Given today’s high beltlines and gunslit windows, the Volvo 262C doesn’t look all that odd. It was just forty years ahead of its time. But it raised eyebrows pretty consistently back in the day: what were they thinking? Which is a question that’s never been properly answered, and probably never will. Although I’m sure a few folks must have asked Jan Wilksgaard, Volvo’s then Chief of Design. But the answer came none.
The 262C was a halo car for Volvo, and Bertone was commissioned to build just 1200 per year, of which 1000 came to the US. And according to the R&T scribes, public reaction was very favorable wherever they went with it. But then Americans tend to have a thing for something new and different, until they tire of it. R&T’s staff had decidedly more mixed feelings on it, and the lack of headroom was undeniable.
The interior was high quality, with lots of black leather everywhere. At $15,000 ($60k adjusted) this was of course by far the priciest Volvo yet ever built. So a nice interior was to be expected.
The 125 hp 2.7L PRV 90° V6 acquitted itself well enough, although its uneven firing impulses could be heard. It was mated to Volvo’s venerable 4 speed manual and OD, which only some 10% of 262Cs would have. I rather assumed they were all automatic. Handling was ok, but hardly stellar. The 200 series chassis was not exactly the most sophisticated, so there was no way it was going to have the control, comfort and ride of a Mercedes or such.
The Limited Edition 262. The highbrow Volvo, for the low of brow. (Alt: 262, by Volvo. For the short and rich).
I clearly recall seeing one of these on display at the ’79 Melbourne International(!) Motorshow, and being at a most susceptible age, believed this golden vision to be as beautiful as Volvo said it was, enhanced by it being so expensive (and in this country, with 57% tariffs of the time, the price was massive). It just seemed so very, very posh that it MUST be a classy looker. Surely.
Then, minus the flattering lights, and closer than ropes allowed, I saw a few on the street. Being still as young, I blamed the fact that I thought it now looked like a gaudy chin-jutting coffin – the occupants were indeed nearly horizontal to pilot it – upon my callow youthfulness, reverently discarding my irreligious thoughts as True Greatness snuffled by.
Later, I realized they looked as silly as first I thought. Their relevant hour was a real Tamigotchi in time.
Interesting to read that the rack steering, the 4 discs, the excellent seats, the crashability and much else helped make the otherwise clunk-faced Volvo a properly decent car in that time, something easy to forget looking back from the safe cars universally standard now.
However, that V6! What a complete dunger it was all its unfortunate, cylinder-lopped life. Very low-specific power, silly consumption, lack of any idle smoothness whatever, no no-rev power, no top-end either all topped off by poor reliability. In Europe, the 262 later got the 4-cyl , hardly a paragon of refinement or low fuel use either, but still actually faster than the six and vastly more reliable.
I think someone at Volvo saw a Cordoba and said, “Hey, why can’t we make one of those?”
This car was the result of Volvo having an innovative approach to factory management in the ’70s that was thought to be improving quality and labor retention. Ford sent a contingent of executives including Henry the deuce to Sweden to check it out. They brought a number of Lincoln Mark IVs to drive while they were in Sweden. Volvo’s CEO Per Gyllenhammar was green with envy at the style of the Lincolns, so Volvo’s designers were tasked with building something similar. They couldn’t tool up for a limited run of cars that were so different from the usual boxes, so they farmed out production to Bertone.
Around the same time one of the Swedish car companies was advertising their products as, ‘the car for people who think.” Car and Driver billed the Volvo 262C Bertone Coupe as the car for people who shrink.
I would take that unsourced Wikipedia story with a shovel full of salt. It has the obvious trappings of a convenient urban myth.
Where did that “number of Mark IVs” come from? Airlifted into Gothenburg? Smells mighty fishy. As a matter of fact, HFII was quite fond of Ford’s European cars, and if they did drive to the factory, it would have been in some European Granadas or such.
And it’s not like anyone at Volvo didn’t know what a Mk. IV looked like. Their P1800 ended in 1973, and they needed a replacement as a halo car, so a coupe version of their 240 series was the obvious choice.
https://www.nytimes.com/1987/06/23/business/making-cars-the-volvo-way.html
Documentation of the trip above. First hand account of the presence of Lincoln Mark IVs below:
https://www.hemmings.com/stories/article/volvo-262c-bertone-coupe
Documentation of the trip above.
