Re: '91 200Q vs 850 Turbo (long)

[Brett Dikeman <quattro@arthur.malebolge.com>]

>Fellow Audi nuts,
>	Given the recent spate of odious comparisons, here's another, hopefully
>less odious one.
>
>	I took a colleague's '96 Volvo 850 Turbo out for a drive yesterday. 48K
>miles, IPD chip upgrade to a claimed 270 HP (up from stock 222).  I've
Wha?  Was the T5 sedan, which is very rare(the equivalent of an S car.)?

>	Power: Lots of it, esp. from 20-60 or so.  Not particularly quick off
>the line, but no noticeable torque steer either. Surprisingly, engine
>seems to peter out after 70 or so.  The automatic was probably too quick
>to upshift, and somewhat reluctant to downshift.
All Volvo trannies now have personality switches; was the personality
switch in "Sport"(S) mode, or "Economy"(E)?  In sport it hangs on longer
before shifting up and kicks down much more easily(takes a slight blip of
the throttle instead of a 1/2 way "blip".)


>	Handling: Lots of body roll, understeered like anything when driven
>hard into an fwy entrance ramp.  Car felt "light" in some indescribable
>way, but that's probably something you could get used to, and even like.
Our 960 wagon feels light too...funny, considering it's a tank... Volvos
are sprung very tightly, so they tend to bounce around more and I guess
that feels "light"?

>	Build quality: Good, but nothing spectacular. This is a fairly
>top-of-the-line car, but the interior didn't reflect it. (I drove a '98
>528 a couple of weeks ago, and that car felt *really* solid).
Same again.  Our 960 was the top-of-the-line wagon for 1993, and the
interior just feels too plastic-ish.  The S70 we got as a loaner once was
even worse; I felt like I was driving a sweedish Ford...it could be the
interior color that we picked(grey/grey.)

>	Overall, I was a *lot* less impressed than I expected to be. The car
>has a ~400 lbs/50 HP advantage on my 200Q, but my car sure *feels*
>faster. This in spite of the fact that the Volvo was a good bit noisier,
>esp. when accelerating hard. The inline 5 is remarkably similar to the
>3B, but the sounds it made left me cold. The Volvo engine sounds like
>the small displacement engine that it is: not so the 3B .. or for that
>matter my older KH.
The engine for the 850 series(turbo and non) was designed by Peugot(sp?)
That's why the V70's/850's sound so different...I personally think the 850
sounds like a big gas-powered vacuum cleaner...

>	The 200 has a heft, a solid feel  that the Volvo did not match (IMHO,
>and I realize that it's a matter of taste).  And remember that my car is
>5 years older and has twice as many miles on it.


The opposite was the audi...my mother complained to the Audi dealer when we
first got the 5000 that "it feels like I'm driving on a marshmellow."
Interestingly enough, I find I get a lot of road and traction feedback from
the gas pedal in the Audi, something that was completely absent in the
Volvo.

Brett

------
Brett Dikeman
brett@pdikeman.ne.mediaone.net
~)-|
Hostes alienigeni me abduxerunt.  Qui annus est?
Te audire non possum.  Musa sapientum fixa est in aure.
Ita, scio hunc 'sig file' veterem fieri.
------