New S40 model meets, and breaks, Volvo tradition
[[cutline stuff:
#1— From its sleek nose on back, the new Volvo S40 represents a styling departure from the tradition of boxy Volvo sedans.
#2— Volvo instrument panel and console show off Scandinavian attention to detail and technical sophistication.
#3— The leather seats in the test S40 Volvo seem to engulf occupant in form-fitting luxury.
#4— Volvo V40 is the latest — and possibly best-looking — of the recent resurgence in station wagons.
Way back in 1968, we bought a dark green Volvo 242, a 2-door sedan that richly exhibited all of Volvo’s traditional strongpoints — solid, safe, comfortable, durable and only stylish if you liked the boxy look. The car had its engine in front and the drive wheels at the rear, because Volvo was a proud Swedish company, and wouldn’t think of trying front-wheel drive, which was left for Saab, that other proud, Swedish company.
I remember one family trip where three of us, plus a tent, three sleeping bags, and all the luggage we needed, were packed into that Volvo for a trip across Western Canada, to Edmonton and Calgary, and a return trip down to Montana, and then home. I drove the last leg, from Great Falls, Mont., back to the Twin Cities, stopping only for food and fuel — an all-day trek that was only possible because those fantastic Volvo bucket seats would not contribute to fatigue in any way.
A lot of years, and a large transition in Volvo, have passed since then. Volvo has moved its models upscale, and the price has climbed along with it. When I first got a chance to drive Volvo’s all-new 40-series models, I admit I was anxious to try out the newest member of Volvo’s stable. When it came and didn’t have a price sticker, I answered somebody’s question with an estimate that it was a very nice car, and I would guess it had to be between $30,000 and $35,000, because, after all, it was a Volvo.
I was surprised and impressed with the V40, which is the station wagon version of the new model line. Particularly with the performance of the 1.9-liter turbocharged engine, and the handling, as well as the sleekly tapered lines which had replaced the old boxiness. And, it has front-wheel drive, as do all Volvos these days.
It wasn’t until I got to drive the S40 — the sedan version — that I was still more surprised and impressed, because that one did have a sticker with it, and the base price of the car is $22,900. That’s about $10,000 under my estimate.
True, you can load the car up on the option table, and the test car had a foul weather package and a sunroof/leather interior/fake woodgrain package that boosted the price by over $3,000 together, and other amenities raised the bottom line sticker to $28,897. But the point is, if you got the basic car and chose frugally from the options, you could indeed have a Volvo S40 for under $25,000.
So another problem new S40 or V40 owners might have is to simply accept neighbors’ compliments, and pretend you paid $40,000 for the car.
REVISED TRADITION
Back when car-makers were worried about styling and go-power, and hadn’t given any thought to safety, Volvo WAS thinking about safety. That old 242 model that debuted in 1967 was the first of a revolutionary new breed of safety designs from Volvo. Until that model, Volvo sedans were solid structural vehicles that were virtually unbendable, and indestructable.
In Scandinavian tradition, they were built solidly enough to withstand heavy blows of even nasty accidents, far ahead of almost every other car on the planet. But when the 242 series came out, Volvo engineers had changed 180 degrees. Instead of an impenetrable and unbreakable vehicle, the new cars were built in three sections, with the interior passenger compartment a crushproof cage, but with the front and rear ends designed to collapse upon impact, with that crushing designed to absorb energy from the impact and still keep the penetration from reaching the interior.
It was amazing, in retrospect. As we hurtle into model year 2000, there are a number of worldly manufacturers who boast about their all-new car designs having collapsible, energy-absorbing “crumple zones” front and rear. It’s great that they are so equipped, but it is 30 years after Volvo engineers went that route — by their own initiative, not by any government mandate.
Volvo always was extremely popular Up North, both because of the many Scandinavians in the region and because of area dealerships. There is no Up North Volvo dealer any more, so interested customers would have to head for the Twin Cities to find one. If they were so moved, they would find that the tradition of safety and durability remains, but the tradition of boxy styling, rear drive and homely-but-efficient appearance is completely gone.
The S40, and V40 wagon, have slim, contoured grilles, tapering gently to the windshield, and a roofline that curves instead of tracing a square, gracefully blending into the trunk line. Overall, it is the most stylish sedan Volvo has ever built, making another giant stride from the standard set impressively by the larger S70/V70.
The engine is a 1.9-liter 4-cylinder, with dual-overhead cams and 4-valves per cylinder, plus a neat little turbocharger that makes that 1.9 feel like twice as much displacement. The power comes on smoothly, with a 4-speed automatic, and button-controlled stability control, and winter startup devices to enhance the traction. The turbo makes the car accelerate briskly, but the comparatively small displacement allows you to get up to 30 miles per gallon with sedate driving.
