|
From Swedespeed.com Miscellaneous Features While at the SEMA Show in November, Swedespeed was as surprised as you were to see a new company on the Volvo aftermarket: Evolve Cars. While at the show, we sat down with Don Nicholson, President of Evolve Cars to learn more about the new startup.
DN – Sure. The SEMA Show is all about the wildest, trickest and most over the top. When we gave Volvo the proposal to build a car for SEMA, we had some ideas, but once we actually got our hands on the S60R we said, “Great car to begin with,” but we saw the opportunity to develop some even more over-the-top products. You see the body kit that we created for it. We didn’t just create a bottom lip spoiler. We created a full front bumper cover that included the upper grille also. We did the same thing at the rear with the rear treatment. We did an entire bumper cover again, created our own side skirt spoilers, created our own decklid spoiler, created taillight treatments in order to give the taillights a different look. We darkened the taillights for the show in order to give the car that much more of an aggressive look. The brakes are probably my favorite part because we did 15-inch rotors at all four corners. Up front we have two 6-piston calipers and at the rear there are single six-piston calipers. So the car has plenty of brakes. It really turned out well. Whether or not we bring this actual brake system to the market remains to be seen. SS – So you’re still evaluating that? DN – Yes. The brakes especially. They work great. They’re a prototype at this point. Wheel fitment is really a big problem because the 15-inch rotors are huge, as are the calipers so it’s very difficult to find wheels that fit. Actually, to get wheels for this car we had to go to HRE and had them custom make a set for us. We ended up going with 19”x 8 1/2” in the front with 235/35/19 tires. In the rear we went with 19” x 9 1/2” and fit 275/30/19. With the car being all-wheel drive, you have to be very conscious of the overall diameter remaining the same, so that the software driving the system doesn’t get confused on you. With our equipment the difference is a very small percentage so that it is well within the guidelines of where the system’s computer will recognize it and still be happy. With that, we got a lot more tire in the rear, and it looks great.
SS – Tell me a little bit about the motor. What have you done in there? What is actually product you’ll be offering and what is, at this point, still in development? DN – We only had two months to build the cars. We picked up the cars from Volvo on August 20 and today is November 5, so we’ve been thrashing just to try to get things done. One area that we didn’t get to spend too much time with yet is under the hood. We did some cosmetics under the hood. We created some custom turbo ducting from the turbo to the intercooler and then out of the intercooler into the throttle body. On the hood, we did our own ram-air hood inlet that feeds a cold air box. We think this will work quite well just to get cold fresh air into the motor rather than trying to pull it from on top of the radiator. We created our own strut-tower brace, which truly ties the strut-towers together. The factory provides what looks to be a strut-tower brace, but it’s got rubber bushings on both ends. It’s also got a very flexible rubber bushing on the upper engine mount. So what we did was we truly tied the strut-towers together with solid mounts and created a urethane bushing for the engine mount to more firmly locate the engine and minimize engine movement. We’re anxious to see how that works. The strut tower brace will be a production piece. The turbo ducting will likely be a production piece. We didn’t have time to put a larger turbo on the car, but the target for this car is to be 500-horsepower with 450 ft.-lbs. of torque, or at least somewhere in that neighborhood. We’ve done the math. We’ve got the recipe. We’ve got the ingredients. We just didn’t have time to put them all together in time for the show. Creating the turbo upgrade is not going to be too big of a challenge. The software side is going to be a challenge. But we’ll get there. We hope to have it up and running in the next couple of months. SS – That’s a pretty aggressive configuration that you’re talking about there and while there’s a market for that, it’s probably somewhat narrow. Are you also considering some configurations that are less aggressive; some plug and play things for the more casual car modifier who doesn’t want to spend the money for an expensive kit and wants to do much of the work himself even with more limited mechanical abilities.
