Time to revive
I haven't done anything to the car that would be especially interesting or 'new' to this forum. Thus I saw no point in keeping the thread updated. However the stage I am up to now might be attracting to some, and I'm fairly sure nothing of the like has been documented here. So you may appreciate reading the following. Before I continue with this, I will bring you up to date of what has happened since Oct 2016.
The car has been chugging along nicely. My plans for it have changed from keeping it stock and reliable to on the road to performance, maybe even competition. I have started studying engineering and I suppose I have taken a liking to the performance and improving side of things a lot more. Or a better way of saying it is I am very interested in racing and motorsport, and I think my car will partly reflect this. I hope to occasionally take this to a track, even more so a hill climb track that is 20 mins away from me.
In Aug 2017 I contacted
@AshDVS regarding lower/stiffer springs and shocks. He recommended me a bunch of options and I decided on DVS front/King rear springs and B6 front/sachs rear struts. I installed them mostly myself and as you may already know - holy moly, what a difference.
In Nov 2017 I set out to replace all suspension bushings and of course consulted Ash. I ended up with everything urethane except for large lower control arm and front trailing arm bushes, both of which oem replacements. Again, installed everything myself relatively problem free.
Other miscellaneous happenings over the past year and a bit include buying professionally reupholstered and re-foamed seats from a guy in the GC for an absolute steal @ $150. Still, I need something with more support but they beat 30 year old seats. New steering wheel and hub. Parcel shelf speakers and moved Modern stereo player to glove box and put original back in to suit the dash/centre console.
My attempt at expert pics:
That's basically bringing you up to date with the car as it is now. There are still things that need tidying up/replacing and I planned to complete it all over the Christmas break but... I'll get to that.
- Engine + bay needs to be cleaned
- Wiring in engine bay needs to be replaced because of biodegradable wiring. I want to replace all of it too, not just the badly affected areas
- Pilot bearing needs to be replaced - it rattles almost always. I would also like to visually inspect the clutch/flywheel's condition too
I thought I might as well pull the engine to do everything, however due to wanting performance I thought I'd investigate a turbo motor swap and kill two birds with one stone. Hoped to have this completed before uni starts. I ended up deciding LH2.4 was the way to go and researched and researched and researched. I got to the point where I was ready to start collecting parts when I realised I may be jumping the gun here because I haven't even bothered to learn what is already in the car - K-Jet. So I set out to learn about K-Jet and realised it's a really neat system. Well, the rest is history:
I put up a thread on turbobricks regarding a few Q's I had on T K-Jet. My queries were answered and I was also contacted by a guy from Greece by the name of Aris who was willing to sell all of his gear from his B21ET.
Those of you who don't know, K-Jet Turbo came in two varieties on Volvo's. B21FT and B21ET for America and Europe respectively. Both motors use exactly the same blocks - same compression. The FT uses K-Jet lambda or KE-Jet. Basically this just means it uses an oxygen sensor in the exhaust and a frequency valve inline with the WUR and trims control pressure accordingly. The ET is just K-Jet or K Basic. Purely mechanical operation, no input from electrical sensors. This is the system I wanted.
Eventually everything came to my door. This includes:
- Turbo manifold
- Turbo distributor
- Airbox + snorkel
- 2x Turbo WUR
- Turbo Ignition distributor
- Ignition Computer - same p/n as in my car now
- Assorted fuel lines
- + other spares
The next thing I have acquired: the motor.
So as said before, K-Jet Turbo came on a B21. I'm not after originality so I decided I wanted b230. Called all of the wreckers up here in Brisbane but no one had any at the time. I called
@iceton1975 at Berry Motor Group and in the end got a B230FK motor sent up. Arrived today. It has a 530 head on it stock but being from an EFI car there are no K-Jet injector holes. So I ordered a 405 head as well - here's where I messed up. Mark said it was from a B23ET and I thought 'cool, it will have turbo exhaust valves then' completely forgetting that head is also from an EFI car. That head will go on the shelf in case I want it in the future. Alas, I got the motor I wanted anyway.
This is basically everything I have so far. I will write up my shopping list for everyone to have a geeze in the coming days.
I have run out of time to get this in the car before Uni so I will draw up a more realistic plan. I will say now I want to get this running by September so I can bring it down to the Canberra show.
Tomorrow I will clean up the block and have a look at the bores etc and see where I stand in terms of that area.
