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Dr. Stanley Goodspeed, Weekend warrior NA 244 auto-x project

Mr. Blewregaurd

New member
Joined
Jul 13, 2007
Location
Denver
Hi all. High time a started a project thread for this car since things are actually starting to move along with it. We will start with a little history.
This was my first Volvo that I'm sure at least some of you will remember.
Had a lot of fun putting this car together, met a lot of new friends because of it, blah blah blah. Basically it was a rust bucket. Windshield frame was toast, floors were toast, rear quarters and inner fenders were gone, all the usual spots. It didn't show it in all the doctor'd up pictures that got passed from some BS instagram page to the next but it was bad. I considered fixing all the rust, but it was just a lost cause. I couldn't bring myself to part it, didn't really want to sell it, so it sat. I always really wanted this car to be a 122, but I couldn't afford one.
So one day about a year later, this clapper finds its way into my life. Traded a beater 245 i had straight up for it. Had been sitting next to a barn for 27 years.
After a few winters worth of sporadic work, it sits like this now

So somewhere in the second year of owning this 122, I decided that the bagged 245 was no longer adding any value to my life, so I sold it. Unfortunately it went to a guy locally who still brings it back to me to get fixed (I own a shop) so I get to slowly watch it die.
Last picture I took of it, only picture of the two together

/End history lesson. The 122 project rarely gets worked on, but some day once I get back on it I will start a project thread for it. Anyways, moving on......
 
So about 2 months after I sold the 245, My lovely wife bought me a photo book by Norwegian artist Helge Skodvin called 240 Landscapes. Its a great book documenting 240's in their homeland.
Inside the front cover is the famous quote from the rock, "I drive a Volvo, a Beige one."-Dr. Stanley Goodspeed. I get about halfway through the book and I start feeling like my life isn't complete without a 240. Flip the phone out, open craigslist, Boom, 1985 240 sedan, beige, $700. Call the guy and tell him I'm on my way.
This car just spoke to me for some reason. I had this vision in my head for the 240 I always wanted to build, but never did for some reason.
I've always loved the Monte carlo in tokyo drift, and the Chevelle in Drive, and this car just screamed that to me. Not super nice cosmetically, but just a bad ass driver's car. So I went down that path. I've also always dreamed of competing in auto-x, track days etc. as that is what initially drew me to cars in the first place, so the main focus was going to be suspension. I also knew I wanted this car to be NA. The wagon was +t, but I got tired of blowing m46s up, and wanted this car to be trouble free so I don't have to spend a bunch of time fixing it after every race. I kicked around ideas of swapping in iconic NA Japanese engines, but I decided that I didn't want to spend a ton of money and time to familiarize myself with a new power train I know nothing about when I can just build a b230 for next to nothing. Reading here it looked like there were some NA tricks I could use to make just enough power to make this thing fun to drive. I don't care if its fast, just fun. So the tear down began about a week later after I got it through smog and registration.
Did new rings and bearings in the bottom end, honed the block, and swapped to some 13mm rods I had laying around. Sent the head off to the machine shop to have .065" milled of and to have all new guides with seals installed on all 8 valves. I also did some minor gasket matching on the head and manifolds. I got a good deal on a RSI NA cam from a user here and installed that as well. Did lots of reading on the "tight squish" methods, and decided to give it a try. Measured my block piston protrusion at .006". So to give me the squish clearance I needed at stock redline, I needed a .028" head gasket. Assembled all that jazz with a pinto timing belt and an old style IPD gear I had laying around.
The header is a whole thing in its self. Ill choose to keep my mouth shut mostly about it, but long story short, it's in the dumpster.
In its home
So somewhere in here, I placed a large order with Kaplhenke. I ordered his reinforced coilovers like the day after he sold his last set. Ben reaches out to me and says he is working on something exciting to replace them, but it is going to take some time. Master of suspense over here! My original plan was to have this entire car done in 2 months so I could race in the 2016 auto-x season. After a few back and forth's with Ben it became apparent that that wasn't going to happen, but once he told me JRZ was going to be producing them, that was just fine with me. So things kind of got stagnant with the car for a while. 6 months or so passed with not a lot of work getting done on the car. Once production of the coilovers actually started in Belgium, It was time to get my ass in gear. Powered through getting the car up and running, not a lot of pictures there....
3 row copper I had sitting around, 850 e fan in a turbo shroud, blah blah blah, nothing new there.
I flipped a set of 740 steelies and got some Dunlap Direzza's.
At this point it's time to get an exhaust made up. So off it goes to my pal Rod's shop. I had a old corbeau seat laying around the shop I threw in it that had a set of harness's with it. This raised the question of where to mount the harnesses. I said lets do a simple little harness bar. Rod had just finished a crazy cage for his 510 project, and wanted to do another. A little snow balling later, I had a pretty complex harness bar.

In hind sight, we really should have just done a complete cage, but I ran out of money, and Rod had to move to the other side of the state, so we just did the back half.
Seat and harnesses in...

