240 performance

Hello,

I bought my 240 in 1990. It was the last 240 manual car here in Australia.
Its a great ride.

But I noticed that the car's handling could (perhaps) do with a little
imporvement. When I am going downhill and applying my brakes, I feel the
back of the car tending to want to do sideways. A year ago, another car
pulled infront of me, I braked, and my car went 180 degrees sideways.
Luckily nothing was injured or damaged. The road was also a little damp from
the rain.

Should I consider buying new shockers or considering other improvements to
the car?

Cheers,

JM

 

Flush your brakes. Use about 2Ltr of fluid from sealed containers NOT bulk
fluid. Check pad Ect. (I would replace. It can be hard to get decent pads in
AU. Bendix are not upto the job in my experience.)
A bad shock can make a huge difference to your car. Replace as sets and I
would look at doing the whole car of you need them. Check bushes.

I have done shocks, springs, bushes, bars, brakes and quite a few other
things. A 240 can handle and stop very well indeed. It depends on how much
money you can spend and what your after.




AJS

 

How are the tires? That's the first thing I thought of reading your post...

I've read that the 240 series is a better handler than the 700/ 900 because
its
weight distribution is 50/50 front and rear.

Den6N
=================================================

 

!? It was? They made the 240 up to '93 tho' !

 

The tyres are brand new - they are Bridgestone - 195/65/R14.

 

140s/240s all seem to get soft in the tail. On one 244 I had with the
tail sagging badly, we put extra coils from a small Datsun wreck, model
unknown, inside the Volvo coils. They fitted and seated nicely top and
bottom. It already had Koni shocks. Adjusted these half way up, which
required removal, and the back end firmed up nicely. The whole job took
about an hour, easy.

On a 142S, fitted rubber coil blocks in the springs, two each side, and
heavy duty shocks off a Transit van. Ditto, nice and hard. Can't buy
these blocks any more, unfortunately.

The present 245 is also down in the back, especially with a load, so
it's going to get the treatment too.

Cost in each case, half of bugger-all.

Get it right and they scoot round corners. Cheers.

 

Perhaps the brake ballance is off somehow? I know there's proportioning
valves, I've locked up the brakes on my 240 several times and the back end
has never tried to come around. From the factory they tend to understeer,
including under heavy breaking.

 

The usual cause of this is shot bushings in the back, change those before
you mess with the springs.

 

On a Volvo that has lost one of its braking circuits, the car only has
brakes to three wheels the two in front and one in the rear. In a panic
stop the rear will tend to want to come around because the rotating wheel
will have more traction than the other three. The wheel with the greater
traction will always try to go to the front of the mass ( the car)