Long-overdue update - 6,000 miles

I haven't posted in a while because, frankly, the V60 has been steadily doing its thing with hardly an issue. It's been an enjoyable, relaxing car. I can't really think of any new quirks or issues that have come up, but I figured it's time to share my thoughts now that the "honeymoon" phase of new car ownership is over.

Comfort remains exceptional. Road noise is reasonable, although I wish it was a little quieter overall (it's certainly nothing objectionable). The seats are likely some of the best in the business. A family member recently bought a 2018 BMW 530e and the standard thrones in that car are far less comfortable than the lowly Volvo's chairs. I haven't taken it for incredibly long drives, but it's a perfect companion for 4+ hour stints behind the wheel.

Fuel economy has been surprisingly strong, to the point where I don't think the 2.0L is worthwhile given its penchant for premium gasoline which is nearly 20% more expensive in these parts. It's warm now, so I had expected an uptick in mileage. Overall I'm averaging around 25 mpg with my best tank at 26.6 mpg. Volvo's estimate of 29 mpg on the highway is probably only achievable at 60-65 mph - I've never come close.

I installed the Curt model 12066 1.25" trailer hitch for mounting a bike carrier. Overall installation was quite easy but more involved than simply bolting the thing on. The rear bumper cover and bumper bar has to be removed, and the process takes two people and about 2-3 hours of time. My only extremely minor complaint is that the hitch mounts behind the bumper bar, and this causes the bar to be just slightly more protuberant. The bar pushes out against the bumper cover because the clearances are quite tight. This means that I needed to manhandle, stretch, and cajole the cover to snap back into place. There is a very minor change in how the cover fits, leading to a slightly uneven panel gap. It's no big deal for me, but YMMV. Volvo needs to come out with a first party solution for this, but they would probably charge an insane amount of money for it. My local dealer quoted ~$300 for a V60CC part, and 2-3 hours of labor at $100/hr. Ouch!

Since the weather is so nice, I've been taking the Miata on more road trips, including one long, lovely journey up to Quebec City with a stay at the famous Chateau Frontenac. I missed the comfort of the Volvo but the weather was too good not to drive top-down. Among other creature comforts, the Miata doesn't have cruise control, which is something you completely take for granted until you have to drive without it.

I did take the Volvo to Montreal a few weeks ago for the Grand Prix and enjoyed the drive immensely. It's just a fantastic car to soak up a few hundred miles and arrive at the other end feeling fresh. The V60 is a good city car as well, with a reasonable turning radius, well weighted electro-hydraulic steering, and excellent visibility. Parallel parking is super easy with the rear view camera and the ability to flip down the passenger side mirror by holding the "R" mirror button. My favorite driver Valtteri Bottas did a fine job, coming in second place behind the legend Lewis Hamilton.

So those are my thoughts at 6,000 miles. The V60 is an old car, to be sure. Its platform dates back to the early 2010s but it remains a fantastic choice for a daily driver and road trip car. The 2.5 L engine sounds good and delivers solid gas mileage on (this is important!) 87 octane gasoline. The seats are wonderful and the entire car delivers a sense of old-school solidity that makes it very, very satisfying to drive.

Fuel economy - premium versus regular

If you look on the interwebs you'll find all kinds of hyperbole and controversy surrounding the simple topic of using premium gasoline versus regular. Inevitably someone will bring up the notion that "if you can't afford an extra $5 per tank, you shouldn't be driving the car!" as if throwing money away is somehow irrelevant. I've always been a little skeptical about claims of premium fuel superiority. My 2006 NC Miata with a naturally aspirated, and honestly pretty craptacular, engine actually recommends premium and I've never quite understood this.

Over the last 11 tanks of gasoline I've done a modest experiment. I ran my first 5 tanks of gas on 87 octane, then performed a "washout" tank of premium, and then ran my next 5 tanks on 91 or 93 octane (whichever was available).

Regular octane average over 5 tanks = 24.1 mpg
Premium octane average over 5 tanks = 23.2 mpg
Two-sided t-test P value = 0.37 (not statistically significant)

Weather during this test was extremely similar, with most days around or below 32 F and some random warm days thrown in. This was all on winter fuel which is normally 10% ethanol. I kept track of the city/highway balance for each tank and this was similar across both groups as well.

So there isn't really a difference in fuel economy. What about driving feel? There does seem to be a very subtle difference in smoothness and "eagerness" of the engine when using premium. However, this isn't blinded or controlled in any manner so I can't be confident that this is a real difference.

Although the extra couple of bucks per tank isn't a huge deal, I'm sticking with 87 octane for now. The small difference in driving feel just doesn't seem worth the extra money with no improvement in fuel economy.

Thoughts at 3500 miles

I've owned the V60 for two months and driven 3500 miles now. I was hoping to provide some initial thoughts at this point, for anyone who might be interested in buying one.

