Volvo 1994 BTCC 850 Estate

[Silent1]

I'm trying to find some photos of these racing, there only appears to be 2 or 3 on google?

Does anyone have any or know of a good source of them, i find it excellent that they used to race estates and as my mum used to have one, it would make quite a fitting wallpaper

[Lord Croker]

Silent1 said:

I'm trying to find some photos of these racing, there only appears to be 2 or 3 on google?

Does anyone have any or know of a good source of them, i find it excellent that they used to race estates and as my mum used to have one, it would make quite a fitting wallpaper

HTH

[ajprice]

Here's a couple of sites.

http://www.swedespeed.com/gallery/gallery2.php?mod...
http://www.stillphotography.co.uk/gallery/v/Motors...

[Cara Van Man]

One of the coolest racing cars ever to be built.

i bet Rydell had a mattress in the back also.

[jasonxr2racer]

I think the new Focus touring car will sound similar as it uses the same engine.

I used to love the sound of the Mondeo and Volvo 5 cylinder engines

[Silent1]

thanks for the links chaps

[Satsuma]

7/8ths scale if i'm not mistaken.

[stifler]

How much smaller actually was it? And more importantly, how did TWR get away with it? Did no-one notice?

[touring fan]

jasonxr2racer said:

I think the new Focus touring car will sound similar as it uses the same engine.

The Focus uses a 4 cylinder.

[Gillet]

I remember my dad having a Volvo estate back in the day, and they had a Touring car replica in the Volvo dealership, the best looking Touring car ever in my opinion, and was great seeing the race.

[james_tigerwoods]

That was such a brilliant car.

We're not worthy

[longblackcoat]

Satsuma said:

7/8ths scale if i'm not mistaken.

Really? Any info on this - I'm fascinated.

[RichB]

Satsuma said:

7/8ths scale if i'm not mistaken.

I think you're mistaken...

[Silent1]

I was going to say, that's the first time i've heard anything about it being a smaller scale.

I know of one of the nascars/or something of that ilk was built to a smaller scale and won a lot of races until they realised.

Whereas the story behind the estate is that when they went to collect the body they were only building estates that day, so TWR thought it would be brilliant and Ovlov realised that it was a brilliant marketing tool.

[snowen250]

The story i have always heard is that the saloon version wasnt quite ready so they used an estate as a mule. When they saw it went well, and it made a great story they kept it. It was only the introduction of wings and splitters in 95 that forced it out.
I've never heard of it being smaller and while TWR were crafty i doubt they were that crafty. especially as publicity photos used to show them next to normal 850 estates, people may have noticed the size difference then......
Simon

[stifler]

I have heard it rumoured before. But I have never heard of anyone that worked on it that has spoken out about it. I don't know who has the surviving cars either.?

[GBRM]

Great idea and marketing tool (I now have a T5 early V70/late 850) but the 7/8th size is something that was always levelled at TWR's Rover SD1s and if you throw enough **** at someone/thing some if evetually sticks but not for me to comment. (even with my history with TW!!)

[Nick_F]

I think the 7/8ths thing was a Smokey Yunick number.

[Hairbrakes]

Cara Van Man said:

One of the coolest racing cars ever to be built.

I bet Rydell had a mattress in the back also.

They did quite famously race several times with a pair of stuffed dalmations in the back

RichB said:

Satsuma said:

7/8ths scale if i'm not mistaken.

I think you're mistaken...

The Ford Supervans were 7/8s, but the Volvo BTCC cars werent! There was talk of the windscreen rake and roofline being altered though, as someone found out when standard doors didnt fit....

[Red Firecracker]

The 7/8 stories were (allegedly) started by Gerry Marshall as a bit of fun at TW's expense and referred to the SD1's he ran. There has never been any substantive proof that any of TWR's cars were scale size. Plenty of other shenanigans though, such as wafer thin panels etc. Some good info on 10Tenths about the various tricks that were emplyed.