As Jerry would say. This is a very very small update, I was in doubt if I had to put it on this site, but I like to make updates so here it is anyway lol 😉
As the stand has to be repaired first, I placed the car on some stone blocks and started scraping. With a heat blower gun it comes off pretty easy, but it’s a messy job.
This took about 30 mins, I did some more but still lots to do. To be continued!
I placed the car in the restoration stand today and it works okay. It was originally built to fit on a Amazon, but a 1800S is almost the same, so it was a almost direct fit. The car is now back on its wheels again because the stand needs to be strengthened, there are some bad welds which need repair.
Just enough ground clearance.
I have this sitting in my bookshelf for a long time now, but I rediscovered it again this week and I would like to share this. It is a compilation written by one of my favorite (dutch) writers: Martin Bril. Sadly, he died in 2009 and so making this book extra special. It’s written in Dutch, so this probably won’t be very interesting for international visitors visiting this site.
Martin Bril liked and drove Volvo’s. He wrote some beautiful columns about these cars over the years and these columns where collected and put together in this book. His writing style was different, full with humor and self mockery. A quote of a piece he wrote two years before his death:
“Zolang we maar bewegen, de Volvo en ik, zo lang leven we”
“As long as we are moving, the Volvo and I, this long we will live”
Dear Martin, I hope you are still moving, wherever you may be.
I picked up a restoration stand today. It looks sturdy enough. It’s missing a long steel tube to connect the two curved tubes, so I’ll have to find something which will fit.
Lots of space in the 940 😉
I’m finished with scraping of the interior! But man, what a bitch this coating on the seams. And at 2 or 3 places I found a little bit of rust behind the coating, again some ticking time bombs, I hate bombs :(.
I’ll see if maybe it’s better to use something else to cover the seams again when the car is sand blasted.
But with the help of a small blowtorch (watch out of not putting too much heat in the metal of the car!) and again, some patience, I got it almost all removed from the interior (trunk, engine bay and interior), I hope it’s good enough for the sand blasting guys. Next is the lower side of the old diva! :). The lower side is really going to be a LOT of work. Maybe I can trick some friends with a case of beer and a BBQ to help me a day or so ;). When the car is painted again I’m not going to use Tectyl again, I want to use something like Dinitrol. This because dinitrol is transparent and this way you can see if there are rusty spots forming over time. With Tectyl you cannot see this. I guess Dinitrol is not as tough as Tectyl, so it provides less protection, but at least you can still see the metal. But these are all far, far away future plans :).
Cleaned up the inside.
A strange weld at the front. I guess I’m gonna find some more repairs at the lower side of the car, but it would be strange if I wouldn’t find any repairs on a 47 year old car.
I’m beginning to know all of the car this way ;).
In the process of disassembling the car I found that this 1800S has multiple ID tags, but i’m not sure what they all mean.
VIN number in the RH aft side (ALF = aft looking forward) of the engine bay:
This is the body number. Apparently, this is a manufacture sequence number to help construction of vehicle. Other parts on the car may also have this number written or stamped on the vehicle. But I’m not sure what this means in a practical way. It’s stamped on a plate which is fitted in the LH aft side of the engine bay (see first picture). I’ts almost the same as the VIN number.
ID tag in the LH aft side of the engine bay with info about type, colour and upholstery (colour of seats, carpet etc.).
I also found this tag which is fitted behind the backseat, but I have no idea what the number, SV021769, means. Again in kind of looks like a VIN number, but I have no idea what the relation with this number to the actual VIN number of the car would be. It’s also not mentioned in the image with the ID tags below.
I had sent an email to Volvo Sweden to check if they had more info about my car, and today I got a reaction:
Everything is removed from the interior, so finally the real fun work can begin! :(. Removing all the glue, adhesives, sealant, isolation panels, dirt etc etc. Especially the sealant at the seams is a bitch. But working with plastic scrapers, a fire torch and lots of patience does the job. The interior is almost done, just some more sealant at the seams has to be removed.
When the interior is clean, I can start with the underside of the car. This will take the most work because underneath the car is completely covered in a 1/2 cm thick layer of tectyl.. For this work I can borrow some sort of restoration stand, so I can put he car on its side to work on the lower side of the car, kinda like as in the image below. It is fitted on the wheel hubs, so the frond and aft suspensions cannot be removed from the car.
This would even be better, but then it would not fit in my garage:
And I also want to build something like this, a sort of transportation stand:
I would like to make something like that, but the frame has to support the car at the jack points, because the front and aft wheel suspensions will remain installed (because of the restoration stand I will use fits on the wheel hubs) untill the car will go to the shop for sand blasting.
Or I could just do it without a restoration stand and do it like this.. 😉
I removed the wire loom from the car and its completely labeled now. Now I have to search for the correct wires, connectors etc etc. I’ve also removed even more parts. The car is almost completely empty now.
I did some extensive cleaning of the engine with solvent and a steel wire brush, quite a messy job!
These freeze plugs don’t look very original, I have never seen these kind of plugs. I wonder what the function of the nuts in the plugs are.
And I got a very nice present today! 😀
These are the bad spots in the metal of the car which I have found until now. It could be worse, but the car does needs some repairs. As I cannot repair it myself, I have to find someone or a shop who can do the job.
Rust at the RH aft light housing.
FWD winscreen.
FWD windscreen RH lower corner.
FWD windscreen LH lower corner.
LH headlight housing, inside the front fender. The RH side is a bit the same, beginning rust.
Aft windscreen RH lower corner.
Beginning rust behind AFT fender covers.
