240 turbo

Ben83 · 2024-09-19T06:02:00+00:00

Anyone here put a turbo on a non turbo mechanical injected engine?

Slowbrick

Forg
They no doubt have. When I did a +T in my sedan I had to go through engineering for it to be insured. That was in about 2011.

242GT

I had mine engineered ( have RMS number to prove) & converted by one of the best volvo mechanics in Sydney Gerry MacCarthy in 2005.
When I got historic reregistered this year , I was amazed at how little anyone apart from the enthusiasts on forums like this know about early turbo Volvo's.
The main thing they wanted to see was all early volvo parts that were available in the day , so the early 760 Turbo mechanicals parts used wasn't a problem as such.

Forg

242GT When I got historic reregistered this year , I was amazed at how little anyone apart from the enthusiasts on forums like this know about early turbo Volvo's.

Heh heh heh ... when circa 1997-ish I was looking for a car to drive to the station, to replace the Liberty RS which was stolen, and wanted something with readily available parts & yet which would NEVER be stolen ... I'd totally & completely forgotten the 242GT had ever existed. I was only reminded 'cos my best mate was working for council and had been dealing with a lady who had a minty one in the garage she insisted on showing him every time he visited regarding the noise-complaints she was making about a neighbour's rooster.
And that's a car enthusiast. 🙂

Major Ledfoot

242GT When I got historic reregistered this year , I was amazed at how little anyone apart from the enthusiasts on forums like this know about early turbo Volvo's.

Not just early turbo Volvos. It appears there is much cluelessness among vehicle inspectors in general about such things as chassis numbers, body numbers, and engine numbers on late 20th century Volvos, before the standardised VIN system was introduced. My recently-registered 1800ES was an ordeal to get done, when the body number was entered as the chassis number, and 4 digits of the engine's 6-digit part number (!?!?) were entered as the engine serial number. Thanks to Lars at Volvo Heritage, I was able to show evidence that all the numbers incorrectly entered in the registration databases of two states for my car somehow all tallied up with the car at issue.

But it seems some states will accept any old numbers for historic rego. If they enter any numbers at all ….

The 242GT I picked up from SA some years ago had SA rego and papers, but no engine number, chassis number,or body number was on the registration papers! Only the make, model, and plate number. You can imagine how much fun it was to get it registered in NSW……

With regards to what mods various states and territories will allow: IIRC Spac and I had some back and forth ages ago about what was allowed in NSW, as he believed it was as restrictive as Victoria. But the regs had changed since he'd last looked, and we discovered NSW was easier going that VIC - at that time at least.

AFAIK now, the regs are pretty much a national standard, but it's been so long since I looked, I can't say for certain if that's the case.

Also, the engineer certification scheme has changed since that discussion, and appears to have gone to a national scheme. I found this out when I needed to register the 780 here in TAS (which has an engineering cert because LHD and ex-USA) and the TAS authority was happy with an engineer's report from a NSW engineer.

242GT

Thankfully they're are some inspection mechanics with common sense and understanding of what constitutes a good road worthy classic/historic motor vehicle.
.
But becarefull when you get that engineers report as the NSW RMS took mine , luckily in my 35yr old log book I had old rego papers in it and on the bottom of them was the engineers report number , so when transferring from standard road rego to historic ( the whole process starts from scratch in NSW) I was able to provide said engineers report number.
DONT give the rms the original , colour photo copy it and use that as they will keep it when processing your rego at payment & picking up plates time in the RMS office, which if you give them the original leaves you with nothing to pass onto a new owner should you sell the car.

dmc

If in Vic take the car to Berry's, historically they have RWCd a turbo 240 easily so long as it is a tidy car. They are aware of the original turbo cars so are happy to register/CPS them.

Regarding the original k jet turbos, I would approach it as mentioned above, make it look stock and just say it is Bosch fuel injection from a 740.

Paul_Roodenrys

It seems I'm far from Robinson Crusoe dealing with this issue. The car has a Haltec and a few other modern goodies but only because I found it easier that way than playing with the old loom and ECU. And I got carried away. I think the car will be ready sometime next year so it will be interesting to see how I go. Some very interesting comments too. 🙂

tery

folks, im involved with a group looking to introduce a new class of amateur historic touring car racing into Australia. The proposed cut-off date is Dec 1983. This of course will capture the Volvo 240 series. It will not however allow for the much improved 240 turbos that raced here and around the world in 1984-85-86 period.

is there a resident 'technical expert" on these cars that might like to get involved in preparing specifications (or better still , get involved in the racing if this comes about). This is a technical data list against which cars can be compared if needed. Of course it covers all the simple things like body dimensions, but also more detailed stuff like gearbox gear ratios, diff ratios, fuel injection components etc etc. Thankfully, the world governing body, the FIA, has a lot of this info freely available, but for older cars there are sometimes errors, so subject matter experts are needed to check it thoroughly. These ideally need to be real hands-on folk, not internet warriors simply repeating what they read elsewhere.