INEXPENSIVE LUXURY
Luxury cars are proliferating throughout the industry these days, and even some modest cars are loaded to the roofline with luxury appointments. But even it you enjoy expensive luxury sedans, you owe it to yourself to open the S40 or V40 door and climb into the driver’s seat.
Your first thought is that you are almost encapsuled in that seat with its curved backrest and seat cushion cupping you snugly into that leather. At almost the same instant, you are instantly aware of a fabulous scent of high-quality leather. The seats are so wonderfully covered in such quality leather that you figure a dozen cows may have given their lives for that interior.
The instrument panel is all business, reflecting an almost stoic attention to technical detail that also is so…Swedish. There is woodgrain all over the doors, dashboard and console to complement the leather, but the difference is that the leather is real, and the woodgrain is plastic stuff. How very, very, unSwedish. Closer scrutiny reveals that the 40-series Volvos are assembled in Born, Netherlands, so we can blame the Dutch for the phony wood.
While the car looks low, sleek and much more compact than any Volvo in recent memory, it will house 6-footers front and rear with ease. In fact, these seats would encourage you to drive right past the office and head for Great Falls, which could be frustrating if the urge hit you every day.
Because its company is Swedish, Volvos have a clue about winters. The S40/V40 come equipped with heated outside mirrors, headlight washer-wipers, and the usual power windows and locks. The foul-weather package has stability assistance, heated seats, the headlight wiper-washer, and another package has the sunroof, leather and fake wood, and foglights and an audio upgrade with a CD player also came on the test car.
As for safety, the unit body construction includes high strength steel in thepassenger cage, side-impact protection plus airbags front and side for driver and front passenger, and Volvo’s whiplash protection system. That brought up another flashback to that 1968 model 242.
Driving home from downtown St. Paul one day, when my older son was young, he was standing in the back seat, leaning on the front backrests and looking out the front — we didn’t know enough to realize the importance of child seats, and we seemed to somehow survive with kids bouncing around freely in the rear. I stopped on wet pavement for a couple of cars at a stoplight, and in a glance at the mirror I saw a young hot-rodder coming too fast. I shouted to my son to brace himself, and the impact was a severe jolt, hurling us into the car ahead.
Neither of us was hurt, and after getting out to look at the damage, I noticed the bucket seat backrest was leaning much to far back. Turns out, that was another Volvo safety item from over 30 years ago — a backrest that dropped back at a controlled rate to offset any whiplash.
We can assume, I assume, that the fabulous seats in the new S40/V40 have improved on that tradition, too.
As for the wagon, I feel somewhat awkward in noting yet another revision in my personal choice of good-looking station wagons. I thought the Audi and the Subaru Legacy wagons were perhaps the best-looking station wagons I had ever seen. Then the new Saturn L-series wagon joined that group. But here I go again — the Volvo V40 with its stylish lines and expandable rear storage area also looks as good, or better, than a wagon should be expected to look.
There goes another tradition.
Low-priced Toyota Echo meets high-tech standards
[CUTLINES:
#1— The Toyota Echo is a model-year 2000 attempt to recapture the virtues of an inexpensive economy car with contemporary features and futuristic tecnology.
#2— Short in overall length, the Echo is 4 inches taller than a Metro and demonstrates great efficiency of interior and trunk room.
#3— The Echo interior is as efficient as its operation, with the center-mounted instrument cluster the biggest diversion. ]]]
So, you’re weary of all the hefty truck-like SUVs out there jamming up the roadways and guzzling all the gas. And you’ve had it with all the $30,000-plus sedans with their phony woodgrain inserts and plush creature comforts. What ever happened to those good-ol’ virtues, like economy, simple transportation, roominess, utility and inexpensive purchase price — can’t they be resurrected in concert with the current surge toward high-tech automotives?
OK, all you folks who line up as critics, the 2000 model year will be YOUR year, with several cars designed to plug directly into all of those factors. One of them — and Toyota hopes it will be the main one — is the new Toyota Echo. Think of it as an “echo” of the time when economy and usefulness were the maximum selling points of cars.
If looks are everything, the Echo has state-of-the-art styling touches, but it also is a little, well…different. A cynic might say weird. But in typical Toyota fashion, the Echo compromises a lot of things so that form will follow function.
The Echo is aimed primarily at younger buyers who are not among the zillions who seem to be unable to find enough mammoth SUVs and pickup trucks to satisfy their cravings for big and burly. It will cost only $11,095 for starters, and “starters” is a key word here. Folks just out of college and earning their first paychecks have been choosing between a few scattered inexpensive new cars or expensive cars that have come down near $10,000 as used cars. The Echo can make a strong case for being a top alternative to such new consumers.
