1995 Volvo 850 T5 GLE estate

I resumed the fun yesterday to finish off the front brake job, not many pics but I removed and rebuilt the caliper with new seals, rubber mounts, bleed nipple and flexi hose. Then re-fitted with new discs and pads, flushed and bled the fluid to end up here.




This side was the one with the flexi I was concerned about, I think it was original as it was difficult to remove, much more so than the other side but budged in the end with patience, WD40, heat and the right spanners. Bleed nipple was tricky too but came out ok so I could replace it once the caliper was cleaned up.




Refitted wheel, topped up fluid and a short drive to bed the pads in and test for leaks, funny noises etc. All seems fine so left it there for now, will do the rears when I get time but they are working ok for the MOT with no binding and the handbrake seems fine.

Not too much to update over the last month on the Volvo. It's been doing usual Volvo stuff, like being left at Manchester airport amongst lots of cars designed in wind tunnels and slightly more aerodynamic...




That was for a trip to Stockholm, actually where I saw this fine example of automotive design and engineering to drool over. Apologies for the red thing behind.




What else, oh yeah - dog transport as usual (this is NOT dogging before anyone says that, again...!)




In terms of maintenance / stuff needing fixing:
1. Tailgate inside trim doesn't want to go back on and needs new clips as they are really brittle.

2. Squeak from aux belt (now fixed, see next post)

3. AC doesn't work, never has but wish it did.I checked the service history and found a receipt from 2001 to diagnose why it didn't work (when the car was only 6 years old!). This suggests it hasn't worked for 17 years due to an evaporator leak and 'noisy compressor'. Hmm... might be a big job...

Overdue updates:

Mid-October - got back from being away for a few weeks on holiday and found...
a). Volvo battery dead
b). I'd remembered to order and pickup tailgate trim clips before I went on hols, chuck them in the house and forget about them
c). Volvo was filthy

I started with the battery since the car wouldn't start and I needed it to work properly. I put the battery on charge but found even after charging, one start would deplete it and though the alternator appeared to be working ok, the charge to it was fluctuating and not holding. I checked the fluid in the battery and it looks ok, maybe a little low, couldn't tell if any of the plates were warped inside easily though the filler holes.

Old battery:



I checked the spec of the battery and looked up prices for a new one, then remembered my old BMW that lives in the garage unused has a great Bosch 70Ah whopper battery with the same connections that looked like it would squeeze into the Volvo battery tray. I could use that for now if it fits and test the alternator, I keep that battery topped up though the car is rarely used.

It did indeed squeeze in, start the car quickly, and with the multimeter hooked up I tested the voltage with headlights, heated screen etc. on and off and it maintained around this figure. I like a larger capacity battery where I can squeeze one in, hence buying this one for my E30 years ago even though it was oversized.




Happy with that, I moved on to replacing the clips on the tailgate interior trim that's been flapping around for months. These are the part numbers for the four upper and four lower clips you need.




No pics of them fitted, but it was easy and for the first time in ages the tailgate shuts and opens without a scraping noise of the trim trying to detach itself.
I gave the car a decent wash to celebrate and remembered it has a slow puncture rear right so pumped that up and noted to get it fixed soon.

Late-October...

1. Oil changed at 169,700 miles and service light reset.
2. I adjusted the front right suspension strut to sort a camber problem and also had the alignment setup. A bit too much toe in was wearing the outer front tyre edges. Handling and steering feel much better now.
3. I had no numberplate lights! Both bulbs out so I suspected fuse or wiring but it turned out to actually be both bulbs that had gone, replaced and cleaned up lenses and all working again.

Good news as we had a long drive planned in Nov again...

Update from earlier in December...

Firstly, collecting a 6 ft tree... 'tis the season...




Earlier in the week I had ordered a new expansion tank cap (green one) as my old one appeared to be letting a bit of coolant pressure out and staining the top of the tank. As I'd been slowly loosing a little coolant over the last month, I thought this may sort it. I also remembered that I'd meant to change the spark plugs, so asked the Volvo parts dept. to add a set of those to my order too, may improve economy a little as they haven't been changed in my ownership?

