Perhaps only after having the glitz in front of you can you calm down and appreciate Volvo's ultimate safety.
Author: Lu Weijia
Photo: Lu Weijia
As we all know, China is the world's largest luxury car market, consuming more than 3 million luxury cars with a starting price of more than 300,000 yuan per year.
However, China's luxury car market in fact in the early years has been solid, not all "luxury cars" can be favored by Chinese consumers, if the definition of luxury cars locked in the traditional luxury brand, then the composition of China's luxury car market is Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Audi iron triangle, BBA three giants account for more than two-thirds of China's luxury car sales, their position in china's luxury car market can not be easily shaken.
Therefore, even if the Chinese luxury car market is a fat and oily piece of fat, it is only distributed by the BBA iron triangle, in fact, luxury brands with brand recognition below the BBA cannot eat here, at best, they can only eat some minced meat.
Over time, China's luxury car market has formed three classes, one is the ultra-luxury brands such as Rolls-Royce, Bentley and Porsche at the top of the pyramid, the second is the BBA iron triangle that can do whatever it wants in the Chinese market, and the third is the second-tier brands such as Volvo, Cadillac, Lexus and Land Rover Jaguar.
In other words, China's luxury car market is both huge and polarized. As for why the luxury car market will develop to the point of polarization, most people will blame the low added value of the second-tier luxury brands, based on the consideration of face engineering, the second-tier luxury brands will naturally not become the first choice of most consumers.
However, in fact, BBA is not only winning in brand influence, even if the added value of the brand is not to be discussed, in fact, BBA also has enough product advantages to become the mainstream of the luxury car market.
For example, Mercedes-Benz has a design, BMW has control, Audi has technology, and their product features are either visible or touchable, and they can very accurately grasp the car buying psychology of luxury car consumers. So in a way, BBA actually wins in brand influence and product characteristics complement each other.
In contrast, Volvo Cars, which is known for its safety, as the name suggests, the biggest feature of the brand and its products is the safety performance ahead of the industry, if Volvo attaches great importance to car safety and considers itself the second, I am afraid that no car brand dares to recognize the first.
But unfortunately, safety performance has never been the primary demand of most people to choose a car, and when Volvo's brand features are not valued by the market, Volvo Cars' attractiveness to consumers will be greatly reduced, and the proportion of sales will certainly be better than BBA, which is a reality that Volvo Cars has to accept.
Of course, I am not saying that safety performance is not important for cars, but that safety performance is something that consumers cannot see and touch, consumers cannot enjoy the value of high safety performance at all times, and high safety performance can only reflect the value when encountering traffic accidents. What's more, the safety performance of the BBA is not bad, but it is not as extreme as Volvo.
The Volvo S60 is like this, for a luxury brand mid-level sedan, the Volvo S60 is obviously not "rich" enough to be grounded. Although Volvo Cars has repeatedly emphasized that Volvo's understanding of luxury has never been the use of leather materials and the setting of atmosphere, but the pursuit of safety, health and sustainable development.
However, consumers who are willing to think of safety, health and sustainability as luxury can only be one of the best.
If the Volvo S60 is likened to a pot of wine, I am actually willing to call it a good wine, but this altar of good wine is not loved by most people, not because it is hidden in the deep alley, but because there are very few people who can appreciate this altar wine.
Now that I've spoken for that, the question arises, is the Volvo S60 worthless of anything but safety and health?
The answer is no, in fact the volvo S60 is only slightly inferior to the ultra-high safety performance in other aspects, and I personally do not have the courage to throw out this absolute 100% view. According to the promotional content of volvo cars' official website, the handling of the new generation of Volvo S60 is also one of the product features, and said that "there is no bend in life that cannot be passed.".
In order to improve the handling performance, the new generation of S60 has spent a lot of effort on the hardware of the chassis mechanism. The front suspension has been upgraded from McPherson to a double wishbone independent structure, and the rear suspension is a multi-link independent suspension, and the aluminum alloy hem arm is used.
It is worth mentioning that the new Volvo S60 does not use our common steel coil springs, but is equipped with a resin vane spring. The advantages and disadvantages of this spring are very obvious, the advantage is to reduce the under-spring mass, and the spring will rebound faster. The disadvantage is that the left and right suspension systems cannot be 100% independent, which can have a negative impact on comfort.
