Little mods to the Volvo's handling

[Welly]

Had these bits fitted last week at the same time as me new brake pads all round.

Volvo OE strut brace (£39.00 from the stealers)


IPD Anti-Sway bar



New Kumho KH31's all round, asymmetric tread, these saved me £228.00 over the Continentals I looked at but these Kumhos are getting brilliant reviews and came 3rd out of 14 tyre makers in a recent German Auto Bild test so thought I'd try some and yes they are fantastic (and very quiet)



The handling is *completely* transformed in a straight line the car sits planted and tracks straight and true. It used to kind of roll from left to right over some roads (like rocking from side to side) which felt weird and uncomfortable but this has gone. Cornering hasn't been tested fully due to the weather but I can feel the back end is tight with limited body roll. The car no longer crashes over bumps or down holes and the front no longer takes a nose dive under braking.

Over all a massive improvement to handling and overall comfort, very very pleased. The car feels like it should have done when leaving the factory.

My mechanic charged me £60.00 to fit all the pads and the two sussy parts

[GeordieBoy]

Strut Brace, Handling Mods, you starting to drive like a Chav?

[Doggy]

Surprised me too - I thought the IPD thingy was a posh zimmer frame.

[Welly]

Surprised me too - I thought the IPD thingy was a posh zimmer frame.

In a round about kinda way it is

[Gary406]

nice work, my uncle has a V70 2.5TDi is a good car and has got sum decent power behind it

[Doggy]

How many miles did you get to the fronts, welly?

(My last set, [G'Yr 'Excellence'], lasted 9k "motorway miles").

Kuhmo's are looking a tad 2nd hand too....

[steve_earwig]

Kumho

I hope it's an optical illusion but they don't look like they have much tread

Looks good, I'd spray some waxoyl on the panhard rod tho, unless that bare metal's stainless...

[TooT]

Tasty little mods there Welly

Always like to here about good reviews on tyres, the Pirelli Pzero Nero's i have on mine are absolute crap in this weather

[FarmerPug]

Good work, im assuming thats a v50 a neighbour has one, nice dash structure with the see through thing. But that engine in yours looks more than a 2.0d
Are you still driving a 406?

[Welly]

Doggy - I got 14000 miles out of the last set but they were Pirelli P7's the Kumho's are supposed to be soft so we'll see....

Steve - it is a crap picture of the tread (bit of reflection), they've only been on 2 weeks and have the full 7-8mm tread. Cheers for the advice the fittings are stainless, but dirty now, and the roll bar is powder coated

406exec - I haven't driven a 406 for 2 years, I used to have a 1999 exec like yours but had just about everything that could go wrong happen to me the Volvo is the saloon version S40 and it's a 2.5 petrol turbo 5cyl (as per Focus ST).

[Bailes1992]

My old Man got a struyt brace on his V50, thought they were standard across the board?

[Welly]

It's weird, some of the diesels have them, some don't, some T5's do and some don't

[GeordieBoy]

406exec - I haven't driven a 406 for 2 years, I used to have a 1999 exec like yours but had just about everything that could go wrong happen to me the Volvo is the saloon version S40 and it's a 2.5 petrol turbo 5cyl (as per Focus ST).

Quite a difference in MPG going from an HDi to a 2.5 Turbo Petrol. Midlife crisis is it?
You'll be coming with me on track days soon, I'll race ya in my BMW 328.

[Welly]

Funnily enough it's not that much different, when I first got the car in 2009 petrol was a fair bit cheaper than diesel and the difference between 38mpg (HDi) and 25mpg (T5) meant it was costing about £9.00 extra a week.

Now it's costing an extra £12.00 per week in fuel.

[FarmerPug]

[quote="Welly"}
406exec - I haven't driven a 406 for 2 years, I used to have a 1999 exec like yours but had just about everything that could go wrong happen to me[/quote]

nothing wrong is happening to me, unless i actually add something in which case the thing i add goes wrong suprisingly fast. I think im slowly overcoming it.