First V8 Supercars Volvo S60 to be tested with Holden engine

The first V8 Supercars Volvo S60 is scheduled for its first shakedown in the week after the season finale in Sydney on December 8th. The car will be run with Garry Rogers Motorsport’s existing Holden engine as development of the new Volvo V8 engine is still ongoing in Sweden by Polestar.

There has been no official word on when the new Volvo engine is scheduled for completion while Volvo Motorsport head Derek Crabb says the first tests could be run with a Holden engine.
“You can do the basic aero testing with any engine in it. You’re simply looking at modelling the basic parameters of an S60 against the basic parameters of the others. You can do the testing of the chassis and aero with any engine, and then when the engine is ready, off you go with the combined,” said Crabb to speedcafe.com.

Christian Dahl, owner of Polestar, is not worried about the rapidly closing 2014 V8 Supercars season start.
”Everyone looking from the outside is scared when they see the first round looming, but you do the hard work and it all comes together in the last weeks. It’s the same thing when we did the (WTCC) C30 from scratch, we didn’t have a component with a month to go, but then everything came together and we went racing. As long as you have control of your time schedules and supplies you will be fine,” said Dahl.

The first scheduled official test for the V8 Supercars Volvo S60 when the new Volvo engine is ready is the homologation test done by the V8 Supercars organisation. The car will be tested together with a benchmark V8 Supercars car and the Nissan Altima, which will undergo aerodynamical changes ahead of the 2014 season.