Big Red Swede.

[Roverageous]

Been looking for a Volvo V70 / S60 for a while now, and every single one that I go and see is an absolute dog, so I was very surprised when I saw a seemingly good deal pop up this morning near Bedford...

2002 Volvo S60 in varying shades of red, with 121,000 miles on the clock & LPG converted. I was even more surprised when I went to see it and it's in bloody good condition, bar a bit of lacquer peel on some of the plastic parts (mirror caps etc...). Was on the forecourt of a 'Prestige Car' place out in the sticks, and they didn't seem to have much of a clue about the LPG system - they hadn't tried it.

It also had a decent enough history - cam belt has been done, lots of regular services, lots of suspension work too, premium tyres all with good tread. The best receipt was the one for £5000 (how much?!) for the LPG system - seems it's a good one.

Anyway, after paying them £800 + plus a similarly valued Renault Laguna, I drove away in my very red Volvo. Pressed the button to switch to gas, which it promptly did and looks like there's some has already in there - so we'll see how long that lasts! If it's anything like the system I had previously, the level indicator is more guesswork than anything else.

It's a boggo spec one, although it does have leather seats, cruise control & working air-conditioning. No luck on the heated seats or power seats though - never mind!

[Ian_Fearn]

Looks great! Would love to know which LPG system warrants a £5k install bill!! The one on my old 5.7 Jeep was only about £2k for a Prins system.

[warninglight]

Top purchase!

Spotted it on autotrader last night as I was curious how many lpg motors are still about. Impending move means lpg might become feasible again for me.

[chaseracer]

Top bombing, that man.

[Roverageous]

1 hour ago, Ian_Fearn said:

Looks great! Would love to know which LPG system warrants a £5k install bill!! The one on my old 5.7 Jeep was only about £2k for a Prins system.

I think I misread the invoice a bit! It seems that the company who converted it to LPG also sold the vehicle - so I think the £4995 is actually the sale of the whole vehicle, although it has the conversion certificate etc... attached. If I'm reading the certificate correctly, it looks like it's got a 100L LPG tank... a bit scared to fill that up!

26 minutes ago, warninglight said:

Top purchase!

Spotted it on autotrader last night as I was curious how many lpg motors are still about. Impending move means lpg might become feasible again for me.

I'm pretty pleased so far! The car has obviously been loved, and mechanically seems very fit and well.

[Roverageous]

Filled up with LPG this morning which was uneventful, which cost £51 for 70 litres or so of the stuff. Trying to work out a way to accurately monitor MPG, which my brain can't cope with as the car starts on petrol and automatically flicks over to LPG as it's warming up.

 

[jonathan_dyane]

Looks amazing! Provided you have local stockists LPG is fantastic 

[FakeConcern]

Looks lovely, unusual in red too. I had a 2002 V70 T5 (no LPG) and loved it.

[Roverageous]

According to the gauge on the tank, I'm sitting at 64% (it fills to 80%) after 100 miles. I realise this isn't an accurate way of doing it, but if the tank is linear, then that would be circa 465 miles from the usable tank capacity and would equate to 26mpg.

I'd be very happy if that proves to be the case!

[grogee]

It's all a bit confusing with LPG, I don't get the 'litres' measure if it's a gas, although I guess the measure is for a set pressure when it's liquid.

I also don't understand 80% being 'full' unless there's some sort of protection for temperature rises.

26mpg sounds a bit low although I know you lose 10-20% for LPG v pez. Is it a 5-cyl?

Anyway the good news is it works! Well bought. I do like the S60, pretty car. TBH you might be better off with boggo spec on the HVAC (sticky flaps). Electric seats - meh, if you're like me you never adjust them once they're set. Heated is a nice to have, but you could put a towel on the radiator and sit on that in the mornings...

[NorthernMonkey]

1 minute ago, grogee said:

It's all a bit confusing with LPG, I don't get the 'litres' measure if it's a gas, although I guess the measure is for a set pressure when it's liquid.

I also don't understand 80% being 'full' unless there's some sort of protection for temperature rises.

26mpg sounds a bit low although I know you lose 10-20% for LPG v pez. Is it a 5-cyl?

