People in the comments on previous videos were saying this thing is a rusty piece of junk... they couldn't be further from correct. For a vehicle of this age (and especially the price you paid) this vehicle is a gem. It doesn't get much cleaner than this for a vehicle that has been used on a regular basis for the last quarter of a century. Vehicles kept in garages and driven 50km on the weekends are a different story, but you pay a premium for vehicles like that. Also a Volvo was meant to be used, so the chances of finding a '90 Volvo that's been babied is almost non existent. You're doing good work. The only other thing I can recommend to you to make this vehicle extremely reliable would be to replace any vacuum lines or other rubber fitting (as many of them as you can find anyways) with new fresh lines and seals. Rubber hoses has been the #1 reason for my vehicles breaking down, and considering things like generic vacuum line is very cheap it's worth the few dollars to prevent vacuum leaks by replacing it.
warm air is controlled by a heat operated valve, it only draws warm air in cold weather while it is warmng up, then switches, it is a good idea to fix this. it promotes faster and more economic warm up, and in extreme cold weather prevents freezeing inside the inlet manifold and throttle response issues.
leave the warm air duct off and test during the winter. If you notice engine hesitation when it is cold, you know you need to but the duct back. If you search on line you can usually find this ducting cheaper. For oil filter, use a chain wrench that fits on a socket wrench. That way you do not need more clearance.
So many memories. I had the same car (even the same color). My plastic cover also fell off, but I never put it back. Also my horn was broken and I replaced it with just that part you have. I think I still have the special tool for removing the oil filter (even though I never use it anymore). Thank you!
I enjoy this series of videos a lot. I've been a mechanic for nearly 2 decades & I appreciate your attention to detail. I also enjoy doing much as you do when getting a car that is new to me, I go through many systems to ensure they are in acceptable working order. I would advise against using tap water in the cooling system. the mineral content of tap water will cause rust and scale inside that system. I use distilled water, which is very inexpensive. Also, please inspect the condition of brake fluid. It is supposed to be clear or nearly clear if it's good. If it looks like strong coffee, it is heavily contaminated with atmospheric moisture and that causes the hard brake lines along the chassis to rust from the inside out. It also causes the brake pedal to travel too far, making the brakes less effective. Flushing new brake fluid through each corner of the system will make the brakes very easy to see improvements in. It's also very inexpensive. When I purchase a car, I also like to replace as many vacuum hoses as possible. It's cheap insurance and solves annoying near future problems with older cars too. I'm also fond of your taste in tools! I have owned a facom ratchet in the past and I liked it a lot. I will keep a close eye for the next video. Have fun!
That aluminum hose is called a heat stove pipe, or carburetor preheater hose. There is usually a vacuum-powered damper that opens and closes it from the air filter housing. This system is designed to help the car run more smoothly while the engine is warming up to operating temperature and helps the engine reach operating temperature faster. I have only had one car that used this and it made a night and day difference at freezing temperatures. Without it, my car would struggle to stay running before the engine became warm. Modern cars automatically adjust the fuel/air ratio and idle speed to avoid using these extra parts, but some mechanical intervention is preferred over having to sit there, revving the engine to keep it running like the modern cars do for you. I suggest that if you are going through the trouble to mend the less important parts you showed in this video, that you should also make this helpful system functional again. Otherwise, this car may become very frustrating in the winter. It is supposed to be attached with hose clamps like that coolant hose you removed, not duct tape. Even if you don't think it does anything, you will have 2 extra hose clamps to repair something else in an emergency.
The hot air hose is for preheat when the engine is cold, since the exhaust manifold heats up very quickly. In the bottom of the air box there's a valve that shuts off the hot air to the air box when the engine reaches operating temperature. It shortens warm up times, especially in the winter. How much I really can't say, I've removed it on a couple 740s for friends when installing a cone filter, and they never complained. Still, if you plan to keep the stock air box, I'd replace the hose. The hose isn't anything special and can be bought from any hardware store, just check that it isn't coated in plastic since it can get very hot. Also, change the radiator hose asap, and put some antifreeze in it, the antifreeze is more important for anti-corrosion!
You may want to put in antifreeze sooner rather than later. If that engine has a cast iron block and steel liners these have a tendency to rapidly corrode. The antifreeze also contains a corrosion inhibitor. A friend of mine did a similar thing to an old car and soon after it developed all the symptoms of a blown head gasket. Except that wasn't the problem - the liners had developed hairline rust cracks...
I agree, but since it wasn't the whole cooling system that got drained, but only a part of it, there is still antifreeze in the system, just at a lower concentration. Still, that hose need replacing anyways.
Yes - using water rapidly destroyed a head gasket on my daughter's old car (1992 Saturn SL2 with aluminum block & head / iron cylinders). We should have used 50/50 coolant water mix for top off to prevent a head gasket failure in a few months later. The head gasket looked like Swiss cheese due to the rapid corrosion. It was amazing - a lesson learned the hard way!
raichu raichu yes, distilled water is definitely the better solution. But as I see it, this car isn't being driven yet, so the engine will probably run for less than an hour until that coolant hose is replaced, and with it, I hope, the whole coolant in the system (or at least as much as you can get out - some will always stay in the block).
There is some discussion that distilled water should not be used in coolant, because it leeches much more metal out of the engine block, tap water is already saturated.
I removed my 1990 740 estate's warm air intake set-up not long after I bought it in 2003, as the air tube had broken into several pieces and the metal part which bolts to the exhaust manifold was rattling. 13 years and 100,000 miles later, the car still has no trouble starting and running from cold, even in the depths of a British winter :)
I'm surprised you didn't try plastic welding, good couple of videos keep em comming and maybe continue on with your smps tutorial (I am patiently waiting)
Most people recommend that the preheater hose be removed. What happens is the flap valve in the air box goes bad and constantly provides hot air to the engine which could end up frying the mass air sensor. I read that one guy had 2 Volvo 740's. One with the preheater and one without. He said that they both startup and run fine, even in 0 degree (F) weather. But, you may fail your inspection without the hose. I say, just slap on a new (cheap) aluminum flex hose and cal it done.
Never use tap water in the cooling system of an automobile, ever. 50/50 antifreeze is a must year round, because its main function is to lubricate every moving part to minimize friction, and contains powerful additives to prevent corrosion, allow engine temps up to 265 deg before overheating, and protect down to -34F before freezing. 50/50 antifreeze is cheap insurance year-round, and your best friend. I really liked your video on this 740, and was impressed by your simple, effective solutions. Just picked up a 97 Volvo 850 w/180,000 & loving it. Hope you're enjoying your 740, she sure looked nice!
In answer to your questions, keep the warm air piping, it takes heat energy to vapouize petrol which can lead to freezing. I had a Scimitar (3 ltr V6 Ford engined) once and a previous owner put a sports air filter on it and threw away the standard warm air kit. In any weather conditions other than summer it would misfire after about a mile until the under bonnet temp got hot enough. I also had a 1961 Austin A40 which stopped on me one morning after about 5 miles, when I lifted the bonnet the carb was covered with ice, once it had all melted, from the heat of the exhaust manifold, the car started straight away. As for the anti freeze, never run an engine with an aluminium head without some form of corrosion inhibitor or the head will crumble away around the water passages. A friend of mine earns a living welding up heads for people that thought it unnecessary.
There are meant to be 2 horns underneath the car, there is usually a High-pitch and a Low-pitch Horn. The Warm-Air intake is not needed. I drove without it in -24ºC without any problems, started just fine.
Your leather belt and a long flat head screwdriver works most times. Wrap the filter with your belt and then use the screw driver to leverage it off with the belt buckle . Just make sure you have a hefty belt buckle
Yeah the horns always rust away on this model. Its gets all the dirt from the road. Looking forward for more repair videos. Nice solution on the plastic undercover.
If you use the hot air hose then it's a good idea to replace the thermostat in the airbox. If the thermostat gets stuck open then the hot air from the hose can burn up your MAF.
