Quote:
Originally Posted by Othen
I'd agree about that 740 Dave, if one had a good 740 and a bit of room to store a donor car that didn't upset the neighbours too much then it would be a good buy at £260, but of course it would need trailering away (W London I think) so that might make it a bit impractical for most folk. It did cross my mind to buy that car, bring it here (I have a large enough drive for about 8 cars) and gradually strip everything off it that might be useful to the RB (certainly the auto box, probably the motor - maybe all sorts of other stuff that might be made to fit) then advertising the glass and removable panels here free to a good home before getting our local Romanian scrap bloke to take away the carcass. On balance it thought it might be a good project, but I thought my neighbours might object to a rotting carcass being picked apart on my drive for 6 months - and house prices in the street might have plummeted as a result :-)
Re your car: I'd certainly say £200 was a good price for a running and riding car, so you have done very well. If you accounted for your time (which none of us do of course) then it would probably have to sell for £8,000 to make it worthwhile, but that isn't the point.
I feel the same way about the RB, I paid a couple of grand for it, have spent £900 total on it (that includes two sets of new tyres though - by far the most expensive items), and I suppose it is worth considerably more than my cash investment now (I see 244s that are similar to the RB being advertised north of £6,000 - I have no idea whether they sell or not though). The RB is worth more than that to me though - not only have I invested a lot of time in the car, but I have enjoyed bringing it back to life and it is satisfying that it has become a really nice historic car that I could not replace for £3,000.
Alan
PS. This looks like a nice 240 saloon:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/volvo240g...sAAOSwSYVfw3Ea
... it will be interesting to see what it makes so I'll watch it and report back. Similar-ish to the RB, except it won't qualify as an historic car for another 8 years.
PPS. talking of £6,000 244s, I have just noticed this one:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/VOLVO-240...0AAOSwHHBfmT7F
... a Japanese import, which is good and bad, but it won't be an historic car for nearly a decade and is... £6,000 :-( |
That 740 wouldn't have yielded much of any use to you Alan except the gearbox and possibly the prop shaft. The engine is the B200E, K-Jetronic (mechanical) injection so puts out 112bhp if memory serves (something in the back of my mind says 118bhp but might be wrong) so wouldn't have been worth the time and trouble to swap it really.
Might have been other stuff useful for you but nothing i can think of easily.
I think with everything i had to spend on mine to bring it up to standard, including the original purchase price it came to ~£500 and that includes the first MoT in my ownership.
With other things since, it's probably approaching a grand now including the replacement axle and 5 tyres (one part-worn ~£15 delivered and 4 brand new budget ones £105) and it goes and drives much better. I've just ordered a new thermostat for it and a litre of anti-freeze to replace whatever is lost when i change the 'stat (it's gone weak and i had planned to renew the 'stat when i change the anti-freeze and oil but waiting on a part to fit the oil cooler) but i consider that a service part every 4 years these days and it's 4 years since i replaced it last.
My ethos is similar to yours, i couldn't replace it under £3k at least, possibly more and i've enjoyed improving it and using it.
That white 240 is interesting. Can you explain how you arrive at the 9 years before it becomes Historic please? Mine is about 6 months younger (88/F) and should be eligible in 2028 for Historic tax.
It has a lot of genuine Volvo accessories (driving lights, front dog lights, inside/outside temp gauge plus a few others i can't make out, mud-flaps, upgraded stereo? and possibly a few i've missed) and looks very nice.
That silver JDM import looks ncie but always a bit wary of them. Not heard any horror stories about JDM imports regardless of the marque but there are usually niggles to overcome from stereos that won't recieve UK broadcasts to sat-nags in Japanese with no UK maps or any way of changing them - obviously dependent on the year, tech fitted and so on but also have come across many cars where the parts are unique to the JDM models (mainly Honda) but strangely, once part numbers are found, those parts are available on the UK market for other vehicles including in one case the Gold Wing 1800 motorbike!
Whether Volvo had any bespoke JDM parts i don't know but at a time when UK parts are getting scarce, i would think any Japanese spec parts would be on the shelf between the unicorn horns and the rocking horse manure.
As for price, i've seen Rover 800s that are JDM imports. No matter how nice they are, they never seem to make the same money as genuine UKDM models that have been well looked after and are in similar condition with higher mileage.
Presumably the same will hold true for the 240 but until it sells and we know if it went for £5995 or not we won't be certain.