I think, after a week-long test drive, that Toyota also may have a winner for those folks who have been buying bigger sedans and now have branched off to add an SUV or minivan or pickup to the family stable. Owning a gas-hungry SUV or pickup makes a lot more sense if it is reserved for heavy duty operation, and it can be reserved for such work if a family also has a second vehicle that is compact, eminently useful and extremely economical.
Let’s hear it for an Echo.
LEAN, BUT FUNKY
Toyota has taken over the top selling spot in the U.S. for cars. We’re not talking trucks, which currently dominate the market. But in just cars, the Toyota Camry is the No. 1 seller in the U.S. Toyota also is riding high in the SUV world, producing the compact RAV4, the steadfast 4Runner, and the large Land Cruiser, plus offering alternative upgraded SUVs under the Lexus names, with the RX300 and the LX470. Plus, Toyota has long made an impressive compact pickup truck and now has added the full-size Tundra and a very good minivan in the Sienna.
But Toyota also never has lost sight of the inexpensive end of the scale, where the Tercel once was among the dominant subcompacts and the Corolla still remains as a stalwart.
Covering all niches of the marketplace is tough to do, but Toyota is aiming for it, by bringing back the sporty Celica in all-new styling for 2000 and teasing us with the Prius as an alternative-energy entry about to hit the market.
But the Echo is already here, even if it has been lost a little by the flash and splash of the more profitable high-end models.
The first thing you notice about it is that it looks fairly big. And, from some angles, it is. It stands a couple of inches taller than some luxury sedans, in fact, with a height of 59.4 inches. But it also is stubby in overall length, where its 163.2 inches makes it shorter than a subcompact such as the Suzuki-built Chevrolet (formerly Geo) Metro, the car generally considered the smallest.
That somewhat odd configuration has meaning. Toyota has cheated on the frontal length, stretching that steeply sloped nose over the side-mounted engine, and chopping off the rear end abruptly. However, it has not compromised on usable room. The tallness gives the interior amazingly spacious headroom, and legroom also is surprising, even in the rear with the front seats in normal location for a 6-foot driver.
Maybe more surprising is that from the outside, it appears there can’t be much of any trunkroom, but the Echo has a large trunk, so large you want to walk back around the outside of the car wondering where that space could come from. Typically, the rear seats fold down to expand that storage area even more.
Inside, the seats on the test vehicle were covered with a sort-of 60s-ish geometric pattern of pastelness. The weirdest thing was that the instrument cluster was located in the upper middle of the dashboard, right there between the driver and front passenger seats. It was angled toward the driver, and it included only a speedometer, temperature and fuel gauges and a pattern of what we used to call “idiot lights.” No tachometer.
Some have said locating the intruments in the center means they aren’t a distraction to the driver. I’ve never found instruments to be a distraction; you need to be able to read them at a glance, and the more in line with your vision the better. It is dark when you look straight ahead driving the Echo at night, but it also requires a glance farther from the roadway to check the instruments.
More logically, the center placement of the angled instrument pod fits in with manufacturing expense. The Echo obviously is Toyota’s latest attempt at a true world car, and for Japan, Great Britain and other places where they drive on the other side of the road, right-hand steering vehicles will require only swinging the pod to a different angle.
‘ENGINE-EERING’
Making a small car, even an all-new small car, would be one thing, but tying it in with the latest, cutting-edge technology is what allows the Echo to shout from the mountaintops — as well as to get there efficiently.
That little side-mounted engine is a 4-cylinder, with dual overhead camshafts and 4 valves per cylinder, the typical things we have come to expect from Toyota, which is more than a decade beyond the archaic concept of pushrod-powered valvetrains. The Echo engine is only 1.5 liters in displacement (91 cubic inches), but it also has variable valve timing, something that Honda has been a leader in developing, but Toyota, BMW, Audi, Mercedes, Porsche, Nissan — the world’s car-building elite — have also been implementing.
The variable valve-timing allows a manufacturer to extract maximum power and also more complete burning of air-fuel mix for maximum fuel economy. So the Echo is adequately quick with 108 horsepower and 105 foot-pounds of torque, and also meets low-emission vehicle status for how cleanly it burns. The real-world translation for that is for owners to realize excellent fuel economy.
The 5-speed manual transmission version of the Echo will deliver 41 miles per gallon in strict highway driving, and 34 in the city. The test car I drove had a 4-speed automatic transmission, which obviously detracts a little from the performance end of such a small powerplant, but still delivered 34.2 miles per gallon in combined city-freeway driving, with the driver’s foot pushing it pretty hard.
Even with the automatic, acceleration is adequate, and the little beast will smoothly move right on up over 100 miles per hour, if there was any place to do that sort of thing. The automatic also has the latest computer-logic control, which means it will hold its shift points when you need more power for climbing hills, rather than upshifting and downshifting in the usual mini-car samba.
