Category: Work

This past week I got a the headlight wiring pigtails I needed from Dave over at 240turbo.com. I was finally ready to get the headlights sorted out. Both lights went to my basement shop where I proceeded to clip out all the parts of the wiring with missing insulation, crimp the new wiring onto the end, and put heat shrink tube over the parts I couldn’t just remove. I reinstalled and, with the help of my son and a heat gun, made sure the head shrink was good and shrunk.

The end result was a pair of North American style headlights that both work and have wiring that isn’t potentially ready to short out in a light rain.

Success!

It dawned on me that despite still waiting on a few parts I actually had enough of them on hand to put the driver side door back together. This was the door that had suffered water damage previously, so the first step was to recreate the missing vapor barrier. My oldest son helped me out with that by copying the pattern for the existing barrier on the passenger side and cutting it out of a contractor garbage bag. Our bags were in the 5 MIL thickness range which was good enough for our purposes.

The Volvo HT-204 speaker mounts the car had come with were not in great shape. I had to glue a few things together an instead of pop rivets to hold them on I used small nuts and bolts. This would make it easier to take the off again if I ever decided to change them. Unfortunately the configuration of the screw holes that attached the actual speakers to the HT-204’s was very unusual. The original speakers were approximately 5.25″ in size but the holes for the mounting screws were in very different places. This required me to snip and bend a few pieces of the speaker’s metal. That’s always a sort of scary process, but after some fiddling and fussing I got the speaker in securely enough. After that it was just a matter of attaching the barrier, connecting the speaker, mounting the the panel, and then adding the various handles and fixtures.

And there we have it! A complete, if somewhat dirty, driver’s side door. Now to find the guide casings for the other three and I’ll be set.

Even though it now boasted a shiny new grille, my one-eyed, wiper-less car was starting to get side eyes from the neighbors. The time to fix the missing headlight was nigh. The new American light was in my basement shop ready for refurbishment. Primarily the lens needed sealing and cementing with silicone. I washed the greasy dirt that had accumulated in on the surface and scraped the old sealer from around the edges. This was in preparation for a bead of Lexel clear silicone in the groove where the lens would sit. In the meantime the 9004 socket had arrived in the mail so I was now ready to fix the car side of the equation.

Finally Time To Work

Unfortunately the weather was not cooperating. Over the past week it had already been raining steadily, but thankfully on Saturday morning there was a short pause. I took that opportunity to attach the 9004 socket to the wires that used to connect to the old H4 socket I had removed. I had previously considered soldering the wires together, but given that these wires would be next to a running engine in a bouncing car this probably would not have been durable enough. Instead I decided to use water-proof butt splice connectors attached using a crimping tool. That would, as the name suggests, make the join water proof and provide an amount of physical strength. The biggest problem I had was that I wasn’t sure which wire was for the high beams and which for the low. Looking at the existing left-hand light was no help as its 9004 socket was very hastily assembled from a H4 socket like the one I had taken out from the other side and some spade terminals. The whole deal was then bound together with some purple electrical tape. I sighed, removed it, and mentally filed another entry on the to-do list. Anyway, given how the rain was slowly starting back up, I decided quickly that the red wire was the high beam and spliced it all up. I cut out the spade terminals on the 9004 connector for the other light and spliced them in the same way. The result? The headlights worked, but since it was still sort of light out I wasn’t sure if the high beam setting was really producing more light. I’d have to wait until dark to see.

I also put the reconditioned windshield wiper arms back on too.

The Next Day

Next my oldest son and I decided to take the other light out so we could clean it up. It was then that I noticed the connector for the blinker and running lights was half way missing. The “sleeve” side that made contact with the pins from the light was missing its housing and had just sort of been stuck on and taped up along with the headlight wires. Also the grounding wire was just sort of wedged under the battery. Was it actually grounding anything? I have no idea, but it came out with the light assembly. I’ll have to order a new connector and, in the meantime, clean up this light as I had done with the other.

I also tested the lights the proper way by using a multimeter to measure the voltage Sure enough I had the wires backwards. I undid the crimps, pulled the splices off and redid them properly.

Next up: get the other light back in and make sure the blinkers all work as expected.