The reason I chose the V60 was due to its combination of comfort, practicality, relative reliability (compared to its German peers), and value. On those counts it has done very well.

Comfort
The front seats remain incredible. On the highway at 75 mph, road noise can be highly variable. With a decent road surface, the car is quiet and comfortable. However, on rougher pavement, a significant amount of road noise does still get transmitted into the cabin. This past month I've had the privilege of driving a 2017 BMW 530i and a 2017 Porsche Macan, and there remains a significant difference in NVH between the Volvo and those fancier cars. The road noise doesn't become excessive and I never need to turn up the radio more than 1 or 2 clicks to compensate, but it's not library-quiet like a Mercedes C300. I still feel that the BMW 3-series is unacceptably loud with significant wind noise (not to mention subpar materials) and the V60 easily bests it in this regard.

Practicality
Although the V60 is on the smaller side for a wagon, it hits a sweet spot for hauling capacity. The Golf Sportwagen is significantly larger, however (44 ft³ versus 66 ft³). Although there is a big difference between the two, in practice the V60 handles my needs without issue. In particular, I can fit my bulky Surly Crosscheck touring bike with full fenders and racks easily, and the low load floor is extremely helpful when manhandling this heavy bike into the back.

Reliability
Nothing to mention here. Even the oft-maligned infotainment system has been totally reliable. The funny skipping issue with the iPhone interface actually hasn't resurfaced.

Value
This is a interesting one. When I purchased my car ($30,900), the VW Golf Sportwagen 4Motion was just coming out onto the market, and prices hovered in the $25,500 range in my area for the VW. The VW is more modern and has a great interior in its own right, although the seats can't compare to the Volvo. The VW also comes in a manual transmission which is a great benefit. The Volvo is rated at 20/29 while the VW achieves 22/30 so the rated difference is small, although I suspect the VW will have better real-world mileage with its 170 hp 1.8 liter turbocharged engine (edit - the VW seems to have been revised upward to 22/32). In my area dealerships are not discounting the VW yet, but I suspect it will be only a matter of time before a manual Sportwagen 4Motion can be had for $22-23,000, and that makes the Volvo seem like a significantly poorer value. The more premium German competition such as the BMW 328i xDrive Sports Wagon and the Audi A4 Allroad remain much pricier, and Mercedes is still M.I.A. in this market segment.

Nitpicks
I've really had very few nitpicks with this car. Gas mileage has been decent, but not mind-blowing. I certainly haven't approached the 29 mpg highway rating. My average still hovers around 23 mpg and premium fuel seems to have made zero difference in economy. I have a few more tanks to go, and I'll update this blog with my 87 vs 93 octane testing.

BLIS is a must-have on this vehicle. The B-pillars are simply too large and are positioned just behind my head in the 8 o'clock position, interfering with manual blind spot checks. That's a major problem in my book, because driver aids should never be required to make up for shortcomings of the car.

The navigation is effective, but its directions in busy urban areas can be incomplete. For example, in some cases it might tell you to turn right or exit in some distance, but fail to mention the road/exit name. In other cases, particularly with complex junctions, the rudimentary directions don't give you a good enough idea of which road to take. This is compounded by the fact that the "next turn" is displayed in a tiny corner of the screen and isn't visually evident at first glance.

Well, that's it! I hope my rambling thoughts are helpful to someone out there considering this car. I've been very pleased with it so far and I'm looking forward to more road trips as the weather warms up.

Blending right in

This is just the usual scene at our local grocery co-op. If you've got CSI enhance skills, you can even spot a V60CC in the back right corner and what looks to be an old 240 in the distance. I didn't even realize the 240 was there until I looked at the photo on my computer.

There are also 3 Subarus in this photo. See if you can find them all.

Winter tire users rejoice - no TPMS

I had a pleasant surprise with the V60 when I took delivery of the car and installed my winter wheel set. Like many New Englanders, I have a separate set of wheels with winter tires mounted, specifically Dunlop SP Winter Sport 3Ds. All of my previous cars have had a tire pressure monitoring  system (TPMS) in place. This is a nice little feature when driving with stock tires, but I typically don't waste my money on a separate set of sensors for winter. They can cost $30-50 per wheel, like these here. For 6 months out of the year, I would simply put up with the TPMS warning light on my dash.

No such warning light occurred after I installed my winter wheels and tires onto the V60. Curious to know why, I delved into the owner's manual and discovered the following:

The V60 can have a regular TPMS system, or the confusingly-named Tire Monitor (I'll call it TM for short). There's no outward clue on the car, to my knowledge, as to which system you have. How do you check? Go into the My Car menu --> Settings --> Car Settings. If you have an entry called Tire Pressure, sucks for you! You have TPMS and you must now suffer the warning light in wintertime, or pay out the nose for a separate set of sensors, or pay out the nose to have a tire shop swap your tires twice per year, or move to Florida, or crash and die on your all-season tires (and pay out the nose in medical/funeral bills). If you have an entry called Tire Monitoring, congrats! You have TM and you will suffer none of those indignities.