DN – Sure. For someone who doesn’t want 500-horsepower, we’ll be offering ECU upgrades, exhaust systems, cold air intakes, and intercooler upgrades. The blue car that is here at the show has a 3-inch system and the red car has a 2 1/2-inch system. We’re evaluating between the two cars which system will work better. It looks like the 3-inch system works really well and we’re still able to get plenty of ground clearance with it. The turbo needs to have minimal back pressure in order to spool up as quickly as possible and it seems like the system we’ve created really does that for it. You can really feel it throughout the power band. Suspension-wise, what we’ve created for both of the cars is an adjustable coilover suspension system. What that allows is about four inches of height adjustment. We’ve completely retained the factory Monroe-Ohlins 4C cockpit-adjustable system. It only compliments the system. It doesn’t compromise it in any way. We went with about a 15% more aggressive spring and the beauty of adjustable coilovers is we have an almost infinite number of spring rates and spring heights, which is ideal for the autocrosser, the racer or maybe the guy who wants to do a little bit more with the car even on the road. With adjustable coilovers you have the best of both worlds. You can drop it for the show, as you see here on both of the cars, or you can raise it up an inch or two and have plenty of ground clearance for good drivablity around town. This is another product that we’ll probably bring to market very soon. It’s a fairly straight-forward upgrade and, again, it doesn’t compromise the factory system in any way. SS – In regards to the engine modifications you’ve been developing, while the R is a great car, it’s somewhat limited in production numbers. Will those owners of T5s or 2.5T and 2.4T models have products available for them as well? DN – Certainly. For everything on the styling side that we are creating, we’re making sure that it is not exclusive to the R. As far as the body kit, we want it to fit the 125,000 non-R S60s out there and also the V70s as well. We’re developing the products in such a way that they’ll also be appealing to the more mass-market offerings from Volvo as well. On the engine side, we look forward to doing exhausts, ECU upgrades and air intakes; some of the more usual engine upgrades you see for other turbocharged cars out there. That’s really what Evolve is all about.
SS – We talked about the body kit earlier. I couldn’t help but notice a styling similarity to the PCC concept car that was a precursor to the production R. Was that intended? DN – There were some themes there that we did carry over at the front and at the rear also with the diffuser. We carried over some of those elements, but made them a little bit smoother and a little bit more market appropriate. Kind of our whole intention is not to build a car that is just so “tuner” that it’s not going to appeal to the Volvo owner. We want everything to be very market appropriate, but yet appeal to the Volvo enthusiast. But yes, you are correct. There were some elements off of the PCC car that we recognized and thought we could take it and modify it a little bit and make it our own. Because we were starting with essentially a clean slate, we were able to open up the upper grille. It’s larger than the R and larger than the standard S60 nose also. SS – Will a factory R grill fit the kit? DN – No. SS – So you need to use one of your grilles with that? DN – Yes. It will be our grille. But we are also developing a grille for the factory R fascia. I don’t have a sample here, but we’ve already developed the tooling for the upper grille and the lower valance grille. Those are ready to go. We took the opportunity to allow more air in to the radiator up through the upper grille and through the lower valance to feed the second intercooler on the R that much better. Through the side inlets we’re also able to get more air in there as well in order to direct more cooling to the front brakes. With the grilles, we have a unique grille material that we’re bringing to market. On Evolve body kits there are four pieces in the front; the upper grille and three valance grilles. We also integrated it into the rear, which we just think is a nice styling touch. With the exhaust in both forms, we kept it in fashion with the Rs by doing twin outlets in the factory location. They’re both twin 3-inch outlets. That was our design standard as we built the body kit around two three-inch tips. I come from a motorsport background. Everything I see and do needs to have a “stronger, lighter and faster” theme to it. People might say, “Well why didn’t you do dual twin exhausts that are split and such?” The answer is that there’s really no point in it other than from a styling standpoint. For me, it’s got to be very functional. I don’t want to do excess. If the market were to absolutely ask for a dual split exhaust, then we’d consider it down the road. But, for the direction that we’re going right now, we just want everything to be very functional.
