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right, seems i've been VERY lazy about updating this despite poking my head in to keep up with what's going on on here now and then :|

m-reg, nope, this car came from norfolk, but it was indeed a 940L, L presumable meaning Literally nothing?

so, what's happened since my last update, going to shamelessly copy the posts from my thread on volvoforums as there are too many!

may 24th

well for starters, sorry, i've been crap at photographing today.

this morning i remembered to take my soldering iron with me got the soldering done, now have boost warning (currently choke until i get diesel clocks), glow plug warning (tracs until i get diesel clocks), working glow plugs, all functioning wiring in the engine bay in fact except no start signal to the starter for some reason, i'll work it out tomorrow!

currently the back end is in the air, axel is out, fuel tank is drained and ready to be dropped and exhaust is off, just waiting for the same bits to come off the 940 to go onto it tomorrow morning. once that's done i just need to fix that starter signal (suspect probably either my ignition switch, which has been iffy for a while, or my immobiliser maybe), bleed the injection system and the rack, fill the coolant up and get it out of the yard. i have until the end of sunday to get it moved as the farmer needs to get grain out and dried on monday. got a list of parts to nick off the 940 before it goes to scrap and a few plans for some of them aswell

all going well, so pleased with the wiring just need to wrap it all up so it looks neat. pleased with todays progress although if i had got on better this morning then i'd probably have it on the floor by now :|

May 25th (moms birthday, don't think i paid much attention to that fact though!)

more progress today, even worse on the photos though :| there are a few from this morning which i'll add sometime.

today was a really slow day, started by rebuilding my spare set of instruments with the speedo from the old set, this solved my warning lights issue and left me with the working speedo, so the dash was then resassembled. the wiring loom was wrapped (until i ran out of tape, still have probably two rolls worth to do but some is now done!). problem with starting was not fixed but i know roughly where it is now. when the earth for the glow plug relay is connected then the starter wont run, any time that earth is disconnected it turns over fine. annoying but i'm sure i'll find it so it's not a priority now.

fuel tank then came out, along with sender etc, and also the filler neck, which was a right royal PITA to get out. this was made more annoying by finding that the filer neck form my 940 is in fact identical in every way :| anyway, new filler neck fitted, then tank and fuel lines (more slow progress here, and the tanks not in right but it's in :| will fix these issues soon.

then last thing i tried this evening, about 4 oclock i started this, which was to fit the new diff, and at quarter past 8 i gave up having trying to get the prop shaft to connect. i'll go back to it tomorrow! i cant find a master spline on the prop shaft, and it's gone in far enough to turn together with the front half, but i cant get it to go in further (enough to get the diff back in). thinking about it i should probably have put the differential in first and then put the front half on after where i could use a persuasion tool if necessary, and connect it to the gearbox afterwards :| i'll try that tomorrow unless anyone has any other ideas?

the important thing is that it starts and runs under it's own power. need a set of exhaust clamps though as theres no way that the ones on there are coming off without breaking and it needs to be adjusted. i assume that the mounts are different on a 940 somehow as it's against the rear subframe on mine with the hangers 'adjusted'.

oh well. it's getting there

after spending may 26th fiddling with the prop shaft (something that came up again and again for a while) and trying to find where my volts were going in the glow plug relay

may 27th

well, it works

still some little niggles to fix:

glow plug relay problem
gearbox mount
tracking/adjust steering wheel
adjust exhaust
fix oil cooler mountings
wire washer pumps
shorten fuel tank straps
full service inc cam belt and water pump

however, on the good side, i've done 200 miles, and (depending how accurate this fuel gauge might be) i think i still have about 3/5ths of a tank left, it pulls well, (as everyone who' been in it has commented), and there've only been a few small worries :P

after fixing everything yesterday evening, i decided i'd go and fill up with diesel as the fuel gauge seemed to be playing silly buggers and i didn't want to risk it. while in town i texted a mate to tell him i'd got it working. long and the short i ended up in peterborough and didn't get home till half 4 this morning! still, was good fun and a good test run. did have a few little moments, had to bump start it and had very dim lights, along with some other odd electrical behaviour. assumed this was that the alternator was weak or something was discharging the battery while it was switched off. traced the problem this morning however, i cleaned the earth to the body! now everything works fine, apart from still having this intermittent issue with no start if the glow plugs are plugged in.

i'll trace it all down and get it fixed, just loving having a working car that's better than ever!

may 28th

ok, i checked the wiring on the glow plug relay, couldn't have connected it backwards as the wire that goes to the glow plugs doesn't reach to the other side of the relay. did however give the chassis earth a good clean with some wet and dry and suddenly the glow plugs work properly, cold start is much improved and i don't have to unplug them

this morning took the 940 and all the other bits whites so it's now gone to a better place to rust in peace, got £160 which i split with the farmer so i now have £70 towards my big servicing job that i'll be doing soon and a new thermostat that i fitted this afternoon. car now gets warm and stays there even if you're not thrashing it happy days. thermostat was a VW one marked '94 so i presume it was original, perhaps explains being a little past it, although testing it in boiling water it seemed to be ok.

before doing this i did some work on the gauges. bodged the 940 rev counter into the 740 dashboard with a few bits of wire with ring connectors on the ends of them, which i soldered to the old connections on the 740 cluster and then screwed into the 940 gauge mounts. hey presto, a functioning rev counter that proves it idles at 800RPM, not 6000 :P all ready to take me to uni tomorrow for my exams :| also swapped in the fuel and temp gauges (both known to be good) from the original gauges from my car. fuel gauge now steadily reads about a third, which is what the 940 one used to do i think, either i've used a lot of fuel to be down to that much, or something's wrong. should i remove the jumper on the back?

only issues that remain are:

knocking exhaust
gearbox mount
oil cooler mounts
shorten fuel tank straps
tracking
wayward petrol gauge/i've used a heck of a lot of diesel!
washer fluid warning lamp (i now have a sensor for it) always on
full service inc cam belt and water pump,

think i'll do the pump timing at the same time as the service, and maybe get the injectors pop tested as theres a little too much grey smoke for my liking. cleans up to nice black stuff when it's hot but more grey than i'd like when cold.

and that takes us to the end of the swap, but with issues still ongoing clearly!

Richard