Hello folks. This is my first post here. I'm a lifelong mechanic with a lot of experience but I'm new to Volvos. I have a '90 780 with the 2.3 turbo engine. I got it cheap and it's kind of a beater. My teenage daughter has been driving it and it's been a great car. Problem is, last week a heater control valve on a coolant line broke dumping all the coolant out. My daughter didn't realize this since the temp gauge doesn't work and she drove it a while, resulting in it overheating and blowing the head gasket. I pulled the head off the motor and while everything looks okay to the eye, a straightedge across the head shows about .014" of warpage, with the worst point being between the center two cylinders. This makes sense because these were the cylinders effected by the head gasket problem.
I'd like to get the car back on the road as cheaply as possible so I'd like to avoid buying a reman head for $450. I found some references that say the B230 head can safely have .015" decked off. What do you guys think? I also heard about aftermarket head gaskets that are thicker than stock to make up for the material removed. Anyone have any info on these? Thanks in advance for the help. Cheers.