Project Rusty Triumphs in Scotland - Tow bar delete - 25/6/26

[captain_70s]

3 hours ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

 And the flood-damaged car, if it was fresh water, it would be entirely possible to save it. 

Generally with flood damaged cars the issue is that, as far as insurance are concerned, drains may have backed up and contaminated the car with human waste. Instant write-off, apparently the owner tried to buy back the salvage but it had to go to a licensed breaker.

It's a shame but from speaking to the guy at the yard it was completely stripped by the time it went in the crusher at least, so hopefully helped some restorations! My car is in worse condition than both of the scrap cars!

Trying to decide if door mirrors are worth the hassle...

The wing mirrors actually have a wider field of vision and I like being able to see them while looking dead ahead...

I think door mirrors look better on this age of car, but then I'd have to fill the holes in the wings etc...

They did polish up alright...

I'd quite like to assemble the correct 1972 De-Lux grille. I don't mind the earlier style but seeing it with the newer flush fitting door handles winds me up. 😂

(Obviously I did recover the remains of the grille from the burnt car, but that's just for metal tweaking practice).

[Wibble]

50 minutes ago, captain_70s said:

Generally with flood damaged cars the issue is that, as far as insurance are concerned, drains may have backed up and contaminated the car with human waste

It’s exactly this. Classed as “black water”and potentially full of human and animal waste. I’ve dealt with flood damaged cars, burst water main victims were sometimes recoverable but rarely attempted, general flooding was not. You will never get the smell out, or all the crap in the box sections.

[Spottedlaurel]

Shame to hear of the demise of AFW 738K, I used to see it around the Norfolk town where I worked:

 

 

[danthecapriman]

I think I’d most likely just strip the car out and power wash the body down if it was mine. No way I’d let a car that good go to the scrap heap just because of a bit of shitty water😄

Presumably it’s all down to insurance companies being involved?

[captain_70s]

28 minutes ago, danthecapriman said:

I think I’d most likely just strip the car out and power wash the body down if it was mine. No way I’d let a car that good go to the scrap heap just because of a bit of shitty water😄

Presumably it’s all down to insurance companies being involved?

Yup. Flood = Cat B = has to be sold to a licensed breaker.

According to the bloke in the yard the owner fought quite hard with the insurance company to reverse the Cat B and buy back the salvage but had to give up. 

The freshly re-trimmed interior mysteriously vanished before it got to the yard... Fella reckons the owner stripped it out before it left.

I've known a couple of folk repair flooded cars, but you do have to do it out of pocket and you have to cut out sills and box sections to flush all the mud/silt/shit out, or they just instantly rot away. You also need to redo all the wiring loom as it'll have filled with water and will rot internally. 

[danthecapriman]

2 hours ago, captain_70s said:

Yup. Flood = Cat B = has to be sold to a licensed breaker.

According to the bloke in the yard the owner fought quite hard with the insurance company to reverse the Cat B and buy back the salvage but had to give up. 

The freshly re-trimmed interior mysteriously vanished before it got to the yard... Fella reckons the owner stripped it out before it left.

I've known a couple of folk repair flooded cars, but you do have to do it out of pocket and you have to cut out sills and box sections to flush all the mud/silt/shit out, or they just instantly rot away. You also need to redo all the wiring loom as it'll have filled with water and will rot internally. 

I think if it was me I’d just completely ignore the insurance and not involve them. Obviously you’ve got to have it as a legal requirement but they’ll always do whatever is easiest/cheaper for themselves which isn’t my expectation with irreplaceable things like classic cars. On a modern then fair enough but a classic is unique and not replaceable like for like.

I think if it was me I’d just repair it myself. Effectively it’s just like doing a restoration to repair the flood damage so why not. The metal body is just metal and can be cleaned. Interior is a bit more challenging of course but I’ve done it once so it can be done again. 
Just seems a huge shame for that Volvo to get cubed because of something so stupid.

Pretty sure it’s the same with vehicles that have been involved in anything like fatalities, shootings etc etc where there’s remains or body fluids inside. I don’t think you’re even supposed to take parts off them. Makes you wonder about all those ambulance conversions into campers!

[M'coli]

31 minutes ago, danthecapriman said:

I think if it was me I’d just completely ignore the insurance and not involve them. Obviously you’ve got to have it as a legal requirement but they’ll always do whatever is easiest/cheaper for themselves which isn’t my expectation with irreplaceable things like classic cars. On a modern then fair enough but a classic is unique and not replaceable like for like.

