The Ford/Yamaha Zetec se engine a.k.a sigma engine

The sigma engine was a Ford/Yamaha venture that debuted with the mk5 fiesta, mk1 focus and the mk1 ford puma.

It's a brilliant piece of engineering built by Yamaha.

The production technology behind these engines is as such, that they are said to be 'not serviceable' on the bottom end, side of things.

In fact, ford sells entire armed blocks, and the typical part supplier has no parts for the bottom end in stock.

This, of course, is just a quality sealing way of doing things.

There is engineering to the engine that makes them very tough on the bottom end, also very technical in terms of service procedure. So being inexpensive, it's easy to opt for a armed block replacement, and being so demanding in terms of service, makes sense that Ford claims it not to be serviceable and just replaceable.

But I'm not much to stick with rules made for majorities that are not tech savvy.

 

Truth is, you have SEVERAL engine builders that use normal production engines, disassemble them and rebuild them to new specs. 

The fact alone that they are assembled at a point in their initial production life means that  you really can assemble these yourself, as long as you know the secrets and have the gadgets needed to do so.

 

These is and excellent paper by William PERRY, Malcolm MCDONALD, Peter C. CHARLTON called "Quantitative Analysis of Big End Journal Form and Bolt Installation using Ultrasonic Time of Flight Measurements" that actualy take the SIGMA engine rod assembly.

the Why:

The Zetec SE is a very interesting design. For starters the bottom end has a ladder design (much like the Honda's High Revving engines).

The Crank is forged much like the rods, but the way the rods are built is in it's self different. Ford used a Metal Powder Pressure mold forging process. I essence, the metal is in powder state and pressed liquid into a mold that is then further pressed into shape. This results in a close to Forged strength and durability, but in a less inexpensive way to produce.

But then, the rods are forged into one piece, so they are then thermally stressed on the division point and broken by force, The face of these now 2 parts is rough so they will not be able to slide away under stress. It's like a fingerprint.

As such, each rod has only one way to slot in correctly. And this method also requires your torquing to be equal across the rod surface contact between the 2 previously separated parts.

 

Taken from the referred paper:

 

 

They are, as such, torqued, both screws at the same time, and then after the max torque is reached, the bolts have been slightly stretched for increased strength... reusing those is, not recommended... go for fresh new bolts.

So, by looking at the graph, it's easy to say that the proper torque is between 45 and 48nm.

You can torque further into the 52nm range, but you'll be fully relying on the bolt fabrication quality to be that close to the limit. I wouldn't!

Stick with 35nm + 90 Degree (should get you close to 40-42nm)... there are yamaha engines with 25nm + 75 degrees torque specs.

You can go up to:

Initial  42nm (BOTH screws at the same time)

Secondary to 47nm (again, both screws simultaneously).

If not possible to screw the 2 bolts at the same time, make a max 2nm stepping per screw till you reach the figure you want.

This is a lot trickier to do by steps, so I really recommend you to have 2 torque wrenches.

So there is no real dark magic as to why these engines are considered non serviceable... but in truth, they are and have been serviced by a lot of tuners over the years. 

Remember that the Fiesta and the Puma used to compete in the s1400 and s1600 classes. So these engines ARE serviceable as they are also tunable.

It is, however, difficult to find the parts you need to rebuild. Most Tune-shops really only focus on big engines and forced induction, VAG or JDM engines.

However, you still have the Good old brand specialists, particularly in the UK. 

 

For Fords, I STRONGLY recommend BurtonPower. 

These are images of the parts I've brought to rebuild the bottom end of my old 1.4 zetec-se... and as you can see, IT IS POSSIBLE AND THE PARTS DO EXIST, regardless of what people sell you.

The factory rods handles A LOT more than what the car has standard, and the bolts are good for turbo applications, so they too can handle a lot more.

Sure you can go all out and forge the thing, but unless you are force-induction"ing" the car, beyond 250 bhp, I see no reason for that.

Old dog needs new tricks

Old cars normally die due to overheating problems. Some times it's the fan that gets stuck or the sensor that stops sending data properly, then you stop at a red light and don't mind the needle going up till the red, and then it's too late and you've burn the head-gasket.