TM must be calibrated with the tires at their correct pressures to begin with. You can do this in the settings menu. It will then use the ABS sensors to track the rotational speed of the tires individually. If one tire becomes low, its diameter becomes smaller, and thus will rotate faster - the ABS system senses this, and warns the user that a tire might be low on pressure. It can determine which tire is low to some degree, but not with pinpoint accuracy, since it's indirectly measuring pressure.

The benefit of this whole thing is that cold-weather drivers who use TM don't have to suffer an annoying warning light on their dash for the entire winter. Or move to Florida. Thank goodness.

MPG update

I just completed my fifth tank at 87 octane.

Tank 1 - 26 mpg (90% highway)
Tank 2 - 21.2 mpg (50/50)
Tank 3 - 25.5 mpg (95% highway)
Tank 4 - 23.5 mpg (75% highway)
Tank 5 - 24.2 mpg (75% highway)

Average - 24.1 mpg. This is actually pretty good for a fairly heavy, powerful, AWD car in cold temperatures on winter gas. Apart from this past week of freakishly balmy weather, most of this driving has been in below-freezing temps. It's not much worse than the ~26 mpg I averaged in my Focus ST.

I absentmindedly put in 87 today, so I'll start the wash-out tank on 93 octane next, and then do five tanks at that level. Unfortunately for this test (fortunately for everything else) the weather is warming up much more rapidly than expected, so this comparison may not be completely fair. Also, a significant portion of tank 3 was in severe heavy snow and the AWD system was likely engaged more.

The car's own fuel economy meter is surprisingly accurate. After each fillup I've been zeroing out the meter, and typically it is only about 3% optimistic.

Raising the low beams

One of the worst things about the V60 has been the headlights. Consumer Reports actually gave the V60 headlights their worst possible rating, which I agree with. They are worse than both of my previous cars, the Ford Focus ST and Honda Fit. Even driving on a darkened road at 40 mph makes me feel uneasy - it would be hard to spot a sudden obstacle such as deer or severe potholes with these lights.

IIHS also gave the S60 and V60 halogens their worst rating. The halogens received a rating of "Poor", while the xenons received "Acceptable." Their scale runs from Poor -> Marginal -> Acceptable -> Good. Here are their comments about the halogen lamps:

Low beams: On the straightaway, visibility was inadequate on both sides of the road. On curves, visibility was inadequate in all 4 tests. 

The low beams never exceeded glare limits.

High beams: On the straightaway, visibility was good on the right side of the road and fair on the left side. On curves, visibility was inadequate in all 4 tests.

It's interesting to note that many of the V60 and S60's peers also receive subpar ratings. For the Mercedes C300, for example, both the base halogen and upgraded LED headlights receive "Poor" ratings. The BMW 3-series halogens and mid-level LEDs both receive a "Poor" rating, while the highest trim Lighting Package LEDs receive a "Acceptable" rating. The 2017 Audi A4 does better, earning "Marginal" and "Acceptable" ratings on their base and upgraded models, respectively.

I began researching ways to improve the situation soon after discovering this limitation. Sylvania and several other companies produce higher performance halogen bulbs that are reportedly whiter, although I've read mixed things about whether they actually improve illumination distance.

The V60 headlights are tuned oddly from the factory. They point more downward than most cars, perhaps to avoid blinding other road-users. Luckily, Volvo has made it extremely easy to adjust the level of the beam.

Here are the low beams at stock setting:

Notice how at around 15 feet, the beams are already starting to hit the ground.

To adjust the beams, you need to pop the hood and locate the small plastic white nut on top of the headlamp unit:

The hole above the headlamp just allows a 6 mm socket to fit through. Turning the nut counter-clockwise raises the beam, and clockwise lowers it. My initial adjustment turned out to be too high:

I went for a brief drive and it felt like the beams were shining off into the woods, rather than onto the road. Another quick adjustment later, and...

Much improved! The brightness of the lamps remains a little unsatisfying, but driving at night feels far safer. I tested my usual roads at my usual speed of 40 mph and felt comfortable driving on low beams. They don't seem to be high enough to cause issues for oncoming drivers but I can certainly adjust them downward if people flash at me. Later on I might still consider upgrading the bulbs, but for now this seems to be a good solution.

Thoughts on BLIS

I purchased my V60 in Hartford, CT. If you've ever been there, you've probably experienced the joys of its highway system. Connecticut drivers are prone to dallying in the left lane even at baseline, but I-84 through Hartford accentuates this highly annoying tendency by employing a large number of left exits. To make things worse, I-84 curves through the city, and drivers seem to stomp on their brakes whenever they sense even the tiniest bit of lateral g-force. The result? About 7 miles of absolute fucking chaos.

