swedishiron

2008 S60 T5 Inscription ? leather - I wish I had flown and bough this T5 instead of my R honestly: http://www.cars.com/go/search/detail.jsp?tracktype=usedcc&csDlId=&csDgId=&listingId=82182992&listingRecNum=8&criteria=sf1Dir%3DDESC%26mkId%3D20044%26stkTyp%3DU%26mdId%3D21916%26rd%3D100000%26crSrtFlds%3DstkTypId-feedSegId-mkId-mdId-yrId-trId%26zc%3D30305%26rn%3D0%26PMmt%3D1-1-1%26stkTypId%3D28881%26sf2Dir%3DASC%26sf1Nm%3Dprice%26yrId%3D20201%26yrId%3D20145%26yrId%3D20200%26sf2Nm%3Dmiles%26isDealerGrouping%3Dfalse%26trId%3D25641%26rpp%3D50%26feedSegId%3D28705&aff=national&listType=1

The engines were fine for the most part (sans 2005 V8) under Ford ownership which is expected by Volvo, where they fell down were the transmissions. Volvo went up market (which it need to do) with the S80 and XC90 T6 and shot itself in the foot. They lost tons of repeat buyers and potential new buyers due to all the bad will. Volvo should have replaced every one these transmissions (no charge to the owners) until the cars reached 200K in my opinion as you can NOT put a price tag on good will. Then even dumber in my opinion was to give up on RWD. Look at ALL the sales between the Lexus IS, Catera CTS, BMW 3/5 series, Infiniti G series - a market position could have easily stepped into if they kept funding a RWD platform.

I hope and believe Geely will take Volvo further upmarket - if they are really smart RWD will be back in the Volvo portfolio. I could see more upscale Volvos being built in Sweden(and Netherlands?) in small volume hopefully with many customization options with mass market FWD/AWD Volvos being built in China. Volvo should go after Jaguar and BMW and steal the high profit low Volume sales. I think the current S80 could get a RWD biased AWD system and really go after the 5 series/CTS/E-Class market - with a properly promoted relaunch. I personally think the current S80 should be AWD ONLY with a more powerful base engine at least for the North American Market. Shoot for higher profits per unit with increase selling prices versus volume. I currently drive a 1998 C70 and recently test drove an S80 T6 (first gen) and could NOT believe how much the ride floated and reminded me of a 1980's Cadillac - it was NOT confidence inspiring (maybe a set of Bilstein HD would fix much of that). Admittedly my C70 ride is ROUGH but it is confidence inspiring when pushing it hard.

There's so much RWD now to choose from - its hard to justify a premium FWD car; Bring back the S90 with a turbo six cylinder

Honda claims they will offer diesels that won't need a urea catalyst to meet US emission standards - Volvo SHOULD be able to do the same since they claim to be an environmental leader and will be LATE to the market.