Volvo built the 200 Series for nearly 20 years and the owners of those sensibly rectangular machines tended to keep them for decade after decade, so I have no problem finding plenty of discarded examples during my junkyard travels despite the last ones rolling off the assembly line in 1993. Most of those machines have been the four–cylinder/four– or five–door cars, though, because more cylinders and/or fewer doors didn’t seem stolid enough for your typical American Volvo shopper. In fact, prior to today, I had documented as many junked 262C Bertones as 242 two–doors (and just a single 264 sedan). Now I’ve found this rusty 242 in a self-service yard between Denver and Cheyenne.
The fender tag shows that it was built at the plant in Ghent, Belgium and that it’s a California-spec car rather than the 49-state model. Just about all the other 240s I’ve found in junkyards were built in Göteborg.
This car may have been sold new in California, but it sure didn’t stay there long. I’m guessing that this 242 spent some time in a Rust Monster-friendly place like Michigan or Maine before coming to Colorado (they don’t use much road salt around here and the single-digit humidity helps slow down corrosion).
Moe’s Broadway Bagel in Boulder has been around since the early 1990s, and I see these stickers on many Front Range junkyard vehicles.
It’s well-traveled, with better than a quarter-million miles on the odometer. I find 240s with more miles, but 263,554 is a respectable final total for the old Swede.
Volvo stopped making the two-door 240 after the 1984 model year, so this car is one of the last ones. While not exactly sporty, the two-door coupe was quite a bit cheaper than the four-door; in 1983 a 240 two-door sedan with manual transmission listed at $10,650 (around $32,265 in 2022 dollars), while the four-door version cost $11,085 ($33,585 now).
If you want to get picky about the official name of this car, Volvo called it a 240 DL when it was in the showrooms; these days, everybody uses the more useful 1975-1979 naming system to describe 200 Series cars. That’s what I’ve done here.
The engine is a 2.0-liter B23, rated at 107 horsepower.
The interior is pretty well beat up, the body is rusty, the odometer shows a scary number, and it has a type of transmission that few are willing or able to drive these days. The local Volvo 240 aficionados have all the projects they can handle, so this car was bound for The Crusher the moment it entered the junkyard ecosystem.
You could get a turbocharged version with 127 horsepower for $16,050 (about $48,625 today).
The 700 Series was supposed to replace the 200 Series, but that never happened. In fact, the 240 stayed in production a year after the 740 got axed.
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[Images by the author]
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These cars were never bulletproof, or exceptional or even competitive on anything at the time, but still: fun memories.
Love the 4+3 OD, that was a great transmission. You needed every gear to get this pig moving.
The car was perfect for teaching new drivers how to drive stick. The clutch was light and direct and worked well with the smooth shifting transmission. (At least that’s how I remember them.)
In their 30s as a non-tenured professor it was the 240. In their 40s as a tenured professor, it was the Prius. In their 60’s as a department head, it was a Tesla. In their 70s in retirement it was a Rivian. Smug virtue signalling off the CO taxpayer dime feels so good!
In the late 1970s’/early 1980’s at least two of my profs drove Checker Marathons.
Caddy is your daddy.
Suck it bitches !
That’s a pretty smug comment you got there.
I kinda miss when professors drove slightly eccentric but bullet proof cars for years and years and years but without the holier than thou lecture. When I was in school in the early 90’s it was 240’s and Toyota Celicas from the 70’s. Occasionally a Mercedes Turbo Diesel. Good times, and all worthy vehicles.
At that time there were still a lot of quirky and apolitical professors about, but you could tell they were starting to give way to the Marxist wackos. Sadly that transformation is nearly complete.
These Volvos were about as bullet proof as you could get in 1983. The drive train is proven and is mechanically simple compared to other vehicles during the same time and definitely compared to today’s vehicles. Few American cars from the 80s could even be found today even in a salvage yard so I would say these old Volvos were very robust.
By bulletproof you don’t actually mean bulletproof, right?
Asking for a friend in Europe.