Front disc brakes are complemented by rear drums, which is not the ideal set-up, but it again is inexpensive from a manufacturing standpoint. The tires are 175/65 by 14-inch, which seems small and skinny, in perspective with the tall body of the car, but which makes sense from the standpoints of expense and fuel-economy (less wind resistance). However, I would enjoy driving an Echo with bigger wheels and low-profile tires, just for the obvious enhancements that would give handling and stability.
The test car’s 4-speed automatic was standard equipment, as are driver and passenger airbags, pretensioners with force limiters on the 3-point harnesses, side impact door beams, halogen headlights, under seat storage tray and various cubicles and stowage bins, and tilt steering wheel. At $11,095, it’s a cheap but worthy commuter.
The test car also had some impressive options added, such as a heavy duty battery, rear heater and rear window defogger, a sports body kit with side and fender molding panels, power steering and a package that includes air-conditioning and a 6-speaker audio upgrade with both a cassette and CD player. All that pushed the price tage up to $14,374, which is still inexpensive. And the upgraded audio system would make for the perfect diversion if you were ever caught in a heavy traffic jam with nothing else to think about but your 34 miles per gallon, those weird-pattern seats, and where did the instruments go?
New Sable has simpler, cleaner lines for 2000
It seems as though it gets increasingly difficult to design a sedan that is distinctive in any way from the rest of the mainstream. At Ford Motor Company, where designers have had no difficulty in coming up with distinctively different styling, the new Taurus and Sable for 2000 are somewhat improved by being LESS distinctive and different.
Tauruses are a bit scarce these days, and may not be around for another month or so, but I was able to latch on to a new Sable, which is identical under the skin, and very similar on the outside as well. Well-equipped with options, we can estimate the sticker price to be about $23,000, which should put the car right in the midst of the segment.
I probably had heard the word “ovoid” a time or two before 1995, which was the year that Ford Motor Company brought out the second generation Ford Taurus and Mercury Sable. In its first generation, Ford had introduced a controversial new design, with a rounded aerodynamic shape that only Audi had tried with its full-sized sedan. That first Taurus/Sable was a surprising success, and it zoomed to the top of the sales charts.
For several years running, the Taurus was the top-selling single car in the U.S., although a large percentage of them were sold through program deals to fleets. Among the top challengers to Taurus sales were the Honda Accord and Toyota Camry, both of which continued to make technical advances and closed the gap. Along came the new, second-generation Taurus/Sable with those egg-shaped (ovoid) designs repeated everywhere — overall passenger compartment, grille, windshield, rear window, instrument cluster, console, headlights, taillights, and various other areas. It was the first time I can ever recall being genuinely tired of one design shape because of its exaggerated use in a single car.
It so happened that when Ford changed the design of the Taurus and Sable, Toyota and Honda were right on its tail in sales, but neither of them were involved in the lower-profit fleet programs. In the 1997 model year, however, Toyota decided to make a fleet program push, and the Camry became the top U.S. car, then repeated the title claim last year.
A lot of critics, and a lot of people at Ford, decided too-much-ovoid caused the demise of the technically sound Taurus and Sable sedans, perhaps overlooking the continually improved competition from Camry and Accord. So, after only three model years, the Taurus/Sable sedans have gotten a complete new changeover to generation three for the 2000 model year.
Whether the new cars can regain the company’s instensely sought hold on being the largest-selling car in the U.S. remains to be determined, and it may take most of the year 2000 before we get a clue. But the cars are all new, while top contenders Toyota Camry and Honda Accord are a year or two past their most recent changes, which could be an advantage for the Taurus/Sable duo.
As is often the case, the Mercury Sable gets a few tiny styling touches to differentiate it from the Ford Taurus, and a lot of buyers might find they prefer the Sable’s look.
The test car I drove was painted an attractive champagne-gold. The grille veers away from the everything-oval style of its predecessor by having diagonal slants outlining either side, and that diagonal parallels the inside edge of the large headlight lens. The rounded underside of the grille seems to sink into the upper edge of the bumper, copying a bit from the new Lincoln LS sedan’s front styling.
The large, horizontal air intake panel under the front bumper is flanked with foglights to complete a stylish and contemporary look.
From the side, the Sable looks a lot like its predecessor, which makes sense, because the doors are the same shape and design. The roofline is a bit higher and stretches a bit farther back than the car it replaces, increasing the front headroom by about an inch, and rear headroom by two inches. That’s important in a competitive area where several companies seem to have found the secret to gouging more space out of the same size and dimensions.
The rear of the roofline tapers down, almost BMW-ish, while the rear window has squared-off sides to replace the old oval look. The taillights simply wrap around to the trunk, looking very simple, but in this case simpler means classier compared to the curvy and rounded off look of the previous car.