Around 0º and high humidity is actually more of a problem than -30ºC. Causes the the thottle body/carb to ice up. At -30 the air is almost completely dry. But carburated engines was more sensetive to that, I've never seen the problem with fuel injection. My -71 142 with SU's and open pancake filters on the other hand... Drive for a km, wait for the carbs to thaw, drive a km, and so on. And I would say that 80% of the 740's here in Sweden haven't had a whole preheater hose for many years....
You will have to give us a review on your tools now that you have had a need to use them. What will you want to buy next, what worked and what did not. My favorite oil filter tools is really just a wide nylon strap loop ran through a square tube that a 1/2"/12.5mm socket wrench will drive. It fits and grabs any size filter that you can fit the socket wrench with maybe an extension in to turn it as a lever. I am sure you could make one for very little money. Basically a simple strap wrench. Best of Luck!!
For the rattle plates: The front one I used to drill between the pipes and put a long M6 through with big washers. The other one? It won't rattle in the thrash can... Save the bracket you removed if you are going to change the downpipe some time. I usually just move it up a bit so it doesn't vibrate against the pipe.
If you reinstall the preheat hose you need to make sure the door in the air box works. If that door fails in the hot air position the constant stream of hot air will kill the maf sensor.
The preheater hose is to allow quicker heating of the engine in colder climates, here where im at in Texas it never snows and like yours its expensive to replace so i just removed mine.
It's a good idea to replace the warm air intake tubing, it helps during warm-up. My experience with the original mounting position for the horn is that it just always rusts away. I've mounted it behind the grille instead, works like a charm. Yellow/black wires should be the stock colours.
Plain hot water is especially corrosive to iron, and while it'll work in a pinch, you'll really want to add at least some anti-freeze to your cooling system to prevent rust from forming on the walls of the coolant passages: Just a coating of rust will reduce the efficiency of heat transfer; a clog can create a hot-spot and lead to all kinds of trouble, like warped heads and burnt valves. Unless you have some Technetium, which curiously inhibits rust formation on iron when present in trace quantities in hot and superheated water.
I was going to say the same thing. Distilled water and anti-freeze only. Anti-freeze should always be added because it contains anti-corrosion chemicals and it raises the boiling point (vapor pressure) of the coolant and lowers the freezing point. This means the car will evaporate less coolant in hot weather (above 80 F). Also, the ratio should never be more that 50% water to anti-freeze.
Man what a pain in the keister to change that oil filter... Your repairs on the engine cover are stronger than the original mounting holes now. Great work with the cable clamps I would have never thought of that. :) I have that same aluminum hose setup on my chevy pickup it fell off one time and I did not replace it for several months. It did not affect fuel economy or emissions testing according to my records. I do NOT live in a place with very cold winters though. I put it back on because I found a piece of discarded aluminum hose that fit.
Instead of removing all the items shown in the video to unscrew the oil filter use a long screwdriver and punch it through the filter body. This should give enough leverage to start the filter turning, then you can normally unscrew it by hand.
I would recommend a strap wrench for removing the oil filter in the future. You can get them in a variety of sizes and they are quite cheap here in the USA, at least. Additionally, you may want to verify the alternator belt is not just poorly tensioned, instead of worn out. I'd also suggest replacing your mechanical fan clutch with an electric fan setup. I've used them before in vehicles with mechanical fans, and they often improve engine warm up in the winter, A/C operation in the summer, do a better job of cooling the engine in stop and go traffic, and reduce some of that engine noise, which makes diagnosing things a bit easier.
The intake heater is a basic heat recovery system to help the engine warm up faster in cold weather. You don't absolutely need it, but it helps in the subzero (Celsius) range. My general opinion of these things is that the engineers that designed it probably knew what they were doing. Great car by the way.
I removed the intake hose on my Volvo 240 and routed it to an area behind the headlight to get cold air coming into the intake and had no problems. Though where I live, it never gets below freezing.
As far as the hot air intake goes. My uncle recently bought a proper heat exchanger online for one of his Venetian cars. It looks no bigger than a single size RAD that is used in water cooling a pc. I suggest you look into getting one of these kits instead. If it can be installed into a car that's over 100 years old, you should be able to manage. And while it may not provide the heat as fast as your current setup can. At least you don't have to do away with the heater all together.
One way of removing a tight oil filter is by hammering a long screwdriver through it, once the screwdriver is through you can use it to unscrew the filter. Very messy, but a good way of removing a tight filter in a tight space like this.
First great video. Second replace the hose as soon as possible. The cooling system need antifreeze not just for freezing but it contains anti rust additives and lube for the coolant pump. The hose removal may be ok but it may be required for emission inspection in your area. It is in the US. Hope this info helps.
Duct taped radiator hose, steel wires used as zipties and indoor electric cable joints outside. You can really get the feel of how this car was serviced, and it doesn't feel nice. At least it's in good hands now and will get the other DIY treatment, do the important stuff to specs and jerry-rig the details making them stronger than original.
Some very ingenious solutions to those plastic covers! Could've done with you in the 60s when I was an HGV fitter! (LKV) I'd forget the warm air collectors unless your motoring in a very cold ambient temps
yes, it keeps the throttlebody from iceing, which can actually happen at the current weather in germany. But removeing the hose might actually not do very much because the thermostat in the switch housing is probably quite dead anyways (judeging by the general state of the car). The function of the thermostat is to generate 10 °C warm air for the intake, its effectively a mixer between pre heated an fresh air. If it dies, it will be stuck at the preheated position, which will make for quite warm air intake temps. In case this thermostat has been dead for a while, it might have impacted the AMM aswell (they dont really like to get cooked).
Forgot to mention the thing about the warm air hose: that thing will have been designed for really cold Scandinavian winter conditions, to make the engine warm up quicker and keep it warm. In really cold climates, people actually block off their radiators and cover the engine compartment just to keep the engine warm! I suspect you won't be needing that in Germany, unless the winter gets terribly cold with you!
New radiator hoses sooner rather than later, and if you have to drain the coolant into a bucket simply use an old, but not too worn, sock to filter it when pouring it back into the bottle. Gets the dirt out and saves the coolant. That engine will also need a new oil pump soon, the tell tale knock on start up says the oil pump clearances have grown larger than the tolerance allowed, and thus lower oil pressure to the big end bearings. Just make sure the oil warning light works, and if it comes on in operation stop immediately, or drive to the nearest scrapyard and park it there. But Volvo does make good vehicles and trucks. Will always have little niggles but they are very reliable.
I believe that investing in that warm air duct will pay back in fuel saving over time. The engine is probably designed for intake air temperature(iat) of ~25°C. Running with lower iat means that the mass flow of the air mix is higher. This gives higher horsepower at full throttle, but the compression cycle uses more energy too. The higher loss during the compression cycle means that the motor uses more fuel at low throttle. I think that motors running high iat are very interesting projects for DIY-ers.
The air duct from the exhaust heat shield is there to pass warm air into the intake to help the engine warm up in cold conditions. Of course it's not strictly necessary, however, you might find that the engine runs lumpy in the winter until the engine eventually gets warm. In my opinion, it's far better that the engine gets what it needs to run as smoothly as possible in the shortest space of time. My car has a similar setup, but the air filter housing sits right over the exhaust manifold, i currently don't have the duct installed and in damp cold conditions it takes around 5 minutes longer for the engine to settle into a good idle speed.
I vote no pre heat hose. even if you get one, it will break again anyway. I don't have one on my 93 940. actually I took the belly pan off as well - but I admire your solution to that problem. I want to try something like that to fix my tailgate rattle. the kit I bought isn't effective.
Spray can of penetrating oil for the rusty bolts. I am adding this to a separate comment as it's more important than what I say in my other comment... spraying those rusty bolts with a penetrating oil first will save you many stripped bolts. Also a jar of "Never Seeze" would help as well, that's a name brand, but it's an alluminum powder suspended in a grease. if you put it on the threads of a rusty bolt when reassembling then you won't need to worry about it rusting in place in the future when you remove it.
