[ZX5focused]

I was driving by my local volvo dealer today when a Red C30 caught my eye in front of the dealer. Did a quick u-turn and pulled in to take a look.

I ended up driving both a 2.4I and T5, but the T5 was an auto with the slapstick.

2.4I
engine: 2.4 inline 5 making 168 hp and 170 lbs/ft
5 speed manual

Interior Feel: Seats were comfortable and provided support in the right areas for me. controls were well laid and fairly easy to use. not much room in the backseat or in the hatch. opening for the hatch is really small.

Driving: Car pulls hard and motor has lots of torque, most of the drive was in traffic so i couldnt really open it up. i did take on the expressway (100km/h) and pulled easily up to speed, and a downshift was sufficient to pass.

it handled the on ramp as would have expected able to carry speed and stay confident. there wasnt too much body roll either

overall it is a very capable car but im not sure that its worth the price depending on the options. option it out and it easily gets into T5 territory.


T5

Engine: 2.5 l inline 5 turbocharged making 218 hp and 238 lb/ft tourque at 1500-4800 rpm
transmission: 5 speed automatic with slap stick

Interior is the same, though the one i drove did not have the power adjsut seat.

suspension wise it felt pretty much the same.

no boost gauge!!!

Motor/Trans:

Car pulls pretty hard. tourquey above 2500 rpm. seemed a little laggy but not alot and i dont know if that was due to the tranmission or not but it still pulled hard once everything aligned. easily pulls in any gear though. The transmission allowed for downshifts and held the rpm's until i told it to shift.

I would really love to drive it with the 6 speed manual though.

now i just need to drive and mazdaspeed and wrx to compare


o and ther said i could get roughly 4000-4500 for my car :lol:


suprisingly they let me take them out by myself too!!

[NikiterZTS]

sweet

i tried with mazdaspeed3 before
and got tottaly rejected (never happened to me before and i test drive ALOT)

in reply i got "people who want this car pretty much buy it first with out any test drive" :ph34r: what? :blink:

[NOS2Go4Me]

^^ I actually got the same answer from a Chev dealer here in North Bay... for a loaded Stunfire at the time. Options and all that.

Yet, I had no trouble getting the keys to an Ion Red Line at the Saturn dealer on the other side of town. Ditto for the VW dealer here. I won't even go into how much gas I burnt in the Fusions or the Foci.

Hell, the Subbie dealer called ME the other day to offer a Legacy GT up for an afternoon's jaunt. I may just do that next week.

[Drivesthebeast]

Same thing for me...when I showed up at the local GM dealer wanting to drive the black on black GP GXP they had (V8 yumminess), they wouldn't even let me drive it...and reminded me that it's a $40K + car.

Went to the Ford dealership, they couldn't get me out in my Stang fast enough...lol

It's like, if you LOOK like you have no money, or show up in an average car, the salesmen will sometimes brush you off, and the opposite is said about the same dealership/salesmen if you look like you DO have money. It's kinda like my galpal thought we were under dressed to go shopping on the top floor of the Eaton Center at places like Birks one time, where nobody paid any attention to us until I mentioned to her not so quietly that there's a lot of multi-millionaire's and billionaires that walk around looking like bums these days...I had 3 sales people come at me the moment I finished saying it... :lol:

Still, back on topic, I would like to check out a C30, and see how a car with 2/3 the hp and tq of a Mustang, but at a weight advantage feels like...

Tell us more...including if you go and try a T5 Manual....

[ZX5focused]

ya they said they dont have one on order but if i was buying they would get it

the chick even said they are trying to sell them to people like me and get them hooked on volvo for life

[Drivesthebeast]

My grandparents had a S40 Turbo, and then they traded up to the S60 T5...they seem to like them a lot, and wish they had bought them sooner (they owned like 6 Fords back to back)...

[Burnin21]

:lol: it reminds me of the time when I went to the Pontiac/Caddy Dealership and they wouldnt flip me the keys to the used 02' Camaro SS, so I went with my uncle whos been buying Caddys from there forever, they offered me the keys to the Camaro SS and I took a ride in a Caddy XLR too :lol:

Everything is about the people you know ;)

[2001 ZTS]

I love the C30 and have for a long time, I have been active on the website for more than a year:

http://www.c30world.com/forums/

Turned off by the price though however but for those who'd die for a Euro Focus like an RS that's as close as one will come in this country. It's at the price that held back the truly stellar Focus' all these years though. We are talking 40+ out the door.

There may be an AWD "R" version by 2008 I may consider but that just duplicates what I already have in the REX. Volvo often releases an "Ocean Race" special trim models, that would have certain appeal to me.

[Flofocus]

2001 ZTS,Mar 12 2007, 09:21 PM Wrote:...but for those who'd die for a Euro Focus like an RS  that's as close as one will come in this country. .[right][snapback]230115[/snapback][/right]

Theres still the mazda3 speed also.

[j3rt]

The other-halfs father got into a S40 T5. I like it plenty, love the lowtorque "snow option". The plain center console is a real deal breaker though.
Oh and price for me. I'll keep an eye on volvo though, it'll be a couple years before we move up the car chain.

[D-Dub]

Took the z4 to the BMW dealership for a oil change and tire sensor reset, some smoking hot sales girl came up to me and asked if I wanted to test something out while I waited........I picked the m3

[2001 ZTS]

Subaru of Mississauga lets me take anything out for drives unacompanied. Thats probably agism though, I am sure any guy in a suit could get away with it at any dealer.

[2001 ZTS]

[Flofocus]

she's hot. Both the car and the fine lady. B)

[NikiterZTS]

the black one is alright but another one needs to go tanning

[2001 ZTS]

NikiterZTS,Mar 13 2007, 09:07 AM Wrote:the black one is alright but another one needs to go tanning
[right][snapback]230206[/snapback][/right]

That and a sandwich

[Frost__2001]

I donno, I love Volvo, but if I did get one I could afford it would be very very used... and the only Volvo's I'd concider would be the XC90, and the S40's in wagon & sedan forms.

funny thing about dealers is when I was looking at some SUV's with my partner, we pulled into Waterloo Honda parked the car there and started to look at the new CRV's and the sales staff would not give me the time of day. We walked over to the Volvo & BMW Dealership and their comment was why did you park your Focus at Honda? the 3 volvo ppl proceed to walk over to my car and check it out as we we looking at used XC90's & S40 wagons, got to test drive both new and used versions of both.. when we wnt back to the car the honda ppl we all out in force by then going we saw you blah blah blah... and my responce was... I'm no longer interested in a Honda as I got better service from the Volvo dealer next door.

[Drivesthebeast]

/\ :lol:

That T5 is friggen awesome....blows the Civic SI out of the water...

My roomate has mad love for the 1 Series BMW, but of course, like the MkII Focus, it's been deemed that Canada doesn't need them for some reason...so maybe I'll get him to check out the C30, which to me, is a LOT cooler looking...

[NOS2Go4Me]

C30 with a retune could be alright... the MS3 is nice but I keep hearing about the fact it suffers the same fate as the MS6 - no top end, almost as if the turbo is running out of punch.

I really should go to North Bay Mazda and see if they have one in stock.

[dBlast]

2001 ZTS,Mar 13 2007, 09:14 AM Wrote:

NikiterZTS,Mar 13 2007, 09:07 AM Wrote:the black one is alright but another one needs to go tanning
[right][snapback]230206[/snapback][/right]

That and a sandwich
[right][snapback]230209[/snapback][/right]

mmm... ice cream sandwich