Bingo: ’64 Volvo P1800S
We like to mix things up here at Mint featuring submissions that represent a wide range of cool cars. The blue car we featured a few days ago looked great in original condition. This one looks like all of the heavy lifting is done. So we made an exception with this Volvo P1800S – too nice to wait or pass on. It is no secret the enthusiast community has recognized the Volvo P1800 is a really neat sports car. It took quite some time to achieve that status. But back in the day, auto journalists liked the car. The press instantly recognized that this was a sporting car, rather than one built for out-and-out performance, and gave the P1800 good reviews. “In doing that for which it is intended, fast steady cruising, the P1800 is superb and it gave us the impression it would run forever at near maximum speed,” Road & Track said. Car and Driver liked the car, too:
“From our perspective, the P1800 seems to have all the makings of a winner…. At its listed price, it has no real competition; it’s low enough to lure buyers of both less expensive machines and ones that cost more.” The run forever reference is particularly telling in light of Irv Gordon’s quest to hit 3 million miles in his ’66 P1800S. We already know Irv has proclaimed his Volvo his “dead guy” car. So that gets us to today’s 64. It is said to be a California and Colorado car proclaiming it “rust free.” These are hardly ever totally rust free particularly the early ones so the fact that it has been inspected by Auto Turismo Sport means it probably is rust free. In 1990, the body was treated to a bare metal respray in the original Cherry Red. The seller states the original B18 (Bingo!) engine has been rebuilt and the transmission resealed and clutch replaced. We happen to like the cars with the “cow horn” front bumpers. One must ask the question if cows actually have horns or are they steers or bulls. Just saying. The eggcrate grill appears to have been painted black and that has to be corrected to appear original but looks good just like it is. The rest of the car looks pretty good to us. We would have appreciated a photo of the front seats sans covers (they are said to be decent) and the gauges and their aqua faces look in pretty good nick. Better than most. There are a few other custom touches that can be repaired like replacing the V O L V O letters on the rear of the car and removing the handy but custom center console. The ask is $22,900. It is at the top of the market but it would cost you more to start from scratch. We think it is worth a look. Contact Mark at (914) 217-4817.