Volvo C30 concept revealed in front of NAIAS debut!
While we're already gassing up the Autoblog Gulfstream in anticipation of this year's North American
International Auto Show, it's still a ways away. However, Spanish language publication El Diferencial has
seen fit to drop a bit of Christmas/Chanukkah/Kwanzaa/Festivus cheer the enthusiast's way, with what appears to be
an advanced showing of Volvo's C30 concept slated to debut at to debut at January's NAIAS.
Said to be 'spot-on' Volvo's forthcoming compact hatch entry, the C30 is based upon Ford's C1 architecture, which underpins the superb Mazda3 and the Swedish firm's S40 sedan and V50 wagon-- no bad thing. It also lurks under the not-for-U.S. consumption Ford Focus... but don't even get us started about that nonsense. As expected, styling cribs heavily from both the SCC and 3CC concept cars, both of which in turn borrow liberally from Volvo's classic P1800 ES.
Set to go on sale in 2007, expect the C30 to make use of either a twin-cam four or Volvo's surprisingly charismatic trademark 2.5L five-banger, which plays to good effect in the S40. A C30 with hybrid drivetrain is also possible. When it hits U.S. shores, it will mix it up in a reinvigorated European hot hatch market, dicing it up with the Audi A3, Volkswagen GTI and MINI.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Car-la 8:34AM (12/26/2005)
Seems the hot hatch market gets very crowded these days. Hopefully the Volvo C30 will inherit some of its donor's (Ford Focus) handling traits. The backend at least looks interesting.
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Paco 10:51AM (12/26/2005)
I'm from the mexican website that published the photo about the Volvo C30:
http://www.eldiferencial.com.mx/content/view/1138/28/
The photo and the info came from the Volvo press site.
It's dated on january (January 4, 2006) but as we didn't see any warning to not publish it, well... we did it.
I think that Volvo made a mistake because the info is only (even today) on the Spanish version of their press website, so maybe they didn't notice it.
And now nobody is working to remove the info.
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tbyron 12:38PM (12/26/2005)
In the 80's, I coveted Volvo's small coupe, the 480ES...never sold in the US unfortunately. The rear of the C30 leverages the design language of the 480ES and the 1800ES before it.
http://hem.bredband.net/parren/volvo480es.html
http://www.volvoclub.org.uk/photopost/data/3032/21800es.jpg
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Paco 12:31AM (12/27/2005)
Well, someone went to work today and removed the info & photo from the main page of the spanish press site.
Some sites say that we broke an embargo, but there's no one on the info & photo.
It's just that someone from Volvo made a mistake releasing the info last week.
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Marco83 11:20AM (12/27/2005)
It looks even uglier than Fiat Stilo....and I've said all...
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