'

David Adame/Caller-Times

The five-cylinder engine in the S60 T5 is turbocharged and hands over 247 Scandinavian ponies to the driver when they are needed.

   As you will note, this sleek (and, in the case of our tester, loaded) Swede comes to the dance with a pretty hefty bottom line: within shouting range, in fact, of the less lavish versions of the big S80. (The base vehicle, not incidentally, stickers in with a base price - sans add-ons - of $26,500. Thought you might like to know.)
   Certainly the S60 is a handsome cuss. From certain angles - from the rear especially - it looks like a seven-eighths version of the S80. Volvo's elves, we are told, incorporated the roofline from the ultra-elegant C70 coupe, plus other familiar visual cues. Quoth designer Giza Loczi: "It's a true Volvo sedan with the heart and soul of a coupe."
   Interesting - and fortuitous, for it brings us to one of the quirkier elements in the S60's make-up. In fact, I would make so bold as to amend Loczi's observation as follows: It's a true Volvo sedan with the heart and soul and rear-seat room of a coupe.
   A large trunk

David Adame/Caller-Times

The S60 T5's shifter is agreeable in its operation despite its initial impression of a '30s-futuristic look.

   Don't get the idea I'm piling on here; it's just that, presuming the driver or front-seat passenger puts his/her seat all the way back, the aft compartment is going to get very snug indeed, legroom-wise.
   Plenty of room in most other directions, to be sure, but keeping the rear-seat contingent happy may require a certain amount of give and take.
   The trunk, on the other hand, is gargantuan. (Any way we could whittle here, rejigger there, and free up a bit more people room?)
   Enough quibbling. Let's settle into that endlessly accommodating driver's seat.
   Now, this is more like it, except . . . well, this ex-Volvo owner would appreciate a bit more lumbar support: The adjustment is definitely there, via the traditional knob on the seatback, but even when set at the max, the old boost for the lower back is minimal.
   The fun begins
   In keeping with the T5's sporting character, your stock transmission is a 5-speed manual box. (A sophisticated 5-speed Geartronic automatic transmission is optional.)
   Initially, the shifter may put you off: It's a pewter-finished ball-in-socket arrangement with a kind of '30s-futuristic look to it, but in operation it's perfectly agreeable . . .
   Once you reach an understanding with the clutch, that is. There's nothing really wrong with it, understand - but it's a shade sensitive. After a couple of lurching starts, however, you'll get it down pat.
   And that, of course, is where the fun begins. While I have never been a big fan of five-cylinder engines, I'm here to tell you Volvo seems to have this formula worked out to near perfection. Particularly in the heavy-breathing T5 iteration, it combines smoothness with prodigious grunt.
   (The one thing you want to keep in mind is that in front-wheel-drive cars - particularly high-powered ones - a touch of torque steer may make its presence known.
   In the S60, that translates into a certain darty quality as you tear through the gears. It's never worrisome, but if you're transitioning in from an analogous rear-drive vehicle, it may take a little getting used to.)
   Predictable handling
   Happily, there's no nanny-like rev limiter, so you can hit the redline without suddenly experiencing a rap on your knuckles and an embarrassing lurch in the vehicle's forward progress.
   The handling is uniformly predictable: Nothing here is going to sneak up and bite you unless you get caught up in that Norse berserker spirit. Even if you do, all the usual Volvo safety gear will take good care of you.
   Not least, the brakes are endlessly impressive, peeling off the speed at an uncanny rate and with great composure.
   There is - or was - a breed of car known, for want of a better term, as the businessman's express. To me, the S60 fits admirably in this niche: It's powerful, smooth-riding and endlessly capable.
   And if you have to accommodate yourself to a few Scandinavian idiosyncrasies . . . well, isn't that sort of thing what the Art of the Deal is all about?
  
   Volvo S60 T5
   Five-passenger front-wheel-drive sedan