Niclas Andersson’s Volvo V70 a rear-wheel-drive conversion drifting powerhouse!

There are many who after a life-long interest in motorsport perhaps discover the one discipline that interests them the most, even if it would not appear to be the most practical or cost effective. And this would be the case with Niclas Andersson and his unique drift build based on a front-wheel-drive Volvo V70 as featured in a video that went viral in the Grumblo Car Builds video series

Video: Niclas Andersson’s B629T powered Volvo V70 (600whp, 700nm) at Swedish Drift Championship R3 2018

One might wonder what had driven Niclas (pun intended) to begin with a front-wheel-drive chassis rather than an older and cheaper rear-wheel-drive option. Niclas tells us how he just wanted to have a rear-wheel-drive Volvo V70 and given the fact that they are built to include either front or all-wheel-drive the only option was a careful conversion.

The core of the conversion involved replacing the rear subframe with the subframe of a BMW E34 and according to Niclas this wasn’t such a major task. The front subframe is comprised of random parts from other Volvo models such as the Volvo 740 and 940 which worked well as part of the build. It did however take quite a lot of work to integrate the various parts so that the steering would function correctly.

And the current engine in this converted Volvo V70 is yet again another Volvo part, a straight-six B6294T from a Volvo XC90 which came stock as twin-turbocharged. This small pair of snails was not enough to reach Niclas’ power goals so he upgraded to a Borg Warner S366 Turbo along with some SMP 1260cc fuel injectors and as Niclas describes it “a sweet manifold from CM Racing”. But other than that as Niclas tells us the engine is stock. And with a gearbox from a BMW E60 530D the setup works fine and when placed on a dyno the engine gets around 600 whp on e85 pump fuel with around 1.7 bar of boost.

Now some might think that this conversion was perhaps a bit extreme and indeed in his own words Niclas admits that it was maybe not the smartest thing he’s done in his life but that he’s having a lot of fun with the car! And he’s not finished! When we asked him if he has any plans for the future, he tells us that he would like to continue developing the V70 in 2020 by maybe swapping the engine to something else and to continue competing in drifting competitions.

And not only has he completed converting the V70 to rear-wheel-drive. Along with planning yet another engine change he has been considering building yet another car. Naturally he’s not willing to reveal his plans just yet which make us even more excited to see the results!

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Photo Credits: Niclas Andersson