adamdrives
Member
- Joined
- Aug 9, 2010
- Location
- San Jose
This thread will follow my progress bringing this car into excellent condition as a clean and aesthetically pleasing useable fun to drive daily. I have a few other cars so I'll probably never drive it for more than a week at a time, but I'd still like to be able to hop in for a road trip if the mood or occasion strikes. That means working climate control, not too harsh ride, quiet cabin and mild exhaust. I don't have any plans to turbo or engine swap it at this point, just enjoy it as it was meant to be with some worthwhile improvements.
A little history on this car: it had been sitting for about ten years after the original owner passed or stopped driving it. A friend of her son bought the car as a project, but got in over his head and needed to find it a good home. A friend of mine told me about the car, and we picked it up on a trailer in Hollister. It came with a nice stack of records going back to its original purchase invoice in Campbell which is where I currently work.
This is the first 240 I've owned or driven for more than a day, I've had mostly white block cars and a diesel 740. I didn't know much about 240s when I bought the car, I just liked that it looked different from most 240s on the road. I got really lucky, because it ended up needing very little to be a driver, and besides from a few blemishes was in very good condition.
With the car at my shop, the first step was to replace the rusty fuel tank. Next, figure out why the freshly replaced main pump wasn't running. Looking under the dash I saw a clean new relay, but in the wrong harness. With the actual fuel pump relay replaced, fresh gas in the tank and a new fuel filter, the car started and ran decently well. I replaced all the vacuum lines, ignition parts and adjusted the (zero millimeter) valve clearance and injector seals, and she purred. A week later the car passed smog on the first try, which was a good sign.
With the reg sticker in place I drove the car for about a week and to a show an hour or so North. I noticed that the blower motor was dead, the cabin was inhospitably loud, and the windshield whistled noisily. The three speed automatic with no overdrive didn't help with noise on the highway, or anything else that involving acceleration. It was satisfying to be driving an early modern era car, but if I was going to keep it some of those issues needed to be addressed.
I decided to replace the blower motor, heater core and evaporator, and put down as much soundproofing as I could while the dash was apart. It struck me that it would also be the easiest time to manual swap the car, with nothing obstructing the pedal box and all the wiring exposed to wire in an overdrive relay. I found a full swap kit in the classifieds (thanks MCHN8) and got to work disassembling the dash and removing the interior.
I spent the next few months chipping away at getting down the sound proofing a few hours at a time when it was slow at work. I found a cheaper alternative to the real Dynamat on amazon, and it wasn't too hard to apply using rollers a user recommended. Talking to Dad (lookforjoe) he mentioned that the foil backed butyl stuff wasn't really that great for noise dampening, but the foam stuff worked pretty well. Since I already had done most of the car with the dynamat, I went ahead and covered the front floors and firewall in a second layer of the foam. In total I used about 50 sq feet of the dynamat and 20 sq feet of the closed cell foam.
Underneath the car I had a hard time getting the trans in because the input shaft kept hanging up on the pressure plate fingers. Turns out I had the clutch disc in backwards I'd like to say I didn't give the tunnel some light pounding before I figured that out, but I'd be lying. The only other issue I ran into while replacing the transmission was overzealous reassembly on the u joints, which I think are a little too tight and causing an intermittent shuddering.
With the swap done and the interior back in the car I took it for the first drive home from the shop. The cabin noise was better, but still a lot like standing in a room full of sewing machines. I think sound proofing the bottom of the hood and getting some thicker foam in the shifter opening will help with that. The speedo reads high, so I need to figure out how to fix that. On the bright side my overdrive wiring I put off for weeks worked perfectly and the car thunked into 5th with very little hesitation. With an actual cruising gear I could finally just drive the car like a regular car.
Other than not having a working radio, It's completely drivable. The clutch cable may need a little adjustment, it engages almost immediately and some times is hard to get into first or catches a little going into third, but nothing major. I took the car to Santa Cruz today with my roommate to visit a few breweries, and we got multiple thumbs ups and a conversation just by being in it. To me, that really makes all the hard work pay off.
Plans for the near future:
Alright, enough talking.
First start:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laVNIlFD9gA
After a initial tune up:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHA867Uiwek
Underneath the car
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lUDqz9-d0g
As she sat before I picked her up
Back at the shop!
A little rough, but not bad interior
valve cover cleaned up, all vac lines replaced
Cleaned up very well. Impressive how thick and glossy the paint is even in the bay
The start of the soundproofing and manual swap. It took a little over a year from start to finish with the car being out of the shop between June and October while I worked on other smaller projects. I started in Feb of 20 right before Covid happened.
man the center stack took me a while to get just right
Trans prepped
O/D wiring
sound asleep in the shop after work
A little history on this car: it had been sitting for about ten years after the original owner passed or stopped driving it. A friend of her son bought the car as a project, but got in over his head and needed to find it a good home. A friend of mine told me about the car, and we picked it up on a trailer in Hollister. It came with a nice stack of records going back to its original purchase invoice in Campbell which is where I currently work.