SS – One of the aspects we haven’t spoken about yet is the interior. There’s generous use of a very unique, silver, almost carbon-fiber looking material used there. There’s use of an aftermarket knob with the Spaceball shifter. We’re intrigued. Can you tell us more. DN – Yes, I’d be happy to. We started with the factory blue Nordkap interior, which is one of the unique R interiors. We changed out some of the panels in the seats with, as you described, a silver carbon-fiber-look material, which really brightened up the interior and gave it more of a motorsports feel. We think it really turned out great. We changed out the blue carpet and put gray carpet in. We put aluminum pedals on it, aluminum foot rest and as you mentioned the shifter. I think I read on your forums that some of the R owners don’t like the Spaceball shifter because of the way the stitching on the knob is. We’ve already sourced a shifter to replace that. I don’t know if you’ve ever removed an R shift knob, but I’d be happy to show you how easy it is. SS – Oh really? So changing it out from Spaceball to a standard shifter? DN – No, we just changed out the shiftknob itself. It’s a five-minute deal. It’s a really nice styling cue and it feels really nice in the hand as well. SS – I noticed you’re using a Sparco knob. Is it a fairly common attachment point? DN – You can use a Sparco. We used the Sparco because of time at this point. We’ll be bringing our own knobs to market. Also with the pedals too, we used Sparco now but will be developing our own.
SS – In talking about what you’ve been developing, what is available now? What can we look forward to in the near future? DN – Probably the first pieces that will be available will be the grills. The grills will be available very soon. The body kit that is on these two cars are actually made out of fiberglass because these are prototypes, and as I mentioned before, we only had two months to develop it. So that’s where we’re at. The front, the rear and the sides will all be going into urethane. We recognize who the Volvo owner is. They want high quality. They want perfect fitment, and they want a good value. That’s what we want to do with everything we create. So the body kit is going to be made in urethane. It will probably take two to three months to make the tooling for that. But those will be available shortly. We should have exhausts in two or three months for the S60R. Again, that will be a three-inch exhaust with twin outlets. SS – When can we expect the rest of this stuff? What sort of timeframe are we looking at? DN – Over the next several months as things get produced to our spec, we’ll be rolling them out on our website EVOLVECARS.COM.
SS – On another subject, can you tell us a little bit more about yourself? DN – Absolutely. My name is Don Nicholson and my great uncle is “Dyno Don” Nicholson who is 76 years old now. People of my dad’s generation and older will quickly recognize him as arguably one of the greatest drag racers and one of the forefathers of the sport of drag racing. He drove both Chevys and Fords. He was probably most famous for his Fords. He had the first flip-top fiberglass-bodied funny car, which was a Mercury Comet called the “Eliminator”. So, I grew up around motorsports. I grew up watching my great uncle drag race. Drag-racing is a sport I enjoy, but I’m really more into F1. I enjoy the technology that is behind that, because there is more than going fast and going straight. You also have to brake and turn as you do on the road. So I appreciate motorsports very much. I have been in the automotive industry pretty much my whole life. I’ve always known that I wanted to have a place somewhere in the automotive aftermarket. I went to college at Point Loma Nazarene College down in San Diego. When I graduated from there, I went to work for Meguiar’s car care products, which was a good fit because it was in the industry I wanted to be in. It’s a great product and a great company to work for. Really my passion is more making a car go faster, stop harder and turn better rather than just making it shiny and making it look great. This is really a way for me to express my passion that much more, both on the performance side and some of my partners with the project are able to assist me on the styling side, which is a great balance. SS – You mentioned your interest in motorsport. Is there any chance that Evolve might get more involved in motorsport, campaigning Volvos or helping to get Volvos to get into a domestic series in some capacity? DN – That would sure be a fun thing (laughs). There are certainly some series out there that could be a lot of fun with a Volvo. It’s an interesting prospect. Whether it’s campaigning our own cars at some point or partnering with Volvo if they wanted to do something someday… that could be a lot of fun too. Motorsports is a great way to get our name out and to really associate with the enthusiasts of whatever marque it might be. We’d sure love to see our products and our cars on some circuit someday and give Volvo enthusiasts something to rally behind. The direction that we see Volvo going is amazing. That’s where we see the opportunity. Volvo bringing some exciting products to market and the opportunity that could potentially be there is attractive.
