[Mark Petch]

During my editing of the appalling google translating of Swedish to English, for the soon to be published Swedish language edition of "History of the Volvo 240 Turbo" the truth about the 500 FIA Homologated Evolution 240T cars emerged.

The FIA homologation process of the 500 Evolution cars that formed the basis of the famous GpA Volvo 240T race cars [in order to make the car competitive with the Jaguar’s XKS and BMW’s 635’s coupe’s, in Group A touring car racing] was controversial, because VMS [Volvo Motor Sport] elected to convert 500 designated car similatanously [270 on the West coast and 230 on the East coast] in America, instead of down the assembly lines in Europe, and then once inspected by the FIA in the USA, the assembled 500 Evolution car's would be stripped of the Evolution Kit parts, save only for the new intercooler, which was left in place on all 500 cars, and sold across America.

For the sake of clarity all 500 of these cars had sunroofs, and none were ever shipped back to VMS to be built up into GpA race cars, as only the Swedish built 240 DL body shell's were used because they did not have a sunroof option, and were built locally in Gothenburg

VMS simply took advantage of a loop hole in the FIA regulations at that time, which did not require that so called "Evolution" cars had to be sold to the public, but merely built and inspected, prior to being granted Homologation status. Hence the controversy that followed the success of the factory car’s when they won the European Touring Car Championship in 1985 and would have won again in 1986, but for a fuel irregularity at one race meeting, that ultimately cost Volvo the Championship. This incident also resulted in the Board of Directors withdrawing from factory supported GpA racing programs, much to the disappointment of all the Flying Brick fans around the world.

Due to time constraints there was insufficient time to install the Evolution components in the 500 designated 240T cars as they went down the assembly lines in Belgium [save only for the fitting of the European market only Flat-Nose bonnet and matching plain silver grill] and so a decision was made to stow each cars Evolution component kit into the trunks of each of the designated car’s before they were shipped to the USA, and then retro-fit the component in the USA. 270 of these cars were sent to the Volvo facility, at Long Island, LA and the remaining 230 cars were sent to Volvo East Coast facility at Chesapeake Bay, during a period of only 3 weeks all 500 cars were retro-fitted simultaneously on both the West and East coast with the Evolution Kits. However, immediately following the FIA's random inspection of all the 500 "Evolution" cars, the installation teams, removed all of the Evolution components, with the exception of the uprated Intercooler, which was left in all 500 cars, and sold to the public as the first of the new uprated 240 Turbo Inetrcooled car’s.

All but one of these car’s [which was sent back to VMS] were then sold across the USA as the first of 240 Turbo Intercooler cars with the uprated intercoolers. So whilst there were no full Evolution car’s sold to the public, the remaining 499 Flat-nosed car’s that were sold to the American public were unique, in as much as they were the only Flat -Nosed [Flat Hood] 240 Turbo Intercooler cars ever imported into the USA, and all carried the designation SO2476 on the chassis plate. All subsequent 1983 240 Turbo intercooler car had the projecting, so called Coffin-Nose and grill, and fitted as standard with the uprated 760T's intercooler, which developed more power soley due to the increased efficiency of that intercooler.

Despite the rumour that 30 of these car's were sent back to Sweden to become GpA race cars, not one of the so called 500 Evolution cars was ever used by the factory, and or the factory supported GpA 240T race teams, despite claims to the contrary. All of the VMS so called Factory cars were built up from the 1983 DL body shell's because they had no sunroof's and were built in Sweden so they were readily available and relatively cheap. The myths will perpetuate I am sure, but at least a few of us now know the truth.

We need to thank Goran Sallstrom who was the project engineer in charge of the Evolution cars project, and his co-author Björn Ohlson 240T GpA Historian, who have spent so many thousand of hours putting this definitive book together, for providing the missing link, in the 240T's history after 30 plus years. Hopefully we will see it published in English late next year.