Driving the old Volvo 245 (240 combi)

[holland]

I bought the car in the north of Sweden where winters are very cold and no stain touches the body of the car. The car is from 1983 and in excellent condition. Back in The Netherlands I already changed some things; metallic paint, new shocks, adjusted the camber in front wheels for much better steering, etc. The car runs 1:9 km 11,0 L/100km. 21,4 mpg. In the Netherlands 1 gallon costs aprox 5,3 dollars....
Now I started the 'save fuel' project.
- I checked bearings, etc they seem to be better than can be expected.
- I changed my driving style to coasting in neutral, slower driving, and much more anticipating (my motorcycle driving experience helps a lot).
- Tire pressure from 2,2 bar (31 psi) up to 2,8 bar (40 psi)
- the Volvo has rubber dirt flares (sorry for my English) behind the front wheels, I took them off.

Now I am averaging 1:10.5 ! Thats 24,8 MPG.

So whats next?
- The open front grill of the Volvo is huge, I will close it with an aluminium plate for 90%. It will cause the engine to heat up better, and will improve aerodynamics a bit
- I will streamline the "rain drains??" in the A-pilar. It will improve aerodynamics, and reduce wind noise a bit (not that it is too noisy)
- I will make an (2 mm thick aluminum) underplate for the whole underside. I also drive an 2011 Prius.
- I will make an wind shield just in front of the of all wheels, like many new cars have
- I probably make a kamm-back like spoiler for the rear, but i do not want to adjust the original looks of the car to much.
- Important: I want to put an new digital injected LPG system in the car.
(Vapour Sequential Injection) It turns the the engine from a carb into an high tech fuel injected engine.
LPG costs only 40% of gasoline. Also it is much cleaner, more eco friendly.

Goal : 1: 14 (34 MPG) (Lpg as fuel is cheap, but fuel efficiency is slightly increased). So from 21 MPG to 34 MPG.

[JRMichler]

If your Volvo is geared anything like my old Volvo 144, it will gain several MPG by adding an overdrive.

[Arjan Volvo 244]

Hoi Holland,

I'm also from the Netherlands. I have an 1982 Volvo 244.

I am interested in the fuel economy after your modifications. Are the all installed yet?

What did you do with the rain gutters? I'm thinking about cutting them of.
I'm also interested in your kammback design. (on a 240 sedan this will be different, but i think it can definitely be improved with a spoiler and/or airtabs.

i previously averaged about 7km/l. After my mods my average is 10,5km/l.

mods that i did early'r:

Electric fan
blocked the grill half
y camshaft> very good improvement
put in a b200e engine (took out the old b19a)
chanced my driving style to very low rev. shifting.

New mods:
Aerodynamic mirrors
get the weight down to 1230/1240 kg.
advanced the ignition timing. original at about 10 dg. btdc, now about 16 dg btdc.
tire pressure at 2,7 bar.

Still have to figure out my fuel consumption after the new mods.

I'm aiming at 12km/l, so i'm interested in how you are getting at 14km/l.

Greetings, Arjan.

[ALS]

I have some experience with modding Volvo's for fuel mileage.
I had a 81 242 GLT 2.1 liter Turbo with a M46 manual transmission which I never modded for mileage.

On the other hand I modded a 1987 Turbo 745, Highway mileage went from 525 Km per 60 liter tank to 685 Km's.

1. The early 240 is geared horribly for gas mileage.
If you have an automatic transmission look at swapping it out for a M46 and replacing the rear end with 3.31's.

2. Make sure due to your colder winters that you fill the engine, transmission and differential with quality synthetic fluids.

3. Before you spend the time and money on the belly pan you may want to start by lowering the car by 3 to 4 cm. That will give you the same effect as the belly pan with out all the work.

The 240 is a tough car to squeeze fuel mileage out of due to the high aerodynamic Cd your pushing through the air. Speed is your enemy with this particular car.

[brucepick]

Our family drove only Volvo 240's for 13 years! We owned six and our two grown children still have two of the six. I did much of the work on them, including some ecomodding on my 2nd 245 wagon.

