Hits of the 60s
VOLVO’S SAFE AND SAVVY V60 AND S60 WIN OVER PETER HAYWARD
THE latest Volvo S60 saloon and V60 estate are superb cars, right up there with the best in the premium sector.
But the previous models that were replaced in 2018 were also very good to drive and of course, among the safest cars you could buy, in the Volvo tradition.
That safety really was top of the class, with electronic stability control, loads of airbags, anti-whiplash seats, and the company’s latest innovations – Pedestrian Protect and City Safety. City safety detects impending accidents and checks to see whether the driver is reacting properly. If they are not taking action, the system takes over automatically and will perform an emergency stop at any speed up to 20 miles an hour.
At higher speeds, if a collision is likely it acts to help lessen the damage and give maximum protection to the occupants.
Pedestrian Protect was an extra, but will likely have been fitted to many secondhand models.
It uses a radar system to detect pedestrians in the car’s path and again, if the driver doesn’t react, it will apply the brakes and bring the car swiftly to a stop.
So these are clever cars that will save you in many situations even if you haven’t realised you’re in trouble.
I have driven a number of V60 estates and S60 saloons over the years and have enjoyed them all, and since most of them have very low emissions, they are more reasonable to run, with low road tax, plus good economy.
The vast majority on the secondhand market are diesels, as far as I can see, probably because most were originally company cars.
The diesels start with a D2 1.6 turbo that has 115 or 120bhp, and reaches 60 from rest in 10.6 seconds, while being able to do around 60 miles per gallon.
Next up comes a 2.0-litre, with either 136 or 163bhp in the D3 and D4 and these cover the sprint in 9.9 or 8.9 seconds respectively,
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2021
while still being capable of 60mpg.
Most powerful is the 2.4-litre D5 with 215bhp. This gets to 60 in a swift 7.5 seconds and should still better 50 miles per gallon. The petrol models are quite often cheaper secondhand because they aren’t so sought after, and if you don’t do too many miles, they may be the better bet.
Smallest T3 is again a 1.6 turbo, but this time with around 150bhp, and the same unit is used in a higher state of tune for the T4, which has 190. The T3 reaches 60 in 9.1 seconds and is rated at 42mpg, while the T4 takes 7.4 seconds and could do 40mpg.
The range topping T6 is a 3.0-litre with a standard auto and all-wheel drive. It gets to 60 in 5.9 seconds and will give a best of 25mpg.
The 1.6 diesels are fairly slow, but all the others have decent to excellent performance.
All are very family friendly, with 40/20/40 split fold-back seats and built-in booster seats in many. Comfort is excellent, except for an unsettled feel at low speeds in town.
These are cars built to last a lifetime with classy, durable materials throughout the cabin, among the best seats on the market, and an enviable reputation for reliability.
But make sure you get full service history. No such originally expensive car should be bought without it.
The cabin has excellent legroom and while the saloon’s boot is average, the V60’s is enormous.
Entry-level ES trim brings alloys, remote audio controls, cloth seats, traction control, heated electric mirrors, loads of seat and column adjustment, cruise control and an excellent stereo. Many models have electric leather seats, sat nav, parking sensors and more.
Pay about £6,800 for a ’15 15-reg D2 SE manual, or £14,000 for an ’18 18-reg D4 R-Design Nav SE auto.
Technology Editor
ONCE upon a time you’d need a helicopter and a massive camera to capture decent footage of life on earth from the air.
You may not believe this, but people actually used to make their living by photographing people’s houses from light aircraft and then selling them a print of it. Simpler times.
These days you can bag a fairly decent drone with a camera relatively cheaply, and the footage you can get from them can be really spectacular.
Here are three of the best drones you can get today – and there’s one for every budget.
BEST FOR BUDGET Ryze Tech Tello
■ They say: We set out to build the most fun drone ever, and we came up with Tello: an impressive little drone for kids and adults that’s a blast to fly and helps users learn about drones with coding education.
Get yourself a Tello to find out just how awesome flying can be!
We say: A drone as good as this should not really be available at this price. For less than £100, the Tello is a perfect introduction to the world of drone photography.
It’s small and light and works right out of the box with a smartphone app for control – although it is compatible with other controllers.
It lacks the tracking features of more expensive drones, but does have compatibility with VR headsets for a virtual flight. There’s 13-minutes of flight time, a 100m range, and 720p video capture.
