GRock:

You make very good point about "meeting," either face to face or on the forum, helpful and interesting people. I'm still going round and round about a V90. I can't make a case for needing a new car. My 2015.5 V60 Platinum has only 54K on the clock, almost a year left on the CPO warranty, does everything I need I need it to do and is immaculate inside and out. (and, if I read the numbers correctly, has a slightly larger rear compartment than the new V90) - But there is the "new car itch" and a dealer in the area has a silver one - my favorite car color!

I don't understand the SUV mania either. I'm certain that 95% of them are never further "off road" than a gravel driveway but I will offer this possible insight: A lot of it may relate to being seen driving the "in" vehicle. Case in point - my (ex) wife - 20 years my junior - in the late 80's - early 90's it had to be a BMW but by the late 90's an SUV was a "must have." I even got roped in. When my '94 E300 wagon, having racked up $17K in repair bills in 100K miles needed a transmission, it was replaced by a Greyhound bus (actually a Toyota Sequoia) I will say this much for the Toyota - the build quality was easily the equal if not better than the Benz and it had a full set of instruments thanks to its truck heritage. (It also required very careful attention at highway speeds and, on an annual basis with a lot of highway mileage, averaged about 13 mpg!) Thankfully the anticipated need to pull a horse trailer never materialized* and it was replaced by an '03 V70 2.4T

*another issue: to utilize the cavernous rear compartment, the third row seats had to be removed and stored somewhere!

Decisions, decisions.

 

Hi Pretorian,
Thanks for your reply, and you are among those I have "met" here on this forum that makes time spent here worth it. With nothing but mostly SUVs being offered these days, I can't help but believe there will be something "new" to be offered by the manufacturers to generate more new/different vehicles to an increasingly fickle car buying public. I still love the wagons, but am in the minority here. I also still don't believe in the electric car hype, at least not in the present incantations, due mostly to the woefully under-capable electric grid and the unsustainability of the battery technology that is being exploited today. The mining of lithium being one issue. Recharging stations are not as plentiful as gas stations and the investment required is high, and takes too long even if a restaurant is onsite to allow drivers to use the time waiting on the recharge. I also suspect that "supercharging" a battery to speed up the process is detrimental to the battery life, but only time will prove/disprove this theory. At least Toyota hybrids achieve a long battery life by never fully charging nor allowing the charge level dropping below about 40%. Some Prius have gone more than 400K miles as taxis due to the battery charge management they employ. I had 3 Toyota hybrids, all were great cars. May consider one again if the need to change from Volvo occurs, the Venza hybrid being a possibility. An Avalon wagon hybrid would be a great option if Toyota would only make one!

I'll stop now, getting far off topic....

 

I think the Lucid is an impressive car, but at an incredible price to match. I'm 67, retired and currently in good health. Having purchased my factory ordered 2020 V90 Inscription in June of 2020, I can see keeping it for a very long time. I expect to average no more than 10k miles per year, and purchased a 10 yr VIP platinum zero deductible.

I am very interested in new car tech, especially that relating to safety and navigation.

Looking at the trends, as we age and autonomous driving becomes more of a reality, I can see myself possibly being interested in a self-driving car in my 80's. Living in the suburbs, the two choices for getting around town are one's car or a taxi.

There are many reasons why I wish I was in my 20's again. For car enthusiasts, I think the coming years will be a very exciting time.

 

Don't despair. I am precisely in the middle of my 80's and still enjoy the feel of the wheel in my hands and the satisfaction of a neatly carved corner. I prefer to be in control (the first thing I do on start-up is turn of the (long string of colorful verbiage) start/stop function) One thing has changed - there was a time when I would knock off 500, 600 or even on rare occasions 700 miles in a day. Now I count 350 or perhaps 400 to be a good days work.

 

Maggs: I agree the Lucid is impressive (and so is its prospective price!), but it hasn't been actually mass produced yet, so I am holding judgement. Achieving around 500 miles is quite an accomplishment, but as always YMMV!

