Volvo S80 flexifuel

what_car

my brother is considering changing to an S80 2.0 volvo flexifuel, new car,
the spec is SE with leather and the usual SE stuff. its costing a little over
€42k for the new car..

does anyone have any info on the 2.0 flexifuel from volvo? whats the fuel consumption like? dealer says fuel is 20c cheaper than petrol.


he is currently driving a mazda 6 2.0 petrol manual...

dealer quoted extra urban run at 6.5L/100km about : 43mpg

and combined : 33mpg.

the engine is 145 bhp..

my next question would he find it more expensive to run than his current mazda 6.. and are these figures quoted by dealer accurate?

he was told that at 10,000km it needs a service and every 20,000km after that..

does anyone have any realworld experience of the volvo 2.0 flexifuel? the CO2 rating is 199g

how is this car considering that it is marketed as a green machine affected by the new vrt changes?


cheers

JHMEG

It's marketed as green because it can run on E85, which is 85% alcohol. Maxol sell E85 at a few petrol stations in Dublin.

The alcohol in E85 here is a by product of some dairy process and comes from a factory in Cork. As far as I know there is CO2 produced by that process, so it's not green really at all, tho it does have the benefit of not being imported.

CO2 emissions at 199g are average for a 2.0L. On E85 the car's performance will be better than on petrol, but the economy will be worse. From what I can see the reduced economy is equivalent roughly to the reduced price, so I don't think there are any savings to be made fuel-wise, for now anyway.

Of course it does qualify for the 50% reduction in VRT before July. According to E92's spreadsheet it'll be €9,000 dearer:eek: from July 1st.

what_car

JHMEG wrote: »

It's marketed as green because it can run on E85, which is 85% alcohol. Maxol sell E85 at a few petrol stations in Dublin.

The alcohol in E85 here is a by product of some dairy process and comes from a factory in Cork. As far as I know there is CO2 produced by that process, so it's not green really at all, tho it does have the benefit of not being imported.

CO2 emissions at 199g are average for a 2.0L. On E85 the car's performance will be better than on petrol, but the economy will be worse. From what I can see the reduced economy is equivalent roughly to the reduced price, so I don't think there are any savings to be made fuel-wise, for now anyway.

Of course it does qualify for the 50% reduction in VRT before July. According to E92's spreadsheet it'll be €9,000 dearer:eek: from July 1st.

i was advising him to go diesel, but the spec of the car and size, is attractive at that price.. however i think that the fuel economyfigures in the brochure are very optimistic for the s80 flex.

i was advising him to get v50 SE lux 2.0D which is about 40k
but for a few grand more, he gets the top of the range in volvo the s80
se spec.....

as the flexifuel engines are so new, its hard to get info from someone that actually owns one and can give first hand info..

leincar

The fuel economy figures are not great, so, he would want to keep the car for no more then 2 years. A relative of mine bought the Saab 9-5 biofuel(I know,I know) and it's drinking fuel. He also has a problem of getting biofuel outside the Dublin region. If he can stretch to the Volvo D-5 he may be better off. I took one for a test and fell in lust with it. Unfortunately the budget wouldn't stretch that far.

what_car

leincar wrote: »

The fuel economy figures are not great, so, he would want to keep the car for no more then 2 years. A relative of mine bought the Saab 9-5 biofuel(I know,I know) and it's drinking fuel. He also has a problem of getting biofuel outside the Dublin region. If he can stretch to the Volvo D-5 he may be better off. I took one for a test and fell in lust with it. Unfortunately the budget wouldn't stretch that far.

would it run better on ordinary petrol? 95 unleaded?
would mpg be better than the e85?

unkel

€42k is very cheap for a car like that. But S80s suffer from bad depreciation, so if he wants to sell it on in a few years time, he'll have a problem

And what JHMEG said...

E92

I have my doubts about a 143 bhp petrol being able to do the business performance wise in a car that weighs over 1.5 tonnes. I'd imagine it seriously struggles to haul that car around(the 0-100 time of 11 seconds is suspicion enough).

For the 2.0 SE, you'd be talking about around a €9.7k rise after July in price, though you will get a 2.5k rebate, so that brings it down to €7.2k, so still an awful lot. Under my VRT spreadsheet, the diesel SE could be around the €47k mark in July, as opposed to €42k for the petrol model now.

5k is an awful lot to be spending just so you can have a car that will cost €430 to tax in July, compared to €590 for the 2.0F now(it will be €1,000 from July).

If someone does decide on an S80 after July, then they should really go and get the D5 engine. I don't think bad and all as the 2.0 petrol is likely to be, that you can justify 5k more for a car with even less power(though a lot more torque) than the petrol one costs now. No VRT or tax penalty for the D5 even though it's a bigger engine, more power, not a lot of a fuel consumption penalty, and presumably better refinement because of the 5 cylinders.

leincar

what_car wrote: »

would it run better on ordinary petrol? 95 unleaded?
would mpg be better than the e85?

