I've just returned from the trip I was telling you guys about.
It was a really good to see the car through a whole range of scenarios, giving me a good insight into the car's capabilities.
The trip was almost 180 miles, half of which was on a highway - the rest on windy mountain roads. The average consumption was about 22 mpg. This was with ACC set @ 83 mph (135kph - for us Europeans
) for the highway part, the rest was spirited driving.
The highway part was very enjoyable (FOUR-C set to comfort, gearbox in D). I managed to try the lane departure feature when no one was around me. This time it worked as advertised. I think the last time I tried it he couldn't get a good reading on the road markings because of the rain and wet pavement. Who knows? Today, it didn't miss a chance on warning me. It actually got pretty annoying on the mountain road (so I had to turn it off).
Which brings me to the second part : the spirited driving through the mountains. On this part I drove with the FOUR-C set to Advanced, gearbox in Sport and DSTC off. In this setup the car handles the corners really well. The steering was firm and quick - exactly what's needed for windy roads - with no noticeable body roll. I would say it's a very well composed ride when cornering at high speed. I didn't stop grinning one second.
The gearbox in Sports mode was OK - not perfect...just ok. It's perfect as long as you hold down your acceleration, but as soon as you lift off even for a little bit, it upshifts and leaves you hanging when you need to accelerate again. Good thing for the manual mode. Lets you keep the revs up for instant acceleration - which thanks to the T6 you've got plenty of. Shift speed was ok both in sports mode and in manual.
The seats give you lateral support, but I have the impression they were designed for someone a tad bigger than me. They were very comfortable though, with soft leather that I wish my couch was made of.
Polarized sun glasses don't have issues with the displays in the car. Even the warning light in the dash is clearly visible in a sunny day with glasses on.
The HMI works a lot faster than what I have tried on the demo S60. That was a really nice suprise.
Navigation works well, but I cannot for the sake of it to command it with the voice control. Well, I can, but when I want to choose my destination the country is preselected (UK) and cannot change it
Obviously that's an issue for me ...
And btw ... Pedestrian safety gave me a really big scare today. As I was getting back, it started warning me of an impeding collision (sound and light). Yes there was a guy on the side of the road, yes he was technically in front of the car, but no he wasn't on the road. He was on a sidewalk next to the turn that I was about to take.I think the car thought if I would continue straight I would ram him down (I was doing 45-50 mph) so decided to give me a heads up. Either way, when I saw the light in the windscreen I instinctively hit the brakes (good job Volvo on those subliminal messages), scaring the guy behind me in the process. Pfff...
Here are some pictures of said trip (sorry for the scenery images, but they were so nice, I couldn't help it) :