VOLVO XC40 T5: Haven’t you heard? Crossovers are the devil’s work.
“I refuse to drive a crossover, and you should avoid them too as they are not very stable.”
Those were my words to my wife - the poor woman - when she hinted she would like to trade in her Volvo S60 sedan (end of lease) for a new Volvo XC40 T5 that had been flirting with her. That is, instead of the new, gorgeous, sexy, comfortable, classically elegant, and fast, Volvo S60 T8, which I was flirting with…for her.
This being her car, which I do occasionally drive, it was unfair of me to interfere.
But a man is sometimes measured by his relentless pursuit of stupidity.
As most married couples know, straight, gay, or in between, trying to steer your spouse is a self-defeating proposition. Even more, drawing a line in the sand, in this case, my use of the word “refuse”, which is such an unmovable word, a word which has started wars, precipitated the fall of empires, a word for which men have been brutally neutered, to use it as a means of opposing the unopposable is either destined towards a pyrrhic victory or a loss outright from the get-go.
So, there we were, test-driving a Volvo XC40 at our long-time Volvo dealer. The salesman, a dear man who has sold us cars for over 17 years (Vinny is his name, look him up at Weston Volvo) politely, as ever, indulged her with a few XC40s parked together and ready to test.
No S60 among them.
A dark red R Design XC40 with beautiful wheels and a black roof caught my attention immediately. It was a T4, but, it looked so cool...ahem… for a crossover, that is.
“No”, said my dear wife…” it’s too flashy”.
Isn’t that the point of an R design, red or not?
“What about this blue jean colored one, it’s a unique color to Volvo!” said I, the silly husband…still talking, not getting the clue to close the barn doors.
“No, I don’t like the color.’
What is there not to like? I thought… sigh…at least I kept this to myself.
Vinny saved the marriage by quickly pointing to an arctic white T5 that was in the corner. Knowing us for years, the wise man pulled a rabbit out of the hat and gave her a color combo she was sure to like, arctic white with a sexy yet elegant dark lipstick-red leather interior. And not to leave the jerk husband out in the cold, it was a T5, so it would in the least be fun-er to drive.
Good man, Vinny, good man.
We set off, my wife in the driver’s seat, Vinny in the passenger’s seat, and I, quietly relegated to the rear like some pitiful dog that just bit an old woman.
A sequence of explanations of the new features in the car came and went and I, in my insufferable moodiness - like some wannabe Morrissey marooned at an Ed Sheeran concert (the horror!) - neglected to hear them given I was still cross at being in a crossover.
Haven’t you heard? Crossovers are the devil’s work; they are massacring sedans at the dark angel’s altar. Do you not care that poor sports cars are dying at alarming rates because crossovers are being given enough horsepower to appear fun, and computer controls to wrestle their top heavy and bloated bodies to appear to be dynamic, whilst allowing you space to carry your paddleboard?
The cries went unheard. Mostly because they were just happening in my head.
As the test drive continued, I began to tell myself that the rear seats were too upright and cramped compared to her prior S60, which in Inscription trim was limousine-ish. This of course is a bullshit excuse because if she came to me and said she wanted an MG MGA, which has no back seat, and barely functioning front seats at that, I would have said YES! Plus, I never sit in the back, so why care?
I was also expecting the suspension to heave and shimmy like Blanch Devereaux on a hot date, yet I didn’t feel this. It did have though, pretty much, the same well-made feel, and thoughtful touches, that we have come to expect from its sedan sibling.
As the drive went on, I began to remind myself that the XC40, crossover as it might be, is based on the Compact Modular Architecture (CMA) platform, which itself is derived from Volvo’s Scalable Product Architecture (SPA) platform which underpins the S60. A horrible body on frame, archaic statement on wheels, which is what almost all SUVs are, this is not.
It came time to return to the dealership, and because my wife is the best of the two, she offered me if I wanted to test drive the little boxy Volvo. Of course. And drive it I did.
It had the same engine as her old S60, so the power band and its sensation felt familiar if a little more challenged by the taller stance, the quite vertical front windshield, and the added weight.
The XC40’s upright stance, with its boxy yet voluptuous shape and almost flat roof - as opposed to the rear slanting roof line of most other cross-overs - gave it a classic yet sporty form. All of this silently appealed to me even during my opposing comments given I dislike round and soap-bar designs.
Had I been wrong? Can the demons of height be tamed? To a degree, yes. But physics is immutable. Push too hard to turn a tall vehicle going fast and all the computer-run nanny systems in the world will quickly forget your name. Still, for normal and even spirited driving - this is not a track car - it was fun. And, I must admit, I thought she was beautiful too. That interior… so gorgeous, and the clam-shell hood, with its semi-concave undulations flowing towards Thor’s Hammer’s eyes, which appear to be squinting, malevolently, in a wanna-fool-around bad girl way, was so lovely.
My dear wife signed the lease, later purchasing it outright, and the XC40 T5 is parked in our garage, next to our two Germans, politely telling the two Teutonic boys – as Swedes are known to do - in her best Rose Nylund voice, to play nice, get along, not to boast, otherwise, she’ll give them a double serving of her all-time favorite food: *Surströmming.
*Oh yeah…fermented herring…😩