The performance will probably be better. It is on the Saab 9-5. The MPG if the Saab is anything to go on will be the same.

what_car

E92 wrote: »

I have my doubts about a 143 bhp petrol being able to do the business performance wise in a car that weighs over 1.5 tonnes. I'd imagine it seriously struggles to haul that car around(the 0-100 time of 11 seconds is suspicion enough).

For the 2.0 SE, you'd be talking about around a €9.7k rise after July in price, though you will get a 2.5k rebate, so that brings it down to €7.2k, so still an awful lot. Under my VRT spreadsheet, the diesel SE could be around the €47k mark in July, as opposed to €42k for the petrol model now.

5k is an awful lot to be spending just so you can have a car that will cost €430 to tax in July, compared to €590 for the 2.0F now(it will be €1,000 from July).

If someone does decide on an S80 after July, then they should really go and get the D5 engine. I don't think bad and all as the 2.0 petrol is likely to be, that you can justify 5k more for a car with even less power(though a lot more torque) than the petrol one costs now. No VRT or tax penalty for the D5 even though it's a bigger engine, more power, not a lot of a fuel consumption penalty, and presumably better refinement because of the 5 cylinders.

i get the impression that the s80 2.0Flex will be a dog on fuel. but with limited information its hard to get the real life info.. the book figures i posted earlier are i would imagine very optimisitc at best.

5k extra for a diesel one post july seems like it might be better to wait..
he is anxious to get his new motor, told him to do more homework on the figures re mpg

Panda Moanium

The flexifuel S80 and V70 do appear to be particularly good value at the present. You can get a base spec S80 from around €38.5k which is very cheap for an executive class car.

I haven't driven the 2 litre flexifuel versions but testing a 1.8F S40 a while back the cost of running on biofuel more or less worked out the same as for petrol, i.e. the inferior fuel consumption was compensated for by the cheaper price at the pump. Haven't got the actual figures to hand but compared to Saab who offer higher horsepower and performance with biofuel, Volvo quote the same horsepower whatever fuel the car is running on. Whether as a result of this or not, the difference in running costs with the Volvo isn't as great as with the Saab (I recently recorded 10.2 l/100 km (27.7 mpg) with a Saab 9-3 Biopower running on petrol, but could only manage 13.5 l/100km (20.9 mpg) on a tank of biopower).

Volvo don't tend to be the worst when it comes to exaggerating fuel consumption figures so probably expect to get somewhere between 9 and 10 litres per 100 km for the Flexifuel (28-31 mpg).

Expect adequate rather than rapid performance with the 2 litre engine in a car of this size. The D5 would be a better all-round vehicle (just don't choose the rather tardy auto box), however that is a very tempting price for the flexifuel.

what_car

Panda Moanium wrote: »

The flexifuel S80 and V70 do appear to be particularly good value at the present. You can get a base spec S80 from around €38.5k which is very cheap for an executive class car.

I haven't driven the 2 litre flexifuel versions but testing a 1.8F S40 a while back the cost of running on biofuel more or less worked out the same as for petrol, i.e. the inferior fuel consumption was compensated for by the cheaper price at the pump. Haven't got the actual figures to hand but compared to Saab who offer higher horsepower and performance with biofuel, Volvo quote the same horsepower whatever fuel the car is running on. Whether as a result of this or not, the difference in running costs with the Volvo isn't as great as with the Saab (I recently recorded 10.2 l/100 km (27.7 mpg) with a Saab 9-3 Biopower running on petrol, but could only manage 13.5 l/100km (20.9 mpg) on a tank of biopower).

Volvo don't tend to be the worst when it comes to exaggerating fuel consumption figures so probably expect to get somewhere between 9 and 10 litres per 100 km for the Flexifuel (28-31 mpg).

Expect adequate rather than rapid performance with the 2 litre engine in a car of this size. The D5 would be a better all-round vehicle (just don't choose the rather tardy auto box), however that is a very tempting price for the flexifuel.

yes it does seem good value, i am even tempted myself, i saw one the other day and they look great. i dont think thay they sell may S spec, think its mainly SE spec thats sold.

the S80 is a good lump... how are they reliability wise?

R.O.R

We had one in as a demo. I didn't get hold of it, one of the bosses kept it until it went back. His comments were that it was incredibly slow, but apart from that well specced and nice to drive. I'd say it would probably have quite a thirst as well.

The S80 is available with the 2.0d 140bhp engine (manual only like the FlexFuel), which may be a better bet post July.