Rear Torque Rods

Evidently my rear torque rod bushings are badly worn so I need to do those.  $580 estimate from the shop!?!  It's about $16 worth of parts and removing 4 bolts.  $580?  Really??  I'm ordering the parts (4 bushings) and doing it myself.  I could buy new arms with bushings already in them, but they're $135 ea.  I'll just punch out the old bushings and press in new ones.  I even got them on Amazon Prime!  2-day free shipping.

The torque rods only took about 20 minutes to get out.  The bushings hadn't completely failed, but they didn't look all that great.  Pressing the rusted bushings out was a pain.  I used a friend's hydraulic press.  This took about an hour as I had to finish knocking them out with an air hammer.  Pressing new ones in took 20 minutes.  Retighten with suspension loaded.  The bolts are 17mm and the nuts 18mm.

Front End

The lower A-arms are pretty corroded so I decided to just order new ones as they're only $50 ea.  As long as everything is going to be new, I thought I might as well do ALL the bushings in the front end- less unbolting of things. Soooo everything is on its way!  The lower control arms came without bushings.  I was able to press in the front bushings into the arms  no problem with help from my blacksmith friend, an anvil and a sledge.  The rears are another issue as the bushings are larger and they're in those funky bolted on hangers.  I'm going to have the shop do those.  Interestlingly, the shop said the different R and L bushings are to compensate for the crown in the road.  They said they long ago went to putting the same bushings in both sides.

Tires and Wheels

One of my 14" wheels has a bad tire.  I'm surprised it hasn't failed yet.  I was going to swap on a set of 15" alloys I bought for now, before the snows come, but one of those tires was bad :/  Ugh.  SO now I have 2 alloys and 2 steels.  I much prefer the look of the steels with hubcaps to the 5 spoke alloys.

Bosch LH 3.1

Evidently Bosch LH 3.1 is a really rare system on late 240's.  The MAF or AMM is unavailable. They're supposedly about $650 new. Somehow I stumbled upon one for cheap so I just bought it.  It's good and I think the car runs better now.  It was probably cleaned :)

Temp Gauge

I was having temperature gauge issues.  The car was registering all over the place.  The gauge was reading in the red when the actual temperature was in the 150's F.  Needless to say that was stressing me out a bit until I discovered the problem with post-1986 240's and the "Temp Faker" gauge.  Unfortunately, the gauge stopped working altogether before I got the fix in.  The fix is in, but the gauge is still dead.  Now on to diagnosing that!

Well, the gauge shot to super duper high while I was driving- a sure sign of the sensor wire grounding on the block.  I quick pulled the wires off the back of the instrument cluster so the gauge wouldn't fry.  Reconnected the yellow temp sensor wire and now the gauge is working perfectly!

Heeeeeeee

There's a heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee  noise coming from the center console.  It's because someone took out the vacuum check valve.  No need to rip apart the dash.  It's right on top of the intake manifold.  No more heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.  Volvo Part #9135666  AKA Air Pump Control Valve.

5 Speed

The Volvo has a M47 5-speed manual transmission.  These are pretty rare as they were optional equipment.  The gearbox takes just under 2 quarts of Type-F automatic transmission fluid.  I drilled a hole in the bottle cap and inserted 6' of clear plastic tubing and got my wife to hold the bottle up high and squeeze to get the fluid to go into the transmission.  Cheaper than the $18 fluid transfer pump at the auto parts store!  I was happy to see very little in the way of metal bits on the drain plug magnets.  To fill, fill to overflowing out the top hole.  Both plugs are removed with a 13mm box wrench.  Replace the copper washers or heat them to red hot and reuse.  Evidently, this particular transmission does not have much in the way of extra fluid in it.  If it leaks, make sure you check the fill level regularly.  I have known of two transmission failures resulting from lack of fluid.
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New Volvo

Well, I picked up the Volvo today.  I had mixed feelings as the AC wasn't working, the check engine light was on, it needs tires, but the body and interior are great, It's only got 104k miles on it (documented) and I have maintenance records since new. Timing belt was done at 98k so all the major stuff is good.  I sprayed all the hinges  down with spray grease and fixed a creaky clutch pedal.  Sea Foam in the oil and gas and sucked out and replaced some brake fluid.  I need a key for the trunk.