Volvo P1800S – 5 million km

The Volvo P1800S coupe is a serial sports car produced in the 60s of the last century. The car is not particularly remarkable, but it can be seen in the museum in Gothenburg (Sweden). What did a standard car deserve such honor?


The mileage of this car by the time it was placed in its place of honor exceeded 5 million kilometers, which is an absolute achievement for non-commercial passenger cars. About which a corresponding entry was made in the Guinness Book of Records. How did its owner manage to do this?

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The red car was bought by 25-year-old American Gordon Irwin from the town of Patchogue. The young man gave himself a sports car for $4 for his birthday. This is a rear-wheel drive coupe with a four-speed manual transmission and a 150 liter engine developing 1,78 horsepower. The car could accelerate to 115 km/h.


Gordon is a school teacher by profession, and driving a car while traveling to beautiful places is his passionate hobby. Irwin visited all US states, traveled to Europe and Mexico. However, you also have to travel to work! This is what Gordon did every day: he had to cover a distance of over 200 km there and back.

Registration of records

This happened for the first time in 1998, when the mileage exceeded 2,5 million km. The teacher put up a license plate (how this happened from a legal point of view is not stated anywhere) with the inscription “Milnmiler”. This figure seems unrealistic today: many new cars only exceed the warranty mileage or warranty period.


But Gordon didn’t stop there: the next achievement was recorded in 2006, when the 4 million km mark was passed. We can say that the owner of the coupe has made five trips to the moon or turned around our planet a hundred times.


As of the fall of 2013, the mileage was 4,8 million km, i.e. the owner of the coupe drove it approximately 100 thousand kilometers per year. And this despite the fact that the car has a “native” body, gearbox and engine. True, the latter has already undergone major repairs a couple of times. During this time, the owner of the coupe changed one and a half hundred tires! After the mileage exceeded 5 million km, the car was officially included in the Guinness Book of Records. The fact of real mileage was confirmed by specialists from the manufacturer Volvo.

What Gordon said about the “secrets of longevity”

Nothing new or special. The car owner regularly, within strictly designated periods, serviced the car at an official dealer, filling in only the oil recommended by the manufacturer. In this case it was Castrol GTX. Original spare parts were installed. The car owner recommended washing the car well and... not eating inside it.


Other advice cannot be called special either. During the entire period of operating the Volvo, Irwin was only involved in minor accidents a couple of times. Gordon says you need to drive carefully and follow traffic rules. The teacher also advises to inspect the car without fail before each trip and not to trust it to anyone.

How the car got into the museum

Unfortunately, Irwin Gordon passed away in 2018. His Volvo was bought by the manufacturing company and placed in its museum. What’s surprising is that the Swedes didn’t put the passenger car with the highest mileage in the world on permanent storage.


Often the Volvo P1800S can be seen at various events. At the beginning of this year, the distance traveled by the car is 5 million 230 thousand kilometers.