Volvo S60 T6 Polestar 2012 review

You’ve heard about car names with unfortunate meanings in other languages, and it's still amusing to recall that Holden sold a Nova, which means "Doesn't go'' in Spanish, and that Mitsubishi went in for self-abuse with the most notorious example of all: the Pajero.

It's delightful to come across an outfit that has stared the double entendre in the face and refused to blink. Meet Polestar, a Swedish workshop that turns Volvos into race cars. Recently it has applied its spanners to production cars, and the first one available is the S60 Polestar.

VALUE

I was surprised by the price. The S60 T6 starts at $64,990 and with R-Design trim previously topped out at $72,990. Effectively, the Polestar is a chipped engine and fancy wheels for another 10 grand. Once you're up at that level, German six-cylinders are almost within reach.

TECHNOLOGY

The S60 Polestar is based on the S60 T6 junior exec, sedan or wagon, kitted out with Volvo's R-Design racy treatment. Polestar's main contribution is engine management software that turns up the turbocharger on the straight six.

The outcome is 18kW more power, for 242kW, and 40Nm more torque, for 480Nm. That slices 0.3 seconds off its sprint to 100km/h to make it a sub six-second car. In other words, respectably rapid. There are quad exhausts at the rear, alongside a special diffuser and diamond cut 19-inch alloys, which will look terrific until they get kerbed.

DESIGN

In a lot of respects, the car is identical to the R-Design version, with the same lowered and stiffened suspension. You also get sports seats in a grippy synthetic, coloured dials, shiny pedals and an attractive, if still a bit large, steering wheel.

So the go-fast trim is restrained, and the result is a cabin as sensible as it usually is from Volvo, with a few reservations. The rear headrests and wide C-pillars, for example, get in the way of rear vision. The cabin is a metaphor for the car. If you buy this expecting precision performance, you'll be disappointed. It's a Volvo with more performance, but still a Volvo.

Dynamically, it can't escape the handicap of an engine layout that is all wrong for quick cornering. The six-cylinder is slung out in front of the front axle and oriented east-west. So when you tip it into a bend, the suspension is trying to control a big lump of metal that straddles the centre-line of the car. The result is that you're never entirely sure where and when it's going to settle.

DRIVING

Volvo has worked hard to overcome this problem, and surprisingly the Polestar doesn't understeer wildly, as physics suggests it should. It's benign, but uninspiring.

The steering doesn't help. It has never been a Volvo strong point, but here it feels out of character with the ability of the driveline. It's doughy and slow, with a tendency to weight up oddly, and with this rubber, follow the road surface. It would have benefited from a little of Polestar's racing expertise.

The engine itself delivers strong performance and the throttle is very direct. Despite this, if you are at the wrong place on the rev range, power delivery can fall in a hole. Sometimes this is no more than momentary turbo lag, as the air pump catches up with the engine speed. But I wondered whether the transmission had been retuned for the extra power because on a few occasions the two were singing from different hymn sheets.

VERDICT

One omission here is paddle-shifters. If you want to self-shift, it's by the gear lever. Some of the changes make things worse. Those thin tyres mean a nobbly ride and the wheels thump down hard into potholes. Over many surfaces, there's too much road roar. The tuned S60 is respectably rapid, but the price seems hefty.

Volvo S60 Polestar

Price: From $82,990
Engine: 3.0-litre 6-cyl turbocharged 242kW/480Nm
Transmission: 6-speed automatic, all-wheel drive
Thirst: 10.2L/100km; 243g Co2 per km