Make your own penetrating oil - a 50/50 mix of acetone and ATF. You can spray or paint it on when necessary - just remember to mix it well before you use it! Coppaslip is the brand name in the UK of anti sieze grease in the UK, highly recommended for assembly. You'll thank yourself in the future!
FFVoyager If you do that don't let it touch your paint though, or you'll be really sorry lol. Maybe factory paint would survive, but I've even seen factory painted things lose their paint completely from the acetone.
FFVoyager Brake fluid is the worst, I installed a new brake booster in my car, about a month later I had to have my clutch replaced, the guy who did it spilled some brake fluid on the new brake booster and stripped a huge chunk of paint off it. Now I've got a 4 month old brake booster that's already rusty as hell. :(
You can remove the preheating hose. When its thermostat is functional the system is not bad. Now, 25 years kater, the wax element thermostat is usually broken and stuck in hot only position. Which is bad for the hot wire air mass meter and can be bad for mpg. What i did on both 740 and 240, remove the hose and the whole thermostat assembly. With the removal of the air snorkle upstream of air filter the cars gained some power too. My 240 took a minute longer to warm up under normal temperatures. Winter (-5c) maybe a tad longer.
The warm air intake is for heating up in the winter. I always ditched the stupid thing. Also, to fix that hole, brush on weld AKA Under car body sealer. Glob that on, call it good.
The hot air hose is to prevent the fuel freezing up in the throttle assembly. Never seen this happen to an injection engine but is very common on the old carb engines.
Others have said it. Venturi effect drops pressure in the throttle body, and it can freeze condensed atmospheric water if not supplied with heat. A dry system like port fuel injection where the intake is only air is probably less likely than throttle body injection where fuel and air mix externally. if there are coolant passages in or around the throttle body at engine temp, as long as you have a working thermostat it will likely be fine unless is gets significantly below 0.
If an oil filter is screwed on too tightly, there is one method that helps you get more leverage without needing too much space. That is to stab through it with a screw driver, and then use the screw driver as a handle to turn it more easily. The catch pan should be under it, but that it should be for any oil filter removal.
The heat shield that was removed to get to the oil filter may help reduce the heat in the area. On some models of cars removing heat shields can cause overheating of nearby components. The heat riser tube itself is just for faster warm up in cold weather.
I'd say that you deserve some good metric combination wrenches in lieu of the pliers you are often using. The repairs were fine - if they solved the problem, then great. I also thing the additional aluminum brackets for the splash guard worked pretty well.. I'd spend some spare time gathering the new sheet metal for the exhaust, the hot air intake and so on that rusted as time allows in the distant future... Good work!
This video is quite old but you may still be interested. The cold air intake was used as you may guess for very cold weather on engines with carburettors. As yours is I guess a B230K which has an engine management system that allows for the engine to warm up. Furthermore you may find that the thermostat in the air box has broken anyway. They can be bought from Skandix in Germany but are rather pricy, it think around €20. I have removed it from my Volvo 240 with the B200E engine. This engine is known for its rough idling when cold and I have never had any issues with it. I suggest removing it. Regarding the oil change, the only two things that can kill the redblock engine is probably oil related. Make sure you are using an oil filter that has a non return valve. The redblock engine does not have such a valve, which means that when you shut it off, all oil will drain back into the sump. This also means it will take a few seconds to distribute it when you switch it on. This can cause premature wear. The other thing you may want to check is the flame trap. do it every 10000miles or 15000km. It's a small plastic strainer which sits on the oil separator under the air intake. if that gets clogged, and it does after a while it builds up excessive pressure in the engine and it will start to leak. This can blow the sump and valve cover gaskets. Now yours is a B230K which makes it more difficult to change as you may have to remove the intake manifold. A simple check whether it is still good is in that you remove the oil filler cap when the engine is running put your palm over the oil filler and feel whether there is a negative pressure from within the engine. You may also find that there is indeed a negative pressure but you also find a lot of oil in the intake manifold. In that case someone may have removed it, which means that its sucks in oil mist. As your car looks like it had an interesting former owner i would advise you to check it and replace it anyway. It is a very cheap part something like €1.50 from ebay but well worth it. On another note, you can check whether the in tank fuel pump is working by attaching jump leads in the fuse box. I don't know which ones though as i only know how to do it on the 240. if you can hear a slight buzzing then the in tank fuel pump is still running long story cut short, yours has probably quite a few 100'000km so i would advise you to bite the bullet and replace it even if not yet required. It can seriously extend the life of the main fuel pump by a few 10'000km. I hope that helps. if you need more advice on the engine side just contact me.
About the fuel pump: I talked to a buddy of mine who is a mechanic and he told me it could well be that, although it looks the same, the wrong connectors could be an indication that the fuel pump is the wrong one for this car, because there are occurances where fuel pumps deliver different amounts of pressure to the injection system, while looking like the same part on the outside. So the different electrical connector may be an indicator that this isn't the right pump for this engine.
depending on what sort of temps you get there some 5W-40 oil will help withy starting in the winter time.. and from everything i read it wont harm the engine any as it will still act as 40 weight oil at temp.. but will be thinner in the cold.. this will have the efftct of better lubercation for the engine, less work for the starter, and also quicker starts..
The way you fixed the exhaust heat shields obviously works, but you could have also used something like a clamptite tool. It is good for large and irregularly shaped objects.
The warm air ducting (as well as the heat shields on the downpipe and the belly pan!) are not strictly necessary on your B230F. You might want to get rid of some of the not-original or hacked-together looking stuff in order to make the TÜV guy happy. :)
If you want to prevent splashing hot oil all over the place, put pressure on the drain plug while unscrewing it, and then quickly pull it out of the way.
I would have to say repair the warm air intake system, Volvo spent a lot of money and time developing that system and it does work well and reliably, unlike those on a lot of cars. The warm air intake does help the car to warm up and drop back from cold fast idle quicker, especially in winter, which can save you a decent amount of money in fuel, certainly enough to pay for the replacement hose...
Very interesting video as always. Thank you for sharing your daily exploits with us! As others have recommended, stabbing a large screwdriver into the filter may be an option to get it off. One thing I was wondering was whether the car had the correct filter on it? Maybe it was so difficult to get access to because it was too big, and not meant to go on this car? I can't help feeling that Volvo would not have made access to the filter so complicated that you need to remove all those ancillary items. So it seems a bit suspect... P.s. That oil looked awful. It's probably been in there for a long time. The engine will be much happier now!
The pipe for the warm air from the exhaust prevents the carburetor from freezing up when driving a car in winter. I would have done the repair on the exhaust with the special tape and then additionally wrapped it with some steel wire. Some tapes have to be wet before use.
Greetings from a fellow German Volvo (we 940) owner..... I have the flashing indicator problem..... I guess it is an issue with the rear lights connection, since they flash normal..... but as soon as I press the brakes or switch on the lights they tend to flash fast. Cheers great Video (sadly right now I am in Portugal and probably leave it like that until back in Germany with my lifting jack).
See... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heated_air_inlet The warm air directed to the air intake really have two purposes. The warm air helps to atomize fuel when the ambient temp is low. Also the warm air helps to bring your engine temperature up quicker. You may like that on a cold winters morning. Both of these effects are desirable for fuel economy and efficiency. MUST you have the warm air system? No, the automobile will operate just fine without it. Does it serve a purpose? Yes is does, see the wiki article for more info on that. For you it will boil down to repair cost and ease of future maintenance. Good luck, I really enjoy your videos!
All Volvos that have had that warming hose, that I've had, I have always thrown it away. The effect that operation will have on the engine is that it will take longer for the engine to warm up. Mabye a minute or two in my experience. The only way it will have any noticable effect is if you go to the annual yearly check-ups with a really cold entgine. One of my Volvos I had, was a crummy old 240 from -77 and i never had any additional troubles from takeing that hose and manifold away. That car or any of my Volvos, neither at yearly check-ups nor at Swedish wintertime temperatures.
