Paul’s misadventures - testing times

It's ridiculous that I spend so much time on the cheap, clunky, leaky and generally unpleasant retro chode in my life and so little time on what's by far the best driver's car I own...so today it was time to put that right and give the 911 a little loving.

I've been endeavouring to drive her at least once a week as I've never known a car that didn't like driving as much as this 996. I left her trickle charging but she's barely seen daylight in the last few months and she came out of the garage groaning, complaining, smoking, chugging and misfiring a few weeks ago. A gentle-ish essential trip to Tescos to get her properly warmed up and all her ills went away, leaving her purring like the German kitten I know she is. When I first bought her I was worried I'd bought a nail but a bit of reading would suggest that these 'foibles' are to be expected. Like it or not the engine design is nearly 25 years old, and it just hates not being used - oil leaks through the flat cylinders to create an impressive smoke bomb on startup if left too long, leaving them idling to warm up only makes things worse (and is a HUGE no-no), and they eat coil packs like smarties. I've decided to call it 'character'.

For the last few months something has felt a bit off-ish in the suspension...she was a bit floaty and twitchy at speed, and every cat's eye or puddle jerked the steering wheel. I changed from the more worn out OEM winter wheels to my shiny black semi-forged super lightweight race numbers (with new tyres) and it didn't make much difference. Of course the missus thought it was all in my head. Like all good paranoid car owners with too much time and access to Google I was warming up the parts cannon to fire a grand's worth of drop links, coffin arms, tie rods etc. etc. at the car - but then I thought I'd let a specialist have a look first.

Cue a trip to TyreSmart in Witham (I've been going there for years) and my suspicions were proven correct. With apologies for the filth on the car.





This stuff goes way beyond me, but they correctly identified that the steering wheel was a little off to the left...however his main concern was the toe in on the rear wheels. This perfectly explained the symptoms I was feeling about being skittish in puddles and on uneven surfaces.

Then for the fun part - the aluminium frame combined with steel bolts made for some 'interesting' hammering noises, and by his own admission the old girl put up a fight. I'd watched enough YouTube videos of working on Porsche suspension to know I'd rather leave this one to the pros, but after an hour of clunking and banging we had this



I know enough to know that red is bad, green is good!

Now, every time I go here they always tell me 'it'll drive like a new car' afterwards - and frankly every time they are right. He reported a clean bill of health on the suspension parts themselves, and assured me they do hundreds of these as they're very sensitive to alignment issues.

The rain was hurtling down on the way home - conditions that would have made me nervous previously - but this felt planted, compliant, well balanced and reassuring. I didn't push it - I'm not an idiot - but for less than £100 my confidence in the old girl is totally restored!

Sounds like a right bargain for the suspension geometry, get that money back on proper tyre wear.
Taxi still fun to see, can see that working as a local family / tip run hack.
James

So despite having no time, money or storage I seem to have added to the fleet 😬

I've always lusted after an 850 Volvo. Spacious, boxy, ultra safe...I feel like their curve of uncoolness has bottomed out and now their kudos is rising...

Yes it's not a T5R...it's equipped with the 20v 2.0 engine in automatic flavour, cloth interior (one fag burn only), steelies, tow bar and wheel trims for extra giffer points.
, tow
More importantly it's got a full year's ticket, new cam belt and 107k on the clock, which we all know is nothing on these engines.














No aircon, no electric sunroof, so less to go wrong in my eyes. All other electrics seem to be working, heated seats are extra toasty, even the original stereo is fine.

Plans? Not a lot. Unlike some of my cars I intend to keep this standard. It needs 2 front tyres and the paintwork is nothing to shout about, so I'll be doing with that what I can. More importantly, it looks like this will be the chosen chariot for the Weekender!

I love these, I was lucky enough to have had an 850r estate.
One of the best all-rounders and such a capable car, would love another.
As you say 100000 miles is nothing, I've never bought a Volvo with less than a hundred thousand miles.
Good luck with it, it looks pretty tidy, does it have the seven seat option ?

