That's some piece of kit.
371mm 6 pots! Mental!
Wouldn't like to be you when it's time for new discs and pads.
Insignia brembo 355mm discs are £700 a pair
it was my deciding factor, have one of these or a 5.0 RS6 or 6.2 C63 
especially when the Germans 3 litres were coming in way more efficiently than this. 
Unreal! I had looked at these in polestar blue before landing with the rs6, everything about them is awesome
Except the tax band
No doubt it handles brilliantly, ohlins all round with those trick brakes and decent rubber
) when in a hurry. Which isn't too bad considering but not as good as equivalent Germans for sure.
Plus I have the Lotus if I need to save on fuel
Engage the paddles in sport and it will only ever change when YOU want to. And it will change whenever you want to, no second guessing or delays. Gear changes are instantaneous without being savage. Makes you wonder what all the double clutch fuss is all about, lol. The ZF style box in this car is just brilliant. Especially annoying on narrow roads, in heavy traffic, on tight roundabouts, etc. Off!
Off! Off! Less clutter too.
Can't even begin to express how much I enjoy driving this car! Coming up on 2000 miles and all good! Leave in D and she'll happily cruise along like the best GT. Tip the gear level into sport and all hell breaks lose, lol - it will keep the turbo on song, hold on to gears, and THAT NOISE
Anyway, the main topic of this post is going to go all Quentin Wilson on everyone, lol - "driver assistance" systems. Of which this Volvo has an awful lot, as you would expect.
Adaptive cruise
This is a lifesaver in average speed zones and heavy traffic. Works best in flowing traffic. In "pulsing" traffic where speed varies a lot it's not so good - the car can't read ahead and see that traffic is slowing down, it only reacts once the car in front slams its brakes on. Better to do it yourself in those conditions.
I thought it had a tendency to follow the car in front a bit too closely, but discovered the distance can be altered with the steering wheel controls.
Distance warning
Turned off, lol. What's the point? If someone can't see themselves that they are too close then they shouldn't be driving...
BLIS (blind spot thingy)
Really the same thing, if one doesn't have a sense for the size of the car and what is happening around, well... It also has a tendency to be set off by oncoming traffic and road furniture on busy motorways. I confess I do keep it on though.
City Safety
This is a low-speed emergency braking system. It can't be turned off, but hasn't ever cut in so far. Maybe I'm just a driving God, lol, but it seems pretty unobtrusive.
Driver Alert
This is supposed to sound a warning if the driver starts "driving inconsistently". In theory it works off any difference between the angle of the steering wheel and the direction of lane markings. It's pretty random - off!
Lane departure warning/Lane keeping aid
What it says - tries to detect if the car wanders over lane markings, and tries to counter-steer if it thinks the car does. It's like having the worst back seat driver in the world not just in your ear but actually randomly yanking the wheel, lol
Collision warning system
Another "city" system intended to pick up anything from cyclists to crossing traffic at lower speeds. It's completely random, lol. Just keep your eyes on the road and be aware of what is happening around the car ffs
Park assist
I'm old school, lol - just learn where the corners of the car are and use your eyes. It's what they are for, lol.
Parking sensor - confess I do keep them on. Most of the time they just do their thing. Volume of beeps, etc., can all be adjusted. Gets confused by greenery but that's it.
Parking camera - comes on automatically when reverse is selected, no choice. I just ignore it and turn my head, personally I find that much easier. Fair enough if a car has poor visibility, but that's not the case in this car.
Park assist pilot - this supposedly parks the car for you. Haven't got around to trying it, only discovered it's there just now, lol. Not hard to park this car anyway!
ESC
This can be turned off, but only for a journey and you need to dig deep into the menus.
It seems pretty unobtrusive so I just leave it on.
Pretty sure it's virtually turned off in sport mode, or at least dialled back a lot.
Not really needed at all with 4wd...
Road sign information
This tries to read road signs and display them in the instrument cluster. Seriously? Just use your eyes
Adjustable steering force
Only adjusts the weight, doesn't affect/improve feel. I just leave it in "normal".
NAV
I'm in the "real men know where they are going" camp and never use nav anyway. So can't really comment on if this one is any good or not.
Turns out it's still there and doing all sorts of things anyway, lol. For example, I was getting completely random "bongs" with no other indication or message or anything. Couldn't for the life of me work out what that was! Then randomly stumbled on a nav setting where it can alert about various random things as you go by. Got all that turned off now. Kept the camera warning on though, but it doesn't appear to be terribly useful either and just gets annoying on camera infested motorways so will probably turn that off too.
it's so stealthy and looks brilliant to boot
According to the owner's manual this totally excellent and completely antisocial behaviour at 6am, lol, is perfectly normal and done entirely for environmental reasons as part of the cat preheat process. No joke, that's what it says!
A lovely place to be on long motorway runs, and then quite deranged when required, lol. No boring over-engineered German technofest, true spiritual descendant of the T5-R - just a bunch of engineers with the right attitude having had some craic in the basement doing exactly the right things to put a huge smile on your face ); dual climate; Harman Kardon (fantastic! ); memory seats (by key or memory button); the fancy keys; all the digi tech malarkey new cars have and I never use, lol; auto wipers/lights/etc. which I don't use either, lol; cameras and sensors and lasers and radar absolutely everywhere; digital instrument cluster, configurable in three different styles (I like the "sports" theme); adaptive cruise (excellent for the most part, a bit disconcerting on occasion, lol); bendy adaptive lights (fantastic!); etc. Materials maybe not quite up to a 1999 S3, lol, but then neither is a new Audi! I'd say much closer to an Audi than a BMW, all touch surfaces either soft touch or Alcantara. ), then the seat belt warning is forever on If any other V60 owner has a way around that then let me know!