Of course not I mean they are as reliable as you could get for a vehicle made and bought during this time. No vehicle is perfect and all need maintenance and an occasional repair but these old Volvos seem to run and run and the drive trains are still good even after they hit the junkyard. It wouldn’t surprise me if this Volvo was still running strong and that age, desirability, and the rust made it not worth restoring and that you could still find a similar Volvo for less than it would take to fix it or at least close to it. I still see an occasional Volvo like this on the road but less than I did a few years ago but that is true of an vehicle that is close to 40 years old.
No I mean will it stop a projectile fired out of a weapon. (In case that ever becomes an issue anywhere in the world.)
Possibly it could stop a bullet these old Volvos are thick as a brick. They were tanks.
An aunt and uncle of mine always had Volvos when I was growing up. While they were long lived, they also always needed something. I wouldn’t call them reliable in the sense that Honda and Toyota buyers of the period called their cars reliable. Nor would I call them refined or wort anywhere close to an inflation adjusted 32,000 dollars given the Japanese competition of the time.
The parts were not that hard to find and they were fairly easy to work on. Compared to Toyota and Honda not many vehicles are reliable but for what Volvos were they would outlast many cars. I have seen Volvos with 500k or more miles with the original drive train and true they would rust out in areas with snow where salt and road chemicals were used but in Texas and much of the Southwest these cars would run for decades. They were not very quick and I would not call them smooth riding but they would definitely last and they were about the safest car you could buy during their time before air bags and today’s safety features. They use to have commercials showing how safe Volvos were by crashing them with crash test dummies. I can understand why people were attracted to them and they definitely did not change their design every year as was typical of many American cars in the 60s and much of the early 70s. No one would accuse a Volvo owner of being frivolous or subject to fads. I never had one but I could think of much worse choices of cars during much of the life of this cars run. Volvos were not designed for those who were into performance Volvos were practical and functional.
I had a coworker in the 80’s who owned the turbo version of this 240 in silver with the blue two tone interior and purple tint windows. Volvos weren’t quite on my car radar back then due to the stereotype “They’re boxy, and good” but I was quite impressed with it.
My father bought an early 80’s 240GL wagon (1982, maybe 1983 model year) brand new, which was problematic if my memory serves. There was surface rust starting upon delivery. At least four failed water pumps in as many years. It was slow, and only returned 19mpg around Chicago-land with the automatic. However, it had the rear facing third row seat, it was comfortable, and we kept it longer than most of the other family cars. As the 80’s progressed, it was replaced by a new 1988 Toyota Land Cruiser, reliable, and an honest 12mpg in town, 14 highway…
The B21 engine had 107 hp, and a displacement of 2.1 litres.
The 1983 B23F engine was 2.3 litres but still a 107 hp plodder.
There was never a 2.0 litre B23. Volvo didn’t go in for such naming frippery. A rare Murilee Martin error.
My idea of hell would have been to own a 240 Volvo and have to drive that piece of stodge forever. A friend had a ’76 244 and to say it was a heavy steering low pulse plodder is an overstatement. As in it was worse than that.
And a Volvo 240 if taken care of could virtually last forever. My idea of hell would be forced to drive a Yugo but I doubt a Yugo would last forever but then you might have to push it forever.
I bought a ’83 245 in ’95. It had 196k miles on it. Drove it fifteen years and another (est*) 190k miles. Only got towed three times.
Once when the fuel pump failed.
Once when the timing belt broke. (non-interference motor, easy two hour fix).
Once when the harness leprosy caused the starter to kick in while I was crusng along at 40mph. (Took two weeks to remove the old harness and build a new one from scratch. Good factory harnesses were unobtanium by then.)
(* The odometer gears crumble to dust after time. They also crumble when one tries to remove it from a junkyard speedo)
The OP car appears to have had a functioning odometer when it died. Most all the dead odo’s have the trip odo set to zero since the owner inevitably pushes the reset after the odo dies.
I have heard that about Volvo odometers. Wonder why in such an otherwise well built car that Volvo would put in odometers that would not hold up. Seems odometers are fairly simple devices. Never had an odometer go on any car even American ones.