• RWD

  • Greg's Paddock Basher MK III

OK, because I don't have enough COVID projects, I decided to do up another car as a paddock basher/farm hack/pusher/puller/wood carting car. The basis is the burgundy 93 240 wagon that provided the donor B230FX for my yellow 245 project car. I already gave away the auto transmission, so I had to pull the auto from one of my other parts cars (1990 240GL)...and the engine is coming from my previous paddock basher - 93 240 that should have been a B230FX but was in fact a B230E block and head swapped into the 93 as the owner cooked the FX (don't ask me how). Anyway, that engine has been sitting in the shed taking up space, so motivation to get it into the burgundy wagon. I've stripped the interior and sold a lot of trim bits off the wagon already, so it's beyond getting back to a roadworthy car, plus the paint is off, it has a bit of rust around the windscreen, and several dents and creases here and there. It looks MUCH better in these photos than it actually is. A mate gave me some old but never used rally tyres that I'll swap onto some 15 inch alloys (as they're currently mounted on 140 wheels that I don't think will clear the 240 front brakes, and offset is wrong). I have the engine and trans ready to go back in, and tonight I power-washed the slime off the car and cleaned up the engine bay. I'm going to swap in the manual steering rack from the 1980 245 parts car for simplicity. Will not have AC but I do plan to have a heater. Thinking about how I can get a bit of extra ride height cheap (spacers between spring a body??) and who knows, maybe some day I'll make it into a ute? I'll be throwing on some new parts from my stash, including thermostat, hoses, brake hoses, crank angle sensor, etc. Unfortunately I already sold the front end panel assembly, and then with no bonnet latch when it was sitting outside a wind gust caught the bonnet and flipped it up and bent it and buggered the hinges. I've grabbed the nose cone, bonnet and hinges off the green 90 sedan. Maybe I'll paint it with a roller - art car style? Hmm, need inspiration! Maybe pink like the outback pub car? No! Let the fun begin!

I like it burgundy, not a common colour .

Should have a diesel in it!

Did a bit more work on the paddock basher today. Pulled out the power steering rack and installed manual rack from the 1980 245. Easy peasy with no engine in place. Also removed some of the extraneous AC plumbing.

Got the idea from a post on FB - a guy had rusty rear spring seats so replaced them with water pump pulleys...Whoa! Gave me an idea - "free" 35 mm rear lift kit!!! Need to figure out a free and easy way to do the front - I could add a couple more of the reinforcing plates but they're only 5 mm thick, and the studs on the upper strut mounts aren't very long. Hmm...need to think on that idea a bit more.

One more thing - I test fit the 140 steel wheel (15 inch) with rally tyre on the front - it just kisses the front caliper...probably would rub away eventually! :) It probably would clear with a 5 mm spacer or a tickle with the angle grinder or Dremel on the caliper where it's tight.

One spacer plate with holes for strut bolts , and inner smaller dia bit of pipe or other steel welded in between with another spacer on top , put bolts through it too the tower. Raise it as much as you want!

    Ex850R

    One spacer plate with holes for strut bolts , and inner smaller dia bit of pipe or other steel welded in between with another spacer on top , put bolts through it too the tower. Raise it as much as you want!

    Great idea, but relies on my crappy welding abilities. Gives me some thoughts though as to how I might be able to offset the existing studs and put some longer bolts thru from the top...will come up with something! Now’s the time to do it while I plan to replace the brake hoses, and since I haven’t bolted the tie rods onto the knuckles yet it’s easy to drop the strut and mess around.

      Turn up the welder to MAX, dry the rods in oven for some hours on low or, strike arc but let it stick. Hold it till you see the moisture depart the rod in great hast as steam! Unstick. Burn the first run in clean up, turn power down to suitable amps for rods (remove moisture) lay in a nice bead while metal is bloody hot. Do not quench in water......Use for purpose, check for cracks now n again.

      Or watch a Red Green video on car mods.......hilarious.

        Ex850R

        Turn up the welder to MAX, dry the rods in oven for some hours on low or, strike arc but let it stick. Hold it till you see the moisture depart the rod in great hast as steam! Unstick. Burn the first run in clean up, turn power down to suitable amps for rods (remove moisture) lay in a nice bead while metal is bloody hot. Do not quench in water......Use for purpose, check for cracks now n again.

        Or watch a Red Green video on car mods.......hilarious.

        All I have is a small MIG welder. Could get friend to weld for me but I will see if I can come up with a bolt-together spacer design.

          An easy way to put some camber in.

          Engine is back in - yay! With respect to the caliper clearance using 140 wheels, I thought maybe I could cut the bolt circle “ring” out of a couple old front brake discs and that would give me a couple “free” ~5 mm wheel spacers for the front...time to get out the angle grinder!

