1990 Volvo 240 DL: Winter Beater, take 2

[repinS]

So, I sold the Accord a few weeks ago (and broke even on purchase/repairs) in favour of a friend's 1990 Volvo 240 DL. My friend and his wife have a kid on the way, and I helped them get into their next car (a 2014 Prius V... fantastic things, those). The Honda had some oil consumption issues that I didn't want to chase down, and this Volvo was in the cards anyway if the Honda didn't find me first.

For $900, this brick has a 2.3L inline-four making a piddling 114hp, and is RWD. Even though it's 25 years old, it's in great shape with 266,000km (165k miles). It's very soft and quiet and comfortable, and I really enjoy it on the open road. Although power output is so low, it has some decent low end grunt, and WOT actually feels slower. It's all tied to a four-speed automatic without a lockup torque converter. Handling wise, it pleasantly surprised me with lack of body roll and lots of feedback. I should not be able to take corners as fast as I do with the 185/70/14 winter tires I have mounted. Dare I say that I enjoy it more than the manual transmissioned Honda.

It's a very simple car, cheap to repair, very fun to drive, and I love it. Plans - perhaps some 15" Volvo alloys and a few odds and ends here and there.

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[thesam1984]

I love it... ive had two Volvo 240's both with over 250k. (92- gunmetal gray & 88- dark blue) Lost both to accidents, they were running perfectly at the end... I have a few very rare parts if your interested and the interior is blue... They are molded rubber floor mars and rare center armrest. I rat rodded the first one, there is a small write up of her on IPD's website. Mine was Lola, the 'lil Gray Goose

[nos4blood70]

Such a goofy car. Love it!

[Hotwheels]

Haha. On my morning commute I used to meet up with one a slightly darker shade of blue - the guy always had issues with it running poorly and stalling. Always was sooo slow. I would purposely drive 5-10 mph faster than normal on a certain stretch of road to make sure I got ahead of him before passing lanes were gone, lol. More than once he stalled it and it started rolling backward towards me as I sat in a busy turn lane, another time it stalled while trying to cross a busy highway and I secretly hoped it would get clipped so I didn't have to avoid him every morning, lol. Oh the funny memories this brought up that I completely forgot!

Congrats and hope it treats you well - I've heard these things are tanks and anyone who's owned one seems to love them.

[rustyroger]

They were the car of choice for much of middle class Britain back in the day, particularly for towing camper trailers or horse trailers. Wagon models were very popular, selling a larger percentage of total sales than other big cars on the market.
Bear in mind they were considered a big car over here,

They were simple and robust for the most part, but I hope you never have a leaking heater matrix!. :(

They also had a justified reputation for protecting their occupants in the event of a wreck, however they were unpopular with demolition derby racers because they folded up around the passenger cell too easily.

They resisted rust well, but were by no means immune from it.

Roger.

[ga93sle]

Very cool, I've always had a strange soft spot for Volvos...

[Saturn Simon]

Very tough cars. As Roger said they were once commonplace over here. Even now they have a very good survival rate for an '80s car. There are still a few around.

[Jfridge92]

What an interesting car, just goes to prove that any car can be fun no matter how much power it puts down. Kinda reminds me of my buddy's mid 80s Mercedes 300D turbo. It was a tank, it was heavy, but it made a ton of torque from 1500 rpms and up. But yes, those cars are really hard to kill.

[repinS]

There's quite a bit to be said about driving a slow car fast as opposed to a fast car slow With some snowfall, I can drive this Volvo at 10/10ths and giggle like a little kid. If I tried the same with the G8, it'll try to kill me.

They were the car of choice for much of middle class Britain back in the day, particularly for towing camper trailers or hose trailers. Wagon models were very popular, selling a larger percentage of total sales than other big cars on the market.

For US/Canada, Volvo somehow rated these things to tow 3300lb. Pretty impressive! And this car isn't even that heavy compared to the heavily contented and safety-doodads of today, weighing only 2900lbs. And I do have a squeaky blower motor that I'll leave alone to squeak. Book labour is something like 8-9 hours to replace, and an experienced tech could probably do it in no less than 4-6. Practically the whole dash has to come out. I also need to clean the IAC valve since it doesn't like to idle for the first 30 seconds when it's below -20C/-4F. I need to keep the throttle on or else it'll stall and/or flood. After that 30 seconds or any warm start though, smooth as glass.

And I don't know about other 240s, but maybe the reason why people go so slow in them is an inaccurate speedometer, optimistic by 10% at highway speeds.

[thesam1984]

I used to carry MAF cleaner and would spray the throttle everytime I opened the hood... the idle would drop and no mstter what i didthat was the only thing that would keep her happy. I also could never get the sepentine belts where I wanted them and always got a squeak. I remember I pulled the dash apart to save as much as possible from a parts wagon i had, very easy compared to what one might think.

I never had speedo issues but many automatics are known for the silly button for overdrive.... first thing to fail and mine would go in and out all day. Noticibly slower when it went out, then the trans just thinks its a 3 speed. My second one had it rewired to be permanently on. I used to bomb around doing 80 all day long ( she ran out of breath any faster)

I believe they are geared lower for the wagons (they all use the same setup) and in Europe they are a favorite to tow caravans with. I used to tow a 4x6 utility trailer behind my blue one... I would forget it was there

[repinS]

I haven't had to do it, but service records from when my buddy owned it show the wiring to the overdrive relay repaired at least twice. So far it's working for me, very distinct difference when the OD is engaged/disengaged. It's a *dang* shame that there's no lockup torque converter though, highway mileage is suffering a bit.

I also have a bit of belt squeak when it's stupid -25C cold, but it calms down quickly. Timing belt, water pump, drive belts, and alternator were done in the last couple years. My "tropical" fan clutch (engages at a bit lower temps than stock) came in from Amazon yesterday, so that's the next item on the list. Also waiting on the brake failure valve (often mistaken for a proportioning valve) to come from IPD... I'll be having my local Volvo guy install and bleed it for me, not worth my time when I could be working on other cars.

[thesam1984]

Cool... lookd like yours is in way better shape than mine were lol. If you can get the motor mounts looked at and replaced if needed. It makes worlds of difference expecially with the " crab walk" that these little cars do if base suspension isnt perfect. My sister said that it looked like a top hat because of the profile. Its the high narrow stance that causes the wandering when the car flexes with the unibody... however one of the hardest cars too rust that ive ever seen. I had only one hole in the fender of my gray one and that was a "poorly repaired panel from 20 years before"

[repinS]

Engine mounts were done a year or two ago, it's unfortunate that they're soft as hell to begin with. I know it's for safety reasons - Volvo wanted the engine to break away and slide underneath the car in the event of a collision. The side effect of this being that you gotta replace the mounts every few years. No biggie though, they're horrendously cheap and simple, I'd even consider it a tune-up item. We'll see if I'll replace them with something stiffer down the road.

It has a brand new trans mount from when I had the tailshaft bushing fixed, it was weeping trans fluid out the back. Also an alignment and/or inner/outer tie rods is in the cars for the near future. So yeah, it does have some nagging issues, but thankfully ones that I can tackle on my own for the most part, and I have $1500 that I can put into it before I break even with what I had into the Accord.