tuner4life

The wheels are Duplicolor wheel coating paint. (charcoal followed by clear coat from the same line)

I really don't want to remove the shaft at this point if I don't have to, the AWD is the best part of this car with winter closing fast.. I wish I could rig up a go-pro or something under there just to see whats going on. When I was building the exhaust, I checked out the drive shaft, and it seemed to be in very good shape. The carrier bushing had very minimal deflection, and only when I was basically hanging from it. It is definitely not abnormally loose. 

I mean, if it needs to be replaced, it needs to be replaced.. I was just hoping to not have to do it yet lol. Already dumped enough $ in this one for this year.  was planning on replacing everything involved with the rear subframe sometime next year.. Guess that might just include the driveshaft too.

The tips dont seem to be, although I need to get some more rigid rubber hangers, the ones on the car are a little soft. The only rattle I hear is up closer to the front. I suspect it's coming from the exhaust contacting the carrier bearing bracket. Only does it when turning hard right. Should be able to adjust that clearance fairly easily.

Cleaned the C70 up and prepped it for winter storage. The wagon will be a daily once I can quit working on it all the time...

And in storage with some of the other toys. Under a cover and hooked to a battery maintainer, cozy for the winter.

Still needs work, but at lease I got some pictures of it in the daylight! With the C70...

Changed the rear diff fluid (at least as much as is possible without a freakin drain plug) and drove it around last night. It was dark and rainy so no pictures, but there are a few things that I noticed right away that need to be addressed.

-Exhaust (or maybe driveshaft?) is contacting something when turning hard. Hopefully it's something simple. Don't feel like dropping $ on a driveshaft right now.

-Exhaust is also very loud inside. Not bad outside, but definitely resonates inside. Guessing it's because its a wagon. Hoping that some dynamat and insulation work under the carpet helps this.

Other than these 2 things, it seemed to run much better than when I started this project. Actually made boost and pulled decent at partial throttle. 

Still have a bunch of work to do, but at least it's movable and I can work on getting some of the other projects into storage before the snow hits. Than I'll get back to the Wagon. Still needs (at minimum) valve seals done, and interior put back together. I'm sure that I'll find a half million other things too lol. Probably not going to have this on the road before the snow flies this year. Just going to keep driving the 850 and I'm going to take my time and make sure that everything on this car is right.

Finally got the exhaust done over the weekend.. In retrospec, I should have had it done at a shop, the welds would have been nicer, and it wouldn't have taken me a month. Oh well, most shops around here wouldn't touch it anyways since there is no cat.  The mufflers hang a touch lower than I hoped they would, but I'm still satisfied with it. I need to get the bumper trims to finish it off.

And I'm not sure how to get video to embed since the last forum update, so here's a link. I'm definitely happy with how it sounds!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaUK3QD6-vw

After that, I got the rear brakes replaced and got to work on the wheels.. They are the original 16" meteors. They had been painted white previously, then someone painted them black, and then had several coats of black plastidip on them.. Each paint job seemed to have been prepped with an angle grinder or maybe a battle ax, hard to tell..  Either way, I had these sand blasted, wire wheeled, and stripped and got them as clean and bare as I could. There are still chips, gouges, and all kinds of imperfections, but they look better than before. From 10 ft, you can hardly tell... Or maybe 20-30 ft.. Depends how good your eyes are. They are only winter wheels anyways. Plans are to get pegs or something nice in the future.

The color goes well with Saffron.

Well since the forum is back up now, I guess I'll update. I have valve seals ordered and on the way, hoping that they fix the smoking issue. I will order the Volvo OE sealant, and the valve spring compressor tool this week. Not looking forward to the job but better to do it now than have to rush it in an emergency.

Also, just got word that my wheels are done being sand blasted. (They had several layers of paint and plastidip that wouldn't come off). I'll paint them a charcoal gray for now as they will just be for the all season tires, nothing special. Would love to pick up pegs in a year or 2. 

Lastly, I spent a large part of Sunday mocking up the rear of the exhaust. I've got the pipes all welded together now, just need to find a good way to "T" it into the existing exhaust, and need to make all the hangers. Suspended by bungee cords for now. (tips are taped up to prevent damage). I'm impressed with how nice these look for being $35 ebay mufflers.. Hopefully they hold up decent.

