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Mike K's '79 242 Barn Car Revival

Headlight bezels were still available new as of a year or two ago...take luck with the trim and grille. I know somebody who searched for an NOS grille and paid $400 ish for one from a parts stash in Sweden 5-6 year ago.


And yes, all of the trim holes are in different spots.

Sorry didn?t mean the holes, that was obvious. Wasn?t sure if the skinny bumper cars had the same lip at the front edge of the panels. Seemed to make fitting the trim finicky.

Figured on the grill and trim. Would be nice to find a really good grill but everything the stuff is so old now
 
Wow, that trim made a huge aesthetic difference...

As always, the car looks phenomenal and makes me feel completely inadequate lol, keep it up
 
maybe? Was never sure if the ceramic coating on the old downpipe actually helped or not now that ya mention it.

I'll be honest, I'm a bit of an aesthete under the hood and I ****ing hate header wrap and turbo blankets :lol:. Don't ask me why! Just a thing I have.

While I love the symmetry of the straight pipe leaving the turbine, I cannot imagine how you will overcome ignition issues with the proximity of that pipe. Is there no way to roll the pipe toward the strut tower so that you could insulate the pipe and protect your ignition coils & wires? I love your craftsmanship, but I fear you will not achieve the desired reliability with your exhaust arrangement. Do you have an IR gun (or thermocouple & Fluke) to get some temp data?
 
While I love the symmetry of the straight pipe leaving the turbine, I cannot imagine how you will overcome ignition issues with the proximity of that pipe. Is there no way to roll the pipe toward the strut tower so that you could insulate the pipe and protect your ignition coils & wires? I love your craftsmanship, but I fear you will not achieve the desired reliability with your exhaust arrangement. Do you have an IR gun (or thermocouple & Fluke) to get some temp data?

do have an IR gun although I'm not sure it's going to provide any revelations (that thing's hot!).

I think with my level two mistake proofing of an airgap on the plug wires will help quite a bit. Level three is the obvious solution which is that I need a heat shield. There should be a few good solutions there once I take the time to make a project out of it.

Otherwise no, without rebuilding the downpipe significantly I can't move it out; and at this point don't want to chase it.
 
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mmm September in New England, no better place in the country. 50* in the mornings, 70* in the afternoon, no humidity... car is loving it!

I should report that after the flurry of activity with the burnt out plug wire I had a nice successful cruise down to Lime Rock Park and a showing in their Sunday concours. Part of the reason the wire caused me so much agita was because I had a plan to meet someone at the show, and finally, FINALLY, someone took pictures of the car with something that isn't a telephone. Going to keep the details in my pocket (lest it fall through) but hoping I have something cool to share from this in a month or two.

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I am not having such luck with my quest to pull in a complete set of NOS stainless DL side trim. I've been working on this for a couple months now, I've sourced and paid for all of the parts but GETTING them here is proving to be difficult. Half the set exists (apparently) only at this one warehouse in Germany. I've bought up every piece they have available but we're at an impasse with shipping; they cannot find a carrier willing to take a ~200cm long package to Sweden, where we're going to have VP ship it to the U.S.

The remaining pieces were supposed to be easy. Volvo Parts Webstore listed them as available, I paid, waited, they shipped. Great! Except when they arrived instead of intact trim I got an impressive display of packaging incompetence. After waiting 6 weeks for the parts they took two heavy cardboard tubes (good) stuck them end-to-end, whipped some packing tape around it and shipped it (stupid). No surprise to anyone with eyes and a brain that the structural packing tape failed and three pieces of NOS trim turned into pretzels.

I don't even care about refunds and all that, I'm just really really angry that they were this careless with it. If you boners on here can ship me trim in one piece a damn dealership should be able to figure it out. :roll:

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Woooowwww that is shameful. Hopefully you can get this all rectified

I said to someone online yesterday I don't even like having the ruined trim, it feels like bad Volvo voodoo. I think because I'm working so hard to get the other pieces from Germany, seeing these sticks ruined for no good reason really ticked me off.

Just got off with Oak Park... eh, kid at a parts counter it was about what I expected. He was nice, said he understood and they'd definitely package it better next time, but I'm sure they don't care. They are re-ordering the pieces, so it'll be another 3-6 week backorder and then hope they follow through and pack it right. My concern is that they are going to call me back and say "ohhh sorry dude, no more available here's your refund" then my whole mission is tanked. Hopefully not how it plays out! :x:
 
I said to someone online yesterday I don't even like having the ruined trim, it feels like bad Volvo voodoo. I think because I'm working so hard to get the other pieces from Germany, seeing these sticks ruined for no good reason really ticked me off.

Just got off with Oak Park... eh, kid at a parts counter it was about what I expected. He was nice, said he understood and they'd definitely package it better next time, but I'm sure they don't care. They are re-ordering the pieces, so it'll be another 3-6 week backorder and then hope they follow through and pack it right. My concern is that they are going to call me back and say "ohhh sorry dude, no more available here's your refund" then my whole mission is tanked. Hopefully not how it plays out! :x:

Give me a PM with the part numbers. I can see how many are available at the warehouses.