Anyway the good news is it works! Well bought. I do like the S60, pretty car. TBH you might be better off with boggo spec on the HVAC (sticky flaps). Electric seats - meh, if you're like me you never adjust them once they're set. Heated is a nice to have, but you could put a towel on the radiator and sit on that in the mornings...

LPG - Liquid petroleum gas.

Basically, it goes in to the tank as a liquid then is converted to gas by the evaporator before hitting the injectors.

[Roverageous]

48 minutes ago, grogee said:

It's all a bit confusing with LPG, I don't get the 'litres' measure if it's a gas, although I guess the measure is for a set pressure when it's liquid.

I also don't understand 80% being 'full' unless there's some sort of protection for temperature rises.

26mpg sounds a bit low although I know you lose 10-20% for LPG v pez. Is it a 5-cyl?

Anyway the good news is it works! Well bought. I do like the S60, pretty car. TBH you might be better off with boggo spec on the HVAC (sticky flaps). Electric seats - meh, if you're like me you never adjust them once they're set. Heated is a nice to have, but you could put a towel on the radiator and sit on that in the mornings...

Yes I understand that there has to be a safety margin built in to the tank, so it won't fill the last 20%. After filling the gauge on the tank was bang on 80 (I'm still unsure if this is % or litres!).

M main mileage is in and around Milton Keynes so it tends to be "roundabout - roundabout -traffic jam - roundabout - roundabout" etc...

My V6 Rover 75 was doing mid 20s, so I would be happy with that again!

[Roverageous]

Well it's been an eventful 24 hours with the Big Red Swede. Came back to the car after work last night, and the engine was spinning over but not even attempting to fire. Until this, the car has been performing flawlessly and starting on the button whether cold or warm. 

The space that the car was parked in meant that the car was facing downhill, so I took a gamble and assumed that the car didn't like low petrol (just above the red) and pointing downhill. I walked over the the local fuel station, bought a petrol can (are they still called that?) and went back to the car with 4.5L to see if that made any difference. It did - hurrah!

Lesson learned - despite mostly running on LPG, keep the petrol in the top half of the tank!

This morning, having noticed the odd stutter when driving, I decided to get a cheap wireless code reader to see if anything was stored. It was - Cyl 2 misfire. Upon removing the coil pack it pretty much fell apart in my hand, so obviously it needed replacing. On my walk over to ECP, I also decided to get a full set of spark plugs, as there's no mention of these being done in the history of the car. £120 lighter, I set about changing all 5 plugs & the dodgy coil pack.

Having driven the car this afternoon it does seem smoother, and we're now code-free!

To celebrate, here's some nice interior shots:

[Roverageous]

So an update on this one! As with any 20 year old car there are a few niggles, but generally we're motoring along quite nicely.

I'm currently running on petrol only, as the LPG system kept triggering the EML with code PO171 (Bank 1 Lean), so I think we need some adjustment there! I'll get the LPG system serviced in the new year, but for the moment will continue on petrol. It's returning circa 34mpg, so that's not too bad.

I think the throttle body also needs a clean out as I'm getting a slightly lumpy idle at times (not a misfire, revs up and down slightly) as well as a hesitation when driving at a constant speed with light pressure on the accelerator.

Driver's seat has a split along some of the stitching on the base. Either I missed this when viewing the car, or I've plonked myself in a bit too heavily at some point. I was thinking of getting some self-adhesive black leather to join the two sections as a fix.

No more issues with starting - it's firing on the button every time which is nice.

[Roverageous]

Big Red (or Larry, as he's now known) is doing a sterling job of ferrying me too and from work. Latest MPG count is 32 average which I can't grumble at & I'm appreciating the - quite frankly - excellent heaters in this weather.

This is the temperature that I was greeted by this morning when leaving for work:

I almost did a cold start video, but realised that cold starts and warm starts don't really seem to be any different with this car. It's whisper quiet right from cold - nice.

One thing I have noticed in these icy mornings, is that the S60 is VERY sure-footed, which is very reassuring. 

[Roverageous]

Update time!

It's absolutely filthy - needs a good wash!

This thing has been my main vehicle since buying it, and I've now put 3000 miles on it. There are a few (hopefully minor) issues rearing their head, but nothing too worrying. I'm not getting any codes or lights.