The the majority happens with overheating for lack of water.

Out of these a good percentage of cases is attributed water circuit purely falling apart from cracks on tubes and vaporizing or dumping the water out. Other times the car has overheated before the owner understood it had a cooling issue, and the burnt gasket allows water to combustion passage, and the car will consume water, only noticeable if it is enough to cause compression and detonation issues.

All my cars are old, and with this trend of building worse cars, I'll keep having old cars.

So the first thing I do is to setup an alarm system for the water lever in the expansion tank.

Some cars have an embedded solution for this, others don't as making you replace the engine or buy a new car, is preferable to allowing you some quality for your money.

So on my 2 Hondas, 2 Fords and a Volvo made by Ford, I decided to add a water level warning system... the old 1997 Volvo v70t5 has this from factory... a true sign of times. It's clear to me that somewhere in 1997, engineered ruled and the economists where tied down in a closed room, without windows, down in the basement.. but then someone forgot to lock the door and they got out.. and then they over-thrown the engineers and it has been getting worse by the year.

Shopping list:

5v trigger 12v operation relay module like this:

https://amzn.eu/d/cySr42T  5V trigger is important as some relay modules are 12v operated, and the sensor does not send 12v to trigger the relay. Be careful with this.

led with buzzer alarm 12v:

https://amzn.eu/d/apxafaF

liquid sensor (external):

https://amzn.eu/d/hlVArrI

The schematics:

Explaining:

You will need to wire the sensor and the relay module to a 12v power source. Obviously this circuit doesn't make sense without the engine running, so I recommend you look for the fuse connector that is switched by ignition. That way, your circuit will only draw power with ignition on.

Next you need to ground the GND and (-) connectors for the same devices. That is Sensor, Relay and LED.

Now comes the interesting part. Since you want this circuit to default to trigger mode (in case something fails), so the power to the led should be set as DEFAULT on the relay as pictured. In essence, as you power or the circuit, you should hear a short beep then the triggering of the relay and silence.. until sensor stops sending level data, or the circuit fails for some reason. 

Finally connect the sensor trigger to the relay trigger and test the circuit.

The last part is using T-Rex to glue the sensor to the expansion tank.

Use a lower placement of the sensor and  remember that water will be jumping around that reservoir, while you drive... avoid areas that could get dry on hard cornering.

On my Puma, it looks just like this:

So now, If water runs too low. because of anything and old car can manage to break to do this, starting with a rotten radiator, or dried and fissured rubber hoses... maybe even a gasket starting to go... the red light, together with a buzzer will start sounding. 

You can stop the car before you really burn the gasket and make a mess out of things.

Project Volvo V50 t5 awd "more than" Polestar - Forged t5

The Why:

Some time ago, I decided I should buy my wife a car. Why? well... I believe because it was monday! As long as I like the car, I don't need justification. If i don't like it, on the other hand, I find every possible excuse to rule the thing out... So SUV's are immediately out of the equation, 99% of diesel's too and regarding the crap the auto industry is selling out today, 90% of every other car too. 

Wasn't going to be easy!

 

First candidate was an Peugeot RCZ with 200bhp 1.6 THP engine... beautiful, well built, and fun. But she said: 2 kids with chairs + 1 13yo, this is not practical! And so I had to let the RCZ go.

Then a BMW 320D CC came up... it was beautiful (for a women... I'd never ride a champagne colored car), but, once again, it failed the rear seat space test.

I was giving up when a Volvo V50T5 AWD popped on the market. It was wonderful. The V50 T5 is not the best T5 engine, but then again, there are no BAD t5's. It's a Low pressure turbo K04 version of the same block on the S60R, with smaller spec'd rods and pistons. The great thing is that it has VVT on both Intake and exhaust and, since volvo was transitioning from TWR and the R badge cars to the Polestar branding, this series, along with the C30, S40mk2 and C70mk2, where left with a R-design trim option but no juicy stuff as the old R's used to have. 

Because of this, Volvo dealers offered a Polestar Optimization Pack for the standard RDesign T5's, that you could buy and request installation. 