Honestly, it may have come from the warehouse looking like that. We've been getting things like rotors stacked on top of trim pieces. Its horse ****. Those dealer guys might have had no idea what they were looking at and just wrapped up what they received. Lots of dealers just have shipper receiver minimum wage type guys doing that job.

Sucks over all.
 
Is the German warehouse willing to ship to Germany ? If so, I may be able to help you. A buddy flies to see his GF every month, does Berlin to Stockholm and he would be willing to take some with him if needed.
 
Is the German warehouse willing to ship to Germany ? If so, I may be able to help you. A buddy flies to see his GF every month, does Berlin to Stockholm and he would be willing to take some with him if needed.

I love this place! Generous offer. From what G&W has said they can't even get DHL to pick the thing up in Germany. I tried them at 4am EST today but didn't catch anyone. I'll send you a quick PM.
 
do have an IR gun although I'm not sure it's going to provide any revelations (that thing's hot!).

I think with my level two mistake proofing of an airgap on the plug wires will help quite a bit. Level three is the obvious solution which is that I need a heat shield. There should be a few good solutions there once I take the time to make a project out of it.

Otherwise no, without rebuilding the downpipe significantly I can't move it out; and at this point don't want to chase it.

Understood. Just read a review of the mid ship Vette LT2 engine..... since the headers exit HIGH the GM Engineers mounted all the ignition coils alongside the block down low and ran the wires UP to the plugs. Since your exhaust is also topside, that could be a solution for your issue. Good luck.
 
Understood. Just read a review of the mid ship Vette LT2 engine..... since the headers exit HIGH the GM Engineers mounted all the ignition coils alongside the block down low and ran the wires UP to the plugs. Since your exhaust is also topside, that could be a solution for your issue. Good luck.

interesting! Thanks for the input I'll keep an open mind when I'm staring at it.

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Got a hold of my favorite Germans, the guy's buddy is going to fly over to Sweden next Wednesday and is still willing to carry the trim for me, he'll drop it off with VP, then it'll make it's way over in a container. Over the river and through the woods..
 
Got a hold of my favorite Germans, the guy's buddy is going to fly over to Sweden next Wednesday and is still willing to carry the trim for me, he'll drop it off with VP, then it'll make it's way over in a container. Over the river and through the woods..

Sleeper update. This saga came to a close 5-Feb when this crate showed up at my door:

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The bottom is new inner and outer rocker panels for the day this car gets body worked and repainted. The top... the top is the finest piece of shipping I've seen in some time. Forgive me as I wax poetic about some sticks of trim but this was 7 months of time and more money than I care to admit.

G&W in Germany came through in a big way. This package was checked onto a flight from Germany to Sweden, driven over to VP and dropped off in person, sat in a warehouse for a spell, shipped on a container to SC, then finally made it's way to Western Mass. None of this would have happened without Ian (Hi Perf Auto). I think he knows it by now, but his help with this was the keystone to the whole project and he was nothing but gracious and happy to help. To me this is like the ultimate Volvo community success story. It's also a testament to my own stubbornness in many ways, but seeing this package come is was so exciting! I was so relieved to see a REAL box, and I can't tell you how nervous I was bringing it inside. If it was bent I had no recourse and I was out... well I would have been out.

And my bounty is, from what I can tell from my searching, some of the last (THE last outside of private stores for some) of a few particular pieces of NOS stainless DL trim... in the woooorld. Quarter panels, doors, fender spears, and a lone trunk section. Got it all.

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it's PERFECT

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I'll note that Oak Park Volvo in IL made 3 failed shipment attempts of a quarter panel piece before I finally convinced them to make the best use of their brains by turning them off and letting me do the work for them. Since they could not manage to figure out how to make a box, I ended up SENDING THEM the crate I got from G&W. Only then were they able to get me a piece of trim unbent. They were cooperative with me so I should be kinder, but honestly they should be a little embarrassed. All's well that ends ok, I ended up coming out a few sticks of trim ahead but I'll leave it at that ;-)

So when the day comes, the car will have a high quality repaint and a complete set of brand new trim installed. That will be a payoff. In the meantime I worked really hard for this stuff, and for the price I paid no one is going to recoup my costs, so it's stored safely in the shed where I'm happy to leave all of it. :nod:
 
What a saga!!

Glad you found it though, it'll be that piece that has a story when people ask you about the car lol
 
At this point I would cherish the trim more than the car and would not want to install it for fear of weather and the motoring public in general :lol:
 
I remember hunting for those trim pieces for a 242 turbo car, ended up getting 6 of 7 through my local dealer but couldn't find the passenger door piece for a couple years...eventually ordered another rear quarter piece and cut it down to fit the door. Those are the details that make you appreciate the car!
 
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