Doesn't like 'warm' starts: The car always starts from cold absolutely perfectly, with no hesitation, and if you've turned it off and go to restart it less than half an hour later, it's also fine. If you dare to try and start it after leaving it between 1-4 hours it really doesn't like it at all. It'll crank over for ages, and then gradually splutter into life. When it does this, the idle is always a bit all over the place for a while. 

Warm idle is lumpy: This could be related to the above, but the idle is lovely and smooth on a cold engine, but it's a different story when warm. At traffic lights etc, you become really aware of the engine hunting slightly, and you can feel it through the car. I *think* this is a mix of a coked up throttle body & shit engine mounts.

Knocking from the front end: This has started recently, and was originally diagnosed as needing a ball joint. This was replaced and the car was handed back with even more knocking noises (thanks, Kwikfit). I've since had the car back to them, and quite frankly they couldn't have cared less, so it's booked in with a 'proper' garage for diagnosis. Kwikfit advised that they thought it was engine mounts, not anything suspension related - it definitely seems to be coming from the drivers' side wheel though. While it does knock over rough road surfaces, it is most apparent when setting off, and coming to a stop. We'll see!

Other than that, it's comfortable, quick enough, refined and a nice place to sit for 50 miles every day.

[Roverageous]

So, a few new developments with this one.

Firstly, I'm really growing to like this car - it's a very lovely place to be. I regularly drive a 2019 Seat Alhambra with all the bells and whistles, and it's always a relief to get back into the Volvo. 

I now have a nice, quiet suspension. Turned out the NSF ball joint had excessive play in it too, and required replacing - which is now all done.

I think I've also had a breakthrough with regard to the starting issue. I was reading up, and it appears likely that it's either vapour lock in the fuel system (caused by a small leak) or a MAF issue. The car wasn't logging any fault codes, so it's a bit of trial and error to track it down. I've unplugged the MAF sensor, and so far the warm starting is much improved, so we'll see if that was it. A replacement Bosch item is only around £60, so it might be worth chucking one on anyway.

In other news, I gave the interior a thorough going over today. I'm genuinely impressed at how well it looks inside for a 21 year old car...

 

 

[Jazoli]

Looks fab, i didnt think you could get Volvo without heated seats, they have been in all of mine.

If you want Bluetooth streaming and calls very easily fit one of these

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/254335722747?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=DxUV_A6hTj-&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=CVQtOrP6SSG&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

15 minutes to fit and they just work.

[Roverageous]

On 3/2/2023 at 10:32 PM, Jazoli said:

Looks fab, i didnt think you could get Volvo without heated seats, they have been in all of mine.

If you want Bluetooth streaming and calls very easily fit one of these

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/254335722747?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=DxUV_A6hTj-&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=CVQtOrP6SSG&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

15 minutes to fit and they just work.

Yes, it's the only thing I'm slightly disappointed about - however - they didn't work in my last P2 Volvo anyway. The bluetooth thingamy looks good - I do tend to have earbuds in when driving though.

Given the car a bit of a wash today, as I haven't washed it since buying in November, and hadn't really looked at the bodywork at all. The clear coat isn't too clever in many places (side mirror covers / stone chips on the roof / bumpers / running strips etc...), but from a couple of feet back it all looks presentable.

 

 

[Low Horatio gearbox]

Superb colour. I had a 1999 S70 and could coax 44 mpg out of its 2.4 5 cylinder on a long run so 32 ish is decent for urban use. It's a very underrated engine imho, Ford  were more than happy to solve it in a fair few if their cars which needed a bit more shove.  While mine was a lowly SE it had heated cloth seats and nowadays  I'd take plain cloth over leather.

Very well bought.

[Roverageous]

I'm growing to like the colour. It looks MUCH better in the pictures than it actually is!

 

[Roverageous]

All sorted for £130ish in the end. Managed to get my hands on a sealed Bosch unit locally which is brilliant. Changed it over today and given it a test drive - immediate difference in several ways! The car seems immediately more responsive, starts better, the slightly wobbly idle seems to have vanished (touch wood...). Anyway, money well spent.

Happy Bunny.