matt's 1995 855 Turbo M56L

I bought this car on May 10th 2020 and decided I'd try to start documenting my progress here. This will probably be a long first post since I'm just now starting to document after owning it about 8 months. I've daily driven an automatic '97 854 T5 since 2017 and wasn't necessarily on the hunt for another car, but then this listing popped up:



A couple hours away from me this guy was getting rid of three 850 wagons, one of them being a '97 R, and another being a '95 turbo, which the previous owner had conveniently already manual swapped. I had wanted a wagon for some time but I didn't want to part with my sedan and I hadn't really been able to justify a second vehicle. But when this popped up, I knew it would be a long, long time before another already-swapped 850 would become available near me. Not to mention this car was basically my ideal spec: black like my sedan, turbo, an estate, and a 5 speed manual. Given the space I would've been interested in the R too (full R interior was pretty clean, salvageable R bumper), but I could only have one and I made the easy choice.

So, no-brainer I showed up ready to buy it and the seller was predictably an enthusiast. The car had been sitting 2 years, had entirely blown suspension on all four corners, minor lifter tick and leaked a bit of oil from the PCV. I was told the odometer broke at 182k about 4 years ago but had only driven <5k since then. It started right up and pulled pretty hard on a quick test drive, shifted into all 5 gears and reverse and drove as well as a car with 25 year old original suspension could. It definitely needed a decent amount of work, but I was set on it and managed to drive away in it for $900 with a cargo area full of assorted parts, including a rear wing.

First photo stopping for a snack on the way home:


Perfo wheels with some old tires, x70 door handles, V70 rear hatch, mismatched/spray painted hood, flat black front bumper with no grilles, plasti-dipped & half missing door trim, deleted headlight wipers, a ripped passenger seat and a bit of glue peeking out from inside the passenger side headlight. Oh, and pre-wired for side marker lights.

Interior shot, this pic is from later but not a lot has changed. When I bought it the passenger footwell panel was installed but there was no radio. Put a cheap one in there for now. All the speakers work except the ones on the dash pad, which I removed and discarded. I've grown rather fond of this interior color scheme, an interesting change from my tan interior sedan. Heated seats were a nice upgrade for me, too.



At my parent's place with the sedan


My roommates coincidentally owned identical cars at the time, so I thought this photo was amusing


Priority number one was installing the wing of course, then I brought the wagon in to my local independent Volvo mechanic for a free post-purchase evaluation, and to get it up on a lift.


The inspection revealed many loose suspension bushings (just kidding, the drive home did), a bent wheel and a sticky rear caliper. But overall in good shape underneath. They did give me some **** for how bad the tires were, but I wasn't planning on driving it around much yet. I later ended up purchasing a replacement Perfo from the mechanic for when I replaced the tires at a later date.



The shop also read the mileage from the cluster for me, which was at 186k. So it really was only driven a few thousand miles in the last few years of ownership. Previous owner replaced the timing belt and water pump in January 2016 at 170-something thousand miles, which I have receipts for, so I feel comfortable enough to leave that alone for a bit longer. A full refresh is definitely in order eventually.

The neighbor's cat approves of the purchase:



Right away I:

• changed the oil. Car was sitting since 2018
• did the PCV system. I did the PCV on my sedan about a year prior and it passes the glove test with flying colors. The wagon had leaking URO hoses and I replaced everything with OEM, it was still failing the glove test but not as bad as before, and no longer leaking. A few months later I tried the 5/8 heater hose mod, and now the glove doesn't really inflate but there's no suction either. So that's still somewhat ongoing
• replaced the busted driver door check strap
• replaced the upper engine mount bushing
• replaced a coolant hose
• replaced the oil cap seal and coolant overflow reservoir cap

The front brakes had been replaced quite recently, but the rears were toast. With that on top of the sticky caliper, I went for a rear brake refresh with rotors, pads, new parking brake shoes & hardware, and I just replaced the one caliper since the other one was fine. Looks like the guide pin is missing from the caliper in the photo but I had just taken it back out to install the anti-squeal shims.



Some time passed, I drove the car around for a bit on the toast suspension before finally working up the nerve to order all new suspension parts. I went with Bilstein touring struts and shocks, OE everything else and kept the stock ride height. I think I should have gone for the HD sway bar end links, but I can always buy them later and swap the ones I have onto my sedan, which could use a set. I also may go slightly lower eventually.

I didn't think I'd be documenting this process at this point in time, so here's the only photo I could find of the suspension refresh, featuring some pretty sketchy spring compressors and the old parts in the background:



I'd never done struts before but a friend of mine had air tools which made things a fair bit quicker.

The fresh suspension (obviously) made a huge difference. Life was a bit busy at this time and I wasn't ready to put tires on it yet, so I drove it occasionally with a crooked steering wheel for a few weeks before getting an alignment.



Side marker lights installed, coolant changed, ECT sensor, spark plugs among some other things. Waiting to clean up the paint until I find a decent black hood at the JY. Replaced exterior door trim with a beautiful set sent to me by none other than Robert Spinner! Came from a green NA sedan that he parted for an M56.

Starting to think the neighbor's cat is secretly a P80 enthusiast...


Right as I was about to put a set of tires on the Perfos, a set of Volans popped up on CL for not the worst deal in the world, and long story short....



I honestly expected to stick with the wheels I had for a while and I liked them, but Volans don't come up for sale on local craigslist every day. Would've loved to keep the Perfos, but had to fund those Volans somehow. Ended up selling the set of 4 Perfos (with the one replacement) to a local dealer who put them on a '98 V70. Put some budget-friendly 215/45 tires on them and finally got an alignment.

Replaced blower motor, gross. Unclogged a drain. In desperate need of a cabin air filter.



Went back to the original seller to buy some more parts he had: center console, set of front seats, instrument cluster (mine had a cracked lens), spare carpet etc.

Ripped passenger seat replaced:






As of recently I replaced the heater core and, when it promptly broke, the firewall coupler for the heater hoses, which was nasty inside.





So anyway, there's a summary of the car's journey so far. There's definitely many more things I know it still needs, but I am more than open to any suggestions or advice on it moving forward. Feel free to follow along as I hopefully remember to keep documenting my progress.