Guess what else I found online: The map, the specs for the dampers, the wheels and the numbered kit documentation. So, In order to have a very valid Volvo V50t5 Polestar, all I had to do was to kit the car with wheels and suspension, add the map and the 2 badges together with the manuals and certificates.

And guess what: the engine block on this one is a Polestar branded one. Care to guess why? 

Well, Polestar was preparing and racing the s60r back then and the 2.5 t5 engine block is shared across s60r mk2, and that block fits the v50... as it apparently did :) 

 

So why isn't it the best T5 out there? For starters the turbo is low pressure meaning that this is capped form factory. Then the rods are not near as tough as the S60R ones, also unlike the S60R, the pistons do not provide high compression.

However, much like the S60r, it's a 2.5 with the same block as the S60R. The Volvo t5 are aluminum blocks, open sleeved design with a hard steel liner about 1 or 2 mm thick(depending on the engine). As the block stresses under boost detonation, the block and cylinder walls giveaway a bit to accommodate, but the sleeves liners, in harder steel, will eventually just crack. 

The best t5 is the legendary 4T5 engine on a 2.4l configuration NOT BY BORE, but rather by stroke (long block...or longer that the other 2.4 by bore, low power options).

I knew the pistons are good for almost 500bhp, the rods shouldn't go beyond 330/350bhp and the sleeves, when they are known to crack on standard setups, so having a figure is just nonsense.

I didn't really like the Polestar rims...

...so I decided to go for MAK ones with a better design (particularly for portugal where you can have holes in highways and crack a rim easy.... that is exactly why, for the s2000, I chose the 5Zigens proracer gn+ and not the Typical Volk Cn28).... the MAK have a split mid arm that helps spreading the load across more radius then the Polestars. And price was equivalent, even though the polestarts where 20" and the MAK 18", tire wise it made a difference, and I'm not going go extreme on breaking, so ... 18" is enough.

The rest made into the car. And so a 250BHP T5 AWD was born. 

I also wasn't 100% happy with the remap and tweaked it a bit, while installing a 3Inch CAI, aluminum wrap turbo ducts, full decat and a cut-out installed just before the rear box.

The car jumped to 280bhp. 

 

 

The standard Haldex is a gen2 that BIAS the car towards the front-end... HOWEVER interesting this was for her to drive the car (not too much tail happy), it needed a personal touch. I then installed the Gen3 Haldex controller from the Volvo XC90 V8 and that fixes bias to 60%front 40%rear.. yes it issues errors but then again, as long as the power gets to ground, I'm cool.

 

The car was fitted with MAK wheels and Bridgestone Potenza Sport, and some polyurethane bushings, so it glued to the road and just powered towards the end of the roads all too fast. 

 

Surprisingly the K04 is good for 280bhp and while one thought the car was quick after remap, the moment VVT kicked in, you would feel a tremendous pull towards the car in front of you... or the next corner. These engines are known for starvation limitations due to turbo size, but It didn't feel like this. Probably it will be perceptible from 300 bhp on, and that is maybe why you rarely see them going past 300bhp without major turbo/injector upgrades.

Was really fun, however, some months into this, we felt an occasional stuttering, as if the gearbox wasn't getting into gear, but it was... strangely! 

A week into this occasional stuttering at low speed, the car seized and cylinder number 4 said it was time to go on strike. 

I'm still to eval if this was a piston carving (the car used to have bi-fuel BS) and we all know that gas conversion presents lubrication challenges, or a stuck injector... or a MEGA crack as compression was totally lost on that cylinder. But the piston scratched the wall and that means trouble either way you put it.

 

UPDATE: piston scratched the wall because it was fully cleansed by water from the block and petrol from the injectors. The gasket gave away! 

After a small talk with the mechanic, we figured that the torque specs for the that part of the head where WAY OFF... so a hypothesis can be formulated: 

Former owner overheated the engine, a leak formed, he asked his grease monkey to tighten the block where it warped and sold. Typical Latin BS. I'd have brought the car if he had told me this, anyway, as some tweaking was to happen... but people are shit! We deserve the asteroid coming our way.

So I had 2 options:

    1 - buy an engine and have this fixed in a month

    2 - buy parts and forge this thing to 1000BHP capable, set it up to 500 bhp to be very unstressed, and allow the wife to thrash a 400-500bhp AWD Volvo to pick up the kid at school

... hum... decisions decisions. 