I've always tended to pooh-pooh driver aids. My Honda Fit didn't even have traction control (and with 109 raging horsepower, maybe it didn't need it) and my Ford Focus ST had traction control but nothing else. In spite of my grumpy-old-man attitude, I immediately appreciated the extra security blanket afforded by Volvo's blind spot monitoring system (BLIS) as I drove away from the dealership. It works extremely well when cars are approaching from the left or right, giving you a subtle amber light in the corresponding A-pillar. If you flip on your turn signal as if you're about the change lanes into the car alongside you, the light changes from solid to blinking. It doesn't beep, unlike Mercedes and some other manufacturers' systems, and I appreciate the subtlety.

So BLIS works very well when a car is approaching you. However, it doesn't work well when you are passing others. As you pass and a car transitions into your blind spot, the system will light up about 75% of the time. The other 25% of the time the system does not react. It appears that this behavior might be related to closing speed - it seems that if I approach a car slowly, BLIS will activate, but if I'm passing more quickly, it is less likely to do so. There is some inconsistency and I've been unable to determine if a specific closing speed will or won't activate the system.

Here's an example of BLIS working properly (the blinking is due to the camera - the light is actually constant):

And here's an example of BLIS failing to light up:

I don't think this is a deal breaker. Presumably when you're overtaking, you are already aware that the car is in your blind spot. Volvo's manual itself states that the goals of BLIS are to react when:

• the vehicle is overtaken by other vehicles
• another vehicle is quickly approaching the vehicle.

The manual mentions nothing about when you are overtaking another car. I personally find BLIS to be quite helpful. Yet, this illustrates why manufacturers need to be very explicit and clear when explaining the function and limitations of driver aids. Volvo does a good job of explaining the limitations of City Safety in its manual but is far less detailed in its explanation of BLIS.

If you're in the market for a Volvo V60 or S60, should you get BLIS? I'd recommend it. You should be aware that driver aids can occasionally behave unpredictably, and you need to fight the urge to become complacent. Nevertheless, I find it reassuring to have a helpful yet unobtrusive safety system in congested, chaotic places like Hartford, Boston, New York, or other urban areas.

For further reading, check out this old but great article in Wired about the benefits and pitfalls of driver aid systems.

Road trip report - Montreal uphill both ways in a snowstorm

Montreal, Quebec is an easy 180 mile drive from home and my wife and I love to head there for quick getaways. Even in the dead of winter, the city is full of character, charm, and great food. This past weekend we booked the lovely Loews Hotel Vogue in downtown and packed up the V60 for a road trip.

Unfortunately, the weather was not cooperating this weekend. We were hit by a moderate snowstorm on the way up but the V60 was completely undeterred, as the roads remained fairly clear. The outbound trip took about 3 uneventful hours.

Architecture is not one of Montreal's strong suits

The food and drink makes up for the lack of architectural splendor

On Sunday, northern New England and southern Quebec was hit by a big Nor'easter dumping around 12-18 inches of snow. We had a late checkout scheduled at the hotel (4 PM!) but the snow was already coming down heavily, so we left Montreal around 2 PM. By then, the roads were already a slippery mess.

The highway out of Montreal

The V60 was the perfect vehicle for this. Despite incredibly nasty road conditions, the car was surefooted and confidence-inspiring. As we hit Vermont, the skies darkened and visibility plummeted. Snowplows seemed M.I.A. as large stretches of highway were inches-deep with wet, heavy snow.

Looking good, eh?

It took us about 5 hours to cover the 180 mile return journey including an extended probing screening at the border. I couldn't have asked for a better car for the treacherous drive. The front seats remained super supportive and I can see this being an outstanding car for long road trips. The only real issue remains the terrible, very bad headlights. Terrible! Sad! On dark country highways, there simply isn't enough illumination from the low beams to keep a safe view of the road ahead. I'd highly recommend checking out the xenon headlights if you are considering the V60 or S60.

The car is reporting 26.2 MPG for the journey on 87 octane, and the hand-calculated mileage is 25.5 MPG.

Afterthoughts

Minor nitpick: The front parking sensors get iced over too easily, leading to false-positive beeps in the middle of nowhere.

Minor victory: There is, it turns out, a way to adjust the defroster intensity! When you hit "max defrost" the system immediately turns the fans to hurricane force. In my past cars there was usually a "normal defrost" setting, but not in the Volvo, as I've previously mentioned. You can, however, manually turn the fan speed knob down to quiet the cacophony. Success!

Looks good, drives good

The V60 drives GREAT in the snow. As someone who has always driven FWD cars, having AWD makes a noticeable difference in confidence and capability. Also, something about a Volvo in the snow just looks... right.