I'm still racing the clock hoping that I can get this on the road and reliable before the snow hits.

Saffron always looks best in the fall!

Washed the C70 yesterday. Wash/Wax/full detail. Only have a few more weeks then it will probably get put away for the winter.

I thought the same thing, but there was no smoke after letting it cool down then cold starting it again the next day.. only after extended idling then a rev.. Time will tell I guess.

It's alive!!

I got everything engine wise put back together over the weekend, filled the fluids and fired it up. Started right up, no strange noises, leaks, or suprises, and no check engine light. I let the engine heat cycle a few times and got the fluid levels stabilized.  The only thing that I will need to keep an eye on is the turbo oil seals. There is no smoke on start up or when revving, but if you let it idle for a few minutes then give it a rev it will puff just a little blue smoke then clear up. Doesn't appear to be too bad, but I'll start saving for a turbo rebuild just in case.

Here's a video of it running:

Now I just need to finish up the exhaust, out the interior back together, and get tires and alignment. Getting closer to being on the road! 

I'm waiting on the axle/angle gear seals to come in from FCP, so I took advantage of the weekend to replace the sunroof assembly and recover the headliner.

The sunroof exchange went well. The unit that I pulled from a 2000 S70 fit right in and works fine. However, there is a small part that helps support the glass in the upright position that looks to maybe be cracked. I'm going to take the old unit apart and see what is involved in swapping out the parts. No pictures of that at this time.

On to the headliner.. I started by pulling the old material off (wasn't hard as it was already failing). Then I used a large stiff wire brush and scrubbed all of the old foam off of the headliner board. This was time consuming, but really wasn't that hard. The large wire brush made short work of the foam and really cleaned it up nicely.

Once the board was thoroughly cleaned up, I sprayed some primer on it to help with adhesion of the new material. Since this car has charcoal interior, I went with black headliner material since the original tan is less than flattering.  I used about 4 cans of 3M #38808 headliner adhesive. You spray a few coats on both surfaces and let it tack up for 5-10 minutes, then once you touch them together, you'd better have it right because it will rip the foam off the back of the headliner before it comes loose. I've had great success with this adhesive on past projects. I did it in sections working about 1-2 ft at a time. This would be almost impossible without a competent helper.  Anyways, here is the finished product. Turned out very nice with only a couple small imperfections.

Now I need to paint/dye all the trim on the ceiling to black.

Also, wheels getting sandblasted this week.

What was the issue with the sunroof? the original assembly from my 1997 v70r is pretty nasty, so I got a very nice one from the junk yard and am getting ready to install it. What issues did you have?

Got a little behind on this project, but I was able to work on it again last night. I pulled the angle gear out to change the seals. The angle gear feels great with virtually no play/looseness on any direction. I'm changing the transmission seal, and both axle seals. I need to research on FCP or IPD as to which seals I need as there seems to be some discrepancy. Not going to change the larger seals on the angle gear as they are very far inset and I don't want to tear it down that far. 

Anyways. Angle gear on the floor: Changing the fluid is much easier on the floor. But I am a little concerned that it was a bit low. Guessing it's never been changed.

Do I really need that square box on the bottom? Some people say to leave it, some say that it doesn't matter and is just some sort of vibration damper..  Thoughts?

And here is where the angle gear should go, definitely need to degrease everything before it goes back together!

Also I found a few of the small floor plugs that are missing. I definitely need to go to the junk yard and grab some of these asap since the car will be used in the winter.

Oh my God, that steering wheel!!!  <3

That headliner looks great. Getting ready to do mine as well.

For simplicity sake, I'll probably get the mufflers mounted and weld up a wide "U" shaped pipe between them, then cut a hole and run the exhaust pipe in at a 90 deg angle.. Won't be perfect, but should work alright.

More crappy flux welding!

Last night I got the bung for the rear o2 sensor spacer welded up and installed the 90 deg spacer installed. It points forward and should be out of harms way under the car. I'll have to tie the wire up though because the o2 sensor wiring is about 2 feet too long... Weird. 

Then I came up with a plan to add the head shield between the downpipe and the angle gear back onto the downpipe. The shield was not in great shape and the mounting points were all rusted off. 

