Big Will

That's a lot of work and research you did there. Nice job. It's very cool to see how people are still re-engineering our cars 15+ years on.

Nice project you've got going. I love to see more people building the 9.0:1 compression motors

I agree. That's absolutely awesome.

Great info you guys. I hadn't seen that FCP is now offering bushing #16 from Super Pro. The set that I bought from them came with 2 sets of bushings and was made by a company called DayStar and cost about $7 on clearance...it looks like pretty bad quality. I'll just get the Super Pro set the next time I'm in the States...shipping from Skandix here in Germany to the U.S. is absurd because they use a flat rate up to certain weights. Let me know if you have luck making some delrin bushings for spots 2 and 3.

Hi Neubar! I haven't tackled this project in its entirety yet as this past month while I was in the U.S. Ben and I did a build on my motor (I'll do a thread detailing that soon as soon as I get a few remaining photos from Ben). The next project will be the rear suspension but having an extra set of all the rear suspension parts makes things so much easier. I chose to have a local machine shop press out all the bushings on the spare subframe and LCAs...very little cost that saved a lot of headache in my view and now the parts are ready for paint. I completely agree on the FCP poly version of #16. It looks like an awful quality bushing so I think I'll stick with the Volvo ones for that spot. I spoke with Ben Kaplan about possibly making a spherical bearing insert for that non-existent LCA bushing and he's confident he can make some. Perhaps we can get a group buy together as I'm sure there are 5 of us that would go for a set. There are also those other 2 sets of subframe bushings that appear to be available only as rubber (#s 2 and 3 in the diagram). Bushing #3 seems pretty robust but #2 is a pretty weak one in my view.

Just an edit from my original post. I made a mistake with the Super Pro poly bushing number for #16 in the suspension diagram. The Super Pro part number I mentioned is incorrect. The following is more accurate: Part number 6819057 (#16 in diagram) was pn: 1359599 on the 7 series and is available in poly from Skandix and some other vendors.

Interesting info about the screw kit. There are a ton of screws so depending on the price it could be worth it but if it doesn't include any bushings then I'm less inclined. A few people are working on the mystery bushing in the LCA which is great. Hopefully we'll have some answers soon. If we can't find an exact Volvo part then perhaps with the numbers on the bushing we can go to Lemfoerder or Meyle and figure out if they stock them. As for the poly bushings for the subframe, I think it would be nice to have a sportier response from the suspension and am in favor of trying poly. Probably something like delrin or other plastic bushings would be far too stiff and would add unwanted vibration. As for the differential drain, I spent some time with the owner of the machine shop looking at the spare subframe and the diff and we decided that a small drain hole in the back of the casing could work as long as it was done in a way that would allow a small tool to access it. IIRC, they capped it with a small plug that can be unscrewed using a hex key. In order to do this they unbolted the back of the case so there would be no metal shavings left inside. This was $25 very well spent in my opinion. I may have a small pipe installed that can be capped off with a bolt which would come out from the drain toward the passenger side of the car to make the process extremely easy but the shop didn't have anything to do that on hand.

Hi all, I'm glad people are reading this! Brandon I'm so sorry to have ruined your Memorial Day Weekend Truthfully though, you all know how much I appreciate the Volvo community and the friends I've made in it over the past decade so I hope I can occasionally give back and with some luck we can get enough people together to get a supplier to take us seriously enough to make some bushings. Andy - I should have made measurements of the bushing over Easter when I was in the States. Perhaps someone who picks up a spare set of LCAs can do so in my absence. H - Very interesting on that part number you gave. I will ask my contacts in Sweden if that's possible to obtain here in Europe and what's in it. Good that you got those bushings from IPD as the ones Neu and I got made by Daystar don't look particularly high quality and just from hand fitting them as a test I was skeptical that they would fit nicely. I think the IPD version is from Super Pro...but FCP had a special on the Daystar ones for about $4.25 I'll get a Super Pro set the next time I'm in the States and can work on this a bit further. Also, does anyone know if there is a boot kit made for the rear axles by anyone? After glass beading the one axle I would be very skeptical that the old boot should be reused.

