HISTORY
Volvo was established in 1915 as a subsidiary of SKF, a Swedish ball bearing manufacturer. The name Volvo means "I roll" in Latin, conjugated from "volvere".
The Volvo Group itself considers it started in 1927. The first Volvo car, a Volvo ÖV 4, rolled off the production line at the factory in Hisingen, Gothenburg on April 14, 1927.
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| OV4 1 Wikipedia |
The ÖV 4 was not very successful in the Swedish climate, so the covered version, PV 4, was introduced at the end of 1928. Between 1927 and 1929 a total of 996 cars were manufactured.
The first truck, the "Series 1", debuted in January 1928. It was an immediate success and attracted attention outside Sweden.
In 1959, one of Volvo's engineers, Nils Bohlin, invented the 3-point seat belt. It is now a standard safety feature in all cars and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says that the seat belt saves about 11,000 lives per year. .
When redesigning its seats in the 1960s, Volvo worked with orthopaedic surgeons to create a design that would reduce driving induced back pain.
Volvo was responsible for the first child-friendly car seat in 1967.
Debuting as Volvo's first widely successful sports car, the P1800 saw nearly 50,000 models roll off the production line before its 1973 finale. The car's fame was fueled by its appearance on the British TV series The Saint, driven by the pre-James Bond Roger Moore. The show aired from 1962 to 1969.
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| The Saint logo next to P958-X2 at Volvo Museum. By Jarvin |
Volvo renamed their Cream Yellow paint color for their 1995 850 T-5R "Faded Yellow" in Australia. This was because they knew the paint would eventually fade under the Australian sun due to the technology at the time.
Ford bought the Volvo car company in 1999. In March 2010, Ford signed a deal to sell Volvo to China's biggest multinational automotive manufacturing company Geely for $1.8 billion.
Today there are two companies: Volvo Cars that produces standard size cars and Volvo Group that produces trucks, boat engines, buses and more.
FUN VOLVO FACTS
North Korea ordered 1,000 Volvos from Sweden in 1974 and has yet to pay it off, resulting in a debt of 2.2 billion kronor ($322 million). Every six months the company sends an invoice to Pyongyang,
Volvo's crash test cars are subject to the same machinery that tests the structural integrity of buildings during earthquakes.
Irv Gordon, a science teacher from Long Island, drove over three million miles in his Volvo P1800, which he bought in 1966. The former New York school master held a Guinness Book of World Records certification for having registered the greatest number of miles driven by an owner in one car. By the time Gordon died, on November 15, 2018, the car had driven more than 3.2 million miles.
Source Daily Mail
Volvo's crash test cars are subject to the same machinery that tests the structural integrity of buildings during earthquakes.
Irv Gordon, a science teacher from Long Island, drove over three million miles in his Volvo P1800, which he bought in 1966. The former New York school master held a Guinness Book of World Records certification for having registered the greatest number of miles driven by an owner in one car. By the time Gordon died, on November 15, 2018, the car had driven more than 3.2 million miles.
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| Irv Gordon's 1800S approaching 3,000,000 miles. By Doug Coldwell |
Source Daily Mail
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