Wipers don't lift up easily

We're getting a big snowstorm today in New England and typically people around here lift up their wipers when they park, to prevent snow from accumulating on the blades and freezing. I tried to do this and... I can't! The driver side wiper impacts the rear edge of the hood and doesn't raise up. The passenger side lifts up completely, but rests against the edge of the hood. Maybe Swedes don't lift up their wipers. Or maybe it's a silly design mistake. I think it's a silly design mistake. I would have expected better from a company based in snowy Scandinavia.

[Addendum] Thanks to commenter Jonathan, I've discovered the magic "service mode"!  I tried this feature and, in fact, it works like a charm. It lets you completely lift up the wipers.

Center stack ergonomics and iPhone connectivity

Ergonomics and infotainment are tough to evaluate properly when buying a car. When you test-drive the car, it can be hard to pair your phone, dig through every feature, and evaluate ease-of-use while the salesman is hovering nearby. Far too many reviewers gloss over usability issues and fail to provide specific comments or complaints. PC Magazine did review Sensus (Volvo's infotainment system) but focused on bits that no one will ever use, namely, the web browser and 3G connectivity.

One reason I started this blog was to provide some more in-depth evaluation of the V60. When it comes to controls/infotainment, what I really care about is:

- Is this system easy to use and ergonomic?
- Will I be distracted when I'm trying to use this system?
- Are there bugs or glitches?

I could spend days writing about each detail on this car, but I'll try to write only about center stack ergonomics and iPhone connectivity today.

Center Stack Ergonomics

When you first get into the V60 (or S60, or XC60), the center stack can be intimidating. It looks like a sea of homogeneous chicklet-sized buttons. After a short period of acclimation, the layout becomes fairly logical, and I vastly prefer buttons over touchscreens. When driving, it's far less distracting to push a button and have that immediate feedback, compared to swiping and scrolling through touchscreen menus - a task often made worse because you're outstretching your arm and the road may be bumpy. Furthermore, I think knobs are the best human-car interface for most tasks. It's precise, easy to grab without looking, easy to operate with gloves, and provides tactile feedback as you scroll through the detents. I don't know what Honda was thinking when they removed all knobs from their infotainment system and replaced it with a linear touch-based volume slider. Terrible decision.

There are some ergonomic oddities with this center stack, however. Think of some common tasks you might want to do:

"I want to synchronize the left and right climate zones." Sorry, you literally cannot do this. For unclear reason, there is no way to couple the left and right climate controls. If you've got both set to 67 F and you want to change to 70 F, you have to turn both wheels.

"I want to defrost the windshield, but I don't want max defrost." Every car I've driven in the past has two defrost settings - regular, and max. In the Volvo, you can only do max defrost. I don't know why this is not simply called defrost, but there you have it.

"I want to turn the climate control/HVAC completely off." In order to do this, you have to actually turn the small fan speed wheel (marked "Auto") counter-clockwise until the fans shut off. There is no Power button, strangely.

"I want to defrost the mirrors." Actually, the rear window defroster denoted by the square window button also turns on the mirror defrosters, according to the manual. Good to know.

Infotainment - iPhone Interface

As you can see above, Sensus displays menus in a list form and the user uses the right upper knob (labeled "Tune") to scroll through these menus. Embedded within that wheel are the contextual OK/Menu and Exit/Back buttons. 

If you have your iPhone connected via Lightning cable, you can browse your phone contents within Sensus. It's not immediately clear how to browse - In the default Now Playing screen, you have to actually turn the Tune knob at least one detent to enter the track list, and then click Back one or more times to get to the main menu shown above. It's an ergonomic misstep forced by making OK and Menu share a single contextual button.

Note: If you connect via Bluetooth streaming, you do not have any browsing capabilities. It streams what's on your phone only, and you must use the phone for all control such as browsing through tracks.

Within the submenus, scrolling is extremely intuitive with the right scroll wheel. It's very easy to do with peripheral vision and a minimum of attention. You can also use the thumbwheel on the right side of the steering wheel, although this is less ideal for scrolling through long lists. You can also search through your lists with the number pad. Just use it like you're typing on a dumbphone, albeit without T9 predictive capabilities (the young kiddos these days will scoff).

Bugs:
I had previously mentioned that occasionally the connection will fail and cause the audio to skip uncontrollably. This is remedied by going into a different source such as Radio, and then immediately switching back. This has happened three times in about 1000 miles of driving.

Another bug: the Podcast section is completely garbled. The podcasts are there, but they are listed under the wrong titles. For example, my 99% Invisible podcast episode "222 - Combat Hearing Loss" is showing up under This American Life. They seem to be completely mislabeled and there are two entries for 99% Invisible, both containing the wrong things. So, the Podcast organization is very, very broken.

That's it for today!

Road trip report - Beer run to Maine

I took the V60 on a short road trip this weekend to Maine Beer Company in Freeport, Maine, stopping off in Portland for food. Maine Beer Co. has been around since 2009, makes absolutely fantastic beers with minimalistic white labels (their stout, Mean Old Tom, was my favorite), and has the annoying motto "Do What's Right." We also wandered around the Portland Head Light, which has been in operation since 1791. Portland is chock-full of fantastic restaurants, breweries, and fancy third-wave coffee bars manned by mustachioed baristas, and should be a destination for any New England foodie. We had an incredible lunch at local institution Duckfat before proceeding to Freeport.

