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Mike K? ruin another volvo. 945 pickup build

You should build a canopy (or "topper") out of the back half of a wagons roof. Throw it on. You know, just to mess with people. :rofl:

it has to be a different color though, right? :lol:

Ya ya, we've been working. Actually need to spend some time doing maintenance work so it's more viable as an actual car. A lot of work lately has been focused on getting it to a point where I can play with it for the summer.

I am still playing though. I bought a bunch of 945 accessories mostly so I could get this

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I also got the big FOHA rear hatch spoiler. I really wanted it, but when I did a taste test with the V90 spoiler I easily preferred the smaller one.

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The tailgate got a couple of finishing pieces made, and the cheap and cheerful treatment for grab handles and latches.

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side note: I spent weeks chasing my tail to complete a set of 960 tail lights with the notched side... and now I think I might want stock amber? :roll: maybe it'll depend on what color it ends up

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Fitting the bike: using the full hatch and making it open posed a challenge when thinking about putting a ~220lb motorcycle in the back. Since the hatch is mostly glass and partially aluminum I can't shove the front wheel into it, and can't just build a fence. Kicked around a few ideas and ended up with a two-piece removable cross bar/wheel chock setup.

We have a lot of 1" square tube, and a little bit of 1.5" square tube left over from the hitch brace. The 1" got bent into the cross bar, and the 1.5" was used as the receivers. Cut a hole in the inside of the bed, and made a recessed pocket for the cross bar.

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So, the cross bar passes into the pocket so it clears the other side of the bed, then sets into another piece of 1.5" that is blind to the inside of the bed wall. Both sides of drilled and pinned with push button locking pins.

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Next needed to make something to catch the front wheel. One thing that became clear right away was that the rear wiper meant the wheel needed to be offset 4" to the right! I also wanted to make sure that the front wheel couldn't ride up over the support and run into the glass. This turned into a wheel chock/pocket made to catch the front wheel and provide good support. This had another piece of 1.5" square tube welded to the back. The cross bar had a piece of 1" added vertically, so the wheel chock drops on and secured with another locking pin.

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As soon as it was cooled off I grabbed the bike and gave it a try. This really was a lot of fun, a great feeling to see the car serve its purpose. I started the whole thing off saying it'd be cool to have a Volvo I could move my dirt bike with, and as goofy a vision as that is, here it is realized.

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the wheel chock. I'm going to add tie-down points to the cross bar.

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A perfect fit :party:

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A few more things to check off the list and I can take this thing riding. I really need a respectable set of wheels and tires for it. I also really wish it could be on airbags. Even if it was just in the back..
 
Really coming along nicely -- not surprised! Finally figured out -- if VW had made 'club cab' version - the profile view reminds me of an old Rabbit Pickup except 1 1/3 scale.
 
Lift it!!!!!!!

Idk I keep think about it on airbags and nice wheels! That said I already have three cars that run 45 sidewalls or less...

Really coming along nicely -- not surprised! Finally figured out -- if VW had made 'club cab' version - the profile view reminds me of an old Rabbit Pickup except 1 1/3 scale.

there's a guy in my parking lot at work with one of those, definitely going to get some pictures next to it.

I'm having fun this afternoon on Facebook lording my 6' long bed over everyone else's ute :-P. The Swedes really like to call it nothing special so need to remind them that I didn't slap it together with diamond plate and a 4' square box of a bed like they do!

It looks like this is going to make it to the eEuroparts show at Lime Rock on Saturday, so doing some preppy stuff for that. I put in my new Recaro and a leather wrapped steering wheel - nice improvements! The Recaro is soooper comfortable. As part of that lot of parts I also received 2.25" stainless cat back exhaust pieces which I would like to get installed as well.

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Again from that lot of parts I also got a 3-row Nissens rad which is the same as what I have in my 242. Really want to use it to replace my leaky stock one but it's not the same shape as the later 940 one. I have intercoolers and piping from older 940's, anyone know if it's relatively easy to retrofit? Slam panels different?
 
Baller project

Thanks! I'm kinda miffed it's voted down to 3 stars because it's a 5 star car in my eyes :lol: (edit: ayy groveling got me a vote!)