Tap water contains minerals that will condense on the inside of the block and the radiator, it is not advised to use tap water when filling your coolant. In the future you should try to buy distilled water as it will have no minerals that can deposit on the inside of the cooling system making it less effective. Also not using actual coolant is ill advised as well as the glycol lubricates the pump and prevents galvanic corrosion inside the system (for example, steel block flowing into aluminum radiator will eat away the radiator). Perhaps more importantly and I have seen this often, just plain old tap water will allow the head gasket to be eaten away. My brother and law put plain water in his radiator for 8 months and the vehicle developed a head gasket leak due to the galvanic corrosion. You may already know this, but I just wanted to state it in case you didn't, or perhaps for other viewers of my comment who don't know this as well.
for your coolant system, you should've added distilled water instead of tap water. the tap water has a lot of salts and additives that cal lead to corrosion inside the engine and coolant system.
I have to hook up with this episode: 1, Volvo,s are known for their reliabillity, robust protection( has reinforcement bars in the doors and roof) .2. Volvo,s are tested to functioning underr the most heavy circumstances on this planet .-40.dgr to +60 dgr C.. That declares why Volvo(Sw) have wipers for snow on their headlights.And declares that your hot air-bypass(aluminium hose) part is of an original Swedish model to stand the test! I can imagine that in warmer countries these parts are not neseccary.
Never use Tap Water in the cooling system such as a car. Water has a low boiling point and it can boil out, also cause some serious rusting in the internal veins for the coolant to flow. If you have to use water then use Distilled water. Cooler air is way better then hot air. Helps the air to fuel ratio and would increase the fuel mileage a bit. However if you have harsh winters I would add a coolant line to say a metal hose that is wrapped around the external body of the throttle body. That way the butterfly plate doesn't stick and slightly warms up the air to reasonable temp. A lot of American and Japanese cars use that setup.
I would of positioned those clamps higher up around the shield; they'll catch on something. Can't see those aluminium brackets lasting long. They break off due to vibrations quickly in my experience. Steel or even fiber-glass is much better. I removed the warm-air feed on my old Golf. Never noticed any issues.
skip the warm air intake. also remove the cover plates on the excaust. they arent needef and not many volvo cars have them where i live. the plastic cover under engine is also removed on many. but that one i would say you should keep
The risk of not having the heat pipe is that you may get carburetor icing (assuming you have a carburetor on that thing). If you find yourself losing power and stalling on cooler, damp days, then after sitting at the side of the road for 10 minutes (giving the ice a chance to melt) you can start it again, you need to replace those parts. I'd say forget it for now. It has no impact on performance or emissions. Replace if it's a problem.
As far i know the EGR (exhaust gas recirculation) makes engine efficiency normal in highway speeds. Otherwise it drops at 90+ km/h. I have heard people adding the EGR by themselves to cars which don't have it originally. You could make test run with(tape version) and without it to make decision.
Also during the cold running because the catalyzer ideally must get hot as soon a possible for the chem reaction to breakdown pollutants. Very cold air is going to rob combustion temps , cooler exhaust = slower heating catalytic converter = more emissions
on the heated air intake.... coldd air will provide a bit more power than hot air due to cold air being denser. the hot air intake is generally used for both emissions regulations and for increased fuel atomization when the engine is cold. the hot air is usually turned off by either electronic means or via a spring mechanism within the breather when a pre determined temperature is reached in either case. check with your local mot to see if it is required. if it is not then don't bother with the expense. go without for a bit better power. you should check the condition of the cam timing belt though because if it breaks it potentially spell disaster for your engine. of note about coolant....pure water is not a good idea as use of plain water will accelerate corrosion internally in the engine,radiator and heater core. hope this is of use to you. =dok=
My old polo had such a plastic cover under the motor aswell, and it did fall down at 180km/h on the Autobahn. it just scraped on the asphalt and ripped a whole in the plastic, nothing really bad happened (like it catching on the ground and being thrown under the car), but the sound it made was terrefying, especially since it happened out of the blue and i had no idea what was going on...
I lost lower engine bay cover off my Citroen XM too. It was made from glass fiber so made a huge BANG! sound and i saw pieces of it flying in the mirror. Was doing only 90km/h, pretty sure the hacks who call themselves mechanics did not put front screws in when they fixed my hydraulic leak when I broke down in the city.
I thought you had bought yourself a set of sockets etc, its just that your constant use of pliers and multigrips to remove nuts and bolts is not good mechanical practice. I would buy those new radiator hoses (also check the heater hoses as they probably need replacing by now too) as soon as possible and replace the coolant with a quality coolant that has both antifreeze and buffering components. Water is not good for an aluminium motor or aluminium/steel motor which I think yours is. The easy way to get the oil filter off if you don't have the right tool is to drive a spike through it and turn that. I think the exhaust heater tube you questioned the need for is just to provide rapid warmup for the motor, long time since I have dealt with them but there is usually a butterfly valve to shut them off when the motor is at operating temperature. You can probably get away without it. Best of luck with it, Bob in Australia.
I don't think the hot air intake is needed in Germany either. We have a few days in winter where it's below -10 degrees, and this sounds more like a solution that is made for temperatures of -30 to -40 degrees.
Guten tag! Keep up the great work. I enjoy watching your progress. Regarding the heat riser tube, I would spend the cash for a new one. If your winters are like mine in Oneida county, New York (in the states), these can make a big difference. I had a 1979 Jeep Wagoneer with a V8 engine a while back. It ran much better on cold starts (-20F ambient some days) with the new tube SECURELY fastened. On another note, I would enjoy if you could post a video while speaking in German, possibly with English subtitles. Ich möchte lernen, Deutsch zu sprechen.
You might want to have a look in your green book about those horns (page 102 or thereabout). There should be 2 horns in the wiring diagram, as your car has a 2 tone horn. This item is actually TÜV relevant, but usually nobody pays attention ...
another way of removing a stuck oil filter is to use a flat head screwdriver and hammer it into the oil filter, and use that as a lever. That's if you didn't want to remove those pipes in the way.
i am not a proffesional but i would replace the intake becouse its only better for the engine (maybe not that much) but i gues its wel worth the 20 euro`s especially in the winter. very nice series btw greetings from thomas
You need to invest in new motor and transmission mounts. They are cheap, install involves replacing bolts, and it will make the car run smoother with the engine not heaving around like it is in the video.
People in the comments on previous videos were saying this thing is a rusty piece of junk... they couldn't be further from correct. For a vehicle of this age (and especially the price you paid) this vehicle is a gem. It doesn't get much cleaner than this for a vehicle that has been used on a regular basis for the last quarter of a century. Vehicles kept in garages and driven 50km on the weekends are a different story, but you pay a premium for vehicles like that. Also a Volvo was meant to be used, so the chances of finding a '90 Volvo that's been babied is almost non existent.
You're doing good work. The only other thing I can recommend to you to make this vehicle extremely reliable would be to replace any vacuum lines or other rubber fitting (as many of them as you can find anyways) with new fresh lines and seals. Rubber hoses has been the #1 reason for my vehicles breaking down, and considering things like generic vacuum line is very cheap it's worth the few dollars to prevent vacuum leaks by replacing it.
That was an absolute masterclass In improvisation....problem solving...using what you have and ingenuity...Respect, Peace
warm air is controlled by a heat operated valve, it only draws warm air in cold weather while it is warmng up, then switches, it is a good idea to fix this. it promotes faster and more economic warm up, and in extreme cold weather prevents freezeing inside the inlet manifold and throttle response issues.
leave the warm air duct off and test during the winter. If you notice engine hesitation when it is cold, you know you need to but the duct back. If you search on line you can usually find this ducting cheaper. For oil filter, use a chain wrench that fits on a socket wrench. That way you do not need more clearance.