General Impressions
I'm happy to report that the V60 absolutely eats up highway miles without much to complain about. The ride was quiet with just a moderate thrum from the Dunlop winter tires, buns were kept comfortable and toasty by the amazing seats, and the base sound system was solid although not spectacular. My backseat passenger didn't have any complaints about the legroom over about 160 miles of driving, but I still wish Volvo had made the rear accommodations more spacious.

Infotainment
I did have two separate instances where the "iPod" link started to skip uncontrollably like a 1990's CD player. I needed to switch to a different source i.e. Radio, and then switch back to resume playback from my iPhone, which was hard-connected to the system via Lightning cable. The fact that it's still termed iPod is a clue to the age of Volvo's infotainment system, yet it works extremely well overall. The rightmost wheel on the center stack acts as a classic iPod clickwheel - turn to scroll through Artists, Albums, etc. and click the center buttons to select options ("OK" and "Back"). I think this system is vastly preferable to touchscreens that are both more distracting and less precise.

MPG
I achieved 26 mpg on 87-octane and drove 398 miles (~90% highway around 70 mph) before the low fuel warning came on. The EPA-estimated 29 mpg highway might be achievable in the warmer months. It's a decent performance for a heavy, AWD car in cold weather on winter fuel.

Afterthoughts
Minor victory: You can enter addresses into the navigation system while driving!!

Minor nitpick: The LCD display is totally underused while navigating. It gives you a giant arrow as you approach a turn, but doesn't provide any further info such as the street name or exit number. You have to look at the main screen for that.

Tank One MPG

I filled up for the first time yesterday, and the hand-calculated MPG was 21.5. This was almost 50/50 city/highway - 150 mile trip home after buying the car, nearly all local afterwards. The computer was reading 23.4 and EPA rating is 23. Overall it's not an impressive figure. I drove a lot of short distance trips in below-freezing weather this week, so we'll see if the numbers improve.

I filled up the car with 87 octane. The manual recommends 87 at a minimum, but states that higher octane fuel may improve performance. Pretty vague, if you ask me.

I'll run the next 5 tanks on 87, do a single tank "washout period" using 93, and then run 5 tanks on 93 to see if there's a difference. Of course, my driving conditions might vary so this isn't the perfect experiment. When I start my new job in July I'll have much better controlled conditions for a fuel economy test, because I'll be doing 106 miles per day in nearly pure highway driving.

Not so bright

My V60 didn't come with the optional Xenon lights. Turns out, the base headlights stink. I live in a rural area and I find myself using the high beams much more frequently, because the low beams are so weak. It's a bit hard to convey this with a photo but hopefully you can get an idea.

To date, the worst headlights I've experienced was a 2005 Prius (roughly as bright as the candles in a romantic restaurant). The Volvo isn't as bad as the Prius, but if I was driving on a dark road in Sweden, on the lookout for errant moose to avoid, these headlights would not be up to the task.

The taillights, on the other hand, are my shit.

The wheel is good

For me, a good steering wheel adds a huge amount to the overall driving experience. My Honda Fit was a pretty basic car, but had a leather-wrapped wheel that could have easily been in an Acura. The Focus ST had a decent leather wheel as well, though less supple than the Honda.

One of the first things that I noticed when I sat in the Volvo was the steering wheel. It's fantastic. The thickness and leather is perfect. There are funny protuberances at the 4 and 8 o'clock positions. The 2 and 10 o'clock bulges are... incredibly bulgy. It's a great wheel.

Note: my car did not come with the Climate Package that includes the heated wheel, a true first world problem.

Stray observation: Notice how the LCD gauge cluster only lights up the MPH indicator near the virtual needle? It's an odd design decision by Volvo. When I got into the car the other day, it was 15 F and I figured the LCD was malfunctioning in the cold. Only later did I realize it's a conscious decision, maybe to mimic the effect of a lighted needle in an analog cluster.

So how does a 28 year old guy wind up buying a Volvo wagon?

Let me give you some background info. My first car was a tastelessly modified orange Honda Fit. My second car was a Ford Focus ST in Tangerine Scream. So how did I wind up with a 2016 Volvo V60?

When I started the search to replace my Ford months ago, Volvo wasn't even on my radar. Maybe deep down in my subconscious I knew they still existed, but they didn't seem relevant to me in any way. I had a very specific set of skills needs. I'm starting a job this summer that requires a 53 mile rural highway commute each way. I've always been a guy who wanted to live close to work, and I bike when I can, but life intervened and so here I am. My new car needed to be quiet and comfortable...  which the Ford Focus is decidedly not!  

