Looking at a 745 - advice?

[DennisCA]

Looking at this 1992 745 with a B230F and M47. I admit a huge part of the appeal is the color.







414,000km odometer, inspected July 23rd and passed.





Seller claims clutch has been serviced, as well as brakes. Has some clear coat peeling:





I think this could be stopgapped, sand the edges and clear coat with 2k over it and blend.







Drivers seat a little worn... Speedo not working properly, think seller is referring to a component behind the dash as the culprit. Sometimes it has an idle issue where it goes high. I think the speedo issue is a voltage stabilizer or maybe a capacitor. Not sure what the occasionally surging idle is about.

[matthew1]

Overall I think you're on the good side of the gamble with this car if it's priced well. Did you check engine oil for level and color? Does it have service records? Service records since new would be asking for a lot, but maybe the last 5 or 10 years would be a normal expectation.

If you can, watch the exhaust on a cold start for blue or white smoke. All the usual things.

Great color.

[DennisCA]

Any idea what the occassionally surging idle might be about? I am wondering if it's something electrical, if it was a vacuum issue it ought to be always high.

[matthew1]

Idle - vacuum leaks... https://turbobricks.com/index.php?threa ... ft.277495/ or IAC

Speedo - https://www.volvoclub.org.uk/faq/Electr ... Repair.htm capacitor repair

[volvolugnut]

What Matt said. I have several similar Volvos.
volvoolugnut

[DennisCA]

Gonna go look at it this saturday, haggled a bit but seem stuck on 3500€, it's a borderline case for me if the car is worth it or not, because it doesn't come with winter tires.

What's gonna determine it mostly though is rust. Since this is a 92 it has a galvanized body AFAIK and should not be that terrible underneath, I hope. Based on Baked Beans Garage 740 series the floor pans and front of the front wheel wells are places to look at, but that was an 86 model so it was not galvanized.

[scot850]

Check the following for corrosion:

1) Floor pans as you said. Pay particular attention to the jack points and the 2 short chassis out riggers at the front. Also look at the driver's floor at the front as they can corrode especially just in front of the 2 short out riggers (my young friend with the 740 has this issue with holes in the floors).
2) The 2 frame rails again where they drop down at the front. They can corrode from inside out. Same again at the rear over the wheels
3) Spare wheel area.
4) Behind the rear wheels in the trunk area.

Those are not all possible places but if they are bad, there will likely be more elsewhere.

Good Luck and hope it all goes well!

Neil.

[DennisCA]

I am now a 740 owner

[DennisCA]

OK here it is, home:



Herein follows a photo dump and walkthrough of the car.

Issue #1 and most obvious




Fortunately this rubber list can be bought new! Skandix sells it and even has instructions:
https://www.skandix.de/en/documents/ins ... w/3000165/

Otherwise things look to be in good shape. Exhaust is new after the cat.




Rear door cards look fine, they could use their own speakers tho


Rear seat is in nice shape, as was the roof liner, no sagging.


Lamp button looking a bit worn


I did not like this, on both sides, believe there should be screws here. Hopefully I can manage some kind of plastic repair to make it less noticeable.


I need to remove the instrument cluster anyway, the speedo doesn't work, seller claimed a fuse was bad, but he showed me a picture of what was bad and it looked to be a trace that was broken actually. This was a young guy, 23 and he wasn't an electronics expert.I am gonna look at the caps and there is supposed to be a voltage regulator back there too, some lamps also need replacing.

This was perhaps the only exterior rust I found, on the drivers side door trim, gonna linseed oil it temporarily before doing a repaint (in a couple of years).


Second issue is the worn drivers seat and the side plastic tray is loose, looks like a screw in the rear is supposed to hold it, but it has broken. I think this can be fiberglassed from behind to make an invisible repair. The fabric though... I like the fabric, very old man.


This is a common issue too I believe. I hope to be able to fiberglass this from behind, perhaps some metal rods as support. Then plastic filler and black paint maybe.


And the rear compartment, has an original rubber Volvo insert


I think it could make do with some TLC as well to revitalize the rubber


Checking underneath


I am seeing a few rust spots, but nothing major






The side wells don't have any rust in them, but one was full of debris and the other was slightly wet.




Seems to be in quite decent shape for the mileage and age. It goes straight forward when driving and the power steering is smooth and easy, feels like on a newer car. Seller said he had it professionally aligned and I believe him.

Now it has been welded, under the battery tray but I'll have to get a photo of that later.

It also has a shaking gear stick, it's not excessive but it indicates something wrong or unbalanced. The seller replaced the clutch last year and perhaps he did something wrong. I need to go l looking. It drove home just fine, 140km one way trip. Some wining noise at 80kph and above, no change when depressing the clutch so it's either wind (maybe the loose trim) or something like a bearing.

Oh yeah the front tire (all new tires otherwise) has been fixed with some kind of spray, I need to get that fixed by a tireshop.

Other things I will doing as well:
-Oil and filter change, it's done almost 15000km since last, I will be shortening that intervall.
-Coolant will get flushed and replaced
-Perhaps change gearbox oil, not sure last it was done. Car shifts fine though.

[DennisCA]

I am wondering about the gear stick shake... No difference putting in the clutch or accelerating, the gear lever does feel kinda sloppy, easy to move about even when in gear, so I wonder if it's the lever itself is contributing, worn bushes or something. I feel the vibration of the stick is most visible when idling and gets less so when driving.

The car doesn't vibrate when driving or idle, I feel like I ought to be able to feel some vibration as well if something was unbalanced, but maybe not. This is doing 80-90 ish



---

I changed filter and oil today, put 5W40 in it because it will be winter driven. Here's a look at the engine bay:




All new leads might be an idea, looks like the valve cover has RTV around it. I have gotten new G11 coolant and will be doing a flush of the engine soon, I basically put in water and a machine washing tablet, then I run it for a while before draining and flushing it.

There is the rust repair, it goes into the wheel well. Needs to be de-rusted and painted.


I washed it and cleaned it a bit, need to give it a good vacuum, identified several spots in need of plastic repairs.



Getting colder and condensation is settling on the car, how annoying when I was gonna take a photo...





It's not cockpit shine, it's supposed to be a rubber and vinyl restorer without changing the surface.



The bumpers are not responding the plastic restorer, they are painted and I am gonna need to repaint them. The hood and roof should ideally be repainted too and the drivers side door. I also found rust on top of the rear right door against the door seal. I brushed dinitrol ML on all rusty spots like that to try and keep it from getting worse too fast.



I have temporarily fixed the sagging rubber trim on the rear window. I have ordered a new set from Skandix.de and will be fixing it properly.

Tried to pretty up the rear rubber mat too





Maybe more rubber restorer and letting it soak in will make it better.

I changed the oil and filter today as well and got coolant, will be doing a flush later.