Hi, new to the forums, so first I will say Hello! So a friend had a 1981 240 wagon sitting in her driveway and me being curious asked "so whatcha gonna do with that...." and a week later it was home sitting on the side of my house. Have always loved volvo's and have always wanted to fix up a car.

Her main issue was it kept dying, replaced battery, kept dying, must be alternator, she doesnt care enough to fix it, buys new car. So my dad the mechanic as decieded that yes it is the alternator or one of the wires to it. He said he would get under it this weekend and look.

Well I actually stayed home from work today and out of boredom deceided I could get under there and look for myself.

Guy down at IPD explained to me where the wires ran and what usually happened to them so I was not surprised to see lots of oil and what not caked around them. What did surprise me was the coolant obviously dripping down from the same area.

So my question is, what am I looking for here? I'm sure my dad will know, but since I'm trying to learn I'd like to ask the forum and maybe be able to tell him xyz when he arrives home later. Instead of just saying "uh I looked under there. coolant leaking."

 

I'm not sure what you are looking for, but you can check the alternator out put with a multimeter. You check the battery voltage before you start it and then check it after you start it. It should increase by a volt or more and be pretty consistent. There are better ways to check by loading the battery up at different RPMs, but this check should tell you if the regulator or brushes nee replacing. If that's the problem, they are really easy to replace assuming that the contact surfaces on the armature are not worn away. The regulator we found to fix the alternator on our car was around $25 bucks. We found it at a local heavy equipment service center.

If you got a coolant leak, figure that one out too. It's probably the water pump. How many miles are on the car?

 

No doubt the guy at IPD had you looking under the crank pulley at the wiring there as that is a known trouble point. Seeing coolant leaking from there could indicate the water pump is failing but honestly, I never, NEVER, trust where the coolant drips FROM. You have to be able to trace it back to the source...which will surprise you once in a while as coolant often take a circumloquacious route before dripping to the ground.