I was also looking for AWD. I've been a massive proponent of snow tires and have gone through many New England winters with my FWD Honda and Ford, but after driving my wife's Subaru Crosstrek with snow tires in a snowstorm, I decided to step up to AWD. In my logical brain I've told myself repeatedly that snow tires + FWD handles and stops equally as well as AWD. With that said, I was surprised by how much more confidence I had in the Subaru, so I decided to finally join the AWD bandwagon.

Oh, and regarding fun - last summer I bought a 2006 Miata, something I've always wanted. Not only is it an absolutely brilliant car, but it also meant I could prioritize comfort more in my daily driver.

One of the biggest surprises in my car search was how much my opinions differed from car journalist opinions. That's actually what motivated me to start this blog. I was interested in fun, but also refinement and practicality - these are rarely touched upon in your average car magazine article.

So here's what I test drove, and how I wound up with the oddball Volvo choice, one of 3407 sold in 2016 in the US.

• 2014 Audi A4 Quattro - I rented this on a road trip down the Pacific Coast Highway. It was a car that seemed to everything well, yet left nearly no impression on me. It was a relatively dull drive, didn't feel particularly quick, and didn't leave me with a sense of luxury, sport, or, well, much of anything. Milquetoast. That's how I would describe it. I've known several people with severe reliability issues on their Audis, so basically this was out. The Audi felt like a fancy, potentially less reliable Toyota Camry. Yes, I know that Audi has improved dramatically in recent reliability ratings, but word of mouth is still a big influence.
• 2014 BMW 320i xDrive - I wanted so much to enjoy this car. Alas, where to begin. The interior looked and felt cheap. The drivetrain, benchmark of its class, was adequately powerful and stunningly efficient (at least per EPA claims) but made an awful racket. The seats were flat and the Sensatec didn't feel as good as Mercedes' MB-Tex. Freeway noise levels were surprisingly intrusive for a luxury car, particularly wind noise. Both my wife and I were unimpressed.
• 2015 Mercedes E300 4Matic - Gorgeous exterior and interior, but lacked the sense of solidity that I might have expected from Mercedes. Closing the door didn't give me the sense of Teutonic gravitas that I was looking for. That wasn't necessarily a deal-breaker, however. The deal-breaker was COMAND. This system is utterly indecipherable, and I'm generally obsessed and very facile with tech!
• 2017 Honda CR-V - I was disappointed by this car industry darling. Nearly every auto publication has given it glowing reviews and I went in expecting so much more. The interior looks fabulous from 5 feet away, but then you get closer and - Mother Of God. The dashboard is covered in (bad) fake leather with fake stitching. This is unforgivable. There is bad fake wood to make matters worse. Auto publications have been writing that its NVH is improved, but compared to what? It sounded like a tin can on the highway. The infotainment system graphics and layout looked like one of my college programming projects. It wasn't for me.
• 2017 Subaru Forester - If you ask Consumer Reports what car to get, they will tell you "Subaru Forester." Here in New England, car buyers have heeded their words - nearly every 4th car seems to be a Forester. I test drove a bare bones manual transmission model. On one hand the sheer practicality of this car was seriously impressive. The interior is massive and the windshield view feels like a school bus. On the other hand, the Forester's interior is rather basic, it feels underpowered, and it lacked the highway cruising ability that I was looking for. The shifter was vague, and frankly, I'd recommend just getting the CVT.
• 2017 Subaru Impreza - If every 4th car in New England is a Forester, then another 1/4 of our cars are Imprezas or Crosstreks. I test drove a well equipped Impreza Premium. This was another case of auto-journalists-say-one-thing, reality-turns-out-otherwise. I was eagerly anticipating the new Impreza because it was supposed to have significantly improved NVH characteristics. It did not. It was loud and uncomfortable. The front seats gave me a backache within a few minutes, a problem shared with my wife's 2015 Crosstrek. Subaru has some kind of overly aggressive lumbar bolstering that is nonadjustable. The engine struggled to get it up to speed. Pros? The Eyesight system was very impressive and comprehensive, particularly at this price point. And let's face it, the Impreza is an incredible value in its lower-equipped forms around $20,000.
• 2017 Volkswagen Golf Sportwagen 4Motion - I was actually very impressed by the Golf. The exterior is clean and will age gracefully like most VWs. The interior felt top-notch, although the seats could be better. NVH was reasonable and power from the turbocharged 1.8 liter motor felt more than adequate. The DSG transmission felt quick-witted. I seemed to like everything about this car, and yet I just didn't connect with it. Reliability fears didn't help. I decided to pass.

After driving the above cars, I felt like I had a daunting task still ahead of me. I hadn't even narrowed down what type of car I wanted! I certainly preferred a wagon, but the realities of the US market means small SUVs and sedans are far more abundant. I struggled with whether I should return to the Subaru dealership and test drive an Outback, but my local dealership is rather slow and I didn't feel like spending more time there.

