Hi. I just placed an ad on Brickboard selling my silver 1989 780 Bertone Coupe, which has only 9,000 miles on a rebuilt 4-cylinder B230F engine, because I am a musician and need a 4-dr. with a larger trunk. I know the B230-F engine is a great engine, and I have always been told to STAY AWAY from the 7 series 6-cylinder engines. However, I would like to know, how the 960 6-cylinder engine has held up, is it a wise choice? Will it be as durable and reliable as the 4? What kind of problems should I expect, and what should I be on the look out for. Thank you. Mark Horton, Dedham, Mass. 781-251-9424 Bosbuff@hotmail.com

Stick with the 4cyl. The 960 engine is not nice to deal with, and it's NOT cheap to fix or replace like the B230F. Find a nice 740 Turbo or 940 Turbo.
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Volvo 240 Links

Could you(or anyone) be more specific? I mean, if I find a, say, '94 960 with about 100k on it, and it looks and sounds good, no leaks or ostensible burning, could I reasonably expect to get 200k out of it with proper maintenance? What should I be looking for as possible problems with this engine? One response I got said that it was the V-6 engines to worry about, and that this Inline 6 was a good one. Thanks. Mark H.
Boston, Mass.

I was very vague in my response so that you would search the site for 960 related problems, but I'll add a little. A 960 might cruise to 200K with very few problems, but that would be very rare. It seems that a "bad" 960 starts to deteriorate at around 100K. If you break a timing belt, which are supposed to be changed every 20-30K, you will do severe damage to the engine. You'll be rebuilding the head or slapping a used one on and hoping that there's no damage to the bottom end. That is a very expensive repair. Some certain early 960s had a problem with coolant seeping out (block porosity). Some people have had some issues with wiring, and I recall a fuel rail problem that might be mentioned in the archives. There's also been some low compression, gunked up engines with oil sludge, carbon deposits, bad rings, bad valve seals, dropped/burned/deposit-covered valves, blown head gaskets, and I think one bad tranny (this is from memory, so I might not be totally right).

This one should keep you busy for a while:

960 Longevity Matrix, A Poll. Let's Sort This Out. 𖛼]

Do a search on this site. Search for these names (not all are 960 owners) and view any thread they've taken part in that had something to do with the 900 series.

riverol
Token Ring Man
Shatz
Toyota Tom
Mullah Fuqua
Tom Irwin
jbowers
Jerry Warren
Paul S.
Chris Herbst
ringlee
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Volvo 240 Links

At least in hot weather, the ATF cooler inside the radiator generally blows up. This puts coolant in AT and ATF in coolant lines. Coolant in AT results in blown AT in short order. ATF in coolant hoses results in blown hoses with immediate loss of coolant. This can result in a an overheated engine in a short time, with damage to head and piston rings. This is what happened to the engine in Tom's car, it overheated. I am not talking about some 960 Volvos blowing that ATF where I am, but all or nearly all of them including mine with PO. This is not like a broken radiator neck and loss of coolant with warning. If you are driving on the highway at speed in any fairly long trip and that ATF cooler breaks inside the radiator, you will know about it after you have blown AT and maybe overheated the engine. Hence, the dealer put in my car a brand new AT directly from Volvo under warranty. Of course, one can install an additional ATF cooler (to keep ATF cool), a Magnefine filter (to keep ATF clean and reduce friction) and ATF and engine oil temperature and pressure gauges to monitor closely while driving. Good luck!

See the 700/900 FAQ for accumulated horror stories.