I love that moment when the drain plug drops and you get that column of hot black oil. Xxx
So many memories. I had the same car (even the same color). My plastic cover also fell off, but I never put it back. Also my horn was broken and I replaced it with just that part you have. I think I still have the special tool for removing the oil filter (even though I never use it anymore). Thank you!
I enjoy this series of videos a lot. I've been a mechanic for nearly 2 decades & I appreciate your attention to detail. I also enjoy doing much as you do when getting a car that is new to me, I go through many systems to ensure they are in acceptable working order.
I would advise against using tap water in the cooling system. the mineral content of tap water will cause rust and scale inside that system. I use distilled water, which is very inexpensive.
Also, please inspect the condition of brake fluid. It is supposed to be clear or nearly clear if it's good. If it looks like strong coffee, it is heavily contaminated with atmospheric moisture and that causes the hard brake lines along the chassis to rust from the inside out. It also causes the brake pedal to travel too far, making the brakes less effective. Flushing new brake fluid through each corner of the system will make the brakes very easy to see improvements in. It's also very inexpensive.
When I purchase a car, I also like to replace as many vacuum hoses as possible. It's cheap insurance and solves annoying near future problems with older cars too. I'm also fond of your taste in tools! I have owned a facom ratchet in the past and I liked it a lot.
I will keep a close eye for the next video. Have fun!
That aluminum hose is called a heat stove pipe, or carburetor preheater hose. There is usually a vacuum-powered damper that opens and closes it from the air filter housing. This system is designed to help the car run more smoothly while the engine is warming up to operating temperature and helps the engine reach operating temperature faster. I have only had one car that used this and it made a night and day difference at freezing temperatures. Without it, my car would struggle to stay running before the engine became warm. Modern cars automatically adjust the fuel/air ratio and idle speed to avoid using these extra parts, but some mechanical intervention is preferred over having to sit there, revving the engine to keep it running like the modern cars do for you.
I suggest that if you are going through the trouble to mend the less important parts you showed in this video, that you should also make this helpful system functional again. Otherwise, this car may become very frustrating in the winter. It is supposed to be attached with hose clamps like that coolant hose you removed, not duct tape. Even if you don't think it does anything, you will have 2 extra hose clamps to repair something else in an emergency.
The hot air hose is for preheat when the engine is cold, since the exhaust manifold heats up very quickly. In the bottom of the air box there's a valve that shuts off the hot air to the air box when the engine reaches operating temperature. It shortens warm up times, especially in the winter. How much I really can't say, I've removed it on a couple 740s for friends when installing a cone filter, and they never complained. Still, if you plan to keep the stock air box, I'd replace the hose. The hose isn't anything special and can be bought from any hardware store, just check that it isn't coated in plastic since it can get very hot. Also, change the radiator hose asap, and put some antifreeze in it, the antifreeze is more important for anti-corrosion!
IT looks like a really solid 745 but you really need to wash in the engine bay. And oil the bottom to keep It rust free
You may want to put in antifreeze sooner rather than later. If that engine has a cast iron block and steel liners these have a tendency to rapidly corrode. The antifreeze also contains a corrosion inhibitor. A friend of mine did a similar thing to an old car and soon after it developed all the symptoms of a blown head gasket. Except that wasn't the problem - the liners had developed hairline rust cracks...
I agree, but since it wasn't the whole cooling system that got drained, but only a part of it, there is still antifreeze in the system, just at a lower concentration. Still, that hose need replacing anyways.
Yes - using water rapidly destroyed a head gasket on my daughter's old car (1992 Saturn SL2 with aluminum block & head / iron cylinders). We should have used 50/50 coolant water mix for top off to prevent a head gasket failure in a few months later. The head gasket looked like Swiss cheese due to the rapid corrosion. It was amazing - a lesson learned the hard way!
and tab water is not that good to because of all particals can cause cohesion
raichu raichu yes, distilled water is definitely the better solution. But as I see it, this car isn't being driven yet, so the engine will probably run for less than an hour until that coolant hose is replaced, and with it, I hope, the whole coolant in the system (or at least as much as you can get out - some will always stay in the block).
There is some discussion that distilled water should not be used in coolant, because it leeches much more metal out of the engine block, tap water is already saturated.
I love your videos, but it drives me crazy when I see you using pliers to turn nuts.
I have noticed a lot of sparkies use pliers on nuts and bolts, guess it is a tool they are most used to.
I removed my 1990 740 estate's warm air intake set-up not long after I bought it in 2003, as the air tube had broken into several pieces and the metal part which bolts to the exhaust manifold was rattling. 13 years and 100,000 miles later, the car still has no trouble starting and running from cold, even in the depths of a British winter :)
I'm surprised you didn't try plastic welding, good couple of videos keep em comming and maybe continue on with your smps tutorial (I am patiently waiting)
Most people recommend that the preheater hose be removed. What happens is the flap valve in the air box goes bad and constantly provides hot air to the engine which could end up frying the mass air sensor.
I read that one guy had 2 Volvo 740's. One with the preheater and one without. He said that they both startup and run fine, even in 0 degree (F) weather.
But, you may fail your inspection without the hose.
I say, just slap on a new (cheap) aluminum flex hose and cal it done.
Nice repair on the splash cover well done.
Never use tap water in the cooling system of an automobile, ever. 50/50 antifreeze is a must year round, because its main function is to lubricate every moving part to minimize friction, and contains powerful additives to prevent corrosion, allow engine temps up to 265 deg before overheating, and protect down to -34F before freezing. 50/50 antifreeze is cheap insurance year-round, and your best friend. I really liked your video on this 740, and was impressed by your simple, effective solutions. Just picked up a 97 Volvo 850 w/180,000 & loving it. Hope you're enjoying your 740, she sure looked nice!
In answer to your questions, keep the warm air piping, it takes heat energy to vapouize petrol which can lead to freezing. I had a Scimitar (3 ltr V6 Ford engined) once and a previous owner put a sports air filter on it and threw away the standard warm air kit. In any weather conditions other than summer it would misfire after about a mile until the under bonnet temp got hot enough. I also had a 1961 Austin A40 which stopped on me one morning after about 5 miles, when I lifted the bonnet the carb was covered with ice, once it had all melted, from the heat of the exhaust manifold, the car started straight away.
As for the anti freeze, never run an engine with an aluminium head without some form of corrosion inhibitor or the head will crumble away around the water passages. A friend of mine earns a living welding up heads for people that thought it unnecessary.
There are meant to be 2 horns underneath the car, there is usually a High-pitch and a Low-pitch Horn. The Warm-Air intake is not needed. I drove without it in -24ºC without any problems, started just fine.
Your leather belt and a long flat head screwdriver works most times. Wrap the filter with your belt and then use the screw driver to leverage it off with the belt buckle . Just make sure you have a hefty belt buckle
Yeah the horns always rust away on this model. Its gets all the dirt from the road. Looking forward for more repair videos. Nice solution on the plastic undercover.
If you use the hot air hose then it's a good idea to replace the thermostat in the airbox. If the thermostat gets stuck open then the hot air from the hose can burn up your MAF.
As others have said, I doubt the intake heater is essential in Germany. Maybe in northern Sweden where -30C is not uncommon in wintertime.
It sure is weird that it does not utilize a heater core using the coolant fluid!
Since its for cold starts you get heat much faster off the exhaust.
+Saku Jalonen right
Around 0º and high humidity is actually more of a problem than -30ºC. Causes the the thottle body/carb to ice up. At -30 the air is almost completely dry.
But carburated engines was more sensetive to that, I've never seen the problem with fuel injection. My -71 142 with SU's and open pancake filters on the other hand... Drive for a km, wait for the carbs to thaw, drive a km, and so on.
And I would say that 80% of the 740's here in Sweden haven't had a whole preheater hose for many years....
