Rusted, stubborn front shock retaining nut - 240

Prefab struts? Wow, is that a great suggestion! I'm going to look around
for a new-used set of struts to see if I can pull it off. I am replacing
most front-end components so it would be easier. Nice to be able to work at
a bench for much of the assembly, too. If it's not cost-effective, will
probably
just end up taking each strut out to rebuild them off the car. Kind of the
same,
without the convenience of having the car available for errands.

Three parts cars?! Man, that's some yard. I borrow a driveway to do my
work so I have yard-envy.

Mike

 

BTW, 2-series Volvo struts come in at least 3 variants that I know of. The
ones you want are 1981-on. Up to '80, they had smaller wheel bearings and
stubs and a looser tolerance on the fit of the insert in the tube. I have
an '80 model with the 350 chev in it, and I used '82 struts to upgrade them
as part of the process. The ones you want are easy to identify - the nut
retaining the wheel bearings has an integral washer instead of the separate
nut and washer used on the earlier struts.

I don't think that the strut housings changed again after '81. Oh, and the
3rd variant (in case you're wondering) is that the really early ones had the
ball joint taper integral to the bottom of the strut rather than having the
separate bottom piece bolted on with 4 bolts...

If you're doing the lower control arm bushes, see if you can get spares of
them at the same time. This gives you the luxury of being able to strip,
clean and paint all of the parts before assembly.

LOL.

I'm _down_ to 3 parts cars. It was 4 until recently. I found these old
photos from when we had a concrete truck make a mess of the yard in wet
weather putting down a slab behind the garage and a new driveway... It
looks a little tidier now.

<http://cust.idl.net.au/athol/volvo/volvos.JPG>
<http://cust.idl.net.au/athol/volvo/driveway.jpg>

Oh, and the car roof right at the bottom of the 1st photo is not a Volvo.
Until I found these photos, which are from late June last year, I
thought that I only bought the red parts car about 6 months ago!

 

Apologies for the delay responding.

Glad to hear this - reminds me to insist on the right set of parts. I think
I started reading something that had similar detail, but I glazed over (it
was probably 2am) and made a mental note to go back to it (didn't - out of
sight, out of mind...) Fun to learn about the variations in engineering
mods that have taken place over the years. Haven't had the time in the last
week to look for a set, so I'm still hopeful that I can pick some up.

More great advice. Unfortunately, I recently spent a good day doing both
sides. Thought it would take at most a couple of hours to replace the
bushings. Majority of the time was spent cleaning the control arm and
mounting bracket and prepping each for paint. Put one on late and a little
wet. Figured I'd call it a learning experience (at least they have paint
now) and see if I couldn't pick up a set to do right and install by end of
summer.

Nice pics! Feed the envy I was just looking on ebay and realized that
if I had the space, it'd be pretty easy to pick up some cheap 240's for
parts or projects. Good thing I don't, cause I'd probably stack 'em like
cordwood. Last paragraph is even funnier since my wife is constantly
reminding me that something I think happened last week actually took place
months or even years ago.

Mike

 

No need to apologise. This is usenet.

Even if you have every single tool needed for the job, you need to allow
double what you think that it will take unless you've done that particular
job before.

I just bought another vehicle. Not a Volvo this time... Might end up
taking the V8 out of the Volvo and fitting it to the latest aquisition
after building an even higher performance engine for the Volvo.

Mind you, if the current engine goes into the other vehicle, it'll be
getting a turbo or two while I'm at it!