Now that the new grille had been installed and I had found a replacement for the missing corner trim piece I decided it was time to clear those bits from out of the trunk area and actually get them on the car. This time my daughter assisted me by gently tapping slightly misshaped parts into place.

I also finally received my replacement handle from Tasca parts. It has been a little rainy here for the last couple of days and I was concerned about water getting into the hole where the old handle had been, so when the handle arrived I was eager to reinstall. However I wasn’t entirely sure how the handle worked. There was a spring involved, that much I could figure out by looking at the old parts. My initial thought was that this spring attached directly to the handle but the parts just didn’t line up in any way that would make that either effective or even possible. I looked at the opposite door for wn example, and it showed that the little doodad that was connected to the threaded rod that actuated the latch was supposed to sit in between the hook part if the handle. The spring was actually attached from that to the door. Here’s what it looks like all put together.

Note the black screw. The old handle was missing one so I had to fabricate a new one (using a hacksaw) from a longer screw I already had.

And here is the handle installed!

Four of the five doors on my car have functional handles both inside and out. Fancy, no? I’m also progressing on the interior door trim but until I source some guide casings for the latch handles It’ll have to wait.

I won this grille from eBay for a relative steal, so now my car doesn’t look quite as decrepit as it once did. Tomorrow the 9004 plug should arrive and I’ll try to get the new headlight in. as well as the newly complete set of front trim pieces.

My son and I took a few minutes yesterday evening to remove the right hand “E Code” headlight. It wasn’t a difficult task, but it did require us to unbolt the retaining strap of the radiator overflow tank and move it out of the way so that we could move the windshield wiper fluid reservoir out of the way to get to the bolt that the turn signal light ground wire was connected to with a ring terminal.

After that it was just a matter of removing the three bolts that kept the assembly attached to the frame. As I suspected the E Code light had an H4 bulb connector that had handy spring locks for the wire leads, so removal in anticipation of replacing it with the 9004 style connector used on American headlights was easy and required no wire cutting. Once that new one comes in I will probably solder it together and then cover it with shrink tube for the sake of durability.

I also have a new grille and a few other bits and bobs coming. Once I get the handle guide casings (they’re all pretty much broken) and a few other things the car will almost be in drivable shape. There are still many, many things that need doing, but having functional lights and a method of getting in and out of the car from all seats is a big deal to me.

Today’s car work started out with something a bit superficial. The windshield wiper arms had a bit of rust on them, and that would not do. I removed them all and let my younger son pitch in with the sand paper to try and smooth out the finish a little in preparation for painting. The idea was to get the surface even and ready for some shots of flat black spray paint

I took them over to my “painting bricks” in the back yard where I do all my spray painting and hit them all with Rust-Oleum flat black enamel.

The initial results look promising. The rust on one of the arms was more than just surface level and that is still a little visible, but that can be hidden by putting the ugly side downwards.

Latch Work

I then moved on to the nagging problem of driver’s side door latch not working from the inside. I have a strong belief that when leaving a car one should not have to roll down the window and reach outside to open the door. Call me old fashioned, but it’s just a conviction I hold close to my heart. I fiddled with the latch a bit, and after comparing it to the functional latch on the passenger side I saw that the mechanism just wasn’t moving up to engage enough. Mechanically it all looked sound so I guessed at there being some gumming-up going on, hit the whole thing with some of that sweet, sweet Aerokroil. A few minutes later I had a functional latch!

Next was the completely non-functional rear left hand door handle. I once again took the inside door panel off so I could see the mechanism and saw that when pulled the handle was supposed to pull on a spring that actuates the latch mechanism using a metal rod, but that spring had slipped off.

Easy fix, right? I got it back on pretty easily but the handle still didn’t work. Only then I noticed that one of the screws holding the handle to the door wasn’t actually there, and when I removed the other one and took the handle off I quickly saw that the handle itself was completely broken. The metal “ear” where the handle hinged had sheared off!