Pretorien: I like to control the car myself as well, but occasionally appreciate the help from the Pilot Assist feature on stretches of highway with other drivers wandering all over the place, not maintaining speed, etc. However, this system is not perfect yet, and coming from the software industry, there will always be bugs!! Hopefully they will improve over the next few years, to where you could reliably trust your life to them.

 

So you are, of course, familiar with the term "vaporware" Here's the problem: Battery performance, capacity and charge and discharge rates are in the iron grip of the periodic table of the elements and the laws of thermodynamics. There is no "Moore's Law" and there are no quantum leaps to be made. Incremental improvements in motor efficiency, aerodynamic drag, insulation to reduce heating and cooling demands, certainly, but these are small nibbles at a very large pie. It is very hard to get away from a simple equation: double the range = double the battery (size and weight) Batteries will never come close to the energy density of combustible fuels. Hydrogen is an alternative but has its own storage and distribution problems. Perhaps the ultimate solution will be the development of a bread-loaf sized nuclear reactor. You'll have to pry that gas nozzle out of my cold dead hand!

 

[QUOTE=Pretorien;499735]Don't despair. I am precisely in the middle of my 80's and still enjoy the feel of the wheel in my hands and the satisfaction of a neatly carved corner. I prefer to be in control (the first thing I do on start-up is turn of the (long string of colorful verbiage) start/stop function) One thing has changed - there was a time when I would knock off 500, 600 or even on rare occasions 700 miles in a day. Now I count 350 or perhaps 400 to be a good days work.[/QUOTE

You are my role model!


 

Very familiar with vaporware! Even worse, buggy vaporware! Their only hope is to discover a new addition to the periodic table There's lots of hype coming from GM on their "solid state" battery, but little concrete evidence yet.

I'd still like diesels back! Then you'd have to pry that pump handle from my cold, dead hands!

 

It has occurred to me that, the entire supply/manufacturing/disposal cycle considered, the most cost and impact effective solution would be a small (750cc to 1L) constant speed turbo diesel running a generator with a battery back-up for non-constant loads.

 

I'm sure that would be efficient, and probably the hydrogen powered vehicle is cleaner as well, but the transportation of the fuel is certainly not "green", among other concerns. Just saw this story on the new Tesla Model S Plaid: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/tesla...054528951.html
Now that would be truly frightening! This model has a "new" battery pack, obviously a few bugs left to be worked out.......

 

Okay, back to the decisions. This is a learning process and, hopefully, my account of the path will not be too boring

One of the things that I have learned is that no single one of the various car search sites covers all of the available candidates in a given area. I have now used several leads to interesting results: the number of potential “buys” has expanded and it has diversified to include at least one’ 21 R Design and a number of ’20 and’19 cars both as new (probably demos or courtesy cars) and CPO used cars. The various models, specifications, packages and locations put a lot more in play so we need to organize all these numbers – a spreadsheet of course!

I am still building it (and, if I can figure out how to do it, will share it when it is done) but in the meantime I picked out a couple of things that may serve to focus the decision-making process and thought I would pass them on.

I’m using my current 2015.5 V60 Platinum as a comparison point to highlight the differences, good and bad, that could bend the decision one way or another.

Major dimensions:

Wheelbase V60 109.3 inches V90 115 inches – 6 inches longer

LOA V60 182.5 inches V90 194.3 inches - 12 inches longer

Weight this gets a bit tricky since the quoted weights vary – partial or full fluid levels etc. but, in general, the V90 T5 is about 500 pounds heavier than theV60 (not unreasonable for an additional foot of glass and steel in the body and a longer wheelbase) and theT6 AWD adds an additional 200 pounds to that difference.

