|
Hello, everyone...
I've been reading this board thoroughly for a couple weeks now since acquiring my first Volvo. The advice, expertise, and helpful attitudes here are incredible; you folks are about the nicest bunch of folks I've ever found on an internet board.
Here's my question; the car is at my home right now in central NYS up on jack stands in my garage where I've been working on it for two weeks after having driven it for a week or so to get a feel for the car. The first week in January, it's going to be a Christmas present for my recently-licensed, incredibly mechanicly inept 21 year old son who will be doing a 30 mile-a-day commute in the Ann Arbor, MI area while he student teaches. He's a ... ahem... below average driver, very inexperienced, so I wanted something safe and slow. Bingo!
I'm hoping to provide him with a relatively bulletproof, reliable car, and this seems to be a good choice. Here's the issues I noticed when I drove it, and the steps I've taken to correct them..
1. Brakes pulsed pretty severely in the front end.
Right rotor was pretty warped, but neither front rotor was particularly worn and there was plenty of pads left. The right side caliper had bad seals, and one piston seemed stuck. I've cleaned up the ABS sensors, installed new tone wheels, new rotors, new pads, and reman calipers, along with a new brake line.
2. The car was very loud. Obvious leaking at the exhaust manifold, cylinder farthest forward (no. 1?), and down at the manifold-to-header joint.
New gaskets, studs,nuts, and had the manifold resurfaced. Easy, very rewarding job to do.
3. Alternator wobbling, and belts misadjusted.
New bushings, new bolt, new adjustment bold, new belts all around. Cleaned up the terminals.
4. After warming up, the car shook like crazy at idle, although the engine did not feel like it was missing or running roughly.
Replaced the engine mounts on both sides, and one of the brackets. The P.O had snapped off one of the studs, and I snapped a second one off. Again, a relatively fun, easy job.
Still to be done or already done..
ATF and ATF filter change.
New plugs, wires, cap, rotor, air filter, fuel filter.
New heater return pipe (the one under the exhaust manifold. It looked pretty funky, and figured it was easier to do w/ the manifold off anyway). Take the flexible hose off the firewall instead of trying to jerk around behind the engine. It took me 30 minutes of swearing to think of that. No brain surgeon, am I.. sigh.
New upper and lower radiator hoses and coolant flush'n'fill.
Breather box and flame trap.
OK.. that's the background. Now, here are the questions for anyone willing to help.
1. The breather box/flame trap. Folks say you can do it w/out removing the intake manifold. Looks impossible to me, but I ain't that good. Perhaps just removing the throttle body? AND...that hose that descends into the oil pan that everyone warns about... just HOW EXACTLY do you make sure you don't disturb something you can't see as you take off the breather box?
2. Would it be a good idea to take off the intake manifold anyway, just to get in there and make sure every hose, gasket, and o-ring is in good shape?
3. Most importantly... anything else I should make sure to do prior to sending the car on it's way? There's 136K on the car, the interior is perfect.. really. Almost Twilight-Zone perfect. The A/C doesn't work; who cares. Heat works great, as do the heated seats. Some cobbed up stuff on the exhaust sytem, i.e., a bolt welded on to help join the header to the cat, missing header bracket to the transmission, typical rusty but solid bottom chassis. A friend of mine who is an excellent head mechanic at a well known shop in the area has inspected the front end and assured me the ball joints, tie rods, and other bushings are OK. I don't know the history of the car; I bought it from a "dealer" who was a college kid himself. I found a record of a timing belt change at 90K; should I do that again? What about crank/cam/aux shaft seals while I'm in there?
I have given myself another three weeks to complete the work; I want to have the car done so I can drive it daily for a month to make sure I haven't missed anything. Fire away... How can I best ready this car for someone who knows nothing about cars?
Thanks, everyone. Best wishes, and my heartfelt gratitude for all that I've ALREADY learned on the board. Oh.. I DO have the Bentley manual. I love the part about removing the intake manifold .. "disconnect the stuff attached to it. Remove it. Put it back on."... sigh. Everything else in the book seems pretty complete.
Best wishes..
Barry
|