WHERE YOU LIVE
The view from the driver’s seat is vastly better, if only because you don’t see that same old recurring shape. The instrument panel is simple but efficient, and the leather-covered steering wheel has four spokes, with cruise control switches on either side– on-off switches on the left, set-coast-resume within reach of your right thumb.
There is a lot of fake woodgrain trim on the dash and console, but the audio and air controls deserve special recognition.
After years of trying to make the tiniest buttons in creation, the new Sable has the radio-tape player mounted on top, with the air-heat controls underneath. I think that makes sense, simply because you tend to change the sound system around a lot, but you don’t alter the heat-air switches very often.
While the horizontal push-button set-up is familiar on the right side of the radio, the whole audio system has a large, round button on the left, simply to turn the thing on and off. And the six station preset buttons are appreciably larger than almost any other cars nowadays, and much larger than the previous Sable or Taurus, which required either teeny fingertips or multiple hits when you wanted just one.
The heat-air buttons are similarly large, but the previous Taurus had the simple, and preferable, round switches with the raised center rib, where you could reach, grab and turn up or down for more heat, without taking your eyes off the road.
Along with the in-dash radio and cassette player, there was a vertically stashed CD changer in the console on the test car. Push in on the front edge of the console, and a spring-loaded pair of cupholders will unfold for use.
One of the best features of the Sable and Taurus in its previous form has been exceptional crashworthiness. That occupant protection system has been carried over, and two-stage airbags — designed to inflate with less force for smaller passengers — should even improve on that status.
One of the neatest new features from Ford Motor Company is adjustable gas and brake pedals. You can electrically slide them toward your feet or away from them, which means shorter or taller folks can find the optimum distance for reach from the steering wheel, and then adjust the pedals up to 3 inches to reach your feet.
POWER REMAINS
Unchanged in the new Sable is the availablility of what sounds like an automotive joke. You can choose the base 3.0-liter V6, or the optional 3.0-liter V6. There is, of course, a world of difference. The basic pushrod V6 has had its horsepower increased by 10 to 155, and torque increased by 15 to 185 foot-pounds. The optional V6 is the Duratec that Ford builds in its Cleveland plant and is good enough to be sent to Europe for high-speed autobahn driving in cars such as the Mondeo.
In the Taurus, the 3.0 Duratec V6 turns out 200 horsepower and 200 foot-pounds of torque via its dual overhead camshafts and four valves per cylinder.
Curiously, Ford has softened the suspension settings to make the new Sable more compliant and less performance-oriented. To compensate, the new Sable SE had larger, 16-inch alloy wheels, and Ford apparently has put larger stabilizer bars on the front and rear. I found it still to be stable and good-handling, without the tar-strip-slapping of the older, firmer suspension.
The 4-speed automatic transmission, with the shift lever on the console, was smooth and precise, too. And the headlights were bright and well-aimed, with the foglights doing a good job of lighting up the low, wide area along the shoulders
Honda’s S2000 brings 9,000 RPMs to the real world
[[[[CUTLINE STUFF:
#1— The S2000 is either the Formula 1 car of sports cars, or the Honda of street-racers — which is to say, uncompromising high-tech excellence.
#2— The late-afternoon sun catches reflections of the S2000’s urge for going, which is barely disguised, even when parked.
#3— The electronic tachometer arches over the digital speedometer and runs eagerly all the way to an astounding 9,000 RPM redline as the focal point of a functional interior, including a push-button starter switch.
#4— Producing 240 horsepower out of 2.0 liters gives the S2000 engine the highest power output per liter of any production engine ever built in the world.
If you’re late to the party in the automotive world, you’d better have something special to offer, or else you needn’t bother showing up. Nobody knows that axiom better than Honda.
So when Honda, which is usually on the leading edge of technological advancements, decided to come out with a legitimate sports car with a real-world price tag, it had some formidible competition awaiting — the BMW Z3, the Porsche Boxster, the Mercedes SLK, even the newest Corvette, and the Audi TT. But Honda, which has flexed its technical wizardry at Formula 1 and CART race tracks all over the world, had measured its opposition, and has it covered.
The S2000 is one of the most incredible vehicles ever built. At an estimated price of just over $30,000, the S2000 spots the Z3 that menacing look; it spots the Boxster that smooth, overall refinement; it spots the Mercedes SLK all that hideaway-hardtop gimmickry; it spots the Corvette the all-out blasting power of 5.7 liters; and it spots Audi the TT’s artful retro look and the obvious advantage of all-wheel drive. But anyone, driving any of those cars, will stop in their tracks at the sight of a Honda S2000.