What transmission do you have? Standard 4 spd? with electric overdrive? Automatic? With electric OD? Important question.

Yes an electric radiator fan is an EXCELLENT project for these cars. Even with no fuel economy gauge I was able to see the improvement. My new fan came from a junked 960 with dead engine (very common, sorry to say). Will also give your engine more available power to move the car. Important: put the fan's temp switch in the LOWER radiator hose. Set it for 10-20 deg F lower than your thermostat temperature. I tested upper and lower hose locations with different switching temperatures, and that is the way to go. Lower hose.

Try 45 psi in your tires. I think 50 was too much in my car but you might try it. You won't pop the tire; the bursting point is at least 2x or 3x what is imprinted on the tire.

Kamm extension for back is a good idea. Clear plastic, after you test design using easier materials.

I built an extension for front air dam. New air dam bottom edge was about 7" (175 mm) from road surface. AND I put in a flat board going from that, to meet the original plastic belly pan. I believe this helped a lot. Search in ecomodder.com on my name and "Volvo 240" and "air dam" or "belly pan". I did post some stuff on that.

[brucepick]

Just consider - any work to build a belly pan will be more uncomfortable if the car has been lowered. Lowered car is also not good for deep snow. Yes I have a bias but also some experience. Your choice of course!

[holland]

Thanks for the reactions. I haven't done much yet. It's a B230A engine; 2,3l carb.
I have some problems with the carb. It an old Stromburg. I had a specialist looked at it but that did not help much. He says he helps me with e new, beter carb, I wait, hpoe and call him often..
It's an overdrive. That really helps much in MPG!
Frontdam/lowering: I spend the last 25 years working with aerodynamics, With the Volvo, I am not sure it will help. Lowering it with 4 cm will infect comfort much.
Ground clearance is quite high, so cleaning the underbelly stream good be the best option.

Question: I heard that using syntetic oil is not good for old cars. Is any of that true?

[holland]

About the Kammback design: If you see this research project 'audi a2 coventry'
They use a 'stepped' box cavity. Maby it is an idea. They combine it with a diffuser, flat floor.
Rain drain on front: I also think of cutting it, but my car has a new metallic spray!

[tjts1]

Get your hands on the EFI system from a late B230f, 89+. Its much more efficient and should be a straight swap on to your B230a. Better yet since you're in Sweden you can find a complete B200f with EFI to swap in.


For something a lot easier, get an M or a T cam from one of the EFI engines. These have the least amount overlap and should give the best fuel economy.

[brucepick]

Originally Posted by holland

Thanks for the reactions...
Question: I heard that using syntetic oil is not good for old cars. Is any of that true?

I used to spend quite a lot of time on this forum for rear wheel drive (RWD) Volvos:
RWD - The Volvo Owner's Resource
This is an EXCELLENT information source for all the rear drive Volvos. There is a related forum for the newer front drive ones, you will find the links there.

On that discussion board, the generally held view was that synthetic lubricants (EVERYWHERE!) were superior to regular oils. The only exception would be, if you find oil leaking or being burned. So try it.

On our cars, I would always do an internal engine cleaning before switching to synthetic.

If you have Marvel Mystery Oil (MMO) available, I'd use that first. Add to engine oil per bottle instructions, then drive several hundred km or more. Just check oil level because the MMO will sometimes get past the rings and burn, or could leak. It is an excellent cleaner, has lots of phosphates. Good to use in fuel also, but that's another story.

Next step:
I used one of the very thin kerosene type solvents, made for use in the engine oil. Here, we have GUNK. You add about a liter to the oil, then idle the engine for maybe 5 minutes (whatever the can instructions say). Then drain it all, and put in fresh oil.

I always added an extra step to this solvent-type cleaning process.

After draining the solvent treatment, fill with regular new, cheap oil. Idle 5 minutes. Drain that. Now change the filter and put in the nice synthetic oil. The extra step is to rinse out any remaining solvent-based cleaner. I really don't want it staying in my engine.