With me, as you can gather with other articles, there is no decision. Replace factory compromised stuff with tuner or racing uncompromising parts and stop worrying. 

So a build it was and a big one it would be. 

Well I've just start receiving parts!

K1 I profile Forged Rods

 

 

 

 Darton MID sleeves:

 

 

Wiseco, HighCompression, Forged Pistons:

 

ARP 2000 Main studs:

ACL RACE Tri-Metal Rod Bearings:

KING Tri-Metal crank bearings:

Also arrived:

 

ARP 2000 head bolts

Athena 1.6mm full metal, reinforced gasket  

The Turbo is to be hybridized to a K24 core good for 420 to 500 bhp. As a result, I'll look at the injector charts and choose accordingly.

The Idea is to have a dual map with the minimum duty cycle the injectors handle for the minimum pressure on the turbo (IDK 180bhp maybe), and either 400 or 500 bhp for the max duty cycle on the injectors and turbo feeding.

I think the Wife will be pleased. 

Stay tuned for more info and pictures. I'll be showing off my friend Fabio's skills during the build, in case you wanna try the same recipe.

UPDATE 1

Finally, after a long wait (first gather all the parts, then waiting for the mechanic to have time to assign to the build), I've got word that, next Thursday (in 3 days) the build will start, and the photos will start popping on the blog. Stay tunned.

She is now dry (engine coolant, engine oil and gearbox oil).

Tomorrow, engine and turbo comes out and off to the machine shop. Weeeeee ;)

UPDATE 2

wow this was a mess... no wonder it failed.

Gasket blew and coolant went into the combustion chamber.

Gasket let go almost 50% of the contact patch... it was a matter of time before we had trouble. You can clearly see how clean and washed it is:

 

And a bench of parts that (about 50% of'em) will never be used in this engine again. 

The rods seam thin if you look from this perspective, but turn them sideways and they look like toothpicks. The 2.5 t5 low pressure options is built cheap to it's very core. Disappointing, but a clear tell sign of economists finding their way into engineering departments.

 

UPDATE 3

Engine is now at machine shop, and turbo has been handed to the turbo specialist for hybridization... in goes a BorgWarner K04 out comes a BorgWarner K24.

Next step: Full destruction of existing sleeves and making the inserts for the Dartons.

Then the cold/hot resleve.

Then honing under pressure plate at full torque (simulating a head in place)... the proper way to do it.

This next phase is expected to take about 1month...so update could be delayed until full sleeved block and turbo are done.

Will try to post progress IF the work shop sends images back.

Update:

So summer came, people went on vacation, stuff delayed a bit, however:

The block is sleeved and parts are now in weight correction and dinamic balancing for assembly.

With the engine now being dynamic-balanced, its starting to get close to assembly, so the logic step is starting to work of shaft reinforcement and brakes.

As such, a set of s60R calipers front and rear...

...those are 4 piston calipers all round, brembo made.

next is 330mm rotors, probably 2 part disks with floating mounts...still under research.

The calippers where the ones shown above, but since the V50 is more polestar than standard, i asked (again) for my friends Diogo Silva's help.

And boy did he deliver:

If you are looking for a proper paintjob (with decalcs) Diogo is your man. You can reach him here: diogo2306silva@gmail.com

+351933590153

Credits and Special thanks for this build:

Diogo Silva - caliper paiting

(to be filled at the build end)

Volvo T5 ... T5R... R ... R-design? Volvo Polestar? Just Polestar? But aren't all Volvo's grandparent's cars?

No... ohhh no!

Volvo has a racing heritage. Particularly when they decided to market their mad T5 as R and partner with TWR to show-off all over the BTCC scene, but they've always had a touch of MAD in their saloon and vans, it's just that, people don't know that until they try it.

It all starter much earlier than that. Around mid 70's, Volvo debuted a new line of cars: the 240 and 260 series. 