You could make the case that the S2000 is the clearcut choice, for several reasons. Among them is the price — just a tick over $30,000; the stunning looks; the economy (I got 24.2 miles per gallon running the revs up, up and away); and the sheer driving excitement that is so spectacular it could be included in the warranty. Scarcity is another consideration. Honda is only sending 5,000 of these things to showrooms, and dealers are very likely going to tack on substantial premiums before parting with one.
After seeing a prototype of the car on a pedestal at the Detroit International Auto Show last January, I’ve read much about it, and I’ve seen about a hundred photos. None of those photos did the car justice. In most photos, the front end looks blunt, instead of sleek. In real life, it is sleeker than the aforementioned competition, and the view from the front corner shows a remarkably chiseled shape, tapering back severely from the headlight lenses that flank the large grille opening under the bumper-nose. The angle flares dramatically over the front wheelwells before blending in artfully with the side contours. From the rear, the S2000 is more efficient than dramatic, but those large silver tailpipes show a true dual exhaust.
When I finally got my mitts on one, it was already December, which means we were lucky that there wasn’t snow on the ground, and ice. Because I would have driven it anyway, and its front-engine/rear-drive layout would undoubtedly have gained me a few sideways moments. The timing also meant it was foolhardy to flip the releases, hit the switch, and fold down the top — except for photographic reasons.
But the mind-blowing appeal of the S2000 came through no matter how chilly it was outside, and when I gave a friend a ride near the DECC, a quick burst on the throttle provided all sorts of simultaneous thrills, because the tires were cold and the power immediately sent the beast a bit sideways, but the amazing handling meant it was simple to catch and straighten out where a lesser car could have wound up embarrassingly crossed up.
THE ENGINE
Any true sports-car driver demands certain features from his choice of vehicles. It might have lots of power but it must have quickness and agility, which means great handling is first and foremost. It should be a 2-seater, and its seats should engulf you in a cockpit-like atmosphere.
The S2000 does all those things, but it also has an engine that can only be described as futuristic. It is a 2.0-liter 4-cylinder, for starters. It adds all of Honda’s race-technology tricks, such as dual-overhead camshafts, and four valves per cylinder that are delayed or advanced with the latest in variable valve timing, which Honda designates as VTEC, for variable timing and electronic control.
What makes this engine special is that it will rev high, which is not unusual for Honda’s best street-performance engines, in the NSX, the Prelude, or the Civic Si. But this one is off the scale. It revs up to a redline of 9,000. Think about that for a second. Tachometer redlines are not serious obstacles for cars with automatic transmissions, which shift well before those electronically-guarded limits. A redline of 6,000 is high, 6,500 is very high, and 7,000 is all but unheard of, even for sports cars.
If you revved a NASCAR Winston Cup V8 to 8,500, you would have a lot of shrapnel on your hands. True, a CART racer or a Formula 1 car might rev to 13,500, but those are strictly race-built jewels designed to run at maximums well beyond street concepts. But the S2000 revs, eagerly and almost anxiously with smoothness, right to redline. In the U.S., we are enthralled with the low rumble of pushrod V8s, or Harley Davidsons. But that low rumble is the sound of low-tech. The sound of high-tech is high, higher and highest, getting shrill at the upper limits.
Drive the car to takeoff in first, shift to second, and run it up to the redline and you will reach 65 miles per hour. That’s with the second of the S2000’s six speeds from an extremely precise manual gearbox. If you weren’t on such a fact-finding (wink-wink) mission, and you were shifting by ear, you would probably be shifting at 4,000 revs. And you’d still be impressed. I ran it up to 9,000 a few times, just for the sheer exhilaration of it.
That little 2.0-liter engine delivers 240 horsepower, which means it has the most power-per-liter of any engine made for a standard production car ever in the history of automotives. That horsepower peak is achieved at 8,300 RPMs — a figure that the competitors can’t even pretend to reach. It has only 153 foot-pounds of torque, peaking at 7,500 RPMs, and while that number has led to some criticism, I find it to be one of those numbers that is meaningless. How it goes is more important than any statistics, and the S2000 accelerates, corners and stops so swiftly you learn to appreciate being harnessed into such a secure bucket.
It’s a 2,780-pound car, and it will dash from 0-60 in a blink that measured 5.8 seconds when Car & Driver magazine tested it on a race course. In that test, the S2000 also had a top speed of 147 miles per hour, a 70-0 braking distance of a sudden 157 feet, and negotiated a high-speed lane change at 66.4 mph, which was a couple of miles per hour swifter than all its competitors.
That’s quicker than all but the BMW Z3 — IF you pick the “M” model of the Z3, which costs $12,000 or so more. The S2000 is priced to sell against the basic Z3, but it performs with, or outperforms, the swiftest of three Z3 varieties.
DRIVING KICKS
Climbing into the cockpit, you notice first that you turn the key on conventionally, but then you must push a large, red button on the left edge of the dash to start the engine. There is precious little room, in tiny cubicles here and there, and in a nice trunk that has a deep well to house more than it looks.