Then comes exhaust v1.0. This was just all bad from the get go. It started with trash header, and got worse with me trying to cut up a old 3" 850 exhaust I had at the shop to try and save money. It turned out just like you'd expect. Awful. I drove it around the block, pulled back in the shop, took it off and threw it in the garbage. I had found out about the CVI auto header a while back, and just said screw it, and ordered one, as well as placed a large order with vibrant. The CVI header is perfect. the runners are bigger, it fits like a factory piece, and is coated. Its a no brainer. For some reason I have zero pictures of this...
So back to my shop it comes. We got extremely busy at the end of the summer so, it sat for a while. JRZ was kind of dragging their feet so it didn't matter to much.
Two or so months go by, and I start getting pictures of pretty much complete coilovers from Ben. ****, I have yet to put all of about 5 miles on this car! So I cut the springs, and start shaking it down for a few weeks.
A few things needed to be addressed but nothing serious. Then the day I had been waiting for for 11 months finally came!
They are so beautiful I almost cried.
 
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Install day! (yesterday) Tear down began at noon
Fronts in. Roll centers, links, IPD bar, new inners and outer, ball joints, BNE select camber plates.
Rears In. The usual. IPD torque rods, panhard, Kaphlenke rear kit including rear axle spherical axle bearings. IPD stuff is temporary. will be moving to ben's stuff soon.
Finished the install last night at about midnight. Spent far to much time cleaning under coat off the control and trailing arms and painting, but its in! Didn't fell like moving 10 cars to get on the alignment rack and then spending 3+ hours adjusting everything so I called it a night.
Also installed this cool old Nardi i bought like three years ago because it was cool. Used to live in a old 911 race car.
Now were all caught up! More updates Monday!
 
A customer of mine who designs photo books just showed me that "240 landscapes" book, knowing I own a 242 and 245. Tempted to buy it...

And nice build. I like those projects where the focus is on handling. :nod:
 
That CVI header looks like a nice piece. And as said above, I also enjoy the suspension/handling type builds more so than those trying to make cheap power. The wheels looked to have turned out pretty good, too!

So this car has an m47? Any futures plans for that?
 
M46, but kinda. I did the diy short shifter where you add material under the pivot ball, and sts machining bushings, so the shift feel is OK for now but I will Likley move to something else eventully
 
Got the alignment and ride height all dialed in tonight! Had to do some minor trimming to the strut towers to get even camber and caster in the front, but that was the only issue I had! Looking like some home brew adjustable trailing arms or just shortened may be in my future...



Said minor trimming...

Magic numbers that Im gonna start off with

Showing a bit of a shifted axle, but not bad






Also snapped some pics of the exhaust while I was under there

 
Today's goal was to shake down the suspension. Had to wait until the roads dried out mostly from some recent snow, and then took off to the closest twisties to town, look out mountain.



First drive went amazing! The new JRZ dampers are incredible. Fully daily driveable and just unreal in the corners. Only note made is that I am going to have to get a lsd as it is just constantly spinning the inside tire.

Tonight I swapped out a noisy starter and alternator and started to tackle retroing th 91+ PS pump to the old style no AC bracket. My original intention was to just order new brackets from volvo, but the front one is NLA. Any one else ever tried this?
My first idea is to just flip over the existing brackets and drill a few new holes

 
You could try to find one of the STS machining brackets. This is my setup with the 91+ pump. Massaged the pressure line a little but it fit.

 


20170114_232105_zpsgktuj2zn.jpg

What are the specs on the wheels? They're off of a 740 with the centers flipped? Tire size? This is the perfect look as far as I am concerned.
 
What are the specs on the wheels? They're off of a 740 with the centers flipped? Tire size? This is the perfect look as far as I am concerned.

Thanks man! Yep just stock 740 15" steels with the faces cut out and welded in backwards. 205/50r16. Its one of the worst things to do, the always have a wobble afterwards, and your valve stems are on the inside. Ive done it three times now, and each time i tell myself im never going to do it again.
 
Thanks man! Yep just stock 740 15" steels with the faces cut out and welded in backwards. 205/50r16. Its one of the worst things to do, the always have a wobble afterwards, and your valve stems are on the inside. Ive done it three times now, and each time i tell myself im never going to do it again.

Im sure it could be done without wobble but it would take some careful weld fixturing...

The old valve stem could also be filled and a new hole could be drilled.
 
Im sure it could be done without wobble but it would take some careful weld fixturing...

The old valve stem could also be filled and a new hole could be drilled.

Something happens to the barrel when you knock the face out. It like twists almost. On the last two I did on this car, i torched the barrel before knocking the face out, and it was better but still noticeable. Im sure these 25 year old steelies weren't the straightest from the get go too....
 
Got these new 100w lights in tonight. They are from a place called Rimi lights down in texas. Obviously cheap chinese cibe or bosch knock offs, but they have replaceable bulbs, and a set of 4 is $80 shipped. I hate them less than i thought I would...



They have a ton more light output than the sealed beams.

Decided I needed to replace the scratched up back glass, and I decided I'd do something about the headliner that caught on fire doing the cage. So out they came. Not feeling well, so Im gonna go grab some fabric to cover the headliner in.

 
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