Hi, I am considering buying a 95 850 turbo wagon with 220k miles. The car is beautiful, but the owner is stupid as a brick. She bought it at 200k, and never changed the oil!! Then she stopped driving it when it started blowing smoke out the exhaust and the car shut off on her. The wierd thing is the oil doesn't look all that black. But there is definitely a lot of blue smoke that smells horrible, it's so bad if you put your nose to the exhaust it will gag you. Also, there is a ticking in the head, don't know if that's related. She had a mechanic look at it who told her it was a turbo gasket. Does that sound right? Does that mean the whole turbo needs rebuilt? Also, I noticed some very small droplets of water on the dipstick after letting it idle for a few minutes, is that normal? The inside of the filler cap had a lot of dark burned looking oil also. The car starts right up though, and she said it didn't overheat. She claims she never added oil, but I don't believe her on that one. I can probably talk her down to $400, is it worth it??

 

Hi jmana,

Welcome to the forum... The problem with that car sounds an awful lot like this recent thread (diagnosis - oil pan o-rings). https://volvoforums.com/m_70834/tm.htmSeems like it should be fairly easy tofix.

I can't speak to the $400 price - seems fair to me, but I'm not too familiar with Volvos and 220K does seem like a lot of miles. If it was treated properly for the first 200K, I'd think 20K miles of abuse has probably not done too much damage. Do you have any indication how it was treated before she bought it?

Good luck - if you do get it, I hope the repairs go smoothly for you.

 

The tapping I am not really concerned with, it's the blue smoke, I guess I am wondering how to tell if the turbo is causing it or if it's the piston rings. I would think if the rings were bad, that the smoke would also be shooting out the dipstick tube? Can I disconnect the tube going into the turbo to see if it is smoking pre turbo?

 

If the PCV system is clogged it could be pumping oil through the system and then burning it.

I would buy it and slowly work on changing/cleaning everything really good.

 

I went to look at this car again today and actually test drove it. The thing that worries me is that after driving it for about 10 minutes, there was much more water droplets and a thin covering of foamed oil on the dipstick, plus a little foam on the underside of the oil filler cap. Also, I took the dipstick out and the smoke was flying out of it. There is also oil seeping out the valve cover gaskets. The engine light is on, but I followed the directions to get the code, but nothing comes up, not even the code to say there is nothing wrong. The LED light works when the button is pressed, but after that nothing. The owner of the car went into a little more detail about the problem she had with the car. She said the car smoked a little when she bought it, but one day it shut off on her at a red light. She started it up and drove it home and never drove it again, but when she started it is when the major blue smoke started, and she said it didn't run right, but was not overheated. My fear is that the head gasket or head had been leaking causing the white smoke, then over time ruined a piston ring, does that sound plausible?? I really don't know if I should buy this car. I can get a whole new engine for $700, but I have no idea what it would cost to install it. What do you guys think? Could the PCV issue cause that much smoke? And does it sound like the head or gasket is indeed bad, or is that amount of water in the oil normal for this car?

 

The water in the oil could be condensation from sitting then only driving it a little bit.

Blue smoke means oil burning.

Yes the PCV system can cause the smoke issue but not the stalling issue that is most likely something else.

Unless the plugs are oil fouled. When the PCV system is clogged it will suck oil into the system and burn it. Thats what causes the blue smoke.

 

One thing I noticed is the rubber connectors for the PCV vacuum lines were deteriorated to the point where they were torn up, would that cause the system to malfunction?

 

Yes that would as well.

 

What about the lack of an engine code? What could be causing that, is it a possible faulty computer?

 

Did the light light up when you pressed the button?

 

Most likely a dirty connection rather than a faulty computer.

 

Yes, the LED lit up while holding down the button, but didn't light up after that to show any code. I went ahead and bought the car, and I pulled the dipstick out so it wouldn't build up too much pressure, well not a bit of smoke came out the exhaust on the way home! I guess that's a good sign. I'll clean up the PCV system and see what happens. It also didn't overheat at all. I think I might have actually snagged a good deal for a change!

 

Cool

The connection under the button might be bad. You can seperate it and clean it and try reading codes again.