As my wagon approaches 190K miles I began to think that it would be worth doing a thorough refresh on the rear suspension. My Öhlins shocks have about 70K miles on them and they appear to be perfectly fine so they will simply get a pair of new shock mounts for good measure. I'm more concerned about the bushings...and there are a lot of them! Much of the original groundwork for this thread was done by Neu and I'm very thankful for the research he did a while back. I was going to wait until I had a bit more information and had the project more or less done but I'm posting now in the hopes that we can pool resources and try to figure out a few more of the missing pieces. We'll start with the diagram for reference: I started by getting a used but reasonably clean spare rear subframe and having the bushings removed by the excellent (and refreshingly honest) machine shop I use in Tucson. The next step will be to clean it up and then have it powder coated. There are 3 sets of bushings in the subframe: 9140469 (#2 in diagram) - this one is normally cracked apart by this point in time and in need of replacement.1387226 (#3 in diagram)9169310 (#3a and #11a in diagram)Volvo basically went into their parts bin from the 700/900 IRS equipped cars. In some cases, Volvo used different part numbers in the RWD cars but the bushings remain the same. For example, bushing #3a appears all over the place in Volvo RWD suspension. In fact, on the old bushings that were pressed out, the rubber is stamped with the corresponding RWD part number (1273235) and another bushing actually must have literally been sitting around for Volvos in the 80s because it had “West Germany” stamped onto it. The good news is that bushing 3a is available in poly from Superpro/Superflex as kit SPF2012K for the RWD cars. The bad news is that the other 2 sets of bushings, though common on the RWD cars, are not available in poly from anyone. I would really like to have these manufactured but we would need to get a bunch of people together to convince a company to do a run of these. I can supply a company like Superflex or Powerflex with the original Volvo bushings. The next part of my rebuild involves the upper control arms (#6) and stays (#15). I found a set of each in Sweden that had about 100 miles on them and had them glass beaded. Ready for powder coating: The bushing (#21) that goes in the bracket (#20) for the stays is happily available in poly as it was found on 240 front lower control arms - lower rear position. The kit needed is SPF0638K *The original rubber bushing needs to be burned out so be prepared to repaint the bracket. The lower control arms are a bit more complicated. I got a spare set and had them glass beaded: The LCAs have 3 bushings: 6819057 (#16 in diagram) available as a poly bushing from Daystar through FCP which I have (or from Super Flex as SPF2013K)9169310 (#11a in diagram) again available in poly from Superpro/Superflex as kit SPF2012KMystery Bushing - not available as a separate part from Volvo. This bushing has bolt #14 in the diagram going through it.Apparently Volvo would prefer we spend $500 per side on new LCAs... Here is the bushing in question: Neubar and his friend Howard have tried without luck to find out what this bushing is. The part number stamped on the actual bushing does not correspond to any Volvo part number though it does have the correct number of digits. From what I could read it said "Made in Germany" and either 9157319 or 9157318. The only thing I can think of is that it's this bushing found on more modern Volvos: 9490797 It would be great if we could figure this out. The track arms (#25), also called stays by Volvo, on my car are very rusty. I had once before painted them with some Rustoleum but I always wanted to replace them. I found a rust-free set from someone parting his R in California and had the machine shop swap in new bushings (#26 & 27). Apparently the outer bushing has a separate part # for XCs which is cheaper and I believe some folks here compared the bushings and there is no difference. If you buy the complete track arm from Volvo there is also a separate part number for XCs which costs half the price. I would go that route if you are buying them new as they should fit. In fact, Volvo has discontinued the track arms, non XC bushing and also the hub bearing bracket part numbers for non XCs which would add further evidence that there was never a functional difference. In Sweden, I found a brand new rear axle and a 2nd one with low miles but that was rusty. This has since been cleaned up but I'm struggling to find a boot kit for it. Does anyone know if one is made? Volvo does not list any kit for the rear axles and after it was glass beaded it surely needs to be re-greased and re-booted. I had also picked up a spare rear diff in Sweden with ~500 miles on it that was used on an 850 AWD for a tech school repair course. The car was basically worked on by the students as a new car and then taken to the dismantler. This diff sat on a shelf for about 15 years forgotten. I've had the machine shop drill a small drain hole in the casing to make service easier. This required some work to figure out where it would be accessible given the way the subframe basically surrounds the diff but I think we figured out a spot that will work. I'll take pictures of it the next time I'm in the States. This project has been a long time in collecting parts but I'd like to do it once and do it right. I would greatly appreciate any help tracking down the mystery bushing, a boot kit for the rear axle that would work and would love to work on some kind of group buy to convince someone to make those other 2 sets of subframe bushings in poly. Happy to coordinate, get in touch with manufacturers etc. Hope this information can help some people who are thinking of revamping the bushings on the AWDs. I'll continue to update as work is completed but it will be slow. This is the original suspension thread made by Neu: http://v70r.com/forums/topic/34879-rear-suspension-rebuild/ I also forgot to mention that at this stage it's probably a good idea to replace #37 in the diagram. These rear swaybar endlink bushings come with IPD swaybars but you can also get these separately for about $3.50 from IPD:

Glad to see the project is still coming along Matt.

I've now read so many pages of this stuff in several different threads that my head is spinning. It's a shame if all of this is true because people were very positive about Lucky and ARD for a long time. Everyone was excited to have an alternative to the off-the-shelf tunes of IPD and Rica at half the price...true that recently the prices have gone up considerably for add-ons etc. It's also a shame if it turns out that much of the tuning done was hardly that.

H - it's always appreciated how you keep these threads updated so that when people find them through search the info is current. That's dedication.

You are certainly a pioneer with this stuff Hussein! It's always a bit of trial and error and perfecting.

H - Jerd essentially stopped doing business a couple of years ago. At least that was my understanding when I was in Sweden. I never got a reason why but I had heard orders were on hold from them at least directly.

And it's just crazy to drop a subframe and all that when it's constantly raining out

Sorry but you said "megasquirt abortion" - two words I never expected to see together in this context...thanks for the laugh.

You're working hard Hussein - it's amazing. Look forward to seeing the car soon.

Great pictures Hussein. If you have a chance I'd spray off the exhaust and rear diff area to avoid any silt sitting there for a while once the water recedes.

I believe he used the flywheel that both ViVA and a VS vendor in the UK sells that is meant to allow the M66 to be mated to a single mass style clutch kit hence the single mass flywheel.

Great project Matt. Best of luck with it and glad you are photo-documenting the progress.

Just noticed this. Congrats Mike. Happy New Year and I think I speak for all of us when I say we look forward to seeing your ideas for the site. And also thanks to Rob for creating this forum and always trying to keep it a positive and informative atmosphere.

Given how much I drive around the Northeast when I'm in the States, I'm really surprised no one ever sees my car. It's sad how often I see S60Rs and give the "V" and the driver just looks at me like I'm a jerk.

Good call on the boots being a waste but maybe there is a way to put a bead of silicone around the holes? I know this is a way that some glass shops re-seal our sunroof seals when they start to leak. You probably wouldn't need anything fancy to do it either.

Those endlinks look great - I hope you're going to put some sort of rubber boots on them for longevity in our Northeast weather.

Finally some good news! At least it'll get fixed and upgraded.