Would have loved an 850r but values of those are only going one way - and they're too rich for my blood. Just 5 seats, which is preferable as I've got the dog to get in the back

Short update - bit more time spent on the brick. After a recent jaunt I was alarmed to find that the O/S/F indicator lens had just upped and left. Poof. Vanished. This was all that remained.



Weird. It survived a good blasting with the pressure washer, and must have fallen off...somewhere. Never mind, £20 on eBay later and



Yes, it's chipped. No it didn't come like that. Ol' brainiac here decided to leave it on the roof on a really windy day. A gust of wind and...crack. At least the damage is relatively minimal...it'll do for now. Glad I checked because I hadn't noticed the blown bulb. Thankfully I had a spare kicking around in the toolbox.



Front tyres were quite badly perished on collection, purely through age.



Pirelli p4000? I'd heard of the p6000...



Ah, that'll be why. So, the choice was either to replace the tyres, or try and source some wheels.

My luck has been in recently and these period-correct 16" OEM alloys turned up only 40 minutes away. Deal done.



Now here's the mystery...my car/garage app lists the car as being simultaneously a 2.0l and a 2.4l depending on which page you look at. V5 lists it as a 2.0. Cambelt cover disagrees...



B5252S is definitely the 2.5l 10v engine, assuming of course that the sticker is correct. I need to get in there and have a good look at the block.

Well, there it is.



I just gained (according to Wikipedia) 18bhp and 27lb ft of torque. Free remap!

It's looking increasingly likely that the campervan still won't be ready for the Weekender, so this will most probably be the chariot of choice. Delightful!

Well, if you guessed that yesterday's load being lugged in the Ovlov was new shoes for the 911 - then you're correct!



19" 997 911 wheels, affectionately known as 'lobster claws' - although mention it in the wrong circles and you'll be flamed as some insist they are lobster forks. I don't care, I've just always liked them - I think they're a thoroughly modern-looking OEM wheel and I've been trying to source a set at a reasonable price for ages. These came up reasonably locally, a bit of toing-and-froing ensued, and eventually a deal was done with the previous owner who took them off his 997 because he'd upgraded to some very shiny BBS multi-spoke numbers.



Just for reference here's how she looked this morning with the ultra lightweight and very racey numbers attached - it's all just a bit too much black for me though.



Ah, so what's going on here, I hear you ask...that's now how you change wheels. Well, the aircon in her has never worked. "Just needs a regas" says the dealer when purchased. So I took her for a regas and she wasn't holding pressure...of course. Most likely the condensers or the compressor - thankfully neither are too expensive (if it's the compressor it's - off the top of my head - a Lucas part available for a huge number of different cars), but I knew I'd never cleared out the condensers at the front so I ordered a pair. This was last...July? They've sat gathering dust ever since. What can I say? She kinda has built in aircon anyway.

Taking the front bumper off was entertaining at best - clearly someone's been here before. Some screws are missing, some are the wrong size, and there's a big variety of T25, 27 and a rogue 30 Torx holding it all on. And a random screw or two. Not encouraging. But she came apart pretty much as expected to reveal this.



Ah, but do not be fooled young adventurer - they always look like that from this side. Take off the plastic shrouds and







Yes, that all fell out of the near side in one go.



I think I found the problem.

To guard against this a previous owner had fashioned their own very ill-fitting grilles from, as far as I can make out, chicken wire and black mastic.





Come on now - this is a Porsche 911, it deserves better.




Now aftermarket grilles carry a ridiculous scene tax - I get it - but this is ridiculous. And clearly these made no difference to junk getting in there.

Thankfully the O/S wasn't quite so bad...



Shiny bits ready for fitting



So thus began the very satisfying process of removing the old units (they're only held in two 7mm hex head fittings - even the crusty one came apart with a bit of Plusgas and some persuasion) and cleaning out with an old toothbrush and compressed air...