Because of this, the new volvo S60 has been accused of using a torsion beam type non-independent suspension in disguise.
At the same time, the domestic version of volvo S60 also specially customized HRS hydraulic shock absorber for the Chinese market, which is characterized by holding buffer technology and can passively adjust the softness and hardness of the shock absorber according to road conditions.
Theoretically, when the vehicle runs over the bumpy road, the HRS hydraulic shock absorber will show softer characteristics, and when the vehicle passes through the undulating road surface, the characteristics of the shock absorber will become stiff, so as to achieve the effect of soft when it is soft, and it is hard when it is hard, just like the suspension system using progressive springs, the spring K value will change with the amount of spring compression.
In the actual experience, the comprehensive quality of the chassis of the new Volvo S60 is indeed not low, first of all, the heavy chassis texture shows that it is an authentic European car, and secondly, when I drive through the larger road surface, the role of the HRS hydraulic shock absorber can be played, which can better hold the body and ensure the stability of the vehicle.
In addition, I learned on the S60 forum that although Volvo's official promotion of the new S60 users can choose to control the 4C adaptive chassis with higher limits, and the cost of installing the optional 4C adaptive chassis is less than 10,000 yuan, dealers do not accept users to choose the 4C adaptive chassis, the specific reason is unknown. Friends who have some understanding of this matter may wish to answer for everyone in the comment area.
But then again, the chassis control limit is not the only indicator of whether we measure whether a sports car is qualified, in addition to the control limit of the chassis, it is equally important to communicate between people and cars, as well as the matching of the power system.
In terms of people-vehicle communication, I am personally slightly disappointed with the performance of the Volvo S60. Its steering feel has a strong electronic taste, the damping sensation in comfort mode is too light, the feel when switching to sport mode is unnatural, and when I drive intensely, the problem of low synchronization between the steering wheel and the front of the car is revealed, and the front of the car always reacts half a beat slower than the steering.
Our colleague "Rao Hehe" said that his feeling after test driving the new S60 at The Xiamen International Circuit was that when he had already controlled the steering wheel to complete the steering, the front of the car began to make corresponding steering movements. In other words, it's not so much that he's manipulating or correcting the direction of the front of the car as he's giving instructions to the vehicle to turn.
In terms of power matching, the Volvo S60 still owes some heat.
The test drive we received this time was the B4 Zhiyuan Deluxe Edition, equipped with a 2.0T turbocharged engine + 48V light mixing system, with a maximum output of 197 horsepower and a peak torque of 300 Nm, and the transmission matched the Aisin 8AT gearbox.
During the week-long test drive, we were most impressed by the powertrain: the fuel economy was very good. Thanks to the blessing of the 48V light mixing system, this is a test drive, even under our "no pity" driving training, its 100 km fuel consumption can be controlled within 9L, and the movement of each start/stop of the engine can be too small to be ignored.
But in addition to fuel economy, what we have to complain about is that the powertrain is not matched satisfactorily. Although the power parameters of the B4 version of the model are not weak, with a maximum horsepower of 197 horses and a peak torque of 300 Nm, the official nominal acceleration time of 0-100km/h is only 8 seconds, which is also in line with the medium level of a B-class sedan, but the power reserve during the secondary acceleration in the middle and rear section is always relatively weak, and the explosive force during power output is also weak.
Moreover, when the driver issues a high-class power request, the gearbox's enthusiasm for downshifting is low, and even in many cases, the gearbox cannot feel the gearbox performing the shift without looking at the speedometer. At the same time, the gearbox will also have occasional setbacks when following the car at low speeds, sometimes when I loosen the oil, and sometimes when I step on the accelerator, and I still haven't figured out the reasons for it.
Unfortunately, it has been raining in Guangzhou these days, and I have not had the opportunity to go to the mountain road to experience the subtleties of the new Volvo S60 chassis more fully. But what I can be sure of is that although the new generation of S60 has a bit of a sports car flavor in terms of posture and chassis, and the handling limit may be higher than many competitors of the same level, it is actually not a sports car that is known for driving pleasure.
Or for the Volvo S60, which is a front-driving cross-driver, abandoning sports and focusing on safety and comfort may make it more popular.
Today's topic
Would you consider a Volvo S60?
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