■ Cost: £99 from ryzerobotics.com
BEST MID-RANGE DJI Mini 2
■ They say: There are many places you visit once in a lifetime. Bring DJI Mini 2 for a unique perspective, and make the most of your travels.
■ We say: DJI is THE name in drones, and this is its latest stab at the mini drone market – it is comfortably the best option if you want the most for your money.
The three-axis gimbal 4K camera can capture exceptional footage, and the drone is very stable, even in quite strong breezy conditions.
You can fly it for up to half-an-hour, and it folds right down into a tiny package that’s easy to take with you wherever you want to film.
■ Cost: £419 from store.dji.com
BEST HIGH-END PowerVision PowerEgg X Wizard
■ They say: In Drone Mode, the PowerEgg X is a high-performance drone. It is suitable for highly dynamic aerial photography thanks to its 4K/60fps camera and triaxial
mechanical gimbal. The user can control real-time 1080P image transmission within a distance of 3.7Mile(FCC).
It has a maximum wind speed resistance of 29-38 kph so that it can stably fly in coastal or windy conditions. The PowerEgg X has a flight time of 30 minutes.
■ We say: The PowerEgg is for serious users and features sophisticated tracking technology that can help you make sure your subject is always in frame, whatever they do. It will even remember faces it is tracking, so if they unexpectedly move out and back into shot, it’ll pick up where it left off.
It’s pricey, but it can also operate in hand-held mode, so has more functionality than other cheaper devices – and the stunning stabilised footage it can capture in the air and on the ground, makes this a good bet for the most enthusiastic of droners.
■ Cost £1,030 from powervision.me
LITTLE NIGHTMARES 2
(PEGI 16) PS4, XBOX ONE,PC, Switch
HHHHH
YOU know that strange feeling you get sometimes at night?
You’ve just walked upstairs, or you’re strolling home alone, and for no reason, the hairs stand up on the back of your neck.
You can’t explain why, but you just have this nagging feeling that if you turn around, someone – or something – will silently be standing behind you, watching.
If you could bottle that feeling, you’d get Little Nightmares 2.
The sequel to 2017’s horror adventure hit, this puzzle-platformer introduces a new character to the game’s spooky, and twisted world –Mono – a young, barefooted boy, who hides his face behind a paper bag.
In the opening moments of the game, you help Mono to free Six – the rain-coated child-hero of the game’s predecessor.
Together they make their way through the Pale City, a dark place that’s been distorted by a mysterious signal coming from a distant tower.
A sense of peril grips you from the off – a constant sense of movement in the shadows, a stomach-clenching feeling that at any moment you’ll be spirited away.
Mono is most definitely the hero of the hour here, with Six an AI character who is just along for the ride. And unlike the first game, this time the kids are not completely helpless, with Mono able to grab certain items and swing them to break objects or to fight back against smaller foes. That being said, stealth and cunning remain your greatest allies.
There’s a whole host of new, twisted tormentors our young heroes must face, using the game’s wonderfully tactile environment to help them escape.
The inhabitants of Pale City are transfixed by their TVs, and you’ll find the landscapes you move through littered with broken goggleboxes. At one point Mono picks up a discarded remote control, and toggles the broken sets on and off, like squared-eyed beacons drawing in an enemy.
The game’s hauntingly beautiful graphic style fans the flames of fear, rain and lightning making you feel both vulnerable and in awe at the world around you.
Much like the original, the villains are nightmarishly brilliant.
There’s the Teacher who, like the ghoulish Japanese rokurokubi, is able to extend her neck and chase our terrified youngsters through ducts and drains. There’s the ceilingcrawling Doctor, who you often don’t hear creeping up on you until you look up, and see his bulbous face leering down at you.
Then there are his patients, strange amalgamations of corpses and mannequin parts that ambush and pursue intruders in the dark... and if that wasn’t bad enough, there’s the Living Hands – severed from the Patients, that crawl like spiders to attack.
Taking feedback from fans of the first game, developer Tarsier Studios has made sure checkpoints are frequently placed – although that still didn’t save me from having to repeat puzzles I’d just completed before I died.
Just like the first title though, the journey is brief, and you can fly through this game in just four hours – inevitably leaving you wanting much more.
And if that wasn’t heartbreaking enough, Tarsier announced over the weekend that it will not be making any more Little Nightmares games.
Publisher Bandai Namco Entertainment has said it will continue to make more in the future, but will it work without the original developer to carefully craft the macabre world and its inhabitants?
Only time will tell.
A sense of peril grips you from the off – a constant sense of movement in the shadows