I was surprised to find the new units already had a short 14mm bolt in each plug, and the ends capped off with rubber.



Why, you ask? Well, removing the bolts (which took some persuading tbh) revealed a very pleasing WHOOSH-hisssss noise. I presume they're plugged up and pressure tested in the factory before testing, and it saves time and energy to just leave the plugs in. Gave me the fright of my life on the first one I can tell you.



Refitting is the reversal of removal

Were a couple of the Torx bolts rounded? Naturally. Did I have any spare? Of course not. Did I replace them with some very creative and artistic use of cable ties? Not in any of the pictures I'm going to show you I can assure you. From starting on the bumper to dropping the wheels took 2 1/2 hours-ish, with a stop for a sandwich and several cups of tea. Getting the splash guards wrestled in place under the bumpers was the tricky but as usual...I never can get the hang of manipulating them back into place easily.



Reassembled and new shoes on - 25mm spacer at the rear, 15mm spacer at the front and she's sitting purty. A good day's work :-)

Now to book in for a regas and see if I was right after all - there's no doubt that at least one - if not both - of the condensers were shot, but we'll wait and see whether it was just that...

Been trying to give the Ovlov some love, but man she's been fighting me of late.

When inspecting and cleaning the engine bay I found this upper engine mount was FUBAR.





Getting it out was the easy bit - it had practically self-ejected itself already.





That's where the fun stopped. The new pattern part was just a smidge too wide, despite my homebrew bearing press made of threaded rod, square washers and some pre-drilled chunks of wood. I had to break out the Dremel and taper an edge down on one side, along with half a gallon of WD40, to eeeeeeeaaaaassssseeeeeeee her on in there.

Man that's ugly.



Next time (and there most probably will be a next time) I'll do what the internet said and get one of those split polybush kits instead.

Yesterday my sister was moving house, so of course the Ovlov was called into service. Got down there, loaded up, only to find a large puddle of coolant forming under the OSF of the car, directly under the lower rad hose. Balls. Topped up the coolant reservoir and made a dash to unload (thankfully only a few miles up the road, and in the direction of home), and get the car back to base before ending up stranded. Of course, to add insult to injury this light came on





No idea.

The manual tells me this is an emissions fault, so I go to plug in the code reader.

Ah, no code reader. 1994 is pre-OBD2.

So, what to do? Well, this is where things get really cool (in my eyes) because Volvo were way ahead of me here.

This is the onboard diagnostic port located in the engine bay. Catchily entitled 'Fenix 5.2', you take the supplied pin, plug it into Port no.2, and press the 'A' button...then count the LED flashes



I had something similar in my old KA9 Honda Legend, but you had to
Find the diagnostic plug under the passenger side dash
bridge it with a paperclip
run around to the dashboard
count the different light flashes on the dash.

This...well this was child's play by comparison.

'Scanned' it twice, threw up one code: 3-1-4.

Quick cross reference to Google indicates Camshaft Position Sensor fault. This makes sense actually, as she's been slightly rough starting, running quite rich and definitely giving even worse MPG than I'd anticipated - at a rough calculation less than 20mpg.

New part ordered!

Also managed to find this plug dangling loose under the battery - any and all suggestions welcome!






So, back to the coolant leak. Parked up, ran her for 20 minutes - idle, under load, fan on - the works. No leak. Bone dry. Drier than a peppermint fart. Rad has seen better days though. I'd rather not change it if I can avoid it - not because of the cost, but because most of the hoses and hose clamps look thoroughly rusted and I fear I'd be entering a whole world of pain getting them off. Looks to me like it'll drop straight out the bottom if needs be though.








There's some telltale red crustiness under there, and I managed to get fully 3 turns on the radiator drain plug as it wasn't particularly snug...guess I'll just monitor it?

I have trouble keeping fully up to date with the constant fleet changes, and don't remember that pressure washer before  , but i deffo only recall you having one child?