Tell me the good and bad about a 264 (b27)

okay, seriously looking at a 76' b27 264 in smurf blue, but i've never seen a b27 except at the wreckers. and with that i know nothing, is the b27 the same as the PRV? are there any trouble spots to check on a car this old, i know the spare tire wells, and the rockers and stuff but how about motor/trannywise?

B27 is the PRV. It is the early oddfire version.
They are a 90 degree V6, which means the firing intervals are not even. If you look in the dizzy you will see 3 bunches of 2 firing points.
Later ones like the B280 are evenfire, and have the crank journals split to give an even firing pattern.
Oddfire ones sound better, a bit like a V6 made from 3 Harley motors. A little off beat and woofly.

Check the oil has been changed regularly. They have a fairly narrow oil gallery in the head and if it cruds up then the flow to the cam and timing chain tensioner is low and tehy wear fairly quickly. One good mod is to open up the restrictive hole a little, and shim the oil pump to increase pressure and flow.
You should really change the oil at 3,000 mile intervals and you will get a long and happy life from the motor.
Have a listen to the bearings in the bottom end. these sometimes get rumbly.
Don't cook it as the head gasket will blow.
If the gasket does blow and you fix it, it will probably blow again soon or the liner seals ( it is a wet sleeve liner engine) will go, so it is good to do an overhaul with all new seals and gaskets if the head gasket blows. This is also a good opportunity to replace the timing chain tensioner as a precaution.

Tranny is the good old Borg Warner 55 slush-o-matic on most cars, 3 speed, fairly rugged. If you get a manual one, an early one will have a gearbox unique to the 260s in 4 or 5 speed, but a later one will have an M46. Bellhousings for a V6 are like gold dust. Otherwise conversion should be a piece of cake.
The V6 can be tuned quite a bit, and responds well to boosting. There were Peugeot LeMans racers putting out 400hp using the same standard block and crank.
They are real nice to drive, quite torquey.
Go for it if it is any good.

okay, found a bit more info, 120,000km's on it, 3 speed, gonna go take a look soon. he sounds kind of dumb, so i'm worried about the oil changes :S

If you decide to buy it, be sure you get it really cheap. This is not your father's Volvo. This is the Volvo that you'd never want your kids to have to work on. I purchased my first one of these things 15 years ago on a lark. Drove it home after messing with the fuel distributor - but it is a dog in the heavy duty repair dept. With chain driven camshafts (which I think is the biggest thing that fuels the -piece of crap- debate wrt these cars), just keep your fingers crossed that it keeps working when you need it.

If you know or can learn to understand continuous fuel injection (cis), the car just may suit you well if it's something you're really interested in.

One thing though, it is a pretty quick and fast car! Even on 5 cylinders!

Carnut... man you go way back on this - listen to him. He knows his stuff obviously.

Buy it cheap.

okay, $300 CAD later and WOW by far the cleanest most rust-free 200 series i've ever seen, 102k original kilometers regular service, new tires, good interior, NO RUST with the exception of a few bubbles from a dent on the door and a touch at the rocker panel, the spare tire wells are MINT, it's freeking amazing. i'm getting it, if just for a rust free 76' body, and it's got these REALLY cool looking rimz, omg, fred-flinstone-rusty-ass-frame-rail-89-745' is history! wowowowow.

Awesome, Without question. Even a blind squirrel finds a nut every once in a while.

Enjoy the spirit of the 70's on that thing. You done good!

Please take and post some photos of this car on this thread. I'd love to see one that's in this kinda condition again. They're very rare indeed.

Keep the 745 around for the engine

bingo, that's the plan, i dont reckon an engine swap would be terrible in one of these. And the nice 89' turbo engine should fit right in, despite the fact that it has near 500k on it.

k, picking it up tonight for sure wait for the pics

http://edmonton.craigslist.org/car/330931401.html

there's the CL ad, since the car is now mine muhahahaha.

NICE car.

picked her up tonight, WOW, pics to come! pretty freeking noisy from the engine bay, sounds sorta like a diesel, fairly gutless compared to the 745 turbo.

But, seems to run well.

EXCEPT.

when i went to go get plates/insurance/stuff i left a buddy to do the oil change, and next thing i know when we start it up, there's oil all over the inside of the engine bay, and the dipstick tube (which feels broken or loose or something) well, the dipstick, seems to be overfilled, he says it took 4.4 liters. does that sound right?

gah, having more issues, the whole engine bay appears to sprayed with oil, as it still appears overfilled. Not sure how i can remedy this though, since i've got no jack at the house, and no driveway space to work on it, do you think it'll do any long-term damage being overfilled?

as well, the alt belts are slipping like bastards, again, need ramps or a jack to fix it!

PLUS the absolute tard of an insurance broker we've got, keeps saying she cannot insure it because the VIN is less than 17 digits long QFT! despite citing FMVSS-115 many bazillion times she does not understand that 1976 < 1980.

garrrh.

So, i really need to know the oil capacity on these, thanks.

PRV:s take oil by the barrel, I had a Renault version of the same engine and it took almost 6 liters, the turbo variant even more.

Volvo has all the old owners manuals online at
http://www.volvocars.us/tools/OwnersInfo/

According to their info, '76 B27 takes 6.8 US quarts of oil (incl. filter).

Per the owners manual ( http://new.volvocars.com/ownersdocs/1976/1976_262_264_265/76262264265_03a.htm#pg48 ) 6.8 qts

thank you guys, i'm not sure wtf is going on, but the oil line on the dip stick is still a centimeter or two above the little ticked lines. hmm....

found the owners manual finally too. fixed the corner marker, gave it a wash, gotta go for a drive and then park it, see if it still drips.