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350-400HP Early 90's 240 Wagon?

HiddenFatKid

New member
Joined
Mar 12, 2019
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Hey all!

I've always loved the early 90's 240 and I recently picked up a 1993 240!

What all would I need to build it to a semi-reliable 350-400hp, preferably turboed!

Thanks for reading
 
Money and skills or a lot of money. Read the sticky's at the top for turbo charging the stock motor or read up on swapping in an LS motor, which is the easiest way to 400hp.
 
define 'semi reliable'.

And what you will need is:
- money
- time
- skills

The three interchange fairly well. Money allows you to buy other people's time and skills. Time allows you to fumble your way through stuff you don't know about. Skills allows you to do it right the first time.

Since you seem to have a firm HP level there (likely pulled from thin air) and you haven't done anything yet, you can use this point in the project to decide where you want to go.
- keep the 8V motor. It can make 400 hp. But it has to be pushed hard to do so. Which means it has to be done right. Which is not cheap, and the path for tuning that will keep the motor intact is getting fairly narrow. But it's cheap and easy to start off on the path and slowly work your way up toward 250 - 275 - 325-etc hp.
- 16 swap - Far easier to make 400 hp with a 16V head, since it just flows air so much better. But it's a somewhat pricey endeavor to get one with a turbo up and running in a 240, since nothing really fits. Custom intake and exhaust of some sort. More potential to make HP with this swap, but there's a somewhat pricey buy-in upfront.
- complete engine swap. Two of the more popular swaps are the Gen3/4 Chevy LS family of motors, the Toyota 2JZ. Both of those make yuuuuge HP's pretty easily and are very well supported by a performance aftermarket. Or any of a thousand other motors. There is a whole lot of work involved, if you're not doing it yourself, it's going to cost a silly amount of money. If you don't know what you're doing, hope you're a good learner, there's lots of info on the interwebs.

An LS can even make 400 hp without a turbo, and the aluminum blocked versions aren't even heavier than the iron block Volvo motor by much. And an N/A build sure makes things easier.
 
RedblockTimeBombAnyone?

Yoshifab Built B230 turbo 600+

s-l1600.jpg


Listen to this guy....

-snip-

And what you will need is:
- money

Lots and lots of money you'll never see again.
 
If you have never had a volvo with even 250hp. I can tell you that it is a lot of fun. The good thing is that you can bolt on most everything to get 250-300hp engine hp out of these engines. It will still take time, money, and patience. But you can have a daily driven car with that much power with careful choices of parts.

Realize of course that you are going to need driveline upgrades like a stronger clutch or even a stronger manual trans. If you stay automatic the AW71 version is pretty strong and with some mods like the accumulator mod it should serve you well.
 
When I first built my V8 wagon [Chevy] 31 years ago, the first motor made 300 HP. After a year of driving it, I made it a 2 door wagon and I upped the HP to 370. Beat the snot out of it for 200,000+ miles. Replaced it with a 350/350 in '05, have now put on it another 125K and still love to drive it. The drive train can take 400+ Hp with the right mods, the diff is strong enough, you will break the tires loose first.
 
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