Car of the week: Volvo 850

If you had to drive off a cliff, there is no other car you would want to do this in, except for a Volvo 850. The 850 not only redefined the Volvo brand, but it also rewrote the automotive health and safety bible.

Now it might look like a fridge on wheels. Still, it had revolutionary safety features, such as the side-impact protection system (SIPS), the first mass-produced car with side-impact airbags and self-adjusting seatbelts. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) ranked the Volvo 850 as the fourth safest vehicle on the market in 1995.

The Volvo 850 even scored in the safest segments for fatality risk amongst sedans in the US, with the second-lowest death risk among passenger cars according to other statistics. So when it comes to safety, it sits amongst other fridge legends, such as the fridge in Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull.

But the car was innovative in ways other than safety. It featured a first-of-its-kind 5-cylinder traverse engine, powerful yet compact enough for a front-wheel-drive layout. This layout, in combination with its innovative delta-link rear axle, delivered excellent, near-sporty handling, bringing a more unique and driver-centred driving experience to the brand.

This model also paved the way for future models and performance models, such as the T5R, showing that practical, family estates could also be high-performance vehicles. A mind-blowing concept for the time. And even more minds were blown when the 850 model made its way to the British Touring Car Championship (BTCC), which was impossible to fathom given the brand’s image.

The 850 estate unfortunately never won at the BTCC; however, the 850 saloon model did win in 1995. Winning a total of six races that year alone.

But everyone loves the 850. You can’t find a more widely loved estate car. In 1994, the Volvo 850 estate won the Good Design Grand Prize in Japan and was later named Italy’s “most beautiful estate”. And this was from the country that designed the Ferrari 365GTB/4 Daytona Shooting Brake, but they favoured the 850 estate. That’s how amazing this car was.

Top speed	127 mph
0-60	11.7 seconds
How many units were sold	716,903
Cost when new	£20,900
Would Thelma and Louise have survived if they had driven off the cliff in an 850?	yes

Volvo 850 estate 1994

Either way, the Volvo 850 is our car of the week, as I have spent the last 5 days researching the history of the BTCC. There is no doubt that the 850 has been and always will be the favourite car to ever compete in the competition… ever.

1995 Volvo 850 T-5R estate (front) User3204 Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0