SS – One thing we notice in your media kit, aside from your also being in their stand today, it appears as if you’ve gotten some considerable support from Volvo. Could you expand upon that a little bit? DN – I’d be happy to. Volvo has really blessed us in a lot of ways, or rather God’s blessing through Volvo. They recognize what we want to do and they recognize how it is going to benefit Volvo by really rallying up behind the Volvo enthusiasts and creating really exciting products. There’s some good stuff on the market now. A lot of it is not really easy for US buyers to get easy access to because a lot of it is overseas. We had an opportunity to meet with several Volvo dealers who were here at the show. We were able to present to them what Evolve is all about and give them a quick presentation about the cars presented here and they were really excited about what they saw. That was very encouraging for us. Obviously, Volvo partnered with us, allowing us to build these two cars. We look forward to building more cars for them in the future. We’d love to do an S40 very soon, get our hands on it and start developing product for it also. The S60 and V70 will be a great market for Evolve. The XC90 we’ll have some products for, but we believe the S40 and the V50 will be the basis for our most significant product development, because we think that’s where a lot of the enthusiasts will come from. I am fortunately about a 40-minute drive from Volvo’s office in Irvine, which is helpful as we develop relationships and continue to move forward with the direction we’re going. SS – You mentioned the dealers, is it possible you’ll be seeing distribution of these products through dealerships? DN – We sure hope so. We’re still trying to decide what our best method of distribution will be, whether it will be through local dealerships or directly to the end user. It might be a combination of both, It might be some products go through dealerships. It might be some products go directly from us. The dealerships certainly did seem interested in a lot of the products that we showed them here at the show and some of the future products that we’re looking into. The dealerships have been asking Volvo, from what I gather, for more exciting products. Volvo being the conservative company that it is in Sweden, they’re just not there yet. Volvo Cars North America I think very much recognizes what Evolve is trying to do, how it’s going to benefit Volvo and how it’s going to benefit Volvo owners. SS - One last question… how has response been for people walking into the booth, for people who know Volvos or who don’t know Volvos? How are they reacting to the car. DN – That’s been the best aspect of this show. Being able to stand back and watch people come through the stand and check out the car has been a lot of fun. There are over 110,000 people here at SEMA for these few days. They’re all car guys and girls and it is an automotive trade-only show. They know what cars are, they know engineering, they know what is cool and what’s not. As they come by the Volvo very few people don’t stop and take a look and say “Wow, that’s a Volvo?” and “Oh yeah, I’ve heard about the S60R” and “oh wow, look what they did with this one” and “ and look at those brakes” and “look at that motor” and “look at that body kit”. It’s been a lot of fun. We’ve had a lot of interest from the media. It’s been exciting for us to be able to launch our brand. Swedespeed’s been a great part of that, and it’s been great being able to chat about the direction that Volvo is going and the huge part of that that you have been. SS – I may take that last part out. DN – No! (laughs). SS – I appreciate it very much. Thank you for your time Don. It looks like you’ve been very busy here at the show and we appreciate you fitting us into that busy schedule. DN – Thank you.
More info: EVOLVECARS.COM
All information Copyright © 1999-2003 Swedespeed. All rights reserved. No photos, news stories, graphics, or Swedespeed logos may be used or reproduced without written permission. Volvo is a registered trademark of Volvo Car Corporation and Ford Motor Company. Swedespeed is an independent media publication and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Volvo Car Corporation |