Fuel consumption: these numbers are all over the place reflecting different testing conditions etc. but, in general, looking at the highway mileage predictions, the V90 T5 returns 2-4 mpg less than V60 and the T6 with the supercharger and AWD loses another 1 to 2 mpg. Again this is not surprising. Given my low rate of mileage accumulation, the cost difference is really not meaningful but, when added to the fact that the V90 fuel tank is smaller than the already barely adequate capacity of the V60, the difference in range is significant.

So, expectations and unknowns – the longer wheelbase and greater weight of the various V90s should translate into a slightly less nimble vehicle. All other things being equal (which they rarely are) the V90 T5 should be a little slower off the line – unless, of course, Volvo has taken this into account and changed the final drive ratio – can’t find the data. To what degree the higher output of theT6 variants overcome this is an unknown.

The task now is to get off my duff and go out and drive some of these cars. This will require some planning as they are scattered over a circle with a 100 mile radius from my home base.

Further reports as available



Yr Obdt Svt

 

To me, the best part about buying a new car is the research process. Look forward to your future contributions.

From my 13 months of owning my 2020 V90 Inscription T6 AWD, using 93 octane gas, my highway mileage has been pretty consistent at 29-30 mpg, and my city has been around 24-25 mpg.

Occasionally, depending on the roads and if I drive closer to the speed limit, I've obtained a highway mpg of 32-33, but when I typically drive at 10+ over the speed limit, my mpg is 29-30 on the highway.

While I love my V90, I have to be honest about the ride quality over moderate bumps and even slight pot holes. The ride can be surprisingly jarring, even with the additional weight and wheelbase length. I think has to do with the struts, which I believe don't have much travel length to absorb shocks. From my test drive of the V90 CC, it had a softer ride, while my Inscription's ride was closer to that of the R. To try to compensate for the somewhat stiffer ride, I elected to purchase my car with the 19 inch wheels, as opposed to the 20 inch ones. If given the choice, as in prior years, I would have gladly opted for the 18 inch wheels.

To me, another key difference between my Inscription and the R was the front seats. Specifically, in my case, I felt that the R's seat deck side bolsters were a big high and too firm for my liking. I'm 5'10" and weigh 185 lbs, so I'm not overly large. However, I have arthritic hips, and I felt the hip bolsters pressed to hard against my hip points. This may or may not be an issue for you. Suggest taking a long test drive to reach your own conclusion on this topic.

 

good point on the seats - I'l pay attention to that. ( I'm in the process of "disappearing" - a one-time 6' 180 lb college football player, soft corporate life (ah, those business dinners in Paris, Tokyo etc) took me to 200, now a scant 5'9" and 160 +/- !)

I average about 34.5 mpg on the highway, driving by the 90/10 rule - I pass 90% of the cars and let 10% pass me.

I think a large part of the ride issue is the stupid wheel sizing that is common these days. I don't care for the "wagon wheel" look - the V60 carries a 17" wheel - more than large enough. There is no engineering reason for tire aspect ratios lower than 45-50 (mine are 235/45-17) unless needed for brake rotor clearance - not the case on a typical passenger car These "rubber bad" outsized fitments (a) ride harder (b) are more prone to road hazard damage (c) generally will have poorer traction in bad road conditions and (d) are significantly more expensive

 

Pretorien,

in the end, to me, it is the comfort first, then all the number stuff you are trying to assimilate into a spreadsheet as if the answer will jump off the page at you. It likely won't happen that way, hopefully you will find a car that "speaks" to you and it will be done....
I wholeheartedly agree on the wheel/ tire size foolishness being foisted on the consumer who has no clue as to why his car rides so harshly. It's all in the name of "style" and "mine is bigger than yours" mentality. Hopefully more people recognize this and will demand a more comfortable ride. Maybe with age will come wisdom?!! One can only hope.

 

Yes, you're correct. The habits of a lifetime (in science) lead me to view everything as a problem to be solved or a question to be answered - probably not my most endearing quality (ask my (2) ex-wives)

 

Understood!!!