At first, you might think there is no audio system. But push the release on the little door, and you find a quite sophisticated unit, and, in a great move for a ragtop, you can turn it on and close the door, and anyone peeking into the thing might assume there is no audio system. The left side of the dash has several remote buttons, including a neat little toggle that is operated by a tongue that sticks out far enough so you can hit it with a finger up or down for volume without taking your hand completely off the steering wheel.
You have great forward visibility, but you also notice the unique dash, which has a digital speed readout, that is like the pot of gold under a rainbow arching over it, which is the electronic tachometer.
It is quick, and the steering is so quick, the frame so rigid, and the suspension so firm, that you can change lanes with the tiniest flip of your hands. The 6-speed manual shifter is ergonomically perfect. You shift it in tight, short throws that almost feel like therapy for carpal-tunnel syndrome.
The halogen headlights beamed through those sleek lense-covers have a perfectly flat cutoff, with brilliant light below and total darkness above. Driving at night, the suspension’s firmness conspires with those headlights so that every time you hit an irregularity, or even some tar-strips, the reflective freeway roadside signs appear to be strobe-lit.
You can hear the engine singing and you notice you’re cruising at 70 on the freeway at around 4,000 RPMs. At first, you think that’s high, but then you remember that the limit is 9,000! When you rev it past 6,000, you engage the VTEC changeover, which means the valvetrain responds to the electronic calling and the thrust is enhanced all the way up.
No question, the S2000 would be a handful on icy roadways, which makes it no worse than the Z3, the SLK or the Corvette in that category, but a bit behind the Porsche Boxster’s mid-engine design, and a large leap short of the Audi TT’s front-wheel drive or quattro all-wheel drive. It’s not intended to be a winter-beater anyhow.
Besides, when it’s dry, and you can let that engine sing up to regions above 6,000 RPMs, where no rival dares to go, you get the same thrill that otherwise might be reserved only for big-time race car drivers or jet fighter pilots. And there are a lot of us out there, judging by the number of other-car drivers who followed me off streets, highways and freeways to look over and talk over every detail of the S2000.
Cadillac’s Night Vision challenges even Mercedes
[[[[[CUTLINES:
#1 (combined overall shots)of both cars)— The Cadillac DeVille, left, and the Mercedes S-500 combine contemporary luxury with futuristic features that can astound an unsuspecting driver.
#2— The DeVille’s “NightVision” has an infrared camera aimed through the middle of the grille, and a display superimposed on the lower windshield that can show objects ahead long before they become visible in the headlights.
#3— The S-class Mercedes has a sophisticated navigation system in an interior cadorned with real leather and real wood — or, as an $8,500 option, oppulent light-brown leather and natural elm wood trim.
A couple of the cars that came into the 2000 model year with high hopes of challenging for the International Car of the Year award are the Mercedes S-class and the Cadillac DeVille. Both are excellent versions of contemporary luxury sedans, loaded with driver/rider features aimed at proving that people who can afford such cars will pay any price to get them.
In voting for car of the year, affordability is one of the various elements used in evaluation, and the price of the S-500 and the DeVille pretty much assured that neither can win the honor. However, that doesn’t mean that they won’t be enormously successful in the marketplace, or that they haven’t gone far, far into the realm of automotive fantasyland for features.
To begin with, both cars have powerful engines and supple but firm handling that can satisfy — no, overwhelm — their intended customers. The prices, however, are prohibitive, even at Christmastime. The Cadillac DeVille has a base price of $44,700, and an as-tested sticker of $51,735. That may seem like a lot, but only until you see the Mercedes sticker: Base price of the S-430 is $69,700 with an as-tested sticker of $71,915, and the full-boat S-500, with its bigger engine and more oppulent appointments starting at $77,850, and the test car I drove listing at $90,160.
CADILLAC DE VILLE
The redesigned Cadillac DeVille has taken on more of the Seville’s sleekness for 2000, but with a blunt front end treatment. It has a large interior, befitting its near-limousine history, and it has Cadillac’s NorthStar system, with a 4.6-liter V8, and its 32-valve, dual-overhead camshaft design, producing 300 horsepower.
A new steering system, constantly varying road-sensing suspension, StabiliTrak chassis with all-speed traction control and front-wheel drive. It rides on 17-inch wheels. Plush leather seating and zebrano wood trim set off the interior, and the analog instrument cluster is electronically lit, and there are features such as rain-sensing wipers, and 12-way power seats with massaging lumbar and heat provided.
All that stuff makes for a strong and good-handling sedan, and the Bose sound system is nothing short of magnificent. But here’s what truly sets the DeVille DTS apart from any other car on the planet, regardless of price: It’s called Night Vision.