Here's what I came up with:

First I welded some M10x1.5 bolts to the downpipe on the same location as the original studs. They are significantly larger, so I was a little weary about clearance, but more on that later

Then, since the holes in the shield were rusted and much larger than they used to be, I added some decent sized washers under the shield.

Then the shield. I found some larger cupped washers in the garage, They are old shock absorber bushing washers, they hold the shield tightly on clean metal, not just the rusty part. The nuts are prevailing torque lock nuts, they shoudn't come loose.

Back to the clearance concern... I test fitted the downpipe and it actually fit well. I can still install/uninstall with everything else in place under the car. But the clearance was pretty close between the one bolt I welded and the pinion for the rear shaft, about 1/4 inch. Probably would have never been an issue, but I wasn't comfortable with it, so I ground the rest of the bolt down, now I have over a 1/2 inch of clearance which should be plenty:

So at this point, the exhaust is completed from the turbo to behind the rear axle.. Now to figure out the split for the duals...

Thanks guys!

I actually already had a angled O2 spacer on order (90 deg though), but I was having 2nd thoughts. Thanks for reaffirming. 

Sounds good man, I'm sure there will be things I'm needing but I need to get this driving first lol.  The interior isn't out just yet, only the headliner. Next summer I'm planning on pulling the complete rear subframe and doing all bushings, hoses, shocks, fuel pump/sender/etc.. Once and done. I like the sound deadening idea though, I have a feeling the exhaust I'm building will be kind of loud.

Over the weekend, I got the ABS computer re-soldiered as did the diode mod to delete the SAS system while keeping the ECU happy. Should take care of all the CELs. 

Also worked some more on the exhaust. Got the downpipe completely done and the midpipe is done with the exception of the bung for the rear O2 sensor. Next, I'll work on the rear section. Thankfully I could reuse the factory section over the rear subframe!

Terrible picture, but the factory downpipe is cut short and has a V-Band flange that is easily accessible. Downpipe is removable without dropping driveshaft this way.

Midpipe basically done:

Couple of questions about the exhaust. There was a small aluminum heat shield between the downpipe and the driveshaft. How important is this? The shield is on very bad shape and fell off, can I go without it, or would wrapping the downpipe with header wrap be a good idea? I've heard that it will make it more prone to rust?

Also, the rear O2 sensor.. What's the best placement for it? How far back? And for those that have no catalytic converter, do you have success just using an O2 sensor spacer to pull the sensor out of the main exhaust stream? I know there are plenty of folks running straight pipes and cat-less, but can't find solid answers as to the best way to deal with the rear O2.

Had family come in from out of town this week, so haven't done much.  But I did finally manage to get the "free-to-me" Harbor Freight flux wire welder up and running. I'm excited to be able to stick metal together again.  While flux welding isn't the prettiest thing out there, the welds are rock solid and penetrated perfectly. I may clean them up, I may not..  

The exhaust from the PO was a combination of patches, clamps, that exhaust repair tape, and hose clamps. It looked bad, sounded bad, and was about to fall off. I'll be redoing it all in 2.5".  

I also got the downpipe all repaired and modified. The stock flexpipe was broken and was wrapped in exhaust patch tape, so I cut it off and put the V-band flange closer to the engine. This makes it very easy to remove/install the downpipe with the driveshaft and everything still in place. I will still run a flexpipe just a little bit behind the downpipe so there shouldn't be much stress on anything.  I also welded the support brace back onto the downpipe because it had somehow gotten broken off. Also welded the SAS port shut as we won't be needing that anymore.

Again... Effective, not pretty. Gonna heat wrap the downpipe anyways, so won't be too visible.

Thank you! You are not far from me at all. I'm in Bremen which is just half an hour south of South bend.

Starting to look like an engine again....

I got a bit done over the weekend, but forgot to take very many pictures..  I did get this one though.. 

The front end is now right again. Replaced grille with an XC grille. Replaced broken headlights and corners with great condition replacements. Looks much better now!

Just waiting for the silicone turbo coolant hoses to come in in the next couple of days, then I can finish putting the engine back together and start building that exhaust that I've been dragging my feet on...