WTB: 700 series diesel wagon

[casioqv]

I'm looking for a 700 series diesel wagon, M46 manual transmission preferred (will consider Autos). I'm located in Southern California, but willing to fly/drive anywhere for the right price and/or condition car. PM me with any offers.

Thanks,
Tyler

[EvoStevo]

Don't know of any for sale but I hope you find one. Then we can be SoCal diesel buddies :cool:

[casioqv]

Bump. Looks like diesel 745s are nearly impossible to find.

[Jason]

I have only seen one diesel wagon with a manual in it for sale.. It was up in Maine and I almost bought it back before I bought my car. I then found out my wife would divorce me if I bought a wagon... Who knew?? lol Obviously I ended up with a sedan. Good luck with the hunt! Have you joined the volvo diesel mailing list? You might want to and put out your WTB through that.

Jason

[casioqv]

I think you're right- I'm unlikely to find one at any price. I think I'm just going to purchase a motor from Tom Bryant, and convert my gas 745 Turbo.

[v8volvo]

I have only seen one diesel wagon with a manual in it for sale.. It was up in Maine and I almost bought it back before I bought my car. I then found out my wife would divorce me if I bought a wagon... Who knew?? lol Obviously I ended up with a sedan. Good luck with the hunt! Have you joined the volvo diesel mailing list? You might want to and put out your WTB through that.

Jason

Hah... guess what?? The wagon you nearly bought in Maine is probably the same one that I now own. I bought it last spring from a guy who was a diesel freak and lived on Mt. Desert Island. I drove it back across the country, then immediately took it apart. It's just as well you didn't buy it... it wasn't a great deal. The interior is beautiful, but it has plenty of rust on the body, and had a tired engine and a seized pilot bearing. I finally fixed those, and then a few weeks ago the injection pump had some kind of internal disaster that resulted in the governor letting go and the engine revving unloaded to about 8000 rpm! I was barely able to stall it and couldn't turn it off with the key. Scary. Got a new pump on it last week and it still runs but I haven't yet had a chance to fully check out what kind of damage has been done, if any.

At any rate, you're better off not having this wagon, trust me... I overpaid and it's been the biggest PITA of all my Volvos so far. It was my first Volvo diesel so I have learned plenty from it along the way, but it's now the one I wish I could get rid of... Tyler, any interest?? :-P

On the D24 List, Tom just posted that Ross Converse, the V8 swap guy, drives a 745TD/M46 that he wants to swap an automatic into and drop the drivetrain into a 965. Maybe you should contact him and see if he wants to just save you both a bunch of trouble, and sell you his original manual trans TD wagon outright then start fresh with a D24T/ZF from Tom to put into his 965?

The TD wagons are indeed very rare. They were only available for one year, 1985, and only as a 740. I am lucky enough to own two of them, though as mentioned one of them has some rust and the other one has legal issues that will keep it from ever being able to be registered and put on the road again. I have only ever driven one other besides those two (a white one that is probably somewhere around Seattle still), and saw one that is owned by Tom Bryant, and have seen a couple for sale in CA that you should have jumped on when you had the chance!

If you look long enough, you'll find another, but they are uncommon.

[casioqv]

v8volvo- can you PM me more details about it? I am interested. One annoying thing about the 745 diesels is that it seems like the 7xx series didn't get really durable rust proofing and paint until 1987, after they stopped selling diesels in the USA. I think a newer 945/965 would be the ideal car for a D24T.

[Volvoist]

[QUOTE=v8volvo;3827]The TD wagons are indeed very rare. They were only available for one year, 1985, and only as a 740.QUOTE]
Thats not completely true, I has two '86 745TD's, and an 85 745TD. I know someone who had an 84 7 series TD wagon IIRC. They are super rare it seems. I wish I still had my 86. I should never have gotten rid of it.

[Jason]

George,
is the wagon black with black interior, and did have i have later model volvo alloy wheels? The Mt dessert island sounds familiar, if I remember right he built custom boats or something too.

Jason

[v8volvo]

[QUOTE=v8volvo;3827]The TD wagons are indeed very rare. They were only available for one year, 1985, and only as a 740.QUOTE]
Thats not completely true, I has two '86 745TD's, and an 85 745TD. I know someone who had an 84 7 series TD wagon IIRC. They are super rare it seems. I wish I still had my 86. I should never have gotten rid of it.

Sorry, what I meant to say is that the TD wagon with manual trans was only available for one year in one model -- a 1985 745 GLE TD. You could get an automatic TD wagon for three years as two models -- a 1985 as either a 740 or 760, or a 1986 as a 740 only. In 1986, the only diesel Volvo available was a 740GLE with automatic trans, and could be had as either a sedan or wagon.

Jason, yep, dark gray wagon with black leather interior and later 15" alloys off a 940 Turbo. I bought it in Maine in March 2009 and then used it that summer to drive back out west with all my stuff on board. Car made it OK but had a frozen pilot bearing, so hard to drive in town (was OK on the highway), and it overheated on every pass. The nicest black leather seats I have ever seen, though!

[Jason]

Ha! you were willing to drive alot farther than me! I do remember the video he had sent me of it starting/running and of the interior. It looked pretty fresh.

Jason

[casioqv]

I'm no longer looking since I decided to go with a really nice '84 764GLE sedan (with a new factory crate D24T from Germany) I found and maybe swap the engine into a 945 someday...

I'll post details/photos in the showroom when I get a chance.

[TinMan]

All this talk of the rarity of 1985 740 TD wagons with the M46 makes me want to try and restore mine instead of looking for a nice later model 700/900 series wagon to eventually swap the D24T into. My car is VERY rusty, although with enough time and patience (and a lot of work) I could make it nice again. I really can't stand the maroon interior though, and the car basically needs to be gutted and completely redone from front to back to get it up to my standards (I'm a bit OCD when it comes to my cars). Would it be sacrilege to yank the engine & trans and put it in a later model, or should I bite the bullet and restore the 85?

[Jason]

Nothing wrong with installing the diesel stuff in a later wagon. For that matter, I'm sure you can find a gas wagon from the 80s like yours, but from somewhere south where it wont be rusted out.

Jason

[TinMan]

Yeah, with as much work as this one needs I'm not sure it'd be worth the time or effort when I could find a nice one to swap the engine into. By the time I was done it'd basically have a whole new body anyway...

[Jason]

Ya swapping the diesel powertrain into a similar year gas car is pretty easy from what I understand. Make sure you keep the cross member from your car and then everything bolts in...

Jason