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Sorry I didn't reply sooner, but it's been a busy weekend. However, I did want to give my two cents worth of input to your questions:
"1. How safe volvos really are (and which of the used ones are safest)."
My first statistic is a hard fact, and there's research to back it up. There was a period of 8 years here in the United States, during which time not a single person died in a Volvo 240. This includes belted and un-belted accidents. This also includes some pretty horriffic accidents, like plumeting off of the Pacific Coast Highway (in California) to the rocky surf 100 feet below, and going over the edge of a Colorado mountain pass where the car landed upside down without injuring the occupant inside. FYI, if you know someone who has access to an insurance company database, they can probably provide you with the exact dates. They pay to have these statistics available and use fatality rates and vehicle weight to determine a large portion of your insurance premiums. (The vehicle weight numbers are used to determine how likely you are to kill the occupants in another vehicle if you should hit them. I.E. the heavier the car, the higher the likely hood that someone in the other car will die.) You might try calling Volvo if you need this info, they probably also have records for this.
The second and third statistics that I have, may or may not be true. I've heard them from a few sources, but can't find hard evidence one way or the other to back this up: #2- Not a single person has died in the United States in a Volvo 240 while wearing their seatbelt. #3- Not a single person has died worldwide in a Volvo 240 while wearing their seatbelt.
Much of the safety in a Volvo is part of the integrity of the "safety cage" that surrounds the passenger compartment. For example:
-The roof and supporting members are strong enough to stack these cars 7 high, one on top of the other, without the bottom one crushing.
-The engine mounts are designed to shear off in an accident and push the engine under the car, rather than through the firewall which would kill the occupants.
-The front and rear crumple zones are designed to transfer the energy of a crash around the passenger compartment without intrusion. In a front end crash, the engine is designed to shear off it's mounts and drop down. As the engine and transmission submarine under the car, they push backwards on the driveshaft, which pushes backwards on the rear axle. The brake calipers on the rear axle have ears on them that contact a strike plate on the body of the car, and as the entire drivetrain pushes backwards, you expand the rear crumple section of the car (while the front crumple section crushes in). The reverse is true for a rear end accident (the drivetrain and engine are pushed forwards). The net effect is that a lot of energy from the crash is transfered around the "safety cage" area without being pushed through it.
"2. Which 10-15 year old volvos are best for her to buy."
A few thoughs on the subject:
-If she will be working on the car herself at home, I'd recomend just about any 240/740/940 (4-cylinder gas engine) with a B230 engine in it (1985 and newer). The B200 and B234 engines are interference designs, which are ok if you change your timing belt at the specified intervals, but are slightly more riskier to own because of that reason. I'd also give a good rating to the '83-'85 B23F engines (USA-spec fuel injection), but I have no experience with the carb'd (A) or euro-fuel injection versions (E & K).
-Avoid turbos. They cost twice as much to own and cause twice the wear and tear on the car/engine. I can back this statement up with a list of reciepts of my own and my friends (some of us have non-turbos, some have turbos).
-The 240 vehicles will be easier to repair (generally speaking) than the 740/940 cars, and the 760/780/960 cars will be the most expensive and most difficult to maintain if you're having a mechanic take car of the car for you (versus taking care of it yourself).
-The Front Wheel Drive cars (850, S/V70, S80, S/V50, S40, C70) are nice vehicles as well, but they're newer and will cost more to buy, and they may cost more to maintain when they need parts. Since they're front wheel drive, the engine, transmission, and driveshafts are packed very tightly into the engine bay and are more difficult to work on. Also, I personally would not buy a 2002 or earlier FWD Volvo unless it has already had the engine main rear seal replaced. If it hasn't had that seal replaced yet, knock off $800 USD from the asking price of the car and plan to have it fail when the car has between 100,000 to 200,000 miles on it. There was an issue with the rubber they used on the original rear main seals that caused them to fail at about this timeframe (every friend of mine who has a FWD Volvo with more than 150,000 miles has had to have this seal replaced), however, the new/replacement seals that are installed currently are just fine.
-From personal experience, the 1988 Volvo 240 with the B230F engine seems to have the fewest show-stopping issues. They have bullet-proof fuel injection computers (the last of the LH-2.2 series), they do not have bio-degradeable wiring harnesses (used on the 1980-87 cars), and they do not have the fuel injection computer problems that plagued the LH-2.4 cars from '89-'93 (their 561 computers were failre prone, and I've seen two of the 951 replacement computers die in the last year). The only disadvantages of this car (in my personal opinion) are the lack of On-Board-Diagnostics which weren't available until the LH-2.4 cars, and the lack of an Air-Bag (which really isn't that critical for me).
God bless,
Fitz Fitzgerald.
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'87 Blue 240 Wagon, 278k miles.
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