Apart from the above tech data, we need confirmation of production numbers of the individual MODEL, eg 242GT, 240 turbo etc. it seems Volvo only list combined tallies for each year, eg all the 240 range lumped together.

The Volvo turbo cars were very contentious in their race time, so it will be really important to get the tech data for the proposed early versions, just right, even though im aware they were not sold here in Oz when new. I do remember however new 242GT's being sold here as a friend was our local dealer at the time, so i expect the 242GT wont be so difficult to "specify".

At some point, copies of volvo sales brochures, tech bulletins etc might be required to clear up anything really contentious

tery

jamesinc could u possibly post up pics of what you have got. do you know what year car it came from?

jamesinc

tery I don't know the specifics of the car. I have the KJet system sans control pressure regulator from what I assume was a B21ET/FT. The car was a Volvo press vehicle that was eventually sold to Joe Lupica of Lupica Motors. It came from him when he retired last year. I believe he still has the car, but it was converted to MoTeC EFI. Someone on here or on Facebook probably knows more (paging @Slowbrick)

242GT

Best person I can think of is Anthony Hyde in Canberra, theres not much Anthony dosnt know about turbo Volvo's

tery

242GT thanks, ive now spoken with him and await some documentation about the US and Euro turbo models pre 84

Forg

I think the best approach is to just be very convincing … about the only solid facts we know about the Group A Skylines, 240’s, Sierras, M3’s, 3500’s, etc etc etc is that the manufacturers lied & cheated & scammed & snuck hidden stuff in.

Major Ledfoot

Forg As the late, great Frank Gardiner put it in the early 1980s (when advocating for Group A in preference to Group C): "Group A rules mean If you make it in numbers, you can race it. It means you can't jack up a windscreen wiper and build a race car underneath it any more".

That basically worked well for Group A, until BMW (with the M3) and Ford (with the Sierra RS500 Cosworth) came along and built 5000 street-going hot rods, with another 500 'sporting evolution' racer models (like the 4 extra injectors on the RS500s, which were fitted to the road cars but not hooked up - the rules specified that no additional components could be added to the injection system, but there was freedom of fuel lines and pumps….) Then Nissan, another major maker with huge factories and global sales volume, quit mucking around and built the Godzilla GT-R, which ate everything. But (as always) I digress.

The 240 Turbo's homologation papers are still up on the web.
https://historicdb.fia.com/car/volvo-240-turbo-2127

A search of that FIA database also shows the homologation papers for plain and simple 240s too.

(That FIA site has a wealth of interesting info - e.g. I never knew before tonight that the 140s had an M400 gearbox homologated for Group 2….. or, that there was even an homologated 5 speed box (? !!!) for Group 2 140s).

The Pit Lane Rumors about the 240Ts back in the day went from funny to just plain silly. Like the B21s had ceramic bores to cope with the boost. Or that the fuel cage was actually being used as a fuel tank, because they had to run the thing so rich to stop melting pistons….

But no one in OZ actually saw super cheaters until the WTCC came to town in 87. Like the Sierras with inches cut out of the front guards so they could pile on more negative camber. Or the two Merc 190E 2.3/16s here for the WTCC which were lightweighted hot rods. It's said a certain Sydney turbo shop owner (who bought them after his deal to buy the OZ Volvo dealer team cars fell through) spent an absolute bomb trying to get the cars back to legal Group A. (I knew a guy who worked there, who also did a lot of work on my old 144 back in the day…) Oh, damn; I'm digressing again.

But back to topic (at last): The numbers of 242GTs built - and more to the point, their spec - is going to vary, depending on which market we're talking about. The US only got B21 GTs; for us in OZ, we got the first of the Volvo B23E engines, but with Pulsair, while AFAIK Europe also got B23E GTs sans the systems needed to meet ADR27A at the time.

Since GTs were all built at either Toslanda or Kalmar (AFAIK), I guess Volvo Heritage might have records of how many cars were built with the GT model code (whatever that is - I don't know for certain, maybe it is '844').

This is the ID plate from Rudie (the incomplete GT) - note the type as being "242-844", and "46" as we know is the market code for Australia. What's interesting to note here is the number '8' in the number '5182' - as this vehicle was originally one of the cars modified by dealers to have the M46 removed and a BW55 fitted; that '8' indicates an auto transmission. My other GT has the numbers '5122' and it was originally an M46 car.