There is a constant miss mach on Volvo mode ranges, but I'll try my best to explain this:

Type	BMW Equivalent	Ford Equivalent	Honda Equivalent	VAG Equivalent	70's Volvo	80's Volvo	90's Volvo	00's Volvo	Today's Volvo
HatchBack	1 series	Focus	Civic	A3 / Golf / Leon	-	380	-	C30	C30
Sports hatchback	1m Series	Focus RS / Focus ST	Civic TypeR	S3 / Golf gti/ Sirrocco/LeonCupra	-	480 turbo	-	C30T5 C30 Polestar	-
Compact Family	3 Series Compact	Focus Sedan Focus Van	Civic Van	Jetta / Bora	140/240	240/440	-	-	V40Mk2
Family Coupe	3 Series Coupe	Focus Coupe	-	Passat CC	-	-	C70	-	-
Family Convertible	3 Series Convertible	Focus Convertible	-	EOS	-	-	C70 Coupe	C70	-
Family Minivan	2 series	Focus CMax	-	Touran	-	-	-	-	-
Compact Family SUV	X2	Puma Mk2	HRV	-	-	-	-	-	XC40
Family	3 Series	-	-	A4 / Passat	-	460	S40Mk1 V40Mk1	S40mk2 V50mk1	S40mk3 V50mk2
Family Sports	3M Series	-	-	S4	-	-	-	S40T5/AWD V50T5/AWD Polestar kit	- -
Comfort Family	5 Series	Mondeo	Accord	A6 / Octavia	164/260	260	850/S70/V70mk1	S60mk1 V70mk2	S60mk3 V60
Comfort Family Sports	5M Series	-	Accord TypeR	S6 / Octavia RS	-	-	850T5 850T5R 850R	S60T5 V70T5 S60R V70R	S60 / V60 Polestar
Comfort Family SUV	X3	Kuga	CRV	Q5/Tiguan	-	-	XC70 mk1	XC70 mk2	XC60
Limo	7 Series	Scorpio	Legacy	A8 / Arteon	-	740/760	900	S80	S80 V90
Limo Sports	7M Series	-	-	S8	-	740Turbo 760Turbo	-	S80T6	-
SUV	X5 Series	-	-	Q7/Touareg	-	-	-	XC90	XC90

So, back to the 200's...the 200 series where Volvo's bet into the family car. 

But the chassis was a significant improvement form previous cars and the engines where over-engineered to stand abuse and engineering refinement over the years. So Volvo, aimed against the BMW and Mercedes market, and pumped up the power on the straight 6. They also added better brakes to 

And then, the hairdryer squad hit Volvo and they decided to Turbo-it:

 

... and later, Inter-cool-it:

And with that, people thought: This could be just good enough to race! Guess what...it was!

The 700 series:

It worked, so, Why not adding another "hairdryer" to the 700 series?

And them all the sudden, Volvo had gained the reputation to create cars that just looked normal, until you floor'em and they burn rubber and disappear like they urged an exorcism. So, cleverly, they started appealing to the "kid" inside every man that once was a petrol head, but then got a kids of his own.

And then the P80 chassis

At this point, things started to get VERY interesting. 

Volvo was working on a new line of chassis "p80" and a new line of engines "Volvo Modular engine", and since they where expecting some fast performer versions, and some competition usage, they really thought on chassis dynamics that where fun "within Volvo concepts" and not just safe and habitable.

The 850 was good from start and after some "test production years" mainly with 2.0 and 2.5 NA 5 cylinder engines, then started the T5, T5R, glt(t2) and then the R.

  

The rear Deltalink auto-steering suspension, meant that the car, though enormous, did had some agility... argumentatively a weird one: You need to go all out loading the rear suspension (typically with a lift-off, yang-in, full-throttle), to smash the rubber bushings and twist the geometry into the turn-in. If you get it right, it feels like there is a magical force holding the massive rear end and helping you corner, while the front wheels shred the tires through the bend... but it does help the massive thing turn. So not brilliant, definitely not refined as a BMW; expensive on tires; but efficient, sure.

So it comes with no surprise that this happened:

Volvo teamed up with TomWakinshawRacing team and then:

yes! that is a van... on the BTCC racing track... and it was tremendous.

