Saturday 21 July 2012

Oh, and...


On the basis that it is impossible to say too much about the good value of old Volvos; to help The Broad catch up on recent developments; and to prevent Ms Toa become too relaxed down there in the Australian winter, here is a picture of the new one next to the old one which is being stripped before sent to the knacker's yard.

Note the way the rain is glistening on it's glossy flanks, and note the way I have retouched the number plate before posting up the picture (Me? Paranoid?).  Don't feel too sorry for the forlorn red one, huddled up in the corner - I got it to sign a donor card before it got ill, so many of it's vital organs will live on in it's younger sister, should she ever come down with something.

One of the many reasons I have been buying second-hand Volvos for so long is the mechanic who owns the garage where this photo was taken.  He worked for Volvo (the company) for 21 years before setting out on his own, and he has now trained his son up to carry on.  Between them, there is nothing that they don't know about Volvos, and they regularly attend training courses to acquaint themselves with the later models, as well as keeping all their lap-top diagnostic software up to date to adjust them when they go wrong.

The first Volvo I bought was an 'Amazon', 120 series estate which I sold to a friend with 250,000 miles on the clock.  He rebuilt the engine and ran it for another 200,000, then sold it to someone else.  I believe it is still being driven around the London area.

The second one I bought was a super-fast (for it's day) 122S saloon with such high mileage that one day it simply refused to carry on, having served me for years at only 25% compression on all four cylinders.

I hired a garage nearby (a Georgian stable, actually), removed the engine and took it completely to pieces, carefully placing all the nuts and bolts into labelled, plastic cups so I knew where they came from.  I reconditioned all the moving parts then reassembled it, finally putting the engine back into the car and connecting it all up.  All of this work was done at night and in the winter.

You can imagine my surprise and pride when it started first time, roaring into life and begging to be let out onto the road again.  Even professional mechanics will tell you that - when an engine is reassembled - there are always about half a dozen nuts and bolts left unattached and lying around with no obvious place to put them, and so it was with this one.  After a few uneventful weeks, you simply throw them away and forget about them.

I never carry out work on cars myself these days, other than simple maintenance, partly because - without the software and a lap-top - it would be impossible to do so.  Even those ancient cars above have two computers each in them, one for engine management and the other for all the stuff like air-bags, etc.  I even had to have the horn fixed by the mechanic, due to the danger of taking a steering-wheel off when there is a small charge of high-explosive behind it.

That blue one would have cost £30,000 when it only had 3 miles on the clock, and I have just paid £850 for it.  It ticks all the boxes for me, being a good cruiser, a powerful tower, quick enough to overtake in relative safety, roomy enough to sleep in and boring enough to be ignored by just about everyone except traffic-wardens.

I think that's all for now.  Honest.

22 comments:

  1. I can just make out the number... ENO TS 1.

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    1. I think there is a way you could unscramble the number plate if you really wanted to, but I can't think why you would, other than to embarrass me about it's age.

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  2. Our old Volvo is the only car I ever feel nostalgic about. Memories of kids and dogs piled up in the back. Long, effortless journeys. Heated seats in the winter. Sigh.

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  3. "...carefully placing all the nuts and bolts into labelled, plastic cups so I knew where they came from"

    Common sense but desperately anal to confess to it!

    Also, the excess were not parts bereft of a place to put them, they were parts the manufacturer did not need.

    I love Volvos (and Saabs) but we are no longer allowed to import any car more than five years old.

    As father used to say, there's more kudos turning up in a well maintained 'old' car than a smart new one. Presumably that was his way of saying you had to be stark staring mad to lash out on a new horse when the old nag still got you to the pub.

    When I ditched the Saab 99 and turned up in a Lancia HPE, I think he gave up on me.

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    1. I can immediately see (or presume) that you never took your old Saab to bits before you bought the Lancia.

      I'm still struggling to make sense of the parts bit too - do you mean that all cars are built on the 'belt and braces' principle?

      Anyway, fathers are full of shit, as we all found out, one way or another.

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  4. Wish list item for me?

    Low mileage normally aspirated real Volvo Estate with air con and in left hand drive (RHD is also banned here) from a dealer who is willing to jimmy the documents so that it appears less then five years old. I'll buy two to fill the container up (the container'll cost more than the cars so I might as well max it!).

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    1. Could be arranged, but I would buy direct from Sweden if I were you - it will be cheaper not to have to change the RHD. My mate who lives on the edge of some African game reserve said I could get £4000 for the last one there. He also said that the buffalo were a lot more dangerous than the lions, and I believe him.

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  5. It's a pretty colour ...... that's all I need to know.... I'm a woman, but not a lesbian.

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    1. That sounded like Michael Jackson - "I'm a lover, not a fighter". The colour will suffice for me - it's better than the bright orange one I used to own.

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  6. I think I have got the message Tom - you absolutely adore Volvo cars.

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    1. Nope, not quite - I don't adore them, I just think that Volvos are the best of a generally bad bunch - for me. They are the devil I know, and they are so utterly boring that I don't need to feel precious about them.

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  7. But the red one was, um, red... don't you miss that? By the way, your next one should be white then you can be all American.

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  8. I adore Jacqueline's comment and I am glad you found another devil you know Tom. My Mini just turned over 100,000 miles and I hope it goes that many more.

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    1. Is it a tiny, original Mini or the modern equivalent? I can never understand why the modern ones weigh 1.5 tons!

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  9. Thanks for alleviating my woes about tents and Australian winters via your volvo Tom. Grand effort!
    Bye the way, if you were wondering where the 'toa family barbeque' post went, a family's house exploded in town the same night and a child died. It didn't seem okay to leave up my story. So sad.

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    1. Oh, that's terrible, Sarah. Now I know. Anyway, glad to be of some small service in the alleviation department.

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  10. I like cars that run well for me. I don't think you're paranoid blackening the numbers on the licence plate, i doctored the boat photos so you can't see the registration numbers. If you need to know what they are, you can find out. Those who don't need to know don't need to see them.

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