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But in later years, Volvo changed the ID plates - the plate below is from the ex-AVDT 240 Group A car. It started life as a year model 1980 model 242GT, which Mark Petch originally bought as a shell and which Sheppard turned into a Group A car during the winter of 1986 at Calder. But there's nothing on that plate to indicate clearly it was originally at GT… unless you know that the engine code "8A" means it's a B23E, and they were only fitted to GTs in that model year.

Image description
The people at Volvo Heritage might have access to the 242GT's production records, but gathering them will be a time-consuming task which they may not want to do. That said,they did let Karl-Eric from volvo1800pictures.com do a lot of research from the original P1800 build records. I don't know if the forthcoming book by Björn Ohlson and Mark Petch about the Group A 240T days will cover much about the GT or not, if at all.

Anyone wanna go over to Torslanda and plow through the 242 build sheets? 😃

242GT

That's been motorsport for the last 50yrs , there was always accusations between privateers and factory teams.

tery

Major Ledfoot many, many thanks for your insights. a fuller response to everyone is below.

242GT

Does anyone know what happened to Lance Phillips Australian 242GT register records after he passed.

Anthony

242GT
242/262 Register
Craig Rasmussen from SA will be the custodian.

Anthony

jamesinc

I have the KJet system sans control pressure regulator from what I assume was a B21ET/FT. The car was a Volvo press vehicle that was eventually sold to Joe Lupica of Lupica Motors.

I sold all my B21ET K-Jet parts in 2005 to a Sydney fellow, Brook Reber.
Even had the high flow Bosch 020 mechanical injectors.

242GT

I think Gerry MacCarthy from AClass parts and service did the Motec conversion for Joe some years ago before he passed as I was there one day when said he was going over to Joe's to do a conversion for him.
Simon may know more details on that.

tery

thanks to you all for the helpful comments today.

yes, know all about the FIA database. known to have lots of holes/errors with older cars, but a great starting point. I happen own two genuine GpA race Toyotas , so ive had to deal with this before, including the rampant cheating by some racers
some of the pics in the 1981-82-83 FIA documents are quite poor so unless you had a part like a water spray bar in your hand, you probably wont be able to confirm finer details
AFAIK, mark petch only got involved post 84 and of course, the serious GpA cars were post that date. mark has widely published his "memories" of various events in those times
the proposed race category proposes will allow for a MODEL that was built/sold anywhere., provided it was sold to the public in quantity (suggested to be 250 or maybe 500) BUT, racers wont be able to cherry pick bits. basically, the start point has to be the exact MODEL and the engine has to be the correct code for that MODEL. from my memories, the B23 was "rare" but came in all Oz market 242GT's. despite that, i suspect the real Volvo enthusiasts will want to compete in a turbo car to get a "sensible power to weight ratio, so thats what im trying to focus on right now. Until there are further technical discussions, no-one knows how far would be racers will be able to modify things, but the hope is we can keep things simple, like if the MODEL was injected, thats how it stays, but you can hopefully convert the old Bosch K to more modern EFI. So, i still need help to sort out the tech details of the early 240 turbo cars and of course, numbers made????

Forg

Yeah look if the category being proposed relates to Group A then it's a "B21ET" (sotra/kinda/mostly) you'd be using as a starting-point ... that was the Thing when 240's were being used in Group A.

In Group A terms & timeline, B23E wasn't all that rare, they fitted it to Grandma's 244GLE the year after they stopped making 242GT's ... my dad's 244GLE was a 1982, and the 240T's winning the ATCC was in 1986 ... 1982 or 1983 760 Turbos were B23ET for comparison (1985 you had B230ET 760T's, and 1986 brought the B230FT 740T).

Variations which're allowed would "branch-out from that B21ET starting-point", I guess. 🙂

And with respect to swapping K-Jet with a proper good EFI system; again, it depends on the rules. The Group A rules required K-Jet to be used back then for fuel ... but you might find a loophole, as Volvo apparently used a programmable ECU to manage water injection! So depending on the wording of the rules you need to comply with, you may get away with a proper programmable ECU because the Group A 240T's were using one (not for fuel - but hey, it depends on the wording doesn't it?).

tery

Forg at this stage, we are not looking to emulate group A but if we have a 1984 cut off, then some cars that raced in GpA would become eligible. One of my Corollas for example. There is no intention to mirror or use the GpA rules.

Anthony

turbo-legals-au-states.pdf

809kB

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