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1987 Volvo 244DL "Turd Ferguson" The Anti-Stance Car

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  • 1987 Volvo 244DL "Turd Ferguson" The Anti-Stance Car

    So some of you (unlikely) may recognize my name or have seen my other thread, the static '09 VW Rabbit 2.5 that I daily drive.

    This is not that car.

    This is my other car.

    This... is my shitty car.

    Here we go:



    This was day one. The car has an interesting history. It started it's rounds in the Turbobricks community a number of years back when one of the guys on there (Noah) got the car for basically free. It's actually a 1986 244DL that came factory with an automatic transmission. While Noah owned it, he swapped in an M47 five-speed transmission out of an 88. Voila, I'm calling it an '87. Deal with it.

    Noah's then-wife drove the car around and he did the maintenance on it. They got divorced and he kept the car. He gave it to my other buddy Bret, again for basically free. Bret's girlfriend drove it around. They broke up and she was still driving the car. She got a few tickets and Bret wanted out of the car.

    So I traded a roof rack for the entire car. And those with good observational skills may notice: The car has a roof rack on it. So I am essentially out nothing, and now I have a car.

    Bret's ex-girlfriend was living in a Winnebago and treating the car like a closet. That's where I got the car from in that picture up there. An alleyway in Sebastopol. Apparently it had some running issues and so she wasn't driving it, just using it as storage. But, the price was right...
    2009 Volkswagen Rabbit 2.5L "Snowbunny"
    1987 Volvo 244DL M47 "Turd Ferguson"
    1974 Volkswagen SuperBeetle 1303 "Diego"

  • #2
    Regardless of it's derelict condition, the car did start, run and drive. I drove it the 10-some-odd miles home with Bret nearby in case of emergency. I would have felt a lot better taking surface streets but of course him being in a car that wasn't a complete shitpile, he took the freeway.

    Driving it home was an experience though. The shifter felt like it wasn't connected at all. The engine and transmission mounts were so shot that the whole car rocked around and the combination of those two factors made first and second gear... interesting. When I could find them, that is. Also, the wheel balance was fucked up. So to recount: The car did not like 1st or second gear, or speeds above 57mph. And it didn't stop very well either.

    Regardless, I got it "home" (read: my parent's house, since I don't wanna keep this at my apartment) and let it be.

    The next day I drove down to San Francisco to meet up with another buddy of mine and get some parts. He gave me the passenger side window and some rear springs from a station wagon. Oh, did I forget to mention the passenger side window was broken? Yeah. Bret's ex-girlfriend left the car running and locked the doors, so she broke a window to get back in.

    The next day (now two days after getting the car), I had a buddy over to help me do a few things. We put the wagon rear springs in the car, replaced the broken window, fixed the two bad door handles and made it so I could actually close and lock up my car.

    Here it is with the wagon springs in the back. Volvos are naturally pretty tall but it's hard to see the ass came up around 2 inches already.



    bonus pic: tylor cleaning the glass out of the window run channel:
    Last edited by thebornotaku; 10-03-2015, 11:41 AM.
    2009 Volkswagen Rabbit 2.5L "Snowbunny"
    1987 Volvo 244DL M47 "Turd Ferguson"
    1974 Volkswagen SuperBeetle 1303 "Diego"

    Comment


    • #3
      And then there was the "big" work day.

      I woke up at precisely 9:24am, proceeded to mill around the apartment for a little bit and finally hit up my friends at like 10:11am or something like that.

      Here's how we started the day, with this turd in the morning light:


      I had some old MSW mesh wheels on my old wagon. I coerced the guy I sold my old car to let me buy those wheels back for relatively cheap.


      Tylor, my buddy from the post above, came over and helped get the shitty trunk latch to work consistiently. It was pretty out of adjustment:


      Found this in the trunk...


      Got it up on stands, got wheels on, and the four of us were all getting shit done on various areas of the vehicle.


      My buddies David and Tylor crawled under the car and changed out the trans mount before I had the opportunity to get under there with my tools. I am not complaining.


      I also ripped the air dam off and we did some other stuff. Then we went to Tylor's house to gawk at his mangled driveshaft, and I got this shot:


      I went to show David and Tylor where the sooper secret burnout place in town was, and found some dirt nearby:



      and then promptly did donuts in it. But there's no pictures of that. I also bent my exhaust doing that, somehow. Oh well.


      Then I decided to see how much stock Volvo suspension could flex, so I climbed a tiny dirt mound:



      But my favorite shot by far:

      Makes the car look way cooler than it is.


