My brother-in-law's new 1996 940 GLE with 2.3 Turbo B230FK engine has now developed more serious problems after about 1-2 weeks of driving.
- When we got the car the oil was full up to the max mark, but there was a lot of crud in the valve cover area. There seemed to be the usual leaks on the filler cap and valve cover gasket.
- The oil light came on and on checking the dip stick showed no oil atall, after a top up normal operation was resumed.
- We just serviced it today with flushing oil then semi-synth oil and a volvo filter, aswell as cleaning the crud from the valve cover and the head as much as possible, fitting new valve cover gasket and oil filler seal. There was alot of crud on the tops of the cam bearings, around the side and in the wells that lub the tappet buckets. Inspecting the turbo pipe to the intercooler showed a normal amount of oil. (better than either of the Turbos I have had in my 95 car). 5 min test drive was ok.
- On the way home the owner saw the oil light on again, stopped for a while, tried it again and it was still comming on. The oil level seemed ok but a top up seemed to sort it, but only for a short distance, maybe 10 minutes. He reported some funny noise, maybe squealing but was unclear. This happen repeatedly on his 25 mile journey home.
I guess its possible we caused some problems with the flakey crud comming off with the flushing additive and cleaning the top end with a screwdriver which could be now lodged in the oil pump input filter, but I feel the initial loss is unexplained and we have just exhaserbated the problem rather than caused it.
The next time I see the car I will check the oil in the head if it filling up indicating blocked return, but surely that would be shown by a low oil level.
My next step seems possibly a flush and short run with diesel, and then pull out and clean or replace the oil pump. Would this be wasted and does the engine just need a complete clean and rebuild, say if the return oilways were blocked?
I get the impression the trader has done something to temporarily get rid of the problem to sell the car, and will not honour the sale of good act without a court case. Especially since he sold it 'as is' (I know this is irrelevant if he sold it for normal use).