Mysterious news from the test department - the missing test of the Volvo P 1800
Sometimes it's not the test reports that have appeared that are the most interesting, but the ones that haven't.
The long-distance tests carried out by Automobil-Revue in the 1950s to 1970s were elaborate, characterized by a long driving distance of at least 2,000 km, sometimes even 11,000 km, included meticulous performance measurements and recorded driving experiences in a wide variety of operating conditions and by different people.
A long-distance test could oftenlast several months. And fate did not always play in the test team's favor. Accidents or more serious damage could happen.
In the case of the Volvo P 1800, which was driven in the summer and winter of 1962 and probably into 1963, it was not technical problems that prevented publication, it seems, although the leakage problems noted by the test drivers were certainly unpleasant. Rather, it seems thatthe improved and faster P 1800 S model arrivedtoo early and the publication of the long-distance test of the outdated model no longer made sense. At least that is our current theory.
However, we will prepare this previously unpublished test, restore the many contemporary photos and thus offer our readers an old test that was never published in this form.
