The English Patient - 1962 Volvo P1800

Volvo Cars is betting its future on the P1800. After having a rough past few years, they're turning things around with new technologies and a fresh, distinctive design direction that owes its inspiration to the classic P1800, the company's most beloved flagship GT. The earliest of this series, the Jensen Motors Ltd.-built P1800, is now experiencing a renaissance of popularity, and we've spent time with an unusually original example.

Because--aside from the addition of the 1972-'73 ES variant--the 1800 didn't change visually in its 13-year, 47,485-unit run, you might not notice how different the early models were from those that followed. Volvo 1800 restoration parts specialist Don Thibault (Profile in Excellence, HS&EC #2) is the owner of our feature P1800, a 1962 model, and he explains how this Swedish automaker's only true sports car was born with a British accent.

"Volvo wanted to make a sporty car, but they didn't have the capacity to design and build one in-house," he says. After soliciting the winning design from Italy's Carrozzeria Pietro Frua (actually drawn by 24-year-old Swede Pelle Petterson, a Frua intern and son of Volvo executive Helmer Petterson), Volvo searched in Germany for body-building and assembly firms, talking with NSU and Karrosseriewerke Drauz, as well as the famous Karmann. "Karmann was busy building convertibles and Karmann Ghias for Volkswagen--and Volkswagen probably didn't want the competition, anyway."

And so the production version of the sporty 2+2--powered by Volvo's new B18 four-cylinder engine and using sturdy 120 Amazon mechanicals--would come from Great Britain. Bodies would be built by the Pressed Steel Company's plant in Scotland, while final assembly would be handled by Jensen Motors in England, also home to Austin-Healey 3000 production. The first 6,000 cars of the 1800 series (the only ones with the "P1800" designation) had issues with panel fits, but were concept car-like in their design and detail work.

Even if you aren't familiar with the details of the later 1800S and 1800E, learning about Don's 1962 gives you an appreciation for the time that Jensen employees took to build each individual P1800. "These cars had a lot of complex features that were simplified on 1964-and-newer Swedish-built models," he muses. "The rear area originally had a cubbyhole with individual jump seats. I've taken them apart, and there are lots of tiny Phillips-head screws that have to be carefully installed a certain way. When they went to the bench seat on the S cars, it was five minutes...plug it in, a couple of screws, it's done.

"The Jensen cars used heavily chrome-plated brass for their bright trim, inside and out," Don continues. "The strips on the interior door panels were plated solid brass, held on with little clips that had to be installed by hand--this continued all the way around the interior in a complete circle. When they moved production to Sweden, the door strips were replaced with pre-formed plastic that was glued onto the panel, and the rear compartment trim disappeared. The exterior chrome became cheaper plated aluminum and polished stainless steel. It was very labor-intensive to build, at first; the English were used to that, everything they did was by hand."

Not seen on later models, other special items you'll find on our gray-over-red feature P1800--one of three color combinations offered in this series, the others being white-over-red and red-over-white--include the "bullhorn" front bumper, the elaborate egg-crate grille and cowl vent, white front indicator lenses, full hubcaps and beautiful C-pillar Volvo script.

Don's 1962 is remarkable for its unusual degree of factory originality, as most remaining examples aren't this way because of the easy interchangeability of 1800 parts. "Due to the age of the cars, over the years, many of the Jensens have been bastardized--they suffered a lot of abuse. The interior would start to look shabby, and since Volvo discontinued many things, owners would put in parts from a newer S. I owned a couple of Jensens before this one, but each one of them wasn't original--it was a mixture of different cars, done badly. Early cars, in the early years, didn't get any respect; that's why it's so rare to find one with original parts on it."

While early Swedish-built 1800s also used the original instrument panel, the interiors of Jensen-built cars were filled with hand-fitted details.

More than 50 years after they left West Bromwich, you can still inspect the original hand-written records of individual P1800s, thanks to the excellent website, www.volvo1800pictures.com. Through this, Don was able to confirm that his car, bearing the Pressed Steel-supplied body number 4304, Jensen Motors-supplied chassis number 3329 and Volvo engine number 3154, was intact, and it had started production on March 22, was finished on April 6 and had been shipped on May 7, 1962. This car has the optional M41 four-speed manual transmission with Laycock electric overdrive, and its five-main-bearing, twin SU-carbureted, 100-hp 1,778-cc four has covered fewer than 80,000 miles in its 52-year life.

