A black hearse that is itself only a few miles from the auto graveyard is most people’s image of an ideal Halloween car. The hearse usually will be a Cadillac, but in Sweden, it can be a Volvo. Volvo has sold two door, raised roof versions of its station wagons as hearses, going back at least to the 444/544. Each generation of large Volvo has been made into hearses since then. Being Volvo, Volvo could not avoid marketing the 245 hearse on the basis of passenger safety, apparently missing the obvious irony (see page 5 of this brochure). With American-style Halloween growing in popularity in Sweden since the 1990s and the 240/245 still a popular daily driver, 245 hearses may appear as Halloween-themed cars in Sweden for many years to come. A 245 in Halloween livery appears less frightening to American eyes than, say, a 1959 Cadillac hearse, but Swedish eyes may see it differently.
I thought those quad headlights were a US-market-only thing?
They could be bought as an aftermarket extra. There was also a US-version dealer option, because some people just want to be different. Those dealers sold a package that made the car US-spec. When a car maker has close to fifty percent of the market, there will always be a market for those who want to stand out of the crowd. I’m not sure, but I’m quite certain the 262 Coupe was sold only as US-spec globally in its later years. I guess out of convenience, because it was more practical to make them all alike in such small batches.
Edit: The package was called “GTX”. If you google on “Volvo GTX” pictures from those parts catalogues will come up.
That is awesome, thanks for letting me know.
+1. You are the random-info king Ingvar!
I’m in Denmark and I remember as a kid looking in the Volvo accessoriescatalogue and doing everything in my power to get my dad to buy the GTX option for our old 242 DL. Sadly, I did not prevail.
I saw this exact hearse about a month ago in Stockholm!
Same hearse, same place, it seems! I spotted it on a regular basis in the same parking lot on the waterfront, which leads me to believe that it belongs to someone who works on one of the boats. You got a better view of it in your photo than I ever did; it was always surrounded by other parked cars when I saw it.
Is that number plate some sort of take on the owner’s name I wonder?
No, it’s just a coincidence. The regular plate pattern in Sweden is ABC 123, as this car has. And then there’s personalized plates that can be had in up to seven letters organized in any way, as long as it doesn’t follow the ABC 123-pattern. I guess they have a blacklist of objectionable combinations as well, the personal plates are not allowed to be offensive.
Thanks for the info Ingvar, very interesting. NZ’s regular plate pattern is the same ABC 123. Personalised plates are popular here too, except they’re only allowed up to 6 letters – but they are allowed to follow the ABC 123 pattern (unless the combination has already been issued as part of the regular non-personalised series). There is a blacklist of objectionable combinations here too, and it includes objectionable combinations of the regular ABC 123 series which weren’t allowed to be released.
Canny Kiwis use the regular series to create the own “personalised” plate too – eg a lady I knew through Church who was named Amy, bought a new Peugeot 406 in 2001. The regular pattern at the time was still in the As, so she just registered at the post office for the regular plate “AMY 406”, and as soon as it was released as a regular issue, she had her Peugeot re-registered to that number. 12 years later Amy and her 406 are still in town. I guess a few canny Swedes might buy cars whose regular plate combination meant something too! 🙂