          It’s coming along. Got the brake hoses replaced and new pads rear and slightly used pads front. Because a paddock basher needs braided SS brake hoses LOL! Had to buggerise around with the exhaust. The decent downpipe and cat I had - neither had an O2 sensor hole - so I just drilled a hole in the front section of the cat and put the O2 thru with a nut on the back (inside). Proper job! ;) Used an over-axe pipe and ran the exhaust straight out the back (no rear muffler). Got all the fuel lines and wires routed and hooked up. Radiator in but need to fit the hoses and install all the front end sheet metal, bumper and bonnet. Air inlet plumbing and coolant tank to follow.

          Random question - I sold my spare 92/93 dash gauge clusters. I have one that I think is from a 1990 LH2.4...I know the speedometer ratio is different as the tone ring on the diff changed in 92, but will the 90 cluster plug and play and work OK with LH2.4 for a speed signal, or will it be off and cause issues? I do recall something about the speedometer wires changing positions in the terminals possibly at the 92/93 breakpoint? Guess I’ll give it a try after I check the wiring diagrams. All I really care about is idle...not too fussed if I get deceleration fuel cut-off as top speed prob will be 20 kph LOL! Also is there any way to confirm if a cluster is LH2.4? I’m not 100% sure what year car this cluster came from, but I know it has the halogen globes for the speedometer and tachometer, whereas the earlier known 86/87 cluster has normal globes for those gauges. Unfortunately I can’t make out any dates and/or part numbers on any stickers on the cluster housing etc.

          6 days later

          OK yay, it’s a goer! Spent heaps of COVID-time tidying it up and putting back bits like lights, headlining etc. Did the “free” 6 mm wheel spacers (made from some old brake rotors) so I could fit the 140 front wheels. Looks tough! You don’t want to know how little thread engagement there is on the lug nuts though - maybe 1/2? Good enough! :) So I got a bit cocky and decided to drive it down to our dam. Great fun! Of course when I turned around and tried to go back up the hill...F**K! Stuck! Had a bunch of broken up concrete foot-path slabs down there so I loaded about 100-200 kg in the back...whoa, made it about 1/3 the way up then stuck again. Tyres full of mud. I didn’t think to drop the tyre pressure to like 10 PSI because I was buggered and late for a PM coffee so it sits down by the dam now...maybe until summer when the track dries out? Wayne may be happy - one less car in the driveway. When he gets home from his mum’s house this afternoon I think I’ll tell him I sold it for $1500 to some random person on OzVolvo and they picked it up this afternoon. Then he’ll see it down there by the dam tomorrow AM when walking the dog. LOL! Doubt I can keep a straight face that long though!

          Oh, forgot to mention - FOR SALE: 1993 Volvo 240 wagon in great condition. Not much needed for RWC. BYO tractor to pull it up the hill! ;)

            $50 , Wayne must know you are a fibber by now!

              carnut222

              Oh, forgot to mention - FOR SALE: 1993 Volvo 240 wagon in great condition. Not much needed for RWC. BYO tractor to pull it up the hill! ;)

              Gives me the idea of converting a 244 to tractor...

                  Ex850R

                  $50 , Wayne must know you are a fibber by now!

                  Yeah I couldn’t keep a straight face for more than an hour and the secret was out LOL!

                    Philia_Bear

                    https://ozvolvo.org/discussion/comment/197282#Comment_197282

                    Gives me the idea of converting a 244 to tractor...

                    You'd like this, then.

                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yHl24QynOM

                        Major Ledfoot

                        https://ozvolvo.org/discussion/comment/197309#Comment_197309

                        You'd like this, then.

                        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yHl24QynOM

                        Oh yeah, saw that before - awesome!

                        Forgot to follow up on this - yesterday AM I went back down and let the tyres down to 20 PSI in the rear and shifted all the concrete blocks so they were sitting directly over the rear axle (previously they were near the rear)...got in and drove straight up the hill with no dramas whatsoever. Interestingly I had 3 people tell me to try REVERSING up the hill...this is extremely counterintuitive to me on a rear-wheel drive car as it seems like the weight would be shifted off the driven axle so you’d have less traction, but these 3 people all said that it worked for them before. Hmmm, I don’t know about the physics of that. Maybe dumb luck?

                          Here's my paddock basher from when I was 17 for inspiration! I believe I was CIGlocking the diff at the time. Tractor tyres saw it dig it's way out of big bog holes with a ton of wood in the back regularly lol.

                            volvodriverman

                            https://cdn.ozvolvo.org/uploads/SEHV1RHTOA4I/welding-diff-jpg.jpg

                            Here's my paddock basher from when I was 17 for inspiration! I believe I was CIGlocking the diff at the time. Tractor tyres saw it dig it's way out of big bog holes with a ton of wood in the back regularly lol.

                            Wow nice! I’ve been thinking about cutting the roof off mine some day! I was thinking it would be nice to bolt an engine crane in the back so I can yank out an engine in the driveway to harvest bits off it...however not sure how long I want to be in the wrecking “business” as it’s interfering with my own hobby time LOL!

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