The 850 in the BTCC where not even close to the production T5, T5R or R... but the driving experience was not that different (causing Lamers to leave the team, as he had a 850T5 and thought the driving too similar to consider the BTCC car pro enough). And they looked the same, and since the road going versions where crazy powerful, people loved them.

The BTCC was a masterpiece of clever engineering around the rules from the brilliant TWR team.

First of all the car was NA 2.0 and not Turbo 2.3, however, the 5 cylinder aspirated 2.0 rev'd to 8500 rpm and produced 325bhp (with 13.5:1 compression pistons), but it was always publicized as 280+ after catalytic converter silencer fitting, and delivered it to ground via a 6 speed gearbox.

Engine was mounted lower and further back into the car.

Driving position was also move towards the centre of the car, next to the B pillar, full racing car style.

But the best part, the cherry on top of the cake was the cylinder head. You see BTCC rules stated that the angle of the valves could not be changed from production cars... but there is 2 ways to look at this: 

1- angle towards the head

2- angle towards the block

The standard head could not be tuned enough make a competitive Turing car engine.

You see, the heads from the production 2.0 and 2.5 engines where built towards easiness in production and cost reduction, so the 58 degree intake-exhaust amplitude is less than optimal and high-range, leaves the engine struggling for air volume. The regulations allowed for bigger valves, but not the angle.

So a prototype was built to study the air-flow dynamics and have a goal. This design alone managed 260bhp. It was still a good 25bhp shy of the standard power output from... well everyone else.

So someone at TWR thought outside of the box and move the logic of looking at valve angles from a head geometry perspective into what I really what is valve-to-block angle. 

and regulation said nothing about shaving the head unilaterally and tilting-it. 

There was also nothing saying you couldn't cut the head top-off and fit a custom part to allow bigger valves and cams. 

The result was sort of a Frankenstein with a small part of the original head, sandwiched between custom parts and angled so the cylinder intake and air swirl optimization managed 235bhp. 

And the Deltalink was also 

... gone!

It got known for being a susprise, as no one expected a flying brick to have a decent score in BTCC, but it did... and also got known for this spectacular crash, at the hand of Kevin Burt:

With all this marketing, the 850 got a bunch of "variations" of it's powerful form, over the years.

They all differ slightly, but in the end, they revolve around the same basic concept:

Volvo 850 T5 -     2.3l, 225bhp 300nm

Volvo 850 T5-R - 2.3l, 240bhp 330nm

Volvo 850 R -       2.3l, 250bhp 350nm (bigger turbo)

Enter the V70mk1 / S60 mk1 / C70 mk1

Then, it got a revised front and dashboard, but it was still the 850

But the versioning got a lot more clear:

Volvo C70/V70/S60 T5 - 2.3l, 240bhp 330nm

Volvo V70/S60 R-            2.3l, 250bhp 350nm (bigger turbo)

For some reason I'm yet to compute, the C70 got a convertible... good, but not the R! You can have a Family Van R, but oh no not the coupe :s maybe I'm the crazy one.

 

S40Mk1 V40Mk1

Around the same time, Volvo and Mitsubishi started spawning the results of their affair. The mk1 S40, with a chassis equal to the Mitsubishi charisma was released.

And of course, with a lighter and more nimble chassis, it got straight into TWR hands and this happened:

It got the same engine as it's big brothers, but now on a much more nimble chassis, results where easy to obtain. 

For the street? well they used the "modular" word on the Volvo Modular Engine Design, So they lost a full cylinder off the 2.3 T5, and a 1.95ltr 200bhp T4 was added to the range.

It was fast, it was nimbler than the 850 or S70, but the entire car was built with comfort in mind and the steering response on the road car was just too light and filtered for my liking. The one I loved best to drive had just had a failure on the steering assistance :S a car that, broken, is more interesting to drive.

But the best from this Mitsubishi/Volvo romance is still on the forge, and will come to play at a latter time, under the most unexpected recipe.

MK2 V70/MK2 S60

Volvo had just been brought by Ford. So, new chassis where being produced and new cars had to fit them.

The P2 project spawned a lot of new Volvo models, amongst them the mk2 versions of the V70 and S60.

By then, Volvo had ditched TWR and brought a company called "Flash Engineering". It renamed it as Polestar Engineering and tasked PROdrive to help them get going.

