[NikMA]

While in general I agree with the sentiment that it's not great to cold-start an engine right on the highway, remember that these cars are pretty smart with regard to power distribution.

If your engine is cold and you accelerate onto the highway, when the ICE kicks in, it isn't suddenly taking over the entire load of the power demand. The electric motor is still providing some input, which drastically reduces wear on the engine. I believe the power output of the ICE is also limited until reaching full temperature.

It can also be argued that these little increases in potential wear by cold starts are mostly, if not completely, offset by the overall fewer miles/hours the engines get in city driving, where stop & go does a number on the drivetrain. All to say... Don't overthink it too much.

Same here, I was worried the same in my first few months of ownership.

So I did a test, and measured the engine coolant temp real time via OBD. I couldn't find an engine oil temp sensor output so I assumed a hot engine would equate a hot coolant.

At an ambient temperature of 77F, forcing to ICE to come on from, it took 20-30 mins to get the coolant to 90ish Celsius. Comparing to the 1st gen XC90, I don't recall the engine taking this long to reach 90+C. After thinking it through, it's not worth the hassle and the T8 is just a different beast from your normal ICE. And reading some more that may be the reason the Volvo engineers recommended the T8 to use a very low viscosity oil.