Chunky Swedish ice maiden: Volvo XC60 D4 Manual EE Lux Nav

Cold weather, warm approach

One of the things which made the car especially welcome was that it understood the winter. When my father bought a Volvo in the 1970s the manual suggested that you bang your feet together to shake off the snow as you got in. Time has moved on and coping with weather is more mollycoddling. Heated seats, heated steering wheel and fast window clearing. The windows cleared from heavily frosted to completely defrosted in the time it took me to tap a postcode in the sat-nav.

Warm: The XC60 interior is well suited to cold weather driving

Two things define a Volvo “boxy but good” and safe. Elements of the design date back to when Brit Peter Horbury was in charge of design, but he’s since been kicked upstairs to run design for Volvo’s Chinese parent Geely’s.

The safety comes from a maximum five stars in its Euro NCAP crash test, front and side airbags, cabin-length window airbags, and anti-whiplash front-head restraints. There is also what Volvo calls a “City Safety system” and anyone else would call a row of three huge red lights on the top of the dashboard. If you are doing more than 20mph and too close to something in front they light up and are reflected in the windscreen and a buzzer sounds.

It’s startlingly effective, and I first saw it when something cut in front of me on the motorway. Trying to get the car to do it again however just pisses off the driver ibehind and is not to be recommended. I’m told that if you ignore the sound and lights it will brake for you. I didn’t test this.

Roomy: The 490-litre boot's nice and big on this one

Nor did I think it a good idea to try to photograph it but Volvo has produced a video.

One of the options which significantly adds to the safety of others is the blind spot indicators. If there is something in the blind spot a light comes on by the door mirror. It seems to be sensitive scooters and bikes. I was less impressed by the lane assist which beeps when it thinks you are drifting.

It’s big, which gives everyone a commanding view out and a lot of space. At 490 litres with the seats up, and 1,455 with them down it’s surprisingly not quite as big as the Tesla (1645 litres) and it’s high so you need to lift stuff in but will swallow plenty if you are into outdoor sports or just spend too much time at Ikea.

The size does however make it hard to park and while there are rear sensors I would have liked to have seen a reversing camera, and with a big bonnet it’s really too big to not have front sensors. Perhaps with time and ownership you’d get more confident but I found myself looking for big spaces.

Workhorse: The 4-pot two litre engine gets the XC60 up to 130mph

The four-cylinder, two-litre engine gives enough power to haul the big car around, at 181hp it’s surprisingly quick with a 0-62 of 8.5 seconds and a top speed of 130mph. The combined EU fuel test figure is 62.8mpg.

You pay for all this brilliance. The base XC60 is £31k, the XC60 D4 SE Lux Nav with no options £35,100 and the combination of Driver Support Pack, Security Pack, Winter Illumination pack, and other individual options took the car as tested to £45k.

That’s a lot of money for a mid-range crossover, but ultimately it’s a well thought out car with an exceptionally good take on driver controls. Although I have to admit I was a little disappointed when I concluded that the indicators were just a bulb behind some green plastic. ®