But it was not until the MK3 version of the S60 and V70 that Polestar was really "open for business". 

And this is going to get a Twist for the smaller cars... later, however having them already planning at this point was very important.

The MK2 V70 and S60 had a clear definition too:

Volvo mk2 V70/S60 T5 - 2.4l, 260bhp 350nm (BorgWarner  turbo) 

Volvo mk2 V70/S60 R-    2.5l, 300bhp 400nm (BorgWarner  turbo) AWD

Hold the press. Everyone goes after the R, but the T5, on had the Unicorn engine from Volvo. The Glorious B5244T5. Internals good for 600BHP, standard with a BorgWarner K24... And the basis that Polestar used to tune for high power applications. 

Most people drool about a Toyota 2JZ, or a Nissan RB26DETT, but every one of those engines will require forjed internals beyond 600BHP, much like the Volvo 4T5. So this engine is within that class of engineering, and with one less piston.

Enter the C30 / MK2 S40 / MK2 V50 and MK2 C70

One other Volvo-Ford product was the P1 chassis. The FordFocus CMAX chassis, on a volvo security reinforced frame and crazy Volvo turbo engines.

I don't know if you ever driven a ford since 1996, but they ALL have spectacular chassis (except the KA mk2, based on the garbage fiat 500). 

The Focus is and excellent driver's car and the chassis it just perfect. So The brand new C30, The Mk2 S40, the V50 and mk2 C70, all based out of these chassis are brilliant cars to drive... they are fun, engaging and very sporty. 

And they all where very easy to  understand:

Volvo C30/mk2 S40/ Mk2 c70, V50 T5 - 2.5l, 220bhp 320nm (k04 low pressure turbo) optional AWD

What wait!? The BEST CHASSIS so far, No R, No T5R, No 4T5 and BorgWarner K24, no Prodrive, no Polestar? Has the world gone crazy!? No racing team!? what?

Yeah.. R was transformed into R-Design... a body kit and interior trim option... Pfff

The ONLY real good thing that made the P1 chassis to squeeze it to the limits, was... DSTC. 

Sure you don't really understand this, allow-me to explain:

    TC - Traction Control (combats wheel spin on acceleration by applying brakes and dosing the engine)

    STC - Stability and Traction Control ( it's the Volvo equivalent to ESP from VW, DSC from BWM) Corrects the car trajectory control by applying brakes individually and dosing the engine, depending on circumstances.

    DSTC - Dynamic Stability And Traction Control - It's the STC with added Active Yaw Control - This establishes thresholds on the STC so that it only interveins on the the verge of full loss of control. 

What does it mean? You arrive into a round about, full on brakes, flick the car with some opposite turn to unsettle the chassis, then turn into the drift and full power on the car... and the car allows you to get away with it! If you steer out of the movement or hit the brakes, the car understands you're in trouble and unleashes the fun-cutter STC to get you back on track and regain your dignity before crashing.

And this we have to thank for... Volvo and Mitsubishi sexual affair! 

See what makes the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution perform those perfectly controlled 4WD drifts that seem to last forever? yup Active Yaw Control.

   

You can have it on your Rally based Mitsubishi... or your wife's Volvo to take the kids to school... and I'm the crazy one. But I'm not complaining! Far from it. I can always add the engine and the R you neglects to the car... not the chassis electronics, so I take that option over the R, sure.

Important Note - DSTC can be present in any P1 or P2 based Volvo... yes the gigantic XC90 has DSTC as an option, and yes I've drifted the monster... it's weird. 

So, what happened? Only the Volvo management team can say but rumours are: They invested into the S60Mk3 Polestar for racing and for public "power saloon", based out of the glorious 4T5 unit... but then I've not seen a single 4T5 based polestar.

And that Ford was not happy with the C30 cannibalising part of the Ford Focus sales.

However, at the dealership, you could order a Polestar Optimisation pack for your T5. Composed by some literature, bigger wheels, firmer springs, engine and gearbox optimisation.