I called at the dealer and my low coolant light came on, checked and the level had dropped but it was now apparent that the cap wasn't the only issue as there was a dribble of coolant from the bottom drivers side of the radiator. The opposite side to the bottom hose so not likely to be that. I asked the Volvo parts bod to price up a radiator (£288+vat and has to come from Sweden) for reference and said I'd investigate further.

Anyway, I fitted the new plugs (seems to idle lower and run smoother on a quick test run around the block, so fingers crossed for an extra 1 mpg!).




And then checked where the radiator was leaking, looks to be where the plastic end tank joins the main section aluminium part. It has an oil cooler in this end of the radiator too, but no sign of leaks there or cross contamination.




I dried it off, ran the car and confirmed it gets slightly damp as the car warms up, very little coolant loss but certainly needs sorting ASAP. I topped the coolant up with the proper green Volvo stuff and now need to investigate whether a decent aftermarket radiator will do as over £300 for a genuine one seems steep even though the part (and car) will likely outlast me :

I like these old buses.
They made a huge impression on me when they arrived in Touring cars competition.
Great to see yours getting so well kept.

Hi Stu, I’m pretty sure it was you that I bought an oak green mk2 golf from a good few years back now (actually thinking on, I think you bought it back off me!).

Either ways, just enjoyed reading through this, I’ve a lot of respect for these old swedes. I was renovating a house a couple of years back and ended up buying a poverty spec 2.0 to use as a van, for £156 off eBay (which should give some indication as to its state). Well I cannot tell you the abuse that that poor vehicle sustained and it’s only complaint was to throw off an HT lead - the original 23 year old part. Two years on and with pretty much zero maintenance it’s still going - I gave it to my stepdad.

I can imagine a well sorted T5 to be pretty much all the car you’d ever need and yours looks very well sorted now.

I’m good thanks and the same to you!

I’ve had absolutely all kinds in the intervening years. Until very recently I had a company car so I always had some form of chod to mess about with. Off the top of my head that’s included Alfa GTV V6, GF8 Impreza WRX, Pug 306 GTI-6, Prelude, W202 C250 Turbodiesel, AE82 Corolla GT, Mk1 MR2 (owned that twice)...

I decided I should get a sensible car after losing the company car so got an E39 530d Touring Auto which I liked but my commute is stop start all the way for an hour and it was doing 25mpg and had a dodgy injector so in my infinite wisdom I bought something “a bit newer and cheaper to run”...

An Alfa 147 Ducati Corse (it’s just a runout model diesel with +20bhp and an LSD) which rewarded me by lunching it’s clutch 4 weeks after purchase 😑. I’m actually sat up in bed now with back ache because I replaced the front disks & pads earlier and had to go nuclear on some very well seized caliper carrier bolts. Why do we do it, eh?

Nothing too exciting to report on the Volvo, daily commuting is going well, I keep feeding it petrol and now cover around 500 miles/month at 21mpg average commuting, plus a bit of weekend mileage.
Oh, I fitted new tyres in Dec, same spec Uniroyal Rainsports to match the rears which are still fine (T5s consume front tyres and petrol quite rapidly).

Aside from that, when it was particularly cold weather I noticed what appeared to be exhaust fumes entering the cabin. I checked all the usual bits and pieces looking for petrol leaks, exhaust leaks, PCV blockages etc. and found nothing wrong, but one thing that may be the culprit as it only happened in heavy commuter traffic.

The fact the car, like many of these, has never had a cabin filter fitted. The fresh air intake for the heater is here in the scuttle panel. I believe the absence of filters has led to the deterioration of many A/C evaporators too as that lives down there with the heater blower behind the dash and gets a bit damp if this gets full of leaves. I wonder if that's what happened to mine?




Anyway, as I didn't have anywhere to fit a filter I did some reading on what's needed and found a helpful chap on the Volvo forum was breaking a C70 which did have a filter fitted so had a different part to house it that would fit mine. He posted it to me for a modest fee. Here it is with a new cabin filter...




I swapped the part over and fitted the filter. No fume problems since (yes, I did reconnect the strut brace afterwards...)




Closing in on 173k miles now.

Don't tempt me, I'd love another but already have too many cars and projects still waiting attention.