No mention of any trips there by Ford or others.
First hand account of the presence of Lincoln Mark IVs below:
By whom? The person being quoted is not identified.
I very much doubt HFII would have gone to look at a factory, as by 1974-1975 he had long delegated that to others. Frankly, production facilities were not his thing.
And as I said, where did the Mk IVs come from? Airlifted in? Not.
What’s also very suspicious is this line:
American cars were rare in Sweden,
As a matter of fact, Sweden has always been in love with American cars; they were quite common there. Switzerland and Sweden had the highest percentage of US cars of any American company throughout the post war era, all the way up to quite more recent years.
In any case, it’s absurd to think that the CEO of Volvo didn’t know what a MK IV looked like. You think he didn’t travel to the US regularly, given that the US was by far Volvo’s biggest and most important export market?
The story doesn’t pass the smell test. It’s like the story about the Caprice being created because GM suddenly banned division execs from driving any brand of GM car other than the one they worked at. Idiocy. MY BS meter is better than yours.
It’s like the Studebaker V8 being so massive because it was designed to be able to withstand a 14:1 compression ratio. I’m about to debunk that once and for all.
Undoubtedly Volvo was influenced by the styling trends of the time, and the MK IV was certainly a reflection of that. And for all I know, they might well have used it as a key influence. But it didn’t require HFII arriving in a convoy of air-lifted MK IVs to make that be the case.
I’m adding a couple of wheelbarrows full of salt to Paul’s shovelful. The first barrowful because Hemmings should’ve stuck to the wall-to-wall classifieds they do so well. Their journalism is poor; their articles are very often full of made-up factoids, guesses, and fairytales. All presented as authoritative gospel, of course. Not just here and there, I mean they do it again and again and again.
The second barrowful because this guy’s story centres around a claim that’s not true: “American cars were rare in Sweden”. Actually, Swedes bought quite a lot of American cars, relatively speaking. Valiants and Darts not only as private cars but as police cars and taxicabs, for one example of many. Now, two-door cars (of whatever nationality) were relatively rare in Sweden because of that country’s vehicle taxation structure at that time, but that’s not what the guy claimed.
As for the rest of his story: maybe or not. There is a reason people retire, and there is a thing that happens to our minds and memories with advancing age. Even at its best, the human memory is nothing like the camcorder we like to think it is. And that goes probably double or triple for the likes of a Director of Marketing Communication, a job that boils down to telling colourful stories and making ѕhit up.
Volvo’s first luxury coupe, the V-6-powered 262C, had an unusual genesis, as explained by Bob Austin, who was a 31-year Volvo employee and the company’s director of marketing communications from 1991 through 2001: “Volvo was at the leading edge of reinventing factory work in the 1970s. The CEO, Pehr Gyllenhammar, felt life in the car business was inhumane-that factory work only took advantage of people’s arms and legs. He authorized the building of Kalmar, the new factory that became the world’s first automotive team assembly plant. People worked in small groups, and the cars moved from station to station-they felt that with more worker engagement, there would be fewer defects, fewer work-related injuries and reduced employee turnover. Automakers around the world were interested in this plant, and in the mid-1970s, an American industrialist entourage lead by Henry Ford II traveled to Sweden to inspect the factory.”When they arrived, they brought over a number of cars to drive, all two-door Lincoln Mark coupes with low roofs and wide C-pillars. American cars were rare in Sweden, and they caught the attention of people both inside and outside of Volvo. We wanted to build a car like that, but we knew it would have to be done off-line and that the tooling costs would be too much. Our people were talking to the people at Carrozzeria Bertone at an auto show in Europe, and Bertone expressed great interest in the project; the two companies had previously teamed up to build the Europe-only 264TE limousine.
The quotes are attributed to Bob Austin, who worked for Volvo from 1970-2001. Remember that time I was wrong about something? I admitted it and learned from it. Just a thought.