Again, easy to understand:

Volvo C30/mk2 S40/ Mk2 c70, V50 T5 Polestar optimized - 2.5l, 250bhp 380nm optional AWD

MK3 S60/ V60 (and Polestar finally out of the box)

So S60 got it's Mk3 revision. A much more dynamic chassis, so nice to drive that even the diesel 1.6 option is nice to throw into a corner.

At this point in time, Polestar was full on racing and the S60 Polestar for the road was based not on the 4T5 but on the T6. So it was a 3.0,  cylinder 351bhp 500nm beast.

 

and the road version:

MK2 C30 Polestar (just a concept)

Just before Polestar lost it's mind for good and turned electrrrrrr (sorry can't pronounce that without vomiting all over), they where actually heading in the right direction. 

They used the learned success on the P1 chassis and where working on the C30 Polestar to annihilate all the other RS and GTi's and AMG's and M's the market had on the segment.

 

Based out of the same chassis as the Focus RS, after the focus RS ended production without a worthy replacement (another stupidity I'm yet to compute), also packing AWD and even more power, this was a brutal little car. .. that never got into production and probably never will as polestar collapsed into building toy cars with batteries and stuff.

How pleasant would this baby be?

2.5 T5 engine producing 451bhp and 510nm with a BorgWarner K26... i mean.... just perfect.

But a Limited 250unit production, fixed this into : another car you'll never have! Why?

Check TopGear opinion on it and you'll get the point. 

So now that you understand what is what, lets have a table with Volvo Only and the influence on the sports side of things.

Car	70's Sports	70's Production	80's Sports	80's Production	90's Sports	90's Production	00's Sports	00's Production	2010's sports	2010's Production
240 / 260	-	Volvo	Eggenberger Motorsport / Magnum Racing	Volvo	-	-	-	-	-	-
480 Turbo	-	Volvo/Renault	-	Volvo	-	-	-	-	-	-
740 Turbo	-	-	-	Volvo	-	-	-	-	-	-
850T5 850T5R 850R C70T5 Mk1	-	-		Volvo	TWR	Volvo/Porsche	-	-	-	-
C30T5 S40T5 V50T5 C70T5 mk2	-	-	-	-	TWR (s40 mk1)	Volvo/Porsche	Polestar (C30)	Volvo (Polestar Engineering Kit)	-	-
S60T5 S60R V70T5 V70R	-	-	-	-	-	-	Prodrive/Polestar	Volvo	Polestar	-
S60 Polestar	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	Polestar	Volvo/Polestar
C30 Polestar limited	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	Volvo/Polestar

So with this graph, you should now know that, at a point in time, Volvo went PRO racing with the 850 under TWR engineering, and used Porsche engineering to soup up the street versions. Then it got brought by Ford Motor Company and severed ties with TWR and started Polestar engineering (brought as "flash Engineering" and now called "cyan" as Polestar was spined-off to build... electric crap), a more "close to the chest" thing. Much like M division for BMW, AMG for Mercedes, etc., But before all that, they got an extra marital thing with Mitsubishi, and AYC came out of it, cloaked as DSTC.

By now, You now know that:

Volvo is terrible maintaining sports teams, Volvo builds some crazy cars every now and then, and that between the jump from TWR to Prodrive & Polestar to Polestar, the C30,S40,V50 and mk2 c70 where forgotten in terms of R options, while the S60 and V70 where blessed with the R option and also a pearl of an engine on the t5 260bhp versions.

Recently, Volvo went all crazy and created a brand new Engine with 4 cylinders, 2.0 and both turbo and compressor in line, copying VW. I got nothing against this engine that can , depending on the version and couplings (electric hybrid BS), produce all sorts of BHP . But I can't forgive Volvo for killing the glorious T4, T5 and T6, and transforming the T3, T4, T5, T6, T8 into marketing labels for the same 4 pot engine and a different config. It's just not decent, and Polestar got it very right by using the true T6 for the S60Polestar and the true T5 for the C30Polestar.

One thing is clear:

If you see a 90's, 00's or 10's Volvo ahead of you, and there is anything resembling  a T4, T5, T6, R or a blue label with a white small star in it, don't assume he is getting away from your path and allow you to blast by. It may just, floor-it and leave you in the dust, just because... and still look like Soccer mum's car.