Thanks for posting more car videos I'm really enjoying them
You will have to give us a review on your tools now that you have had a need to use them. What will you want to buy next, what worked and what did not. My favorite oil filter tools is really just a wide nylon strap loop ran through a square tube that a 1/2"/12.5mm socket wrench will drive. It fits and grabs any size filter that you can fit the socket wrench with maybe an extension in to turn it as a lever. I am sure you could make one for very little money. Basically a simple strap wrench. Best of Luck!!
For the rattle plates:
The front one I used to drill between the pipes and put a long M6 through with big washers. The other one? It won't rattle in the thrash can...
Save the bracket you removed if you are going to change the downpipe some time. I usually just move it up a bit so it doesn't vibrate against the pipe.
If you reinstall the preheat hose you need to make sure the door in the air box works. If that door fails in the hot air position the constant stream of hot air will kill the maf sensor.
The preheater hose is to allow quicker heating of the engine in colder climates, here where im at in Texas it never snows and like yours its expensive to replace so i just removed mine.
Not sure why I like your videos but I'm hooked! Greetings from Mexico
It's a good idea to replace the warm air intake tubing, it helps during warm-up.
My experience with the original mounting position for the horn is that it just always rusts away. I've mounted it behind the grille instead, works like a charm. Yellow/black wires should be the stock colours.
Plain hot water is especially corrosive to iron, and while it'll work in a pinch, you'll really want to add at least some anti-freeze to your cooling system to prevent rust from forming on the walls of the coolant passages: Just a coating of rust will reduce the efficiency of heat transfer; a clog can create a hot-spot and lead to all kinds of trouble, like warped heads and burnt valves.
Unless you have some Technetium, which curiously inhibits rust formation on iron when present in trace quantities in hot and superheated water.
I was going to say the same thing. Distilled water and anti-freeze only. Anti-freeze should always be added because it contains anti-corrosion chemicals and it raises the boiling point (vapor pressure) of the coolant and lowers the freezing point. This means the car will evaporate less coolant in hot weather (above 80 F). Also, the ratio should never be more that 50% water to anti-freeze.
Man what a pain in the keister to change that oil filter... Your repairs on the engine cover are stronger than the original mounting holes now. Great work with the cable clamps I would have never thought of that. :) I have that same aluminum hose setup on my chevy pickup it fell off one time and I did not replace it for several months. It did not affect fuel economy or emissions testing according to my records. I do NOT live in a place with very cold winters though. I put it back on because I found a piece of discarded aluminum hose that fit.
Instead of removing all the items shown in the video to unscrew the oil filter use a long screwdriver and punch it through the filter body. This should give enough leverage to start the filter turning, then you can normally unscrew it by hand.
I would recommend a strap wrench for removing the oil filter in the future. You can get them in a variety of sizes and they are quite cheap here in the USA, at least. Additionally, you may want to verify the alternator belt is not just poorly tensioned, instead of worn out.
I'd also suggest replacing your mechanical fan clutch with an electric fan setup. I've used them before in vehicles with mechanical fans, and they often improve engine warm up in the winter, A/C operation in the summer, do a better job of cooling the engine in stop and go traffic, and reduce some of that engine noise, which makes diagnosing things a bit easier.
The intake heater is a basic heat recovery system to help the engine warm up faster in cold weather. You don't absolutely need it, but it helps in the subzero (Celsius) range. My general opinion of these things is that the engineers that designed it probably knew what they were doing. Great car by the way.
I removed the intake hose on my Volvo 240 and routed it to an area behind the headlight to get cold air coming into the intake and had no problems. Though where I live, it never gets below freezing.
As far as the hot air intake goes. My uncle recently bought a proper heat exchanger online for one of his Venetian cars. It looks no bigger than a single size RAD that is used in water cooling a pc. I suggest you look into getting one of these kits instead. If it can be installed into a car that's over 100 years old, you should be able to manage. And while it may not provide the heat as fast as your current setup can. At least you don't have to do away with the heater all together.
One way of removing a tight oil filter is by hammering a long screwdriver through it, once the screwdriver is through you can use it to unscrew the filter. Very messy, but a good way of removing a tight filter in a tight space like this.
You know you can buy a special wrench for this job which costs like 5-6 dollars or thereabout, and you've also got plenty of clearance to move it
First great video. Second replace the hose as soon as possible. The cooling system need antifreeze not just for freezing but it contains anti rust additives and lube for the coolant pump. The hose removal may be ok but it may be required for emission inspection in your area. It is in the US. Hope this info helps.
Duct taped radiator hose, steel wires used as zipties and indoor electric cable joints outside. You can really get the feel of how this car was serviced, and it doesn't feel nice. At least it's in good hands now and will get the other DIY treatment, do the important stuff to specs and jerry-rig the details making them stronger than original.
Some very ingenious solutions to those plastic covers! Could've done with you in the 60s when I was an HGV fitter! (LKV) I'd forget the warm air collectors unless your motoring in a very cold ambient temps
Warm air intake = depends how cold the winter gets, as this system is used to prevent carburettor icing in cold weather. Great car by the way.
More like the trohlebody......this car has EFI...
yes, it keeps the throttlebody from iceing, which can actually happen at the current weather in germany.
But removeing the hose might actually not do very much because the thermostat in the switch housing is probably quite dead anyways (judeging by the general state of the car). The function of the thermostat is to generate 10 °C warm air for the intake, its effectively a mixer between pre heated an fresh air. If it dies, it will be stuck at the preheated position, which will make for quite warm air intake temps.
In case this thermostat has been dead for a while, it might have impacted the AMM aswell (they dont really like to get cooked).
It's also to help cold start emissions.
So if your state requires visual emissions inspection, you may fail of it's removed.
Forgot to mention the thing about the warm air hose: that thing will have been designed for really cold Scandinavian winter conditions, to make the engine warm up quicker and keep it warm. In really cold climates, people actually block off their radiators and cover the engine compartment just to keep the engine warm! I suspect you won't be needing that in Germany, unless the winter gets terribly cold with you!
New radiator hoses sooner rather than later, and if you have to drain the coolant into a bucket simply use an old, but not too worn, sock to filter it when pouring it back into the bottle. Gets the dirt out and saves the coolant.
That engine will also need a new oil pump soon, the tell tale knock on start up says the oil pump clearances have grown larger than the tolerance allowed, and thus lower oil pressure to the big end bearings. Just make sure the oil warning light works, and if it comes on in operation stop immediately, or drive to the nearest scrapyard and park it there.
But Volvo does make good vehicles and trucks. Will always have little niggles but they are very reliable.
I believe that investing in that warm air duct will pay back in fuel saving over time.
The engine is probably designed for intake air temperature(iat) of ~25°C. Running with lower iat means that the mass flow of the air mix is higher. This gives higher horsepower at full throttle, but the compression cycle uses more energy too. The higher loss during the compression cycle means that the motor uses more fuel at low throttle.
I think that motors running high iat are very interesting projects for DIY-ers.
The air duct from the exhaust heat shield is there to pass warm air into the intake to help the engine warm up in cold conditions. Of course it's not strictly necessary, however, you might find that the engine runs lumpy in the winter until the engine eventually gets warm. In my opinion, it's far better that the engine gets what it needs to run as smoothly as possible in the shortest space of time. My car has a similar setup, but the air filter housing sits right over the exhaust manifold, i currently don't have the duct installed and in damp cold conditions it takes around 5 minutes longer for the engine to settle into a good idle speed.
I vote no pre heat hose. even if you get one, it will break again anyway. I don't have one on my 93 940. actually I took the belly pan off as well - but I admire your solution to that problem. I want to try something like that to fix my tailgate rattle. the kit I bought isn't effective.
Spray can of penetrating oil for the rusty bolts. I am adding this to a separate comment as it's more important than what I say in my other comment... spraying those rusty bolts with a penetrating oil first will save you many stripped bolts.
Also a jar of "Never Seeze" would help as well, that's a name brand, but it's an alluminum powder suspended in a grease. if you put it on the threads of a rusty bolt when reassembling then you won't need to worry about it rusting in place in the future when you remove it.