That’ll have to be replaced. I looked around on the web and learned that 1992 240 had a different style of handle than the model years before it. Instead of a shiny handle a matte-black one was used. But my broken handle was not matte-black. When I looked at the other three handles on my car, sure enough they were the expected black color. After seeing the prices of the genuine 1992 style handle it became apparent quite quickly. A previous owner had broken the original handle and, seeing how expensive they were to replace, decided to buy a much cheaper after market pre-92 handle with the shiny finish. They fit, but a common complaint about these after market handles was that the metal was cheap and often times broke within a few years of installation – exactly what had happened to mine. Remembering the old adage “buy cheap, buy twice” I decided the just shell out for the proper handle. When it arrives in about a week I’ll re-install it and finally have a car that all passengers can enter and exit at will.

After getting the broken latch handle off the rear seat the other day I was stuck (no pun intended) on actual getting the latches to disengage. No matter how hard I yanked on the bit of wire that was poking out nothing would happen. Not wanting to break anything, I backed off and took a little time to think. Last night while sitting on my porch enjoying the (long overdue) nice weather I tried to picture how the latches worked. It was obvious that the wire was attached to the latches and that they ran inside the seat, so I thought that perhaps if I pulled on those wires a little closer to the latch I’d get better leverage on them. From the back seat I lowered the center arm rest there and worked my arms through the slits in the seat fabric inside and was just able to grab onto either wire near to where it connected to the lock. A bit of semi-gentle tugging and voilà – the latches spring and the seat folded down. That allowed me to get some of that magic Aerokroil into the latches to free things up and almost immediately I could lock and unlock the seat just by pulling up on the wires from where they meet by the latch handle hole. Now to reinstall that part and I’ll call that done.

Update:

I got it in!

And the seat forward to prove it

I usually only have time to work on the car on the weekends. This past weekend was quite busy which, sadly, meant no work got done. I have on hand a few parts that I’ve been itching to get them installed, so after I got home today I took a few minutes to see what I could get done. First, and easiest, was to put the dash back together. That was just a matter of four screws and some snap-in panels.

Tada! I noticed that the headlight/parking light control knob had a weird yellowish tint to it, and I tried to clean it as best as I can but it’s still got that weird color. It looks pretty grody so it’ll get replaced at some point.

I also started working on the rear seat latch. The original was broken when I got the car and got even more broken when I messed with it trying to put the seat down. So I removed the old one, mostly to get a look at the wires that connect to the seat locks. Even after prying it off I still couldn’t get the wires to move, so something must be stuck somewhere. That will require further probing when I have time.

Of course, the frame around the latch broke the moment I tried to pry it off. You can see bits of it in the top part of this photo showing the old latch next to the new.

This time the arrival of parts was a bit unexpected. I knew they were coming, but because of the 20th century-based vagueness of the USPS’s tracking capabilities I didn’t know they’d come today. So it was a fun surprise.

What Did I Get?

Most of the parts were small – clips and such – and the big box had the door pockets I had ordered. Those will have to wait til the weekend for installation. In the meantime I put the other things were they belonged. Namely as replacement for the numerous lost or broken clips that came with the car.

The first photo is the driver’s side of the cargo area and the two clips shown keep the cover on over the spire tire. The second photo is the passenger seat’s foot space under the glove box. Note two of the mystery wires that run the length of the car. I have no idea what they are connected to, but give the apparent condition of the wiring that runs through the tailgate hinges to things like the defroster and wiper I can only guess that they’re jury-rigging something important. Obviously, we will find out in due time.

My son helped me replace the retaining clips for the sun shades, and I took the opportunity to reconnect the instrument cluster. All seemed good there although I should really drive around the block a few times to make sure things truly work.

A Small Related Project

The trip reset button had broken at some point, so instead of paying nearly $40 for a NOS replacement I decided to repair mine. The clip has a long, thing, somewhat flexible rod onto which snaps the button part you press in to reset the trip counter under the odometer. That broke off and refused to be securely glued back together, so instead I drilled a small hole in the clip part slightly smaller than the diameter of the rod itself, wedged the rod in there, and then cemented it with plastic weld.

Worked like a charm, and farm preferable to spending money.

Today was one of those great days I’m coming to know as a “parts via post day.” I had gotten an email earlier in the morning telling me that my instrument cluster parts were on their way. I got that antsy feeling you get when you see that “OUT FOR DELIVERY” notification on the UPS tracking site. Around 5:30 the parts finally arrived.