That’s what I get for playing with the NYT. Here is the link from the correct article.
https://www.nytimes.com/1974/05/21/archives/a-plant-built-for-workers-sweden.html
KALMAR, Sweden — Henry Ford 2d was here one day last week look over Volvo’s new assembly plant. More Ford executives and other American automobile men are on the way, lured not only by reports that Volvo has found a different, perhaps better way to make automobiles but by possibility that the Swedish firm may have found a partial antidote the worker alienation and discontent troubling industrial societies every‐where.
Volvo has at least made a major effort to adapt technology to human beings, rather than subordinating people to the dictates of the assembly line. The first thing that was eliminated in planning for the Kalmar plant, for instance, was the inexorably moving overhead conveyor belt of usual assembly line; the second the conventional method‐time measurement technique of reducing every sembly‐line function to its smallest dimension, so that the individual worker, too, played only the smallest role in producing the finished product.
The obvious consequences of those two decisions alone were to workers some control over the pace of their work, and a greater share —hence more responsibility for—production of each Volvo.
Or such purposes, Volvo was ing to add ten per cent‐10 million Swedish crowns or about $2.5 million —to what would have been its investment in a conventional plant. The pany is confident that it will recover that and more through reduced senteeism, personnel turnover worker discontent, with a consequent rise in the quality of the work being done.
Already in production at about speed—fifty cars a day are being built against an expected full production next fall of 110 tars a day—the Kalmar plant is a remarkably technological response to the human problems of an advanced industrial society. To replace the overhead conveyor belt, for example, Volvo developed two ingenious forms of “carriers,” batterypowered and computer‐guided, that creep silently about the factory bearing body assemblies and engine assemblies until at a prearranged point one each is finally “married” into a fullfledged automobile.
These carriers enable auto bodies to be tilted 90 degrees, thus eliminating the difficult and tiring overhead work common to conveyor belt assembly lines. Since the carriers move separately, workers in different sections of the plant can vary the pace of production almost to suit themselves. These workers are divided into teams of about 15 men and women; each team has responsibility for one production phase—for instance, installing the electrical system, or interior upholstery, or underbody fittings.
Thanks for reading The Times.
Subscribe to The Times
As long as the teams meet their production goal—about 13.7 installed systems an hour for the working day, when full production is reached—they can go slow in the morning and faster in the afternoon, or at whatever pace they set for themselves.
Team members, moreover, can choose to form their own mini‐assembly line, with each worker doing a different job in sequence on a number of cars; or, when possible, each worker or a group can do the complete installation on one car. The team system permits each worker to learn each job in the team’s assigned function, so jobs can be rotated to avoid boredom and to equalize the distribution of good and bad jobs. From pay scales to job assignment, women are equal members of every team.
The plant’s odd design—combining four six‐sided shapes on one level and three six‐sided shapes on a second level—gives each team its own terior section with ample sunlight and views of the landscaped grounds. Sound buffers hold noise to conversation levels. Teams have their own entrances, locker and coffee‐break rooms, and are encouraged to make collective decisions and suggestions about their own production practices and working conditions.
So far, about a thousand cars destined for the American market have been built. Volvo is pleased with both the quality of the cars and the titudes of the Kalmar work force. the company concedes that it is too early to be sure that the Kalmar plant represents either a better to make autos or an adequate response to worker discontent.
That discontent, after all, is common to industrial societies. It surfaced America in the Lordstown strike, European industry is ruefully aware of it. It is by no means entirely nomic, and it goes deeper than sistance to outmoded assembly‐line techniques. Volvo’s new plant is part of Sweden’s recognition something is badly wrong in industrial society.
Thanks CJ! That’s quite an interesting story, thanks for sharing. Might not pass someone’s smell test but sure seems like a real story. Unless, Trump IS right and the NYT is fake news. I guess none of us were there to truly know the facts.
There’s two (or more) major flaws in the story. The notion that Volvo Chief Designer Jan Wilksgaard was somehow clueless about the existence of the Mark IV is patently absurd. Every design chief in the world was (and had to be) highly aware of all car designs, globally. Design Chiefs always visited major auto shows. And as regards the 262C, the main impetus for creating it came from the US market, as they needed a new halo car to replace the 1800ES, which was not going to meet safety regs for 1974.
The US market was by far Volvo’s biggest export market, and critical to their success. They absolutely knew what was happening in the US, and visited very regularly.
