As it says I have a fried starter/solenoid or both. My car is a 1982 245 with a 2.1L B21F engine.

I drove home from my friend's house, which is basically a straight 3 mile drive, oblivious to some things as it was late at night/early in the morning. I backed into my driveway and I went to shutoff the engine when I had noticed that the key/ignition was stuck in the start position, because it fell to position 2 and the lights were a little brighter. Yikes! After I shut it off and got out of the car I smelled a faint burning scent and realized that I had just fried my starter and whatnot.

I'm going to a junk yard and am curious of a replacement. There are about 5 or 6 post 1986 240s and about 4 240s - 1983, 1982, and 1981 or earlier too. My question is: Is it "a safer bet/closer match" to pull one from a 240 closer to my year (if there isn't an '82 model year) or can I pull one from one off the later models and install that one, or are they not an interchangable part for some years/engines? Just please let me know as what I can and can't do with the early and late model's starters. I would like to get my 240 back on the road by today - Monday, or at least by the 26th Wednesday.

Help is much appreciated.
Please and Thank You.

 

You're in luck...the starters are interchangeable from 1967 to 1996 or newer! Later cars used a smaller, lighter permanent magnet starter but both interchange totally. My personal opinion is that the larger, traditional starters last longer than the permanent magnet variety but until you repair the ignition switch it may not matter. Good luck w/ the swap; removing the top bolt of the starter on a 240 sitting in the drive way, especially w/o air tools is a b*tch!
p.s. If your j/y search falls short, shoot me a pm...I have 3 or 4 good used ones at the shop for my mini-fleet.

 

So that means that I can take the starter from my 1991 244 B230F engine that's sitting in the side of my driveway and throw it into my 1982 245 B21F engine, thus saving me an *** load of time by not having to whale on one in a junk yard in the middle of nowhere in the middle of a Michigan winter?

 

Yup, that's right. Beats the heck out of crawling under a jy car propped up on old rims, wallowing in the mud and snow! Volvo changed the part numbers any number of times but they all interchange...so you dodged the kill shot at least...just a flesh wound!

 

The cars at this junk yard aren't even propped up. They are layed on the ground, not gravel, stones, or cement, just a plain dirt field with plants/bushes/trees growing between and in some cars. All held up by w/e is underneath - trees, tires, seats, sometimes not even wheels therefore making it almost impossible to get a jack under them.

I hit the yard this afternoon, spent about an hour and a half or two working the starter and was finally able to get it off - it was from an '82 or '83, I can't remember but I got it from one of those. Damn it sucks working on those in the middle of winter. I also pulled 3 speakers with covers, a stock radio, and an antenna from the same car, a gear shift **** from an M47 transmission, some fuel pump relays and the quad circular headlights with the matching bezels - both left and right sides.

 

Starters can be a real bitch but if you do it a few times it really isn't that hard. The hardest part is of course the top bolt. I had to use a long extension with a universal joint and a socket to get it. It was much easier once I got the car properly jacked up. The smaller permanent magnet starters are much easier to get in and out. Also they seem to last quite a long time as well. So I would definitely recommend going with one of those or simply getting your current starter rebuilt. But as I recall the earlier starters used both a bolt and nut whereas the later ones used just two bolts which makes life a lot easier.

 

Yeah the nut on the other end of the bolt sucked. I had to have my brother-in-law hold the nut from up top and then I was underneath just inching it out and it took forever. I thought to make it a little easier, I tried to unhook the clutch cable and we ended up snapping the clutch cable while I was down there. I figured out why it was so much harder getting the starter out and it was because the donor car had a/c and mine doesn't.