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  • By: Brad Nevin | Ford Communications Network
    The Volvo 850 is widely considered to be the most significant Volvo of all time, as it foreshadowed the line of good-looking, fun-to-drive, safe and dependable Volvo cars today.
    DEARBORN, Michigan, April 29, 2005 -- Driving a loaner car when your ride is in the shop is, for most people, a drag. For George Voss, however, the experience changed his life.

    Voss owns the first-ever franchise of Molly Maid. About 12 years ago, his office in Ann Arbor, Michigan shared a building with Swedish Engineering, one of three dedicated Volvo repair shops in the country. With Voss's car on the fritz, he borrowed a Volvo from Joe Meza, the president of Swedish Engineering.

    "The car had over 340,000 miles on it," said Voss. "I drove it for a week. Everything on it was functional. There were no problems with the windows, door locks or power seats. The car was dead quiet on the road and smooth as silk. I thought, this is what I need: something safe, something dependable, something durable."

    That was Voss's first introduction to Volvo, and it stuck. He's driven nothing but Volvos ever since. George Voss is, as they say, a Volvophile. Since 1988, he has owned two 740s, one 940, two 850s and an S70. His current fleet is an S70, an 850 and two 740s. Of all those, the car Voss and other Volvophiles think is the most significant -- the most significant Volvo of all time, in fact -- is the 850.

    "The Volvo 850 was the first Volvo to go from rear- to front-wheel drive," said Voss. "That was a huge leap. They also went from a four-cylinder traditionally-mounted motor to a transversely-mounted five-cylinder motor, and there was a change in body style. They went from the brick and started rounding the corners, and it had side-mounted airbags. The 850 represented a significant improvement in performance, too."

    The 1993 850 came with a 2.4-liter five-cylinder engine with 168 horsepower. In 1994, Volvo introduced the 850 Turbo with a 222 horsepower, 2.3-liter five cylinder engine. The website ConsumerGuide.com says that the 850 Turbo can accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in 7.1 seconds -- decent numbers for a sedan in 1994.

    The entire 850 line -- from the 1994 BTCC race car (top) to the 1996 wagon -- transformend Volvo's styling and performance reputation.
    "That's pretty significant for a five-cylinder 2.3-liter motor," said Voss.

    Then in 1995, Volvo introduced the 850 T-5R with a 2.3-liter, five-cylinder DOHC aluminum engine with 240 horsepower. That engine had interior piston cooling nozzles, sodium filled exhaust valves, water cooled turbo housing and a microprocessor-controlled multi-point direct port fuel injection system. Most car magazines compared the T-5R with heavyweights like the BMW M3 and Audi S4. Remember, we're still talking about a Volvo here.

    Consumer Guide said that the overall 850 lineup "represented a good job of breathing new life into what had become an outdated product line. With the side airbags and turbo engines, it also had more going for it than some rivals in the near-luxury market."

    The 850 is significant because it was the spiritual predictor of Volvo cars and SUVs to come. But a sound reputation for safety and durability, plus good looks and exciting performance, aren't all the 850 had going for it. The 1993 850 also debuted with four patent designs, two related to safety and two related to performance.

    The 850's packaging as a front-wheel drive car with a transversely-mounted five-cylinder engine required the development of an unusually short five-speed manual transmission fitted beside the engine. To make this setup work, Volvo designed and patented a transmission with three shafts instead of the usual two. The result was an extraordinarily short, smooth shifting transmission with a fully synchronized reverse and a tight turning radius.

    The second performance-related design was a Delta-link semi-independent rear suspension. Delta-link was designed to give the 850 passive rear steering via deformable rubber bushings that let the rear axle shift slightly as cornering loads increase.


    1993 Volvo 850
    One safety-related patent was a retractor reel positioned vertically inside the B-pillar for the front-seat safety belts. The opening in the pillar and the reel itself were both about twice as wide as the belt itself, permitting the belt to automatically adjust on the reel according to the shoulder height of either the driver or front passenger.

    The last patent was a Side Impact Protection System (SIPS). With SIPS, strengthened B-pillars reinforced the roof rails and doorsills. Tubular members spread the energy of a side impact across as much of the car's structure as possible. Side-impact door beams are universal on cars today.

    When a new car has this much positive news surrounding it, the Public Relations crew usually does everything it can to spread the good word. That was the challenge put to Bob Austin, Volvo's director of Communications in 1993. When the 850 debuted, he wanted to tell everyone how new the 850 was.

    "I wanted to write a press release that stated the 850 is the newest Volvo since?" said Austin. "The problem was, I didn't know since what?"


    The Jakob from 1927
    Tracing its roots, Austin realized that the 850's drivetrain was unique. The 5-cylinder, 20-valve engine was designed specifically for the 850. Ultra short manual and automatic transmissions were designed to transversely mount the five-cylinder engine. Unlike the 200, 700 and 900 series Volvos before it, the 850 drove through its front wheels. The structure of the 850 was totally unique and incorporated a patented Side Impact Protection System. The delta-link rear suspension was also patented, as was the 850's self-adjusting B-pillar mounted seat belt reel. And the 850 was fast, smooth-looking and fun to drive. After his research, Austin concluded that the 1993 Volvo 850 was the newest Volvo since the first-ever Volvo built in 1927, The Jakob.

    "In the history of this company we have made many different models, but they have all shared our core values of safety, reliability and durability," said Austin. "While the 850 was clearly the most radically different car we have introduced since the first Volvo, it was true to our traditional values. I guess that is what makes it a Volvo."

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