156
BHP · B280
The range's coupé, powered by the same 156 bhp B280 as the 760 — and the most Italian of Volvos: designed by Marc Deschamps and built by Bertone in Turin, like the 262C coupé before it. Volvo quotes 8,518 built between 1986 and 1991, all engines included: it is the rarest PRV V6 Volvo.
The B280 is Volvo's 2,849 cc with LH-Jetronic electronic injection — 156 bhp, the highest output the PRV ever reached at Volvo, shared with the 760. The same engine, brought down to 145 bhp, would end up in the Japanese and Australian 960.
Volvo twice entrusted its PRV V6 coupés to Italy: the 260 series' 262C, bodied in Italy with the 126 bhp SU-HIF6 carburetted B28A — or the 140 bhp B27F for the American market —, then the 780, designed by Marc Deschamps and built by Bertone in Turin. Between the two, the PRV went from carburettor to electronic injection, and from 126 to 156 bhp.
The 260 series and its coupé have their own file; the PRV's Italian line also includes the Lancia Thema 6V, the family's only Italian car.
The 760 crossed the two ages of injection — mechanical K-Jetronic first, then the electronic B280 —; the 780 only knew the latter. Its four-cylinder sister, the 740, never had a V6.
It is not the 780: when the 960 replaced the 760 in 1990, Japan and Australia kept the B280 V6 — 145 bhp — while other markets got Volvo's new aluminium in-line six, which is not a PRV.
No document specific to the 780 and its B280 is in the Library yet — if you own one, the Contribute page awaits you. The three Volvo booklets in the Library cover the 260's B27 and B28.
The FAQ answers that concern the 780 and its B280 — pending a period document.
No document specific to the 780 is in the Library yet — if you own one, the Contribute page awaits you.
The Volvo 780 has its own section on the forum — presentations, restorations, questions to members who drive one. Volvo 780 section →
B280 — the engine file of Volvo's peak, the 760 that shares it and the 960 that ends it.