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1980 242 GT T5 swap. An unreasonable pursuit.

On my first T5 build that I am currently doing for my 740 I went in a similar way as you are going. Relatively stock but slight horsepower gain for winter fun.
Mine is B5244T3, but nevertheless.
I just did a slight hone on the cylinders, measured the cylinders. And pretty much just cleaned everything up. I got a seriously gunked up engine which probably did not get any maintenance during it's last life. But everything checked out okay.
For the block added shims between the cylinders.
OE pistons with original rings - measured the ring gaps just in case and that was it.
Connecting rods are stock - I'm probably not be going to be pushing past 300hp.
Even the conrod bearings went back in. Those looked brand new... Main bearings I changed out, because those had slight wear on them.
Refreshed head of course.

My main thought with this was that I want to get the car sorted, running and driving with some kind of an idea what needs to be done. But keep it initially at least in a semi decent budget.
So my 5 cents regarding your build, keep it as simple as possible. If you are not going for huge power goals. Add the new bearings, H-beams just for peace of mind, refresh/clean otherwise and send it.
240's are really light cars by todays standards and a vastly more modern engine than a B230 will make this chassis a rocket ship any way. :)


As for the water pipe, I modified mine like this. It has only the cabin heater port back of the head. Turbo coolant in and drain + the coolant tank port which is the highest. There is one extra threaded pipe under it, in the block. That I just blocked off in a later date, could have put there a petcock, but did not want any chance that it would start leaking.
Thanks for sharing! The B5244T5 (and presumably B5254T4?) has an extra port in the block that the other engines don't have AFAIK. I'll show a photo at some point. I already have the water pipe set up and ready to go, it's just one additional piece.

Man, those install tools really fucked you over.
Yeah. Very dumb way to smoke another engine.
 
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Well you have me looking at our Volvo special tools.

One of them the balls are completely encased in metal with just the surface that touches visible.

BUT, on our other one, there are three balls missing AND it is a piece of tin pinched over to retain the balls on it.

I've ordered a new one to see what shows up and replace the one with missing balls.

Scary. I'm gonna check my aftermarket set of tools I have at home to see what they have for retainers.


Edit- I looked at it closer. One side is enclosed, the other side is not. So these balls can fall out of either one. Sending a case to engineering!

Jordan
 
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Well you have me looking at our Volvo special tools.

One of them the balls are completely encased in metal with just the surface that touches visible.

BUT, on our other one, there are three balls missing AND it is a piece of tin pinched over to retain the balls on it.

I've ordered a new one to see what shows up and replace the one with missing balls.

Scary. I'm gonna check my aftermarket set of tools I have at home to see what they have for retainers.


Edit- I looked at it closer. One side is enclosed, the other side is not. So these balls can fall out of either one. Sending a case to engineering!

Jordan
Wow, I'm surprised that even the proper Volvo tools have this flaw. That would be a nice consolation prize if this whole ordeal ended with Volvo making a change in the tool. Please share if you hear anything back from engineering!
 
Wow, I'm surprised that even the proper Volvo tools have this flaw. That would be a nice consolation prize if this whole ordeal ended with Volvo making a change in the tool. Please share if you hear anything back from engineering!


I will. We tried to order one. They say we have to contact Kent-Moore for one. My parts guy is trying to get one.

If nothing comes of it, I will probably try to find a fully caged bearing and replace the ones on our tools here.

Jordan
 
Dang, y'all are fancy with your bearing spitting tools.
About 15 years ago I mashed the porcelain out of a couple spark plugs, welded some threaded rod into them, cut and drilled a couple pieces of 1" square tubing and have been using those as the whiteblock cam cover install tools since. I just have some greasy nuts and washers to pull them down over the threaded rod. I DO use the legit lock tools though.
 
I heard back. Tool hasn't been updated since it was released in 1991. They are now aware of it, but were unsure if the tool department will do anything about it. At least I tried. I also warned all the other Foremans and techs I know about this potential failure. They're all going to inspect their tools.

Might not be much, but hopefully it saves some engines.

On a side note. I vaguely remember an engine failure years ago that we assumed was a banjo bolt, but was intact when we disassembled the engine. I wonder if that is where our missing balls (or ball) went.
 
Dang, y'all are fancy with your bearing spitting tools.
About 15 years ago I mashed the porcelain out of a couple spark plugs, welded some threaded rod into them, cut and drilled a couple pieces of 1" square tubing and have been using those as the whiteblock cam cover install tools since. I just have some greasy nuts and washers to pull them down over the threaded rod. I DO use the legit lock tools though.
That’s the old school Volvospeed way of doing it
 
Dang, y'all are fancy with your bearing spitting tools.
About 15 years ago I mashed the porcelain out of a couple spark plugs, welded some threaded rod into them, cut and drilled a couple pieces of 1" square tubing and have been using those as the whiteblock cam cover install tools since. I just have some greasy nuts and washers to pull them down over the threaded rod. I DO use the legit lock tools though.

That’s the old school Volvospeed way of doing it

I just carefully snugged down all the cam cover bolts a little at a time to evenly apply pressure across the whole thing 🤷
 
Where at in Indiana? You're not driving past without saying 'hey'...are you?

Any update on motor(s)? Or do we just need to wait for that episode? :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:
 
I actually watched the whole thing.
Thanks! I'm taking this as a compliment, i think?

Where at in Indiana? You're not driving past without saying 'hey'...are you?

Any update on motor(s)? Or do we just need to wait for that episode? :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:
Rochester, so I cut over through Chicago, which is always a delight with a trailer.

I had the ball rolling on the engine, but as soon as the opportunity to paint the car came up, I just dropped everything to plow through that as fast as possible. I need to get the new block and head over the machinist to be resurfaced for the factory MLS gasket, and then I can get back to work on that.

Homer and I are working through sibling engine builds in tandem (his will be the mack-daddy compared to mine though) so some of the tricky bits are already worked out (like a more elegant solution to fitting cam sensors for dual vvt that's inspired by the RNC engines).

I also have a bunch of parts piled up for my BMW 2002 so a lot of that will probably happen first, but I at least want the new engine build to be progressing in the background. It'll probably be a while until i make a video about the new engine because it'll likely be all at once (I think i've made enough T5 build videos for a while lol)
 
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