Normally, the DeVille has a big, rectangular grille with egg-crate design. If you get Night Vision, the same grille has a circle in the middle, with a glass lens on it. Behind the grille is an infrared video machine, believe it or not.
When you’re driving at night, and you turn on the headlights, a small, rectangular patch appears on the lower part of the windshield, at the bottom of the driver’s field of view. It’s not really a distraction, although you can find yourself glancing at it repeatedly. If you owned the car, you would get so you sort of watch it with your peripheral vision, detecting any unusual movement.
When you’re driving, even with excellent headlights and auxiliary foglights, you can only see a certain swatch of roadway ahead. Let’s say the lights will shine 100 yards down the road on high beams. If you’re going 70 miles per hour on the freeway, and something happens out there beyond the reach of those lights — let’s say a deer runs across the road, or a car is stalled up ahead — you notice it after it comes within reach of your lights, and after it enters your awareness.
The little panel on the lower windshield, however, displays what at first looks like a snowy, poor-reception television picture, a little like watching an unassigned channel. But infrared cameras pick up heat-emitting things, like people, or animals. So you might notice a car on the shoulder in faint depiction on the Night Vision panel, long before it comes into actual view, which allows you to slow down and be aware that something is out of order ahead. If that car is running, or has been running, the hot engine area will glow much brighter than the rest.
Ah, but if there is a person up there with the car, he or she will shine brightly in ghostly silhouette, helping you see a jogger, or someone changing a tire, or hitchhiking, well before your headlights illuminate them. And if a deer runs across the road — a primary concern of any Up North drivers at any time of year — you are alerted to it with all kinds of time to prepare to slow down or get the adrenaline going to avoid it.
I talked to one man who was driving across Wisconsin on the freeway in the early-morning darkness and noticed a big deer in bright white form, galloping across the little Night Vision panel. He slowed down, and when he got to the area where the deer had been, the deer was long gone. He found it eerie but effective that he never actually saw the deer, and would never have known it existed had he not seen it on Night Vision.
I was impressed that when the freeway curved ahead, I could detect the curvature of the treeline on either side of the road, indicating which way the road would turn up there a half-mile ahead. I also found it helped keep me awake and alert at night, because I kept glancing at the Night Vision panel, just to see if anything was there.
MERCEDES S-CLASS
Mercedes claims 30 new technical features for the S-Class sedans for 2000, and has applied for 340 patents. At such a steep price, it still is a reduction from the previous S-Class, which denotes the biggest sedans in the Mercedes line, above the C-Class and E-Class, and the SUV’s M-Class.
There is little doubt that the level of excellence in every feature makes the S-Class cars worthy of the objective of being the absolute best. The S-500 has a 5-liter V8, while the S-430 has a 4.3-liter V8. Both have multiple valves and ultra-sophisticated engineering and engine-management systems, with 5-speed automatic transmissions that can be shifted manually. The 430 has 275 horsepower with 295 foot-pounds of torque and the 500 has 302 horses and 339 foot-pounds of torque. The 430 goes 0-60 in 6.9 seconds; the 500 does it in 6.1 seconds. And this is a 4,133-pound car.
In exterior design, the S-Class has a 0.27 coefficient of drag, which is pretty much unheard of in a sedan, let alone a large, luxury sedan.
As anticipated, the S-Class cars have safety systems that are off the scale of excellence, with crushable front and rear sections and a rigid cage around the passenger compartment, with dual front airbags, side airbags mounted in the front and rear doors, and with driver and front passenger side window safety curtains. The 14-way power seats also have10 fans in both front bucket seats for ventilation.
Much of the Mercedes safety characteristics are engineered into precise driving control, and the test cars had all sorts of devices to eliminate slipping and skidding, going well beyond the normal antilock 4-wheel disc brakes. One device even anticipates slippery driving and uses a road-sensing helps make the car go where the driver is streering, while compensating for either oversteer or understeer.
A satellite-based a global positioning system, which operates on discs for different regions, and an emergency “SOS” button above the rear-view mirror that provides instant help from a Mercedes source, or from police or emergency road-side service. Truly unique is the cruise-control system. Instead of just setting your speed, it has a radar sensor to detect the speed of the car ahead of you, and it regulates your speed to maintain the same interval behind that car.
Because the Mercedes cars both have front-engine/rear-drive, an ultrasophisticated traction-control system is expected. If anything, the Mercedes is over-engineered, but nobody who has driven an S-500 or S-430 would suggest it is not worth the seemingly outrageous price. But, thanks to Night Vision, Cadillac is prepared to offer a U.S. challenge to those seeking the ultimate in technical gadgetry.
About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
For those who want to keep up with John Gilbert's view of sports, mainly hockey with a Minnesota slant, click on the following:
Click here for sports