A few weeks ago I was idly watching YouTube car videos and came across the fantastic Motor Trend review of a Volvo V60 Polestar. It dawned on me - Volvo! Volvo makes cars other than the XC90! I browsed around and discovered that the Volvo dealer two miles from my house had a lightly used 2016 V60 T5 AWD in stock. I didn't go into the test drive with any expectations of liking the car, but I wound up liking it a great deal. Some thoughts below:

• Exterior - Tasteful, sober, and restrained, with the boomerang-shaped taillight cluster providing a nice bit of exuberance. The V60 is a fantastic Q-ship in its powerful T6 R-Design and Polestar forms.
• Interior - Inside, the V60 is gorgeous, versatile, and the front seats are unbelievably comfortable. Materials seem excellent. The rear seat is comically small, however.
• Build Quality - This car feels very well built. Volvo has managed to make their aging S/V60 platform feel more solid than Mercedes or BMW, at least in my humble opinion. The doors feel like they're carved from stone and the car rides with a pleasing sense of substantialness.
• Performance - I found the V60 to be surprisingly peppy with its 250 hp, 266 lb-ft turbocharged 5-cylinder engine. The 6-speed automatic transmission isn't as seamless as BMW's ZF 8 speed unit, but goes about its business efficiently and doesn't call much attention to itself. Handling is fairly flat on sweeping curves. The steering is electro-hydraulic, offering more feedback than most of the other cars I test drove.
  
  With that said, this is not a car you drive with your hair on fire. Apart from performance numbers, the impression I had of this car's drivetrain was a general sense of relaxation. I tend to have a light right foot, and in regular driving the car rides its broad torque curve at low revs, barely cresting 3000 rpm on many local drives. The engine makes a pleasant grooooan that doesn't sound quite as refined as a Toyota/Lexus V6 or a BMW I6, yet sounds markedly better than most of the 2.0Ts in the other luxury cars I drove.
  
  Fuel economy is rated at a disappointing 20 city / 29 highway, probably attributed to the older drivetrain. This is ameliorated significantly because it only requires 87 octane, whereas many cars in its class require premium (~15% more expensive where I live). I'll update this blog once I have more data on real world mileage - published reports of MPG on this vehicle are a little hard to find, likely due to its low sales numbers.
• NVH/Comfort - The quietest cars I've ever driven remain my father's 1999 Toyota Solara and a 1998 Lexus LS400 that I briefly considered purchasing a few years ago. The Volvo isn't quite at those benchmarks. It is, however, subjectively similar to the 2001 BMW 525i that my father later owned. There is a hint of wind and road noise at 75 mph, but the din is relatively refined and doesn't grate or cause fatigue. It seemed markedly better than the BMW 3-Series, similar to the Audi (B8 generation), and not quite as good as the Mercedes C-Class. Of course, I drove all of these cars in different contexts so these are subjective impressions only. The ride is slightly stiff but not objectionable at all, and markedly better with 17" wheels compared to 18".
• Infotainment/Tech - The base radio sound quality is decent and helped by the generally good isolation of the car. The infotainment unit is not a touchscreen. Instead, it's operated through two knobs on the dashboard. Operation is intuitive and responsive. BLIS (Blind Spot Information System) provides blind spot monitoring. The parking sensors and back-up camera are useful although the camera quality is muddy.
• Value - This is a big one. For my budget, I could get a new or nearly-new V60, or a CPO German luxury sedan with 20-30,000 miles. Furthermore, Volvo's options are much more reasonable and inclusive than the penny-pinching Germans. It's borderline insulting to get a car with Bluetooth phone connectivity, and then have to pay extra for streaming audio. Incredible.

Car buying is mostly objective, but it's also very emotional. Sometimes a car just fits. After a couple of test drives, I realized that I found my next car.

Objectively, I liked most aspects of the V60 more than its German competition, with some minor exceptions (I'd pretty much ruled out the Japanese cars). BMW clearly has it beat in terms of handling, suspension compliance, and fuel efficiency. Mercedes has more visual appeal, outside and in, although it's a bit over-styled for my tastes. The V60 just seemed to fit me. It fits me physically, in the sense that the seats are absolutely amazing and ergonomics are excellent. It fits my needs - the Volvo seems to be perfectly designed for my long highway commute and periodic road trips. It covers highway miles with comfort and serenity, and has enough passing power to dispatch left lane pirates. It fits my budget. It also fits my style as a nerdy guy who generally avoids flashy things.

The car near my house sold quickly, but I managed to track down a similarly equipped 2016 model with just 5,000 miles on it in Connecticut. One week and a several thousand dollar down payment later, and the car is mine the bank's!! I look forward to updating this blog with my random thoughts and hopefully lots of road trip photos in both my new V60 and my old Miata, plus whatever else might wander into my garage in the future.