      And this is pretty much how she sits now. That day, we replaced the engine mounts, transmission mount, put bronze shifter bushings in, put new rear shocks in, changed the wheels and tires, fixed some of the niggly little interior things like the latches not working or whatever, put a ratchet strap on the motor to help stabilize it and now it's not nearly as shitty as it was before. It's still not as nice running or driving as stock but it's tons closer.


      Upcoming next is fixing the tail lights (they're fucked), removing the tint (it's fucked), replacing the wheelbearings (they're fucked), trying to find decent headlight lenses (they're fucked), and maybe trying to find new seats(I'll let you guess what condition they're in. Hint: They're fucked)
      Last edited by thebornotaku; 10-03-2015, 11:52 AM.
      2009 Volkswagen Rabbit 2.5L "Snowbunny"
      1987 Volvo 244DL M47 "Turd Ferguson"
      1974 Volkswagen SuperBeetle 1303 "Diego"

      Comment


      • #4
        I've also been kicking around power options. I'm not 100% hard sold on this being a lifted battle-sedan but on the other hand with my DD being a dumped VW that struggles with speedbumps, it would be nice to have a car I can smash over anything with and not give a fuck. So there's that.

        I'm kicking around if I want to keep it N/A (slow, reliable, boring but won't break stuff) or strap a turbo on it.

        Right now the best idea is to put on a small turbo like a TD04-13c or the likes for quick spooling and low-end grunt. The M47 is probably Volvo's weakest gearbox so I don't want to throw too much at it. Also if this is gonna be an off-roady kinda car then I don't want a huge laggy lightswitch-boosty kinda turbo anyways because knowing me I'd get a little too excited on a trail somewhere and end up pushing 20psi as I come around a corner backwards in to a tree and die.

        Stay tuned.
        2009 Volkswagen Rabbit 2.5L "Snowbunny"
        1987 Volvo 244DL M47 "Turd Ferguson"
        1974 Volkswagen SuperBeetle 1303 "Diego"

        Comment


        • #5
          I would say leave it N/A for daily purposes, unless you want the turbo in which case just go for it.
          At the same time you could do a battle/rally stance, still keep it clean and functional and I think it would look really nice.( thinking a small lift, mud flaps and some sort of mesh wheels like what you have now)

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by boneskid1 View Post
            I would say leave it N/A for daily purposes, unless you want the turbo in which case just go for it.
            At the same time you could do a battle/rally stance, still keep it clean and functional and I think it would look really nice.( thinking a small lift, mud flaps and some sort of mesh wheels like what you have now)
            That's the kind of "stance" it's gonna get: mild lift, A/T tires and those big floppy mudflaps.

            I have a daily driver that's about 10,000 times nicer than this pile so I don't care too terribly much about reliability aside from not wanting it to shit itself around every corner.

            But a small turbo, low boost for a little assistance would be nice since these cars are absolute dogs from the factory.

            I plan on bringing up the front more than the rear and leaving it with a bit of prerunner/trophy truck style reverse rake mode and then just aim the headlights down a bit.

            It's also gonna get driving/offroad lights because I think every car needs driving lights ever. But since this is a super cheapass budget build I'm probably gonna get an eBay lightbar. Also driving lights are rad when the person driving in front of you is a fucking moron.
            2009 Volkswagen Rabbit 2.5L "Snowbunny"
            1987 Volvo 244DL M47 "Turd Ferguson"
            1974 Volkswagen SuperBeetle 1303 "Diego"

            Comment


            • #7
              I vote rally livery and stripped interior.



              Spend $250 and get the maaco special then slap some stickers on it and call it a rally car.


              Looks good man, old volvos have a ton of character.

              𝔣𝔬𝔩𝔩𝔬𝔴 𝔪𝔢
              @𝔳𝔦𝔳𝔢_𝔪𝔢𝔪𝔬𝔯_𝔩𝔢𝔱𝔦

              Comment


              • #8
                Originally posted by rice4life View Post
                I vote rally livery and stripped interior.



                Spend $250 and get the maaco special then slap some stickers on it and call it a rally car.


                Looks good man, old volvos have a ton of character.
                Why even bother with the Maaco paintjob?

                I may strip the interior. Or just cover it in some mexican blankets. Who knows. I'm not super worried about it.

                The rough kinda outline is an all-terrain rally style kinda thing anyway. But I'll skip the stickers or liveries and just run it.

                This thing needs a lot of work to get to that point anyway. But I should be making fairly consistent progress. Slow, but consistent.
                2009 Volkswagen Rabbit 2.5L "Snowbunny"
                1987 Volvo 244DL M47 "Turd Ferguson"
                1974 Volkswagen SuperBeetle 1303 "Diego"

                Comment


                • #9
                  This thing is cool as fuck. Can't wait to see the progress.

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