This is the first 240 I've owned or driven for more than a day, I've had mostly white block cars and a diesel 740. I didn't know much about 240s when I bought the car, I just liked that it looked different from most 240s on the road. I got really lucky, because it ended up needing very little to be a driver, and besides from a few blemishes was in very good condition.
With the car at my shop, the first step was to replace the rusty fuel tank. Next, figure out why the freshly replaced main pump wasn't running. Looking under the dash I saw a clean new relay, but in the wrong harness. With the actual fuel pump relay replaced, fresh gas in the tank and a new fuel filter, the car started and ran decently well. I replaced all the vacuum lines, ignition parts and adjusted the (zero millimeter) valve clearance and injector seals, and she purred. A week later the car passed smog on the first try, which was a good sign.
With the reg sticker in place I drove the car for about a week and to a show an hour or so North. I noticed that the blower motor was dead, the cabin was inhospitably loud, and the windshield whistled noisily. The three speed automatic with no overdrive didn't help with noise on the highway, or anything else that involving acceleration. It was satisfying to be driving an early modern era car, but if I was going to keep it some of those issues needed to be addressed.
I decided to replace the blower motor, heater core and evaporator, and put down as much soundproofing as I could while the dash was apart. It struck me that it would also be the easiest time to manual swap the car, with nothing obstructing the pedal box and all the wiring exposed to wire in an overdrive relay. I found a full swap kit in the classifieds (thanks MCHN8) and got to work disassembling the dash and removing the interior.
I spent the next few months chipping away at getting down the sound proofing a few hours at a time when it was slow at work. I found a cheaper alternative to the real Dynamat on amazon, and it wasn't too hard to apply using rollers a user recommended. Talking to Dad (lookforjoe) he mentioned that the foil backed butyl stuff wasn't really that great for noise dampening, but the foam stuff worked pretty well. Since I already had done most of the car with the dynamat, I went ahead and covered the front floors and firewall in a second layer of the foam. In total I used about 50 sq feet of the dynamat and 20 sq feet of the closed cell foam.
Underneath the car I had a hard time getting the trans in because the input shaft kept hanging up on the pressure plate fingers. Turns out I had the clutch disc in backwards I'd like to say I didn't give the tunnel some light pounding before I figured that out, but I'd be lying. The only other issue I ran into while replacing the transmission was overzealous reassembly on the u joints, which I think are a little too tight and causing an intermittent shuddering.
With the swap done and the interior back in the car I took it for the first drive home from the shop. The cabin noise was better, but still a lot like standing in a room full of sewing machines. I think sound proofing the bottom of the hood and getting some thicker foam in the shifter opening will help with that. The speedo reads high, so I need to figure out how to fix that. On the bright side my overdrive wiring I put off for weeks worked perfectly and the car thunked into 5th with very little hesitation. With an actual cruising gear I could finally just drive the car like a regular car.
Other than not having a working radio, It's completely drivable. The clutch cable may need a little adjustment, it engages almost immediately and some times is hard to get into first or catches a little going into third, but nothing major. I took the car to Santa Cruz today with my roommate to visit a few breweries, and we got multiple thumbs ups and a conversation just by being in it. To me, that really makes all the hard work pay off.
Plans for the near future:
- replace leaking front seals (not even dripping, the car is otherwise leak free)
- replace fuel pump, its starting to groan. No loss of power that I notice.
- Install 5x114.3 ET16 17" BBS reps (of what model, not sure) with adapters. Thanks 89-240gl+t and 1Smooth84!
- Lower the car. I know coilovers are probably the only way to really get a lower look and maintain a less harsh ride, but I'll probably start with just lowering springs until I find a good deal on the real stuff.
- Install wood Momo steering wheel I've been carrying around for years (just need adapter)
- Paint and install chin spoiler from a Turbo car
Alright, enough talking.
First start:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laVNIlFD9gA
After a initial tune up:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHA867Uiwek
Underneath the car
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lUDqz9-d0g
As she sat before I picked her up
Back at the shop!
A little rough, but not bad interior
valve cover cleaned up, all vac lines replaced
Cleaned up very well. Impressive how thick and glossy the paint is even in the bay
The start of the soundproofing and manual swap. It took a little over a year from start to finish with the car being out of the shop between June and October while I worked on other smaller projects. I started in Feb of 20 right before Covid happened.
man the center stack took me a while to get just right
Trans prepped
O/D wiring
sound asleep in the shop after work
Last edited: