Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

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Fred
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

Hmmm, there are some posts missing from here... I hope one day to add them. But in the mean time:

Tonight I went down to the car for the first time since August 31st when I parked it and the caravan in a quiet cul de sac nearby and abandoned them both.

And there was this under the wiper blade: https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 9324175361

8:32pm TODAY. I only noticed the time later. But that's about when I showed up. Must have just missed them. THANK YOU FOR NOT BEING A C***! :-)

200 dollar fine/bullet dodged! But I had to unhitch and bring the car off the street. Now the caravan is alone in the world.

And I need to get it a WOF, likely Tuesday some time. Shouldn't fail on anything. It's pretty good, and has barely been used.
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

Gave it a good wash last weekend, all clean and tidy and ready for summer sun roof cruising/skids :-D

Hmmm, speaking of skids... how about we swap that locker into this sucker sometime soon? I think this would be a good thing. Just not for my license. :-D
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

No love for this thread? Woops. Put a lot of kms on this car over the summer, 1000+ in one hit mostly towing the caravan :-)

And a few things are bothering me about it...

So, then: https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 7461114880

Image
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

Just ordered new brembo front rotors and four sets of cheap discontinued Bendix HD pads. Pick up tomorrow morning, with luck. :-)
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

Whatever is going on in the front left corner of this thing is getting worse. I genuinely thought I might lose a wheel last night.

High speed brake shudder is bad. Tyre imbalance or deformation evident at 80+kph, especially around 110kph. But worst:

Taking a corner medium hard turning to the right the wheel was pulling/pulsing with the feeling in the car! There is NO way that should happen.

This pretty much proves the tyre is stuffed, rim bent, nuts loose, or wheel bearing badly crook. So I'll have to put some effort into it soon.

The issue is, what to do first:

I have:

All new urethane for up front
23mm sway bar to go with it
Struts/hubs from the caravan
Arms and braces from the caravan
All the stuff on the car, inc urethane radius rod bushes

And my experience with #1 was that those bushes are essential for stable brake life. And that imbalanced wheels and brake shudder destroy those bushes. So I don't really want to put fresh bushes in with bad front end, nor put fresh brakes in with old bushes. Though the latter is probably acceptable. I could do the radius rod arms up and install those, then migrate them to new lower arms later, I suppose.

Poor car. Aside from the shudder, it drove beautifully and the engine sings and the coolant doesn't leak and the rocker cap doesn't leak, love it.

Before winter I need to put some time into the boot lip to stop it leaking, and find an up-hill place to park so it doesn't fill up, either.
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

Been driving it a bit anyway since I noticed this, and it's still pretty bad, but not getting worse.

I also remembered an event that could have played a part... locked up on the motorway a while back.
Flat spots and imbalance? Nothing super obvious, but perhaps enough? Or maybe it flung a weight off?

So tonight I drove this, but didn't work on it, but did do some things for it:

1) Picked up a spare matching wheel with OK tyre to chuck on to check for vibration and/or do burnouts with.
2) Picked up shifter to pinch the bushes from as the shifter in this is as loose as a goose on a bar stool after a 20 year career in Amsterdam

Pics/tweets:

https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 2964932609
https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 4043804672

Image

Image






Looking forward to this thing being as smooth and tight as it should be. Love it.
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

And I went down and took them out of it: https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 6516092928

Image





And the hole ID is 12.85mm which works well with one of the three hoses I have laying around...

https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 2018847744

Image





Left to right:

1) 5/16" ID hose has too large an OD already, but doesn't stretch much and could be compressed a bit.
2) 1/4" ID hose has just about the right OD, but stretches to be too big with the pin inside.
3) Blue chinese silicone hose has too small an ID and OD but stretches to be almost big enough to fill the hole in the shifter arms.
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Re: Fred's 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Sedan

Post by Fred »

About a week ago, we pulled into the drive after an evening motorway run and as it sat there idling, it suddenly made some funny noises and died. Fired it back up a while later, no worries, but did it again at some point. Took it for a run last night and ended up stranded. More off than on. Made a funny squeaking noise which I think is the pulley slipping on itself with accel and decel, and barely ran. Fine then struggling then fine. Electrical. But what? Cast your mind back to the caravan disassembly and you'll recall the fuel pump wire was very loose and responsible for very similar behaviour. I bet it's that. Or similar. More news as it comes to hand...
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