Any new progress on this?

Yeah nothing major but lots of use. Looks like last post was back before eEurofest. I did get the car down to Lime Rock, and collected a trophy to boot. I decided to bring it down with my bike in the back to really show it off. Made a nice pair with the 242 (driven down by my dad)

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After that I've just been using this thing like a truck and I love it! And I really mean using it. I'm glad I spent a season just banging it around before I went further on finishing it, as I made some decisions based on real world stuff. Most significantly I'm completely off looking at 17x8 BMW wheels and now I'm looking at how much K02 I can get on a hydra in there without trimming any metal.

Oh the things you can do when you make your Volvo a truck!

Like carrying your hipster fixie
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Or your mountain bike
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Or an 8x4.5' driveway gate you built in the garage.
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Towed the boats around with it
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Put wheels in storage with it
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Also drove it to the dump a couple dozen times. Honestly this is like the showcase for this thing. I'm in a small town and the dump's only open on Saturday so I run into a lot of people from town. Also the guy who runs the station just LOVES this thing. Every time I go he makes me show the tail gate to someone because he gets such a kick out of it, as do I. This was a highlight for me, someone paid to dump this working 60's GE console stereo so I scooped it up.
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Then I carried all this stuff over to the garage with the lift and got to work on a stage 0
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The car has 246k on it and was not well loved or maintained, I haven't done any maintenance work on it at all. Radiator leaked, driveshaft support was criminally bad, no shocks, clunks, exhaust leaks. I took it on the highway one time with the dirt bike in the back and crossed a bridge over the CT river with a strong crosswind and it was, uhh.. it required attention.

I kinda wish I started with a better car, but I didn't want to pay for one if this whole thing went nowhere. Oh well, all fixable. Over Christmas I did all of the stuff below. After working on the perfectly clean 242 where everything is new this was actual mechanic work. Everything is rusted and caked in oil and grime. Not fun particularly, but satisfying.

In the back:
- KYB whites - cheap and cheerful
- IPD overload springs
This half hour job ended up taking 2.5 when the captive nut for one of the upper spring perches spun. I didn't want to cut the perch so spent ages dicking around inside the frame rail to get it apart.
- much needed driveshaft bushing and bearing (fun fact there were two loose driveshaft bolts at the diff :lol:)

Front:
- Sachs struts
- KYB strut mounts (hope they last at least a while..)
- ball joints
- ALL of the bushings. Rubber except the cone bushings for the control arm stay rod, which were poly from IPD.
- Also put new backing plates on the struts and appear to have gotten the last pair of cheap aftermarket ones around, score.
- New Nissens radiator

looks like an alignment guy got busy on my passenger strut tower. Good thing they didn't bother to dab paint on it or something :roll:

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The brakes were like new so those got left. As mentioned I'm leaning in a more truckish direction and foresee potentially trying to lift the car 2" or so. Nothing crazy, I still want it to look like a car, but I want to get some tire under it. I have a spare front end, so might play around with extending the struts. For now, the refreshed stock stuff will be good.

THEN the exhaust leak. The #1 exhaust manifold gasket was blown out and god it was annoying. I set after it and spent the next day marinating in PB Blaster. This also meant cutting the cobbled together ****ty exhaust which was welded from turbo to tailpipe, which then meant rebuilding it on the backend.

I got halfway through the manifold and thought I might get away with it. Then had one hole on #3 which was a bolt that came out with some thread. Then #4 snapped the first outside the head, then snapped the second inside the head.

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got the stud with a little stump showing with a nut welded over it
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that trick did not work for the one inside the head; could not get enough heat into the stud to get it welded. After many attempts and much time we quit on it and ended up drilling out the broken stud in-situ with a right angle drill and tapped new threads. A little perilous but pulled it off. BIG reward driving the car up the road. Suspension feels great, it's quiet, smooth. Feels like a good Volvo now.

I had started to do some preliminary research on re-powering this thing in 2019. Thought I might make a late winter/spring project out of swapping engines. Unfortunately, I have to prioritize the 242 so it's probably going to push another year. Once May comes around I'll want the truck available for biking, not tied up in the garage.