 

Well, moving on from the number crunching (there is another term for that I shall not use here) to the real world some order may be slowly emerging.

Walk around: there is no question that V90 is one of the prettiest cars on the road.. I would rate the Inscription over the R design because I’m not particularly fond of the Jacques Cousteau “monster from the deep” front end styling that appears to be very popular these days. On the other hand, by eyeball measurement the R design seems to sit a bit lower.

Take a seat: now, my V60 has a very nice interior but either of the new ones simply blow it away. I have not really sorted the differences between the Inscription and the R. Both “sat” really comfortably. Should a choice end up resting on the interior, color might be the deciding factor.

In motion: this is where reality, reaction and prejudice begin to mix a bit. I am quite convinced that I can feel the difference (400 – 600 pounds and a longer wheelbase) between my current V60 and both of the V90s. (A T5 R design FWD and a T6 Inscription AWD.) Despite the fact that both are riding on significantly lower profile tires than my current car, the response to steering and accelerator input seemed a bit slower. In the case of the T5, it may simply reflect a simple pounds divided by horsepower calculation with a little contribution from the longer wheelbase. The T6 has a bit more punch (at the cost of an extra 200 pounds and whatever drag there is in the angle drive/driveshaft/Haldex and rear differential even when deactivated. (And I cannot discount my own lack of familiarity with the dynamics of four-wheel-drive)

One of the benefits of exploratory studies is the opening of new lines of investigation. This is in case here. I decided that I needed to know more about this Haldex system. The difference between the T5 and T6 engines straightforward and easy to understand. The Haldex is just a little more complicated involving a right angle drive from the engine, a driveshaft, motor driven high-pressure fluid pump, a multiplate wet clutch and a differential. If you string it altogether, it is rather reminiscent of the old Time magazine covers by Boris Artzybasheff! There is plenty of information to be found about the Haldex system. A search of this form turns up 6 pages of posts. Of course a complex computer-controlled electromechanical hydraulic system like this will have issues and there are a lot of them out there so the occasional problem is not surprising. Here is the “But” – all of the articles that I read on the system emphasized the need for maintenance. This is particularly true of the current series 5 version which, because it no longer has a built-in fluid filter, requires fluid change at regular, short intervals (13,000 miles = 20,000 km) Nowhere can I find in any of the Volvo literature, manuals or maintenance protocols any mention of this as a service requirement. I find this both strange and unsettling. I very much doubt that Volvo has developed a magic hydraulic fluid that lasts forever.

So, where does it all stand? At the moment I’m willing to sacrifice a little bit of the “edge” in response for the appearance and appointments of the V90. I am leaning strongly toward the T5 for several reasons: the combination of my mid-Atlantic location and my own extensive bad weather driving experience makes AWD relatively unimportant. The T6 takes a significant hit in fuel mileage and will almost certainly entail higher maintenance costs (and potential repair costs.) The choice between the Inscription and R design will probably come down to items like color, equipment and costs.

To be continued.

 

Pretorien,

I think it comes down to availability, there just aren't that many V90s around, unless you are willing to place an order for your exact desires at a dealer. I searched for over a month only to come close to the model I wanted, Kind of irritated to spend that much money and not get exactly what I wanted. Didn't want to wait for months only to discover (as Maggs found out) that the dealer mis-ordered the car I wanted, so I searched and found one in Maryland (I'm in VA), and drove there to purchase, the local Volvo dealers were not at all helpful and wanted $1200 to go get the car. So, you may find what you want or close to it, but will likely take some searching to find the one you like. Good luck with your search.

 

Considering that so few V90 Rs, and even fewer Inscriptions, were sold in 2020 (230) and 2021 (153 thru June), there probably won't be many for sale. The lack of availability caused me to factory order my car in 2020. Hopefully you'll have better luck.

 

I think the word we are looking for is Unicorn, perhaps?