I was looking for some advice on upgrades that will boost the performance of my base 1997 850 from the stock 168HP. I have been investigating a sport exhaust from eurosport tuning, a performance air filter, cold air intake, new spark plugs, etc. I would love to know if I can put a turbo on the base model engine, or if there are any reccomendations for where I could find a cold air intake, anything that can give me some modest gains in HP and torque would be great. Thanks in advance for your help.

 

My advice would be to get it in as good as shape as possible then sell it and buy a Turbo model. As far as I know you will not be able to put a turbo on the NA engine. The T5 model has 220 HP and the R has about 240 just to start with. Then you can do performance mods from there. I'm not sure how much you can do on the non-turbo model to increase performance, and I doubt if you ever get it near what a stock turbo will do. Hopefully other will have more insight.

 

My advice to you is to sell your car and buy a 850 turbo or s70 turbo. However...

1. Have a local muffler shop make you a mandrel bent 2.25" to 2.5" catback system with Magnaflow muffler.

2. As for intake if you want to pay EST's price for their intake do it. Or just slap a K&N cone filteron the end of your MAF and custom fac a heatshield. Or just use a K&N panel filter since the stock airbox is the best setup for our cars.

3. You can get a n/a ECU upgrade, but it wont really be worth it.

In all you may net 20 hp and 20 ft-lb's of torque. With those three mods.

 

I would just get new spark plus nothing special as I doubt you will notice anything different.

 

I had the same issue when I bought my 93 GLT in December. The Turbo models 94 and up are really expensive in good condition with a 5spd (if you can find one in good condition). Like most of us, I'd love a Turbo model, but can't afford the extra $$$$.

The 850 base is not that bad to work with. I put a 2.5" exhaust from the front flex pipe back, including high-flow Cat, Muffler and Resonator/Muffler. This set up is night and day compared to stock - the factory setup is very restrictive. Add a K&N as suggested above with the exhaust and you'll be enjoying the daily drive alot more. It isn't a Turbo, but it stills moves very nicely. ECU upgrade is posted at 30hp increase from stock - not sure if I beleive that, but I haven't investigated it either.

If you have the money and plan on keeping the 850 N/A - there are companies that make will make Supercharger kits for this car. At that point, you'll be in the Turbo hp range ++. And depending on what you paid for your Volvo, it may be cheaper than selling yours to upgrade to the Turbo model...IMO.

FYI - there is a guy on here or another site that put a turbo in his 94 N/A and is apparently running 350hp++. I don't know how broke he is, but it is possible. If your idea is Turbo - do as suggested above - buy a turbo model or settle for less hp.

 

Oh you could had a shot of nitrous as well, but be careful.