Make your own penetrating oil - a 50/50 mix of acetone and ATF. You can spray or paint it on when necessary - just remember to mix it well before you use it!
Coppaslip is the brand name in the UK of anti sieze grease in the UK, highly recommended for assembly. You'll thank yourself in the future!
FFVoyager If you do that don't let it touch your paint though, or you'll be really sorry lol. Maybe factory paint would survive, but I've even seen factory painted things lose their paint completely from the acetone.
Same for any anti-sieze that actually works! (and brake fluid and carb cleaner.....)
FFVoyager Brake fluid is the worst, I installed a new brake booster in my car, about a month later I had to have my clutch replaced, the guy who did it spilled some brake fluid on the new brake booster and stripped a huge chunk of paint off it. Now I've got a 4 month old brake booster that's already rusty as hell. :(
We want more Volvo videos!
You can remove the preheating hose. When its thermostat is functional the system is not bad. Now, 25 years kater, the wax element thermostat is usually broken and stuck in hot only position. Which is bad for the hot wire air mass meter and can be bad for mpg.
What i did on both 740 and 240, remove the hose and the whole thermostat assembly. With the removal of the air snorkle upstream of air filter the cars gained some power too.
My 240 took a minute longer to warm up under normal temperatures. Winter (-5c) maybe a tad longer.
The warm air intake is for heating up in the winter. I always ditched the stupid thing.
Also, to fix that hole, brush on weld AKA Under car body sealer. Glob that on, call it good.
The hot air hose is to prevent the fuel freezing up in the throttle assembly.
Never seen this happen to an injection engine but is very common on the old carb engines.
Others have said it. Venturi effect drops pressure in the throttle body, and it can freeze condensed atmospheric water if not supplied with heat. A dry system like port fuel injection where the intake is only air is probably less likely than throttle body injection where fuel and air mix externally.
if there are coolant passages in or around the throttle body at engine temp, as long as you have a working thermostat it will likely be fine unless is gets significantly below 0.
Nice work. I particularly like the under tray fix.
If an oil filter is screwed on too tightly, there is one method that helps you get more leverage without needing too much space. That is to stab through it with a screw driver, and then use the screw driver as a handle to turn it more easily. The catch pan should be under it, but that it should be for any oil filter removal.
The heat shield that was removed to get to the oil filter may help reduce the heat in the area. On some models of cars removing heat shields can cause overheating of nearby components. The heat riser tube itself is just for faster warm up in cold weather.
I'd say that you deserve some good metric combination wrenches in lieu of the pliers you are often using. The repairs were fine - if they solved the problem, then great. I also thing the additional aluminum brackets for the splash guard worked pretty well.. I'd spend some spare time gathering the new sheet metal for the exhaust, the hot air intake and so on that rusted as time allows in the distant future... Good work!
This video is quite old but you may still be interested. The cold air intake was used as you may guess for very cold weather on engines with carburettors. As yours is I guess a B230K which has an engine management system that allows for the engine to warm up. Furthermore you may find that the thermostat in the air box has broken anyway. They can be bought from Skandix in Germany but are rather pricy, it think around €20. I have removed it from my Volvo 240 with the B200E engine. This engine is known for its rough idling when cold and I have never had any issues with it. I suggest removing it. Regarding the oil change, the only two things that can kill the redblock engine is probably oil related. Make sure you are using an oil filter that has a non return valve. The redblock engine does not have such a valve, which means that when you shut it off, all oil will drain back into the sump. This also means it will take a few seconds to distribute it when you switch it on. This can cause premature wear. The other thing you may want to check is the flame trap. do it every 10000miles or 15000km. It's a small plastic strainer which sits on the oil separator under the air intake. if that gets clogged, and it does after a while it builds up excessive pressure in the engine and it will start to leak. This can blow the sump and valve cover gaskets. Now yours is a B230K which makes it more difficult to change as you may have to remove the intake manifold. A simple check whether it is still good is in that you remove the oil filler cap when the engine is running put your palm over the oil filler and feel whether there is a negative pressure from within the engine. You may also find that there is indeed a negative pressure but you also find a lot of oil in the intake manifold. In that case someone may have removed it, which means that its sucks in oil mist. As your car looks like it had an interesting former owner i would advise you to check it and replace it anyway. It is a very cheap part something like €1.50 from ebay but well worth it. On another note, you can check whether the in tank fuel pump is working by attaching jump leads in the fuse box. I don't know which ones though as i only know how to do it on the 240. if you can hear a slight buzzing then the in tank fuel pump is still running long story cut short, yours has probably quite a few 100'000km so i would advise you to bite the bullet and replace it even if not yet required. It can seriously extend the life of the main fuel pump by a few 10'000km. I hope that helps. if you need more advice on the engine side just contact me.
About the fuel pump: I talked to a buddy of mine who is a mechanic and he told me it could well be that, although it looks the same, the wrong connectors could be an indication that the fuel pump is the wrong one for this car, because there are occurances where fuel pumps deliver different amounts of pressure to the injection system, while looking like the same part on the outside. So the different electrical connector may be an indicator that this isn't the right pump for this engine.
Love how the back feels after lying for some time under a car :D
depending on what sort of temps you get there some 5W-40 oil will help withy starting in the winter time.. and from everything i read it wont harm the engine any as it will still act as 40 weight oil at temp.. but will be thinner in the cold.. this will have the efftct of better lubercation for the engine, less work for the starter, and also quicker starts..
The way you fixed the exhaust heat shields obviously works, but you could have also used something like a clamptite tool. It is good for large and irregularly shaped objects.
The warm air ducting (as well as the heat shields on the downpipe and the belly pan!) are not strictly necessary on your B230F. You might want to get rid of some of the not-original or hacked-together looking stuff in order to make the TÜV guy happy. :)
If you want to prevent splashing hot oil all over the place, put pressure on the drain plug while unscrewing it, and then quickly pull it out of the way.
I would have to say repair the warm air intake system, Volvo spent a lot of money and time developing that system and it does work well and reliably, unlike those on a lot of cars. The warm air intake does help the car to warm up and drop back from cold fast idle quicker, especially in winter, which can save you a decent amount of money in fuel, certainly enough to pay for the replacement hose...
My 1987 Volvo 240 never had the warm air intake hose since I got it 8 yrs ago and it runs great, but I don't live in a cold climate (New Orleans).
Very interesting video as always. Thank you for sharing your daily exploits with us!
As others have recommended, stabbing a large screwdriver into the filter may be an option to get it off.
One thing I was wondering was whether the car had the correct filter on it? Maybe it was so difficult to get access to because it was too big, and not meant to go on this car? I can't help feeling that Volvo would not have made access to the filter so complicated that you need to remove all those ancillary items. So it seems a bit suspect...
P.s. That oil looked awful. It's probably been in there for a long time. The engine will be much happier now!
The pipe for the warm air from the exhaust prevents the carburetor from freezing up when driving a car in winter. I would have done the repair on the exhaust with the special tape and then additionally wrapped it with some steel wire. Some tapes have to be wet before use.
Greetings from a fellow German Volvo (we 940) owner..... I have the flashing indicator problem..... I guess it is an issue with the rear lights connection, since they flash normal..... but as soon as I press the brakes or switch on the lights they tend to flash fast. Cheers great Video (sadly right now I am in Portugal and probably leave it like that until back in Germany with my lifting jack).
See...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heated_air_inlet
The warm air directed to the air intake really have two purposes. The warm air helps to atomize fuel when the ambient temp is low. Also the warm air helps to bring your engine temperature up quicker. You may like that on a cold winters morning. Both of these effects are desirable for fuel economy and efficiency.
MUST you have the warm air system? No, the automobile will operate just fine without it.
Does it serve a purpose? Yes is does, see the wiki article for more info on that. For you it will boil down to repair cost and ease of future maintenance.
Good luck, I really enjoy your videos!
