Post by 345DL on Sept 17, 2012 18:43:05 GMT
Hi
Having met Matt and his lovely 55 estate at the VOC section of the Bishops Stortford Motor Show yesterday, I have been persuaded to join this forum and share some of the vario love, Ovlov style.
Anyway, Bjorn is a 1985 Volvo 340 DL, variomatic of course. DL means it's the most basic model in the range sold in the UK. It has no creature comforts like a radio or door pockets, which I love! The car has done just over 52,000 miles, and I've had him for just over a year.
You may recognise the car, as Alex van der Veer owned him for a while before I did, and it was Richard Butler's car before that. Prior to that, it had one owner from new, who lived in the Knutsford area. All credit must go to Richard for the condition of the car, however, as I gather that he rescued it from a part-exchange auction with a broken clutch and broken belts, and spent I'm sure quite a significant chunk of money repairing it, and replacing a wing and consequently respraying a good proportion of the car to match, to an extremely high standard.
Bjorn is not, however, an entirely unproblematic car, and unfortunately it's the variomatic system that's been causing the bother.
After several months of ownership, I eventually deduced that the electronic vacuum assistance was not operating. The clues were that the revs were not dropping off when cruising and lifting off the throttle, and the low ratio hold switch had no effect. After a lot of research to learn and understand exactly how the system worked, and an overhaul of the vacuum control unit, I narrowed it down to a faulty throttle cable switch. One new throttle cable later, and I finally had a car that dropped the revs when cruising, as it should.
However, the issues don't quite end there, because as I explained to Matt yesterday, the car is still extremely and intolerably loud to drive. There are two noises going on, but it is hard to describe them. One is a high pitched whistle which is quite pronounced, and the other is a deep rumbling boom that gets louder and louder and made, for example, the journey down from Cambridge to Stortford on the M11 yesterday extremely uncomfortable. Matt suggested that there may be no oil in the primary and secondary 'gearboxes'. (As an aside, V300s have a secondary 'gearbox' fed from the secondary pulleys powering the driveshafts). I have been busy under the car with axle stands as soon as I came home from work tonight, but I'm afraid none of the bolts want to move for me, so I will have to take it to a garage so that it can be done on a ramp. I'm really hoping that this is the problem, and that the car will then behave as it should, although I'm not holding my breath.
I should mention that the belts are Roulunds Roflex ones. I put up a video of them in action here:
Anyway, I'm hoping to get over to Daf Central soon to get a bit more of a flavour for variomatics, and Dafs in particular.
I should add that my username 345DL comes from one of my other Ovlov 300s which I own, a 1980 manual:
My third is a 1979 343, again manual, which I am in the process of recommissioning back onto the road. My plan is to take it to Holland next year, and it would be good if I could time it so as to coincide with a meeting of DAFs/300s in Holland, whether organised by the Dutch clubs or British. I know it's a manual, but come on, there aren't many early 343s left so we can't be too mean about its cheat's transmission!
My holy grail, however, is a 1976 or 1977 model year 343. I know it would be a huge challenge to restore one given their dreadful reputation for rotting, and a saying about hen's teeth comes to mind, but there must be one out there somewhere and if there is, I want want need it!
Thanks for reading!
Siôn
Having met Matt and his lovely 55 estate at the VOC section of the Bishops Stortford Motor Show yesterday, I have been persuaded to join this forum and share some of the vario love, Ovlov style.
Anyway, Bjorn is a 1985 Volvo 340 DL, variomatic of course. DL means it's the most basic model in the range sold in the UK. It has no creature comforts like a radio or door pockets, which I love! The car has done just over 52,000 miles, and I've had him for just over a year.
You may recognise the car, as Alex van der Veer owned him for a while before I did, and it was Richard Butler's car before that. Prior to that, it had one owner from new, who lived in the Knutsford area. All credit must go to Richard for the condition of the car, however, as I gather that he rescued it from a part-exchange auction with a broken clutch and broken belts, and spent I'm sure quite a significant chunk of money repairing it, and replacing a wing and consequently respraying a good proportion of the car to match, to an extremely high standard.
Bjorn is not, however, an entirely unproblematic car, and unfortunately it's the variomatic system that's been causing the bother.
After several months of ownership, I eventually deduced that the electronic vacuum assistance was not operating. The clues were that the revs were not dropping off when cruising and lifting off the throttle, and the low ratio hold switch had no effect. After a lot of research to learn and understand exactly how the system worked, and an overhaul of the vacuum control unit, I narrowed it down to a faulty throttle cable switch. One new throttle cable later, and I finally had a car that dropped the revs when cruising, as it should.
However, the issues don't quite end there, because as I explained to Matt yesterday, the car is still extremely and intolerably loud to drive. There are two noises going on, but it is hard to describe them. One is a high pitched whistle which is quite pronounced, and the other is a deep rumbling boom that gets louder and louder and made, for example, the journey down from Cambridge to Stortford on the M11 yesterday extremely uncomfortable. Matt suggested that there may be no oil in the primary and secondary 'gearboxes'. (As an aside, V300s have a secondary 'gearbox' fed from the secondary pulleys powering the driveshafts). I have been busy under the car with axle stands as soon as I came home from work tonight, but I'm afraid none of the bolts want to move for me, so I will have to take it to a garage so that it can be done on a ramp. I'm really hoping that this is the problem, and that the car will then behave as it should, although I'm not holding my breath.
I should mention that the belts are Roulunds Roflex ones. I put up a video of them in action here:
Anyway, I'm hoping to get over to Daf Central soon to get a bit more of a flavour for variomatics, and Dafs in particular.
I should add that my username 345DL comes from one of my other Ovlov 300s which I own, a 1980 manual:
My third is a 1979 343, again manual, which I am in the process of recommissioning back onto the road. My plan is to take it to Holland next year, and it would be good if I could time it so as to coincide with a meeting of DAFs/300s in Holland, whether organised by the Dutch clubs or British. I know it's a manual, but come on, there aren't many early 343s left so we can't be too mean about its cheat's transmission!
My holy grail, however, is a 1976 or 1977 model year 343. I know it would be a huge challenge to restore one given their dreadful reputation for rotting, and a saying about hen's teeth comes to mind, but there must be one out there somewhere and if there is, I want want need it!
Thanks for reading!
Siôn
