advice on buying a 240 please

I've been looking at an '89 240 wagon with just under 200,000km. Its in decent shape with a bit of rust on the tailgate and a bit on the fenders. The rest of the body is decent. The owner has recently put a new starter in, a new muffler, and changed the pads in the front about a year ago. His elderly father has been driving it for about 4 yrs and another family owned it before since '89. I took it for a test drive and it seems to have a rubbing sound coming from the front brakes as I take off from stop position but it goes away fairly quickly until the next stop. I haven't taken it to a mechanic yet but from looking underneath it seems to have a possible fuel leak on the top of the fuel tank, and may have an oil leak on the rear of the engine. The guy is asking $2000 as is, or $2500 safetied. I've been looking for a 240 for a while but they seem to get snatched up around here (Toronto, ON, CAN) in less than 24 hrs of posting on the major classified sites. This one is somewhat un-advertised and I came across it by accident. The owner isn't really in a rush to sell and hasn't put it on the regular spots such as Autotrader, Craigslist, etc. Does anyone have an opinion on this before I take it to my mechanic? Any advice would be nice!

Thanks. cton.

Reply to
cton
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YO

here in the us...NYC you can get that stuff for a little cheakper....

cheaper...

but you are talking canadian dollars prolly.....

some thing like that is about 1300- 1500 USD....and its gonna needs some attention to the front brakes....maybe the new pads were put on wrong or sumptin

hey, if you work on the car yourself...could be a good deal...

check out hte volvo forums....swedespeed.comand brickboard.com and turbobricks.com

that should help;

I just got a 87 760 turbo wagon ...225k miles 500 usd.....but that was REALLY good deal...raare

timing just right

ct> I've been looking at an '89 240 wagon with just under 200,000km. Its in

Reply to
surfbug

Sounds like you scored a pretty sweet deal with your 760. Thanks for your experience in NYC. I've decided that I'm going to keep looking for a better vehicle or deal. I called the guy back today and offered him $1200 CAN for the car and he eventually said he would come down to $1800, as is. This is still too steep in my mind for the condition, so i'm gonna keep looking. I do plan on working on the car myself, but would rather find one with less rust and problems if possible. A few

240 wagons usually come up for sale every other week or so... we have our share of them up here, but usually they're pretty rusty. Seems they go for anywhere from $800 - $5000 depending on condition. Thanks for the links and enjoy the turbo!

surfbug wrote:

Reply to
cton

Funny, I got a '87 740 Turbo sedan for $500 which also had 225K on it at the time. That was 6 years ago and I'm still driving it.

Reply to
James Sweet

$2000 Cdn. is too high. You would be getting an old car with lots of miles and unknown rust problems (there's bound to be more than what's visible). I had one a few years ago. It did very well for 100K plus (miles) in northern Ohio and it seemed to go for many miles more for the person I sold it to (at least he didn't come looking for his money back). The main weak spot for me was the exhaust system -- replace the whole thing when one of the mufflers or pipes rusts out. I also found that I had to replace all of the fuses every few years because the ends corroded and various electrical things went dead unexpectedly including the ignition. That's cheap and easy, however. I did the front brakes a couple of times -- also replaced everything -- rotors, pads, etc.

The rear oil leak is a seal. I don't recall if that was expensive to fix or not -- seems like there was much that had to be taken apart to get at it.

I spent days replacing the heater motor when it failed. It's impossible to get to it unless you take the dash apart; but it is a do-it-yourself project as long as you don't mind laying upside down on your head for hours on end. You might ask any seller you contact if that's been done since you do need the heater in Toronto.

I had the gas leaks too. I think they were due to the seals for the access holes or fuel pump.

Check the lights on the rear tail gate. If they don't work, there's probably a break in the wiring harness that goes through the hinge. It's best to install a new harness rather than try to splice the wire.

But, it was a good car. I loved the room for hauling stuff and the part that I thought would be an expensive problem (the computer) never gave any grief. It always started in the cold too.

Good luck.

TKM

Reply to
TKM

hey...just got home after driving about 150 miles....car is great!

few things....

OD we all know they never work

the climate control only comes out of the defrost....I hate that! gonna do a search...any one know how to fix that?

and....the front brake rotor was locked....or not addjusted right, have to rip into that tomorrow....

hey,.....but I did get it washed!

hahahahhaha

al TKM wrote:

Reply to
surfbug

Might be just a switch or fuse though.

Probably not a biggie. Take the glove compartment out (easy) and fool around with the hoses and flaps. May be just a leaky air hose.

I smell a new brake assembly.

If it stayed in one piece through the car wash, rejoice.

TKM

Reply to
TKM

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