DUBAI, 13 April 2005 — Building on the success of the XC90 4-wheel drive SUV, Volvo launched the new V8 version here last week.
Designed as a premium sport utility vehicle, the answer to the question why Volvo should produce a V8 configuration lies in the US market where 30 percent of all SUV’s sold have V8 engines.
“An SUV in the premium segment needs a V-8, especially in the North American market where we sell about 60 percent of all the XC90s we make,” Vic Doolan, Volvo of North America’s president and CEO, said recently.
Currently, Volvo produces 100,000 units of XC90’s per annum, nearly double the anticipated 55,000 projected for the car.
Markus Matzak-Precht, Volvo regional marketing manager, said that designing the new V8 from scratch was an opportunity to address the environmental concerns that surround the economy and emissions of V8 power units and SUV’s.
“We had two targets,” he told motoring journalists at the launch. “We wanted to have the cleanest V8 in the world — and that we have achieved. We even meet the very tough Euro 5 standard which is not even in force yet. We also wanted to have the best fuel economy for a V8 of this class, and we have also achieved this.”
Matzak-Precht said that the decision to design the new power unit from scratch was driven by the need to achieve minimum emissions while keeping the proven safety architecture of the XC range of SUV’s and keep the crumple zones that in a crash send the engine under the car and away from the driver and passengers. Safety and crash design regulations in the US market are expected to get much tougher in the next two years said Matzak-Precht and this added impetus to the design of the new engine.
A new four catalytic converter setup that is fully operational after only 15 seconds after a cold start significantly reduces emissions from a cold engine — the peak time for pollution. The new engine is compact enough to fit the larger saloon models in Volvo’s range; as yet no announcement has been made to confirm speculation that a V8 saloon is under development.
The new 190 kg 4.4 liter V-8 is mounted transversely in the XC90’s existing engine compartment without compromising any of the vehicle’s safety standards. The unit is even lighter than some other engines used in the XC range. The result is an engine with 60 degrees between the cylinder banks instead of the normal 90 degrees. The left cylinder bank is offset a half cylinder ahead of the right bank so it fits within the vehicle’s structural beam network.
Volvo has replaced the four-speed automatic transmission with a six-speed unit that has manual shift capability that gives very creditable off road performance for what is essentially a family luxury SUV.
The standard all-wheel-drive system, developed by the Swedish company Haldex, has been upgraded to improve quick starts and enhance traction on slippery or sandy surfaces and will spread to 2006 model cars.