I think if it was me I’d just repair it myself. Effectively it’s just like doing a restoration to repair the flood damage so why not. The metal body is just metal and can be cleaned. Interior is a bit more challenging of course but I’ve done it once so it can be done again. 
Just seems a huge shame for that Volvo to get cubed because of something so stupid.

Pretty sure it’s the same with vehicles that have been involved in anything like fatalities, shootings etc etc where there’s remains or body fluids inside. I don’t think you’re even supposed to take parts off them. Makes you wonder about all those ambulance conversions into campers!

An African guy my uncle worked with in the 80s when looking at someone else's ambulance/camper was asked, "Do you fancy it?"  He replied, "No, too many ghosts!"

[Homersimpson]

I can see the logic with flood damaged cars but if they are that concerned about contamination why can it then be stripped for parts which presumably are contaminated?

 

[captain_70s]

Decided to remove the shin basher, as I'm not going to be towing anything with a 80bhp auto...

6 bolts through a plate on the inside of the boot floor, 4 through the spare wheel/storage tubs either side, 4 through the bottom of the bumper and 2 shared with the bumper mounts.

Only the ones into the bumper were a pain to get to, as the nuts are inside it. They were also all different sizes. Nylock nuts used throughout.

The main issue was the bolts shared with the bumper mounts. All of the towbar fittings were metric, and those bolts were no exception. They go in to captive nuts behind the rear valance. Volvo didn't switch over to metric until the 200 series came out in 1974...

Yes, the (massively overly long) 17mm metric bolts had been effectively cross threaded into the imperial nuts, presumably with a impact gun.

What felt like a billion years later with a breaker bar, lying on the ground at 25C, saw the bumper off.

Thankfully the upper bolts, of which there are four, that screw into a threaded mount in the bumper itself were missing entirely...

Anyway I had a quick look for some appropriate imperial bolts, couldn't find any, and fitted the replacement bumper with the same wrong bolts. Albeit ones half the length. The upper four bolts are still absent, I'm not entirely sure where they go in from. Presumably inside the boot somewhere. 

The wiring was spliced into the original loom with scotchlocks, I just snipped the towbar wires as close to the scotchlocks as possible.

Arselift complete.

I only intended to remove the tow bar but the bumper was off and I had a significantly nicer one sat here...

[danthecapriman]

I remember the gigantic tow bar I had on my 244. Fuc*ing huge great thing it was! All tubular steel sections with the tow ball itself mounted on the end of a stubby bit of that tube and sticking right out even beyond the big bumpers. 
The amount of times I walked around the car and either tripped over it or smashed my shins on it! I’ve actually still got a big dent in one shin from it to remember it by.

You can just see it in this pic.

[captain_70s]

38 minutes ago, danthecapriman said:

You can just see it in this pic.

Makes mine look practically lightweight!

Was your car a special edition or was the stripe just dealer bling?

[danthecapriman]

30 minutes ago, captain_70s said:

Makes mine look practically lightweight!

Was your car a special edition or was the stripe just dealer bling?

It was absolutely massive! It must’ve added a huge amount of weight to the car! Totally overkill really so god only knows what they were towing with it. I’d imagine it’d have done some serious damage to anything that hit it too.

That car wasn’t a special edition, it was a 244DL but the supplying dealer jazzed it up with leftover stripe kits from the slightly earlier anniversary edition 244’s. 
It was a funny car though as being the 79 year it had the early big bumpers, early flat bonnet with by then the unique early grill with small square headlights. At the back it had the early big bumper but the later 240 style rear lights and boot lid type.

2.1 redblock power with 4 speed manual. Went surprisingly well and people always used to give it a wide berth because of its rough appearance! Bloody brilliant car it was too. A bit of a cantankerous old pig to start when cold but once warm it was spot on. It’s up in Scotland now and having a bit of work done on it.

[Supernaut]

A Volvo migrating to Scotland?

Just as nature intended.

[danthecapriman]

1 hour ago, Supernaut said:

A Volvo migrating to Scotland?

Just as nature intended.

It’s blue now. The new owner is/was on here but I can’t remember their name.

It started out in Redruth, Cornwall when new. Then ended up in Hemel Hempstead when I bought it around 2004ish when I brought it home to near Portsmouth. I sold it to an (ex?) user on here when I joined this site who lived in London. It went on to NightmareRacing on the blue forum for a bit, then sold to someone else in Scotland. It lost its original number plate around that time (was CRL 99V) but since then went on to the guy who has it now, also in Scotland. So it’s pretty well traveled.

This was the odometer when it left me…

Bugger all mileage on one of these. 
When I had it, it was my daily driver. Likewise the gold 740 you can just see in those pics.