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I've been driving and modifying vintage Volvos for the last 10 years or so. This was my project car for a long time : 1984 Volvo 240 Turbo intercooled wagon, manual transmission, full suspension upgrade, bigger exhaust, 18" BBS wheels. Once my daughter was old enough to drive I had to make a sacrifice and sell it. It's tough to explain to your kids how you don't have money to help them get a car when you have an extra in the garage. I had it for sale for a month or so when an offer came in to make a direct trade for a 91 Volvo 240 automatic for my daughter.
Rented a trailer and towed the wagon to Atlanta to trade for a green 1991 240 sedan.
Sadly after less than a year somebody pulled out in front of her and ended that fun. She wasn't at fault, but losing that car was pretty tough. I would have had no problems letting her drive it to California even on short notice.
She still wanted another Volvo and at the time there wasn't much to pick from in central Texas. I found a blue 1992 sedan in Austin, so we towed I home and I began modifying it. We had some fun with that car, even made a marathon drive one weekend from Houston to North Carolina to drive the Tail of the Dragon. We had it for about a year and a half, but it wasn't nearly as reliable as the car it replaced. It was slowly turning into fixing something every weekend, so we made the decision to sell it and move on. It was tough convincing her to accept a CRV as an option.
After looking at a few others, we found a black 2000 with only 88,000 miles on it. The previous owner had some sketchy bodywork done on the passenger side, but the A/C was ice cold and the price was right.
Notice the flat black fender full of bondo and the crappy paint on the door.
Started hitting the pick n pull and installed a roof rack. Ordered a basket from Amazon. My daughter still wasn't convinced it could be as cool as her Volvo was, but she wasn't able to see my vision of the finished product.
Got lucky another weekend and found a fender in good shape, but the hood on the donor was worse than what is on her car now.
We got to work taking care of the timing belt, drive belts and motor mounts so it would be reliable. Also changed the thermostat, plugs, wires and was running straight water to help in the hot Houston summers.
Ordered a DIY hydrographics kit online and after watching some YouTube videos, I started dipping the interior trim with a carbon fiber pattern.
Replaced the radio and all 4 speakers while we had the console apart.
Had to paint the cam cover a proper Honda wrinkle red finish.
Sold some spare Volvo parts I had lying around and ordered some black headlights and a set of Yonaka coilovers.
About a year after buying the blue Volvo I found a set of 16x8 BBS wheels in 5x114 bolt pattern. The plan was to run them on the Volvo with adapters, but didn't get a chance to. Glad I kept them as they fit the CRV perfect. Tires are 225/50/16.
About 2 weeks ago I took the wheels off and repainted them. The previous clearcoat was almost gone and they looked pretty rough. This spring I'm going to refinish the lips with a brighter silver.
Watched a lot more YouTube videos on paint repair and ordered some paint and clearcoat to match. Got the door repainted and polished out. The color is almost a perfect match, but I'm willing to accept it.
Sold the 18" BBS wheels from my Volvo wagon and upgraded the garage lighting to LEDs so I can finally see. My new project in the back is an 88 Accord LX-I coupe I picked up for $350. It hasn't been driven since 1992 and was sitting behind an old house just around the corner from where I live.
Last weekend I used the rest of the paint from the door to color match the grille because the faded chalky gray was killing me.
Here's the list of things left to complete :
- Install EP3 Civic SI front seats (I have them, they're in the back of the garage)
- upper strut bar
- red/clear tail lights
- rear spoiler
- black painted SE front and rear bumper covers
- black SE painted door handles
- window tint
- headers & exhaust
- powered subwoofer
- slotted front rotors
- powder coated calipers
- stainless brake lines
- JDM front bumper guard
- oil pressure gauge & water temperature gauge
Man, I dig that '84 wagon you started the thread with.
I grew up on 245s. I beat the hell out of them and they just ate it up...
The CRV is looking good!
Nice work so far, keep it up! Looks like fun. Hope to do the same with my daughter when she gets older.
most of the time she's out in the garage working on it beside me. She wants to learn how to fix her own car.
Once your daughter is old enough to drive, make sure you teach her how to change a spare tire, put anti-seize on all the wheel studs so the lug nuts don't rust to them. Keep a safety triangle in the car and buy her an extendable lug wrench so she can get the lug nuts loose and torque the lug nuts yourself with a torque wrench to make sure they aren't super tight. I make her remove a wheel and install the spare once a year.
Just follow the directions provided. There is more than enough material to complete the dash trim in a CRV. Watch some YouTube videos before so you know what you're getting into. I dipped all my parts in a plastic storage tote in the driveway.
When you prepare the film for dipping, only use a thin tape line around the outside of the film so it holds it's shape prior to dipping. Keep the film in an air conditioned space when you're not using it, the film is sensitive to moisture and even the humidity can cause it to stick to itself. After that happens you pretty much have to throw it away.
What are your plans with the coupe in the background? I had an '86 2 dr coupe years ago. Loved that car to death.
Always happy to see new posts on the forums. I don't do the Facebook thing so it's nice to see people still making build/update threads I can check out.
Right before we bought our house it showed up for sale locally on craigslist advertised for $500. I went and took a look at it and had to check to make sure parts were still available before making an offer - namely fuel system parts and a gas tank. The owners acquired the car in an estate sale. The car came with the house that the new owners were flipping. I needed another project with an inexpensive starting point, so I offered $350 and they accepted. Called a tow truck and had it moved to the new house just 1 day after we moved in.
It's been sitting since 1992. For the most part the body is pretty straight, but I've come across some rust due to accumulated dirt trapping water in a couple spots. It only has 100,000 miles on it and the interior is pretty clean. I didn't see any signs of water damage inside and the ECU under the driver seat doesn't have any major corrosion inside.
The first goal is to get the car running again. I need to replace pretty much every rubber part on the car - all the hoses, brake lines, belts and clean out the fuel tank and fuel system. I have a trunk full of parts I've already bought, but haven't had time in the last month to really work on it.
That's quite a project. Looks like a lot of work but a lot of fun as well bringing it back from the dead. Are you going to be able to save the paint? Looks pretty crusty. Looks very solid tho and a great starting price. What does the interior look like? Can't wait to see what you do with it! Keep us posted
I was finally able to let the paint on the passenger front door cure long enough to polish it and overall I'm pretty happy with the results. Aside from a couple minor spots, the gloss and shine is really good. I'm going to order another 2 cans here soon as I picked up a dent free black hood that needs the top surface repainted. I'm going to work on painting all the side trim gloss black with a clear coat because I'm not a big fan of the unpainted trim or the unpainted bumpers.
11-26-2018, 12:34 PM
2000 CRV father/daughter project
