Test drive Volvo V70 2000 - 2004 station wagon

Deja Vu

There is such a biological concept of mimicry. This is when a weaker creature is masked under a predator in order to live calmly. An example of automotive mimicry is new Volvo V70.
 
In Europe and the United States, universals are more popular than sedan, especially recently, when everyone is going crazy for outdoor activities and travel along roads with skiing, bicycles and God knows with what. A couple of years ago, in Greece, I regularly overtaken caravans of cars with boats and water motorcycles on a trailer. By the way, cars were Volvo V70. This is only our car with a body of a shed a dream of a dull summer resident building a house for which the luggageman's volume is measured by the europian cubic meters.
Nevertheless, they can count money for the hill and seek to use the station wagon in everyday life. For example, as a representative machine, if we are talking about a fairly expensive Volvo brand. Most can afford such a machine when they reach a certain material well -being, starting years old with 35 years. And the requirements for a new machine are presented in accordance with the situation in society. The 1996 Volvo V70 did not reach a slightly heavy design and boring interior decoration scared those very buyers who are 3540 years old, despite the obvious success of the station wagons. Last year, more than 400 thousand Volvo were sold in the world, of which 157 thousand S/V70 series. The defense of the station wagons accounted for more than 80 percent. To maintain and strengthen these positions, the company decided to serious updating the V70 series.
 
Elegant camouflage. First of all, it is striking that the new V70 station wagon inherited many features of the S80 sedan of a higher class. The rear lights, still integrated into the racks, resemble the same lid of the piano, but not so clearly. The form of the front part, now made more intricately, has changed significantly than chopped in front of the previous Volvo. The radiator grill is integrated into the front panel and does not rise with the hood. This is also due to the fact that in a more massive beak the PREMAIR system is located (we will talk about it separately). The new Volvo V70 has lost its gloomy suitcase and became more licked. Gray aesthetes can scold this trend in automobile design, but younger customers will clearly like it.
All this is not only a tribute to modern automotive fashion in this a certain meaning. The appearance of the car, its internal device greatly affect the behavior of the car owner.
The second copy. The salon of the new station wagon has also changed significantly, it is practically copied with the same Volvo S80. Naturally, leather seats with electrical adjustments and memory. Luke with two positions. It is indecent to speak indecent about the electric package today only in domestic cars. A powerful stereo system with a CD player integrated into the central panel, a climatic installation with air conditioning everything, as in a prestigious and more expensive S 80.
Of course, there is a computer with the diagnostic system truth, I did not really like how it works. If something is not so, for example, the liquid ended in the washer tank, then a red signal lights up in the center of the panel, similar to our sign of other dangers. You need to turn your gaze to the left lower corner on the display inscription: A message has received a message for you. Next, click the button on the left steering wheel switch and finally find out what the computer is dissatisfied with. Distracting on the go.
Swedish defense. Active and passive safety style of Volvo. The new V70 is no exception, and in terms of protection, this machine is comparable to the headquarters computer in the Pentagon. Firstly, these are various electronic systems that correct the driver’s miscalculations in difficult road conditions. Secondly, these are numerous airbags, including an inflatable curtain on the windows. Thirdly, this is a new system of protection against the Whips wandering, for the first time installed on the same S 80.
During the accident, even insignificant, when the car receives a blow to the rear bumper, the driver’s body pulls back by inertia. Once upon a time, the headrests were invented that save the cervical vertebrae from the fracture, but do not prevent their stretching. Such an injury can lead to serious consequences even a few months after the accident. The Whips system represents a semblance of a floating seat of its back at the time of the accident goes back and down, as if supporting the spine at the time of a sharp jerk back.
And Volvo also had a new hobby for children's security seats. In Volvo V70, the rear sofa is equipped with special children's seats. Conceived perfectly, fulfilled simply, like everything brilliant. The seat pillow moves up and back. As a result of such a transformation, you get a small but high armchair, to which the child is fastened with standard seat belts. In addition to the sincere care of the safety of small passengers, there is a cunning marketing calculation of the car is oriented to the age of customers when in Europe and the USA they are seriously concerned about the continuation of the genus.
Another novelty of the aforementioned Premair system, called the developers, player SOOG. A special filter located on the radiator turns about 75 percent into oxygen. ozone and other rubbish accumulated by the ground.
Up & Down. On the test, the autopilot at once visited two cars with a low -pressure turbocharged, the second V70 T5 with a high -pressure turbine. The first with an automatic box, the second, as befits a sports version, with a mechanical one. The rest of the cars were completely identical, at least at rest. On the road, this, as they say in Odessa, are two big differences.
In the Volvo V70 with an automatic adaptive checkpoint, the effect of turboyam was quite pronounced. At low speeds, when touched from a place or a traffic light, this is not such a large obstacle. The power of the engine and torque is quite enough to confidently and quickly accelerate to permitted rules 60 km/h, and the thoughtfulness of the box at this moment is practically not noticeable. It does not appear with calm and smooth movement in the city stream, when the engine speed rarely exceeds the number 2000. At the time of using the Kick-Down mode, most often with a sharp rebuild from a row in a row, some inhibition of the reaction is even useful. Like the last chance to assess the situation and think: do we need it to make such escapades?
But on the highway it is a little annoying. When the revolutions are off for 3,000, the failure becomes too noticeable. Here is a classic situation: we are going in the left row at a speed of about 100 km/h. On the right and a little in front of the Ikarus, behind is rapidly approaching a cowboy on a dirty foreign car. Well, I see him, I see, but I can’t leave to the right, I need to overtake the bus. Or adapt to the cowboy 140 km/h. I sharply press the gas pedal, and in those seconds, while Volvo falls into the notorious turboyam, the impatient racer manages not only to sit on the bumper, but also to demonstrate the entire power of his headlights.
In the same situation, but on T5 with a mechanical box it was enough just to spread to a low gear and second to the floor. And the cowboy on a foreign car would again be reduced in the rear -view mirror to the clopin sizes. However, the automatic box on Volvo is adaptive, and perhaps we simply did not have enough time to accustom it to an aggressive driving style.
Obviously, this is what it should be determined at the beginning of the note by the age frames of customers of the new Volvo V70, it is safe to say that a more power client will prefer the automatic transmission, and the young, but early mechanical.
Text Nikolay Kachurin, photo Alexey Ilyin

 

Source: "Autopilot"