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Registered User
Join Date: Feb 2001
Location: The Hills of North Georgia,USA
Posts: 7,859
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Coming soon: Even more power under the hood
Automakers claim horsepower surge helps sell safety
By Paul Eisenstein / Special to The Detroit News
LAS VEGAS -- Performance is a hot word in the U.S. automotive industry these days. It's hard to come up with a precise count, but industry observers expect at least 20, possibly more than 25 cars will top the 500-horsepower mark by mid-decade.
But the horsepower race isn't limited to sports cars, such as the eagerly-awaited, next-generation "C6" Corvette, or exotic imports, like the new Lamborghini Gallardo. Some of the most aggressive players in the performance game are traditionally nonperformance marques and the industry's smallest and least-noticed brand names.
"To cut through the clutter, manufacturers have discovered even the lowest common denominator products, like minivans and sedans, have to offer power and performance," said George Peterson, president of the automotive consulting firm, AutoPacific, Inc.
Let's face it, a race track isn't the first place that springs to mind at the mention of "Volvo."
So it came as a bit of a surprise when the Swedish automaker announced plans to unveil the newest addition to its lineup at the Las Vegas International Speedway recently. But then again, the S60 R isn't the type of car you'd expect from Volvo, either.
Sure, the automaker can make claims to having a bit of a performance heritage, but it's been a long time since it built its last 1800 sports car and since then, Volvo's products -- and its corporate message -- have focused almost exclusively on the subject of safety.
Safety remains a central theme for Volvo, but the S60 R sedan and its wagon sibling, the V60 R, are likely to get noticed for other attributes.
Key among them: a turbocharged, 2.5-liter, 5-cylinder powerplant pumping out a hefty 300 horsepower. That's enough to launch the R-cars from 0-to-60 in barely 5.5 seconds, placing them in a very different category from the traditional Volvo offerings.
And the Scandinavian subsidiary of Ford Motor Co. has more performance models in the works, including an R-badged version of the flagship S80 sedan, and an all-new sports car set to debut at the Frankfurt Motor Show in September.
That's great news for Volvo fans like Paul Bender, a 28-year-old from Canton. A buyer with Visteon Corp., he likes the idea of owning a muscle car, but wants something that's more suited to a suburban family lifestyle.
Cars like the S60 R, Bender says, "are a great compromise. They're a lot more comfortable than a Mustang."
Then there's Subaru. The automaker's Impreza WRX and the limited-production, 300-hp WRX STi are aimed at the so-called "rice burner" segment dominated by the likes of the Honda Accord. Subaru wants to connect with the young opinion leaders who can declare a nameplate hip.
Mitsubishi Motors Corp. has similar aspirations for the new Evolution. It may look like a conventional Lancer sedan, but under the skin, it has more in common with Mitsubishi's winning series of production-based rally cars.
At first glance, Jeff Kurzera, a 32-year-old nurse from Macomb Township, would seem like the perfect target for such products. With two children, ages 2 and 10 months, however, Kurzera is now driving a Chrysler Town and Country minivan, rather than the V-8-powered Mustangs he used to love.
Still, he's a bit skeptical of sedans like the WRX or S60R, insisting, "They're not performance cars." But even the most mundane product segments are bulking up on the automotive equivalent of steroids. Take the Honda Odyssey minivan, which recently ran a national billboard campaign promoting the fact that it had "240 horseys."
That's a good 50 percent more horsepower than the Mustang GT of the mid-1980s, and once would have classified the Odyssey as a "muscle car."
"Performance today is different from the days of the muscle car, when it meant going really fast in cars that couldn't handle or brake," AutoPacific's Peterson said.
These days, manufacturers are more likely to couple high horsepower numbers with a variety of other features designed to help their cars not only launch fast, but stop just as quickly, while safely maneuvering hard corners.
Take the Volvo S60 R, which gets rack-and-pinion steering, oversized, anti-lock brakes, all-wheel-drive and a slick, computerized suspension system that constantly monitors driving and road conditions and driver input.
The idea, explains project manager Wayne Baldwin, is to "keep the body as steady as possible and let the wheels do all the motion," as if the car were hanging from a sky hook. That makes it easier to merge into high-speed traffic, and to avoid potential danger, according to Volvo.
Other manufacturers make similar claims, arguing that their products are not muscle cars in the traditional sense of the word. All that power makes for more fun while driving, but it also helps keep you safe.
Brian O'Neill doesn't buy it.
"Claiming that more horsepower translates into improved safety is absolute utter nonsense," said O'Neill, president of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. "There's not one shred of evidence anywhere that high-performance cars have lower accident rates than pedestrian, everyday cars."
Even the most mundane econobox, O'Neill said, has "more than enough power to avoid an accident."
Perhaps, but perception and reality aren't always the same thing. And these days, motorists are increasingly coming to expect more horsepower from their vehicles, whether it's for safety purposes or simply to make driving more fun, Peterson said.
And if that's what customers want, manufacturers are ready to deliver, thanks to a range of technology that makes it easier to boost the performance of even modest-sized engines.
"A manufacturer that ignores the demand for performance," Peterson warned, "is risking the loss of sales."
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Stacy94PGT
My first car was a 67 Mustang Coupe, 2nd one was a 67 Cougar XR-7, 3rd one was a 66 Mustang Coupe. Why did I get rid of these cars for ? I know why, because I'm stupid, stupid, stupid. 
My next Ford.....
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