And that mileage was because the P1800 sat idle for an extended period, its current owner discovered. This car found him, because of his related profession. "I bought it in 2001. Prior to that, it had been sitting in a barn in Southboro, Massachusetts. An electrician came in to get the house ready for sale, and saw the car, which he thought was neat. It was just an old car that had been sitting a long time--it barely ran and had no brakes. He bought it, and then realized he didn't know how to fix it. The electrician discussed it with his insurance agent, who also thought it was a neat car, and who bought it from him. And then the same thing happened--the insurance agent also realized he couldn't fix it up. He found receipts in the car for parts I'd sold the previous owner--radiator hoses, miscellaneous maintenance items--and that's when he called me."

When Don inspected this car, he found it was largely untouched, and for being a New England car all its life, its body shockingly had no rust. It was engine trouble that kept it tucked away, a common issue with early 1800s: water in the gas, due to the location and design of the fuel filler on the rear deck. "I'd been looking for a Jensen for a while, so I ended up buying it. This was an unrestored car, which I could tell as soon as I looked at it. The paint was poor, but I saw that the original vinyl upholstery wasn't ripped, the original door panels were intact, the factory molded rubber mats were still up front. I don't know how many 50-year-old Jensens still have their original seats--you can probably count on one hand.

"It had the original tool bag, the jack handle and jack, and the original spare tire cover. It even had the original glass bowl fuel pump and the factory-installed spark plug wires," he says with amazement. "It didn't need much to get running again: drain and flush the fuel tank, and essentially perform a tune-up. Although those plug wires are still on, they've never given me a hard time! It needed paint to be presentable, and I had to put a later-style rug in the front to replace the rubber mats, which crumbled when I took them out of the car--nobody reproduces them. I tried to do a sympathetic restoration, to keep the original features as much as possible."

And that's what this Volvo now is--an internal-combustion time warp. The re-sprayed deep gray paint contrasts beautifully with the body's still-brilliant 52-year-old chrome and the jukebox feel of the colorful red, silver and black interior, with its three-dimensional, turquoise-accented Smiths gauges. Don is right--this car is filled with delightful details that were quickly lost as the 1800 was standardized and its production streamlined in Sweden. Happily, it drives as well as it looks, starting at the first twist of the key and settling to a smooth idle, showing no less than 100 pounds of oil pressure when cold, 70 when it's at temperature. The gearbox is the definition of "snick-snick," and the ride is comfortable, cruising smoothly on the highway in overdrive.

"I've driven it as a pleasure car, taken it to shows where it's won its class. It's been very reliable and fun to drive--it's a sweet, straight car. Today, people are hungry for early production Jensens. Looking back at the provenance of the 1800, it had to have been a huge undertaking for a small manufacturer to come up with a car like that in that era," he says. "I actually restored an identical, earlier-numbered Jensen P1800 a few years ago, but I sold it. That one actually looked a bit better since everything was fresh and rechromed, but it had been redone. There's nothing wrong with redoing stuff--you have to do it if it's bad--but I believe there's truth in that old line: It's only original once."

Specifications

Engine

Type: OHV inline-four, cast-iron block and cylinder head

Displacement: 1,778 cc

Bore x stroke: 84.14 x 80 mm

Compression ratio: 9.5:1

Fuel delivery: Twin SU 1-inch HS-6 carburetors

Horsepower @ RPM: 100 @ 5,500

Torque @ RPM: 108-lb.ft. @ 4,000

Transmission

Type: Fully synchronized four-speed manual with electronic overdrive

Suspension

Front: Independent; A-arms, coil springs, telescopic shocks, anti-roll bar

Rear: Rigid axle, coil springs, telescopic shocks, trailing arms and track rod

Brakes

Type: 10 7/8-inch disc front/9-inch drum rear, servo assist

Weights and Measures

Wheelbase: 96.5 inches

Overall length: 173 inches

Overall width: 67 inches

Overall height: 51 inches

Curb weight: 2,490 pounds

Performance

0-60 MPH: 12.4 seconds

Top speed: 105 MPH