That’s the odometer gear and light bulbs for the dash in those bags. I took them to the workbench where the instrument cluster has been waiting. I very quickly installed the gear with no issues and observed the gear engaging and turning the odometer numbers a little. The odometer drive was then re-attached to the odometer/speedometer body and that to the cluster itself.

I then tasked my son with putting the new bulbs into their plugs on the cluster .

FLÖSSER! Lights were screwed in, instruments reinstalled, and plastic screen cleaned up a little. I would have loved to put the whole thing back into the car, but it was getting late and the light was dim so I’ll have to do that a different day.

Glove Box Hinge

So far every session with this car has brought revelations of more broken things. For example, I received the new hinge for the glove box in the mail yesterday. After picking the broken bits of the previous hinge out of the box’s door I was able to install the new one easily. However the hinge kept banging into something when closing. I got nervous that this seemingly simple fix was going to be more complicated that I anticipated. The glovebox is a single unit, so I removed a few screws and slide it out of the dashboard to check what was going on. Thankfully it was just some easily repositioned component causing the obstruction, but now that I had the box out and could see it from a different angle I noticed that the not only was the latch striker not original to the car but was also attached with two random wood screws that had been screwed into the plastic housing of the glovebox. Obviously not acceptable, so now I have to find a replacement. I think a pick-and-pull yard might be the best bet for something like that. For now the box will have to hang open.

Tailgate Latch

The gate opens and closes but doesn’t catch, nor does the exterior latch actually actuate the mechanism. I removed the entire assembly, latch, handle, and all, and everything seemed to be in order, but I couldn’t figure out how the exterior latch was linked to the mechanism itself. I looked at the diagrams in my manual and they seemed to suggest there was some part missing, but what that part was wasn’t evident. And to top it off I noticed that the trim piece where the interior handle is was broken. Boo.

Incidentally, I’m sending a special shout-out to Kano for Aerokroil Penetrating Oil. If you have two pieces of metal that are rusted together Kroil will sort you out. It’s almost like magic.

Odometer

As the old saying goes “the third issue with your decades old Volvo’ a charm.” In my workshop, deep in the bowels of my house (aka the basement), I removed the odometer from the cluster and the drive from the odometer. Sure enough the 25 tooth gear inside was missing a tooth, so I ordered a replacement plus a new set of lightbulbs for good measure.

Once those parts arrive and I get them into the cluster and the cluster back into the dashboard I’ll call that one done.

Today was the first work day! First on the list…

Vacuum

Brittle Plastic

I put my son on that detail and moved on to trying to get the driver side inside latch working. It’s funny how once you start taking things apart how many more broken things you find! The first thing I learned is that 26 year old plastic is very, very brittle.

This was the trim around a door handle. Now it is just bits. Oh well.

Door Cards

I got the arm rests off and then the interior door panel only to find that most of the clips had long ago broken and that the panel’s cardboard-like backing material was… not in good shape.

There was no vapor barrier and obviously at some point it got wet. Parts of it flaked off and disintegrated when touched. The panel is still useable but I’m wondering if I’ll eventually have to buy a replacement. I won’t be surprised of the rest of the doors are the same.

Instrument Cluster And Oil

I monkeyed with the latch but couldn’t see anything obvious. Not wanting to remove the latch completely quite yet, I put that aside and instead removed the instrument cluster in preparation for repairing the odometer.

I then noticed that the pin holding the upper hinge of the door together was half way out, so I set it back into its hole and hammered it in.

And for good measure I hit the hinges of all the doors with some grease. That made a big difference. No more rusty, clacking sound when they opened and closed. I also hit the hood lock with some Kroil and got that unstuck so now I could finally open the hood AT WILL!

However I also found that the grill, although more or less intact-looking, was actually broken once you get the hood open and are able to examine it. It will definitely need to be replaced at some point, but it’s non-critical.

Tomorrow, time allowing, I’ll probably take a look at the instruments and get that odometer figured out. I’ve ready that a single gear in there has a tendency to fail over time and it may just be a matter of buying a new one.