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I'd like to do the swap in a simple and economical way. I don't plan on making it a hot rod, I just want the nice motor. One of the obstacles is that the 2j in the Lexus is a front sump, and I've gathered I need a rear sump setup to clear the cross member in a 940. People are asking too much money for rear sump parts online, so I've got to make a little project out of finding cheap parts to solve that. Also need to read wiring diagrams and get smart on transmission options, as I want to use all stock Lexus computers.
 
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Upvoted it for you. 5 stars!!!1!

Lots of good stuff here! I'm not surprised nor saddened to hear that you want to go with a mild lift and meaty tires for this. Makes perfect sense given the intended purpose. It's nice to have a soft-riding useful vehicle in the stable for sure; I've come to appreciate that idea.

When I was driving my diesel 245 around before pulling the engine I was marveling at how soft and comfy it felt over terrible roads, and was even thinking about going a little bit prerunner bro on it and making it into a long-travel V8 wagon buggy. Then I went and rescued the ACS 3-piece wheels from my M5 and now I have to make it all low and BMWey. Ah well!
 
Upvoted it for you. 5 stars!!!1!

Lots of good stuff here! I'm not surprised nor saddened to hear that you want to go with a mild lift and meaty tires for this. Makes perfect sense given the intended purpose. It's nice to have a soft-riding useful vehicle in the stable for sure; I've come to appreciate that idea.

When I was driving my diesel 245 around before pulling the engine I was marveling at how soft and comfy it felt over terrible roads, and was even thinking about going a little bit prerunner bro on it and making it into a long-travel V8 wagon buggy. Then I went and rescued the ACS 3-piece wheels from my M5 and now I have to make it all low and BMWey. Ah well!

Yep, it didn't take long for me to realize I was looking to fill a different gap. Both my 242 and viggen are lowered, stiff, make noise etc. I want to slide this thing into the rocky parking lot before I unload the bike, that doesn't play so well with 45 series sidewalls! We have a pretty good network of dirt roads in town and I want to be able to hammer around at speed, and also have it be a winter machine. It's kinda freeing to love the car for what it is and not feel like I've got something to prove by making it fast. You nailed it with "soft and useful"

Hell I was walking into work this morning and passed a Chevy Volt and thought "ya know that makes a lot of sense as a daily, efficient, quiet, no stress. I wonder how cheap they've gotten." Am I getting older? :lol:

Love this thing. I kinda feel Volvo should have made something like this.

I'm sure they would have sold like lead balloons but it definitely fills a niche that may or may not need filling. It's definitely fun to have car dynamics and pick-up utility (every Bruce reading this is like "yeah duh, mate")
 
Thanks! I'm kinda miffed it's voted down to 3 stars because it's a 5 star car in my eyes :lol: (edit: ayy groveling got me a vote!).

I think someone downvoted all the 7/9 project threads during the Great 2 vs 7/9 Culture War of the summer of '18.:roll:

Nice update, love to see it hauling shiz. Lift with a 2jz swap would be nuts... and awesome.
 
Still awesome, I guess I will send pics of lifted A tractors on IG now :roll:

I wonder how many Swedes will unfollow me because it's not getting Ocean's and a big turbo :)

I think someone downvoted all the 7/9 project threads during the Great 2 vs 7/9 Culture War of the summer of '18.:roll:

Nice update, love to see it hauling shiz. Lift with a 2jz swap would be nuts... and awesome.

I just keep thinking of this thing with some tread, flinging rocks sideways on a dirt road, with a silky smooth straight 6 screaming away. Just a nice smooth 225hp or whatever horsepower, a decent sounding exhaust, yeah.. going to like that :nod:

I tried mining Nathan's old thread for 940 2j swap info but none of the pics were working. Gotta do some homework and make a project plan.
 
The only inline 6 diesel that would really fit is the D24...and barf. :barf: to that idea.

If he wanted to do an oil burner I think a 2.0L common-rail TDI would be much better suited. The dieselgate engine. They are amazing little powerplants if you ignore the NOx.
 
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