2000 V40 850 versus V40

[GDiode]

First time posting, but love all of the great info. We have a '96 850 NA wagon that has served us well and 3 kids driving. This has been the backup car for years and now they drive it to school when they can't ride the bus. I bought a parts 850 for well parts and had anticipated buying another daily driver 850, since the girls are both seniors in high school and our son is a sophmore. I was waiting for our tax return. We got it on Wednesday and the 850 that I have been eyeing for the last month, (well cared for, timing belt already done just needed a new aux belt and tensioner) sold yesterday. Then my wife found on craigslist a 2000 V40 wagon 1.9L turbo with 210,000 miles on it. He is the 2nd owner and has had it for the last 100,000. In that time he has always ran synthetic oil, changed the timing belt and water pump at 185,000. He says the brakes and tires are good but not new, and he had his mechanic go over the entire car in September of 2013 and he found no major issues and since then the car has only gone about 1000 miles.

I don't know much about the V40 and looked in that forum but couldn't find anything that would help with the decision. It looks realy nice and just the couple of cosmetic things that all cars suffer from with time.

How is it's durability compared to the 850?

What should I look for when I go to look at it?

I read in one of the forum posts that after '98 they went with a Electronic Throttle Module that has a high failure rate? Or was that just in the V/S 70 series?

I thought I also read that the '00-'01s had issues with something but I couldn't find it again. Or was this another 70 series issue again?

Any help would be much appreciated. I wanted to stick with the 850's because we have such good luck with ours and I have worked on it some (replaced the radiator two years ago), and we have been thrilled with the durability of it. It has 245,000 miles on it. We bought it 9 years ago with 190,000. The timing belt was done at 185,000 and I am about to go through and redo the PCV system with the 5/8" heater hose et al. And hopefully figure out why its puffing a blue smoke sometimes.

Thanks for reading,

Shannon

[JDS60R]

I will let others chime in but I would skip 00-01 S or V40. We don't see them often but when we do the owner tell us that something is always going wrong. I have such little experience that it is best to take this info with a grain of salt and see what the others say. When I drove them as loaner cars I liked them but was disappointed as in town mpg seemed only a little better than a S60

[j-dawg]

The first-gen S40/V40 is based on a Mitsubishi chassis and uses a Mitsubishi engine. I don't mean that as a bad thing, but if you're a Volvo loyalist for whatever reason - you have a good mechanic, you have a good source for parts, you trust the brand - the V40 isn't necessarily going to yield the same benefits as a "real" Volvo and you may as well expand your search to its contemporaries.

Again, I don't mean that as any slight against the V40; for all I know it's a very good car. It certainly is a good-looking little wagon. But if you're drawn to it for its being a Volvo, you might be disappointed.

[difflock54]

A year 2000 model is less probably likely to have the Mitsubishi GDI engine and may have a proper 4 cylinder white block Volvo engine.
These came in both turbo and non turbo options and various cc ratings and from approx' mid 99 on included variable valve timing.
Diesel models with, I think ? Renault derived engines were also manuf'.
Quite a bit of background on the overall S40 and V40 evolution is available on Wikipedia and also in the Haynes Manual introduction section.