And as a matter of fact, American cars were not rare in Sweden; quite the contrary, as Sweden has always had one of the highest (if not the highest) concentration of American cars in all of Europe.
It’s certainly possible that the design of the Mark IV had some influence on the 262C, but then the Mark IV’s roof was hardly that new or unique.
Volvo mission with the 262C was to go upscale, against Mercedes. And what was the most direct competitor there? the Mercedes W114 coupe, which looks way too much like the 262C, also having had a lowered roof on a boxy body.
Me thinks that’s what Jan Wilksgaard was looking at more than the Mark IV.
“surprising whooming sounds”. Wonderful.
The performance numbers in these old tests suggest the malaise era wasn’t limited to Detroit: 16.5 mpg, 11 second 0-60, and 0.70 g on the skid pad. But though performance has gotten much better in the last 40 years, ironically I now find this once-hideous “anti Volvo” quite well styled. And who needs headroom? Just recline those infinitely adjustable seats and cruise in Göteburg style.
Don’t be selling that 240 chassis short. With a little help from IPD they WILL handle like a Benz, if not a slot car. Did it to my 245; the effect is dramatic.When I used to commute to North Portland, I would often see a 262C with a 5.0L Ford swapped in it. Plate read 50 HO, and that menacing but sweet rumble from its exhaust let you know this wasn’t Aunt Helga’s Volvo.
I like 240s (and even 264s and 265s—it ain’t their fault; they’re doin’ the best they can with what gawd gave ’em, bless their hearts) but not these. I thought they’re ridiculous and stupid-lookin’ when they were new (an opinion bolstered by the transparently snooty people who bought them) and my opinion, which also applies to that other Bertone-vandalised Volvo, hasn’t changed.
I believe the title photo shows a rather special 262, the one one owned by David Bowie.
About the 262, it´s left the category of ugly monster and is now a bona fide collector´s car. And rightly so. Next up is the 780ES and if you don´t own one but want to, this is the time to find one. Values can only go up.
Every time I see one of these, my first reaction is always “Who would ever do such a ridiculous customization like that?!?”.
Then I remember that this came from the factory.
Car & Driver’s review of the 262C was headlined “The car for people who shrink” in a parody of the period “car for people who think” ad slogan.
Went on a road trip in one of these back in the day. I really liked it, thought it was practical and swanky all at the same time.
When these came out I was a teenager getting so close the the magical drivers licence that anything new was I want that for my first car. My mum had a 144 sedan at the time.
Even I looked at it and went “seriously?”
Too me mum’s car was a Volvo. Sensible, sane and a little bit of fun in the right hands ( Dad used to motocross. Enough said ). Sexy coupe was Cordoba, Monte Carlo, Cougar.
This thing didn’t fit in either category. I can see why it didn’t work.
I kind of like these, or at least they have grown on me, and I really don’t like Volvo 240s. As pointed out the proportions are bad but I’ve been numbed by similarly bad proportions of 21st century sedans and the boxy body and roof are kind of refreshing to the sleek egg. I’m a bit shy of 5’9” and imagine I’d actually fit into one ok too.
Funny enough the harder I look at it in profile what stands out more unflatteringly is the misshapen rear wheel opening and front wheel placement within the front one. Chopped top barely phases me focusing on those
My grandfather chose a Volvo GLE an is company/retirement car in 1981. He drove and liked the Bertone coupe but it was a bit tight for his 6’2′ frame. The creamy aromatic leather seats in the GLE felt special enough with out the elaborate braided detail and wood of the Bertone. The car was far from perfect. I think it went through 3 transmissions in the decade he owned it. Some of the failures were probably due to being locked in a hot Florida garage for half the year as they had a summer home in NC. But boy did he take care of that thing! once a week, it got a hand wash. after a drive in the rain, it got wiped down in the garage. the interior was always spotless. I always said I wanted the Volvo when he was ready to get rid of it. By the time it was offered to me in the early 1990’s, my interests had moved away from boxy Volvo sedans. My father ended up with the car for a time but it developed some sort of expensive to repair camshaft issue with it’s PRV V6 so it had to move on. Part of me wishes I had snapped it up when I had the chance. The other part of me feels I may have dodged an expensive bullet by taking a pass.