All Volvos that have had that warming hose, that I've had, I have always thrown it away.
The effect that operation will have on the engine is that it will take longer for the engine to warm up. Mabye a minute or two in my experience.
The only way it will have any noticable effect is if you go to the annual yearly check-ups with a really cold entgine.
One of my Volvos I had, was a crummy old 240 from -77 and i never had any additional troubles from takeing that hose and manifold away. That car or any of my Volvos, neither at yearly check-ups nor at Swedish wintertime temperatures.
Tap water contains minerals that will condense on the inside of the block and the radiator, it is not advised to use tap water when filling your coolant. In the future you should try to buy distilled water as it will have no minerals that can deposit on the inside of the cooling system making it less effective. Also not using actual coolant is ill advised as well as the glycol lubricates the pump and prevents galvanic corrosion inside the system (for example, steel block flowing into aluminum radiator will eat away the radiator). Perhaps more importantly and I have seen this often, just plain old tap water will allow the head gasket to be eaten away. My brother and law put plain water in his radiator for 8 months and the vehicle developed a head gasket leak due to the galvanic corrosion.
You may already know this, but I just wanted to state it in case you didn't, or perhaps for other viewers of my comment who don't know this as well.
for your coolant system, you should've added distilled water instead of tap water. the tap water has a lot of salts and additives that cal lead to corrosion inside the engine and coolant system.
I have to hook up with this episode: 1, Volvo,s are known for their reliabillity, robust protection( has reinforcement bars in the doors and roof) .2. Volvo,s are tested to functioning underr the most heavy circumstances on this planet .-40.dgr to +60 dgr C.. That declares why Volvo(Sw) have wipers for snow on their headlights.And declares that your hot air-bypass(aluminium hose) part is of an original Swedish model to stand the test!
I can imagine that in warmer countries these parts are not neseccary.
Never use Tap Water in the cooling system such as a car. Water has a low boiling point and it can boil out, also cause some serious rusting in the internal veins for the coolant to flow. If you have to use water then use Distilled water.
Cooler air is way better then hot air. Helps the air to fuel ratio and would increase the fuel mileage a bit. However if you have harsh winters I would add a coolant line to say a metal hose that is wrapped around the external body of the throttle body. That way the butterfly plate doesn't stick and slightly warms up the air to reasonable temp. A lot of American and Japanese cars use that setup.
I would of positioned those clamps higher up around the shield; they'll catch on something. Can't see those aluminium brackets lasting long. They break off due to vibrations quickly in my experience. Steel or even fiber-glass is much better.
I removed the warm-air feed on my old Golf. Never noticed any issues.
The warm air intake helps the car getting warm on the winter and also at cold starts. So i think you should buy a new one
Btw get a good coolant in there now. Different metals cause electrolysis corrosion it's not just about anti freeze.
skip the warm air intake. also remove the cover plates on the excaust. they arent needef and not many volvo cars have them where i live. the plastic cover under engine is also removed on many. but that one i would say you should keep
The aluminum hose provides hot air to the intake when is cold weather.
(It's automatic disconnect when its gets warm)
The risk of not having the heat pipe is that you may get carburetor icing (assuming you have a carburetor on that thing). If you find yourself losing power and stalling on cooler, damp days, then after sitting at the side of the road for 10 minutes (giving the ice a chance to melt) you can start it again, you need to replace those parts.
I'd say forget it for now. It has no impact on performance or emissions. Replace if it's a problem.
John Ridley
As far i know the EGR (exhaust gas recirculation) makes engine efficiency normal in highway speeds. Otherwise it drops at 90+ km/h. I have heard people adding the EGR by themselves to cars which don't have it originally. You could make test run with(tape version) and without it to make decision.
The warm air intake helps the engine during cold starts but I think it's also to help reduce emissions of a cold engine.
*after the coold start...
Also during the cold running because the catalyzer ideally must get hot as soon a possible for the chem reaction to breakdown pollutants. Very cold air is going to rob combustion temps , cooler exhaust = slower heating catalytic converter = more emissions
on the heated air intake....
coldd air will provide a bit more power than hot air due to cold air being denser. the hot air intake is generally used for both emissions regulations and for increased fuel atomization when the engine is cold. the hot air is usually turned off by either electronic means or via a spring mechanism within the breather when a pre determined temperature is reached in either case.
check with your local mot to see if it is required. if it is not then don't bother with the expense. go without for a bit better power.
you should check the condition of the cam timing belt though because if it breaks it potentially spell disaster for your engine.
of note about coolant....pure water is not a good idea as use of plain water will accelerate corrosion internally in the engine,radiator and heater core.
hope this is of use to you.
=dok=
I'm enjoying this series. Thanks
My old polo had such a plastic cover under the motor aswell, and it did fall down at 180km/h on the Autobahn. it just scraped on the asphalt and ripped a whole in the plastic, nothing really bad happened (like it catching on the ground and being thrown under the car), but the sound it made was terrefying, especially since it happened out of the blue and i had no idea what was going on...
I lost lower engine bay cover off my Citroen XM too. It was made from glass fiber so made a huge BANG! sound and i saw pieces of it flying in the mirror. Was doing only 90km/h, pretty sure the hacks who call themselves mechanics did not put front screws in when they fixed my hydraulic leak when I broke down in the city.
mechadrake well that sucks... I put mine back on with zip ties, i was just to lazy to really fix it...
I thought you had bought yourself a set of sockets etc, its just that your constant use of pliers and multigrips to remove nuts and bolts is not good mechanical practice. I would buy those new radiator hoses (also check the heater hoses as they probably need replacing by now too) as soon as possible and replace the coolant with a quality coolant that has both antifreeze and buffering components. Water is not good for an aluminium motor or aluminium/steel motor which I think yours is. The easy way to get the oil filter off if you don't have the right tool is to drive a spike through it and turn that. I think the exhaust heater tube you questioned the need for is just to provide rapid warmup for the motor, long time since I have dealt with them but there is usually a butterfly valve to shut them off when the motor is at operating temperature. You can probably get away without it. Best of luck with it, Bob in Australia.
I don't think the hot air intake is needed in Germany either. We have a few days in winter where it's below -10 degrees, and this sounds more like a solution that is made for temperatures of -30 to -40 degrees.
Guten tag! Keep up the great work. I enjoy watching your progress. Regarding the heat riser tube, I would spend the cash for a new one. If your winters are like mine in Oneida county, New York (in the states), these can make a big difference. I had a 1979 Jeep Wagoneer with a V8 engine a while back. It ran much better on cold starts (-20F ambient some days) with the new tube SECURELY fastened. On another note, I would enjoy if you could post a video while speaking in German, possibly with English subtitles. Ich möchte lernen, Deutsch zu sprechen.
check the bearings of the alternator when you replace the belt, they may be noisy
there's a worn out bering too, possibly the alterntor or one of the puley
yes , cold air is condensed so more powerful. the hot air is for emissions.
I never see a car with that warm air intake. Things of living in Brazil. I guess it really don't need that
tappets & valves, new exhaust, and antifreeze asap - it has a corrosion inhibitor - makes a big difference.
You might want to have a look in your green book about those horns (page 102 or thereabout). There should be 2 horns in the wiring diagram, as your car has a 2 tone horn. This item is actually TÜV relevant, but usually nobody pays attention ...
Dont remove warm air hose at all. simply replace it. warm air is needed in winter)
another way of removing a stuck oil filter is to use a flat head screwdriver and hammer it into the oil filter, and use that as a lever. That's if you didn't want to remove those pipes in the way.
i am not a proffesional but i would replace the intake becouse its only better for the engine (maybe not that much) but i gues its wel worth the 20 euro`s especially in the winter. very nice series btw greetings from thomas
not bad bro , motor not covered in oil so not bad looking.looks like good car.
You need to invest in new motor and transmission mounts. They are cheap, install involves replacing bolts, and it will make the car run smoother with the engine not heaving around like it is in the video.