Volvo 240 B230 starter issue.

Hello guys I have a 240 with a NA built b230fx engine in it. The car came with a b23 so i reused the starter from the b23 engine on the 230, fired up the car and the starter worked great. What I would notice though is that whenever the car was idling and i enganged the clutch pedal i noticed that the rpm would drop to the point where it would stall, so after some starting up and testing the starter suddenly died. It sounded like it was spinning "free" and i also think this happend as I started the car with the clutch engaged. So I installed a new starter, the newer type that came on the 230s, and what is happening now is that the starter scrapes badly, it doesnt even crank the engine. But what I would notice is that if i crank the car manually for hand i can hear some kind of sound from the tranny/flywheel, it sounds like the flywheel is hitting the tooth of the starter. I am going to remove the starter to inspect but I would love to hear if anyone has encountered something similar. The tranny is a m47 btw. Thanks in advance!

I can't say what is going on with your car, but I can say that the early and late style starters are interchangeable. I even put a later (smaller, lighter) starter on my '63 PV544 and it works perfectly. And I put a late style starter on my 240 as well, in place of the original big one.

Yup, I'm with John, no issues swapping between the two.

Chances are the first one that died, the solenoid may have been the issue, where it was only kicking in the electrical contact half of the solenoid and not actually engaging the bendix, so the motor would be spinning but not engaged in anything. The replacement, if the bendix isn't fully retracting, it could grind on the ring gear on the flywheel. The other option would be if there's damage to the ring gear, flywheel wasn't installed correct and the put a spacer in or something, but that would usually have other issues.

You should be able to pull the 6 bolts and drop the inspection cover, see what's going on.

Thanks for the answers, will look more into it this weekend, hope i dont have to change the flywheel

Have not tried this but sounds good. If your phone has illumination while video recording you may be able to take a video through the starter hole. Have someone rotate the engine by hand and record the ring gear all the way around. Taking out the spark plugs would make it easier.