I have a friend who has her son's 1999 Volvo S80 T6 in her garage that she wants gone. He claims it was overheating then decided to "work on it himself" and managed to remove the timing belt and valve cover. It idled fine before he started to work on it. I suppose a blown head gasket.

I need to wait and see exactly when he is getting me the title before I do anything, it's all dependent on the title.

Otherwise paint/interior is perfect and complete, new tires, "primary drive belt" needs replaced at 180K but I have no idea how many miles are on it due to not having the key.

Any and all hopes of getting keys is gone. We looked for 6 hours.. I'm told it's at least $300-400 for a new key and I have to take the car in. Good luck programming it without a working engine. It also has broken door glass..

If all is lost I can part it out or if he cannot get his title (small lein) I suppose we can part it out and split the profits.

I've never owned a Volvo and I'm looking for advice. Is it worth it?

 

Sounds like too much of a headache with all the issues, lien, etc.

 

Sounds like a good opportunity to me. I don't know how much experience you have with working on cars, much less Volvos. If it is in good shape and the miles are decent, it could probably repaired cheap enough to drive, or resell. IF you have the room for it, parting it out is a no-brainer. You should be able to make money easy that way. Once you strip all the sellable parts off of it, sell the rest to the junkyard. In fact, I may need a few parts!

 

The cost of repairing a T6 project like that can escalate so bad that even if it was it was free I'd think twice. The motor has a aluminum block. That + overheating + electronic complexity + weak tranny = risky move. To be honest it doesnt sound like you are getting the fully story anyway. Depending on how bad it overheated you could be dealing with a warped block (head will need to be skimmed or replace for sure) and damage to the turbos. Possible ETM issues if that hasnt been taken care off will cost anything from 400-900.

For parts its a good price, but if you plan getting it running, keep in mind it could get REAL expensive REAL fast.

My advice: A 1999 T6 S80 is the worse possible Volvo project you could take on. This is coming from someone who owns 99 T6 S80 . The '99 is the most problematic year of what is possibly Volvos most problematic car. Don't get me wrong, when they are running well they are very good car with decent peformance & handling not to mention extremely comfortable seats, even in the back.
If you want a Volvo project go with something 850ish. Anything from 92-98.

 

i agree with NoLifeTilBoost, and i am comming from a worse than nightmare of a 01 s80 t6 which just had failure after failure after failure month after month of owning it. I can clearly see how much more better and problem free it is in comparison to my 07 s80 v8 awd. World of a difference in reliability.

 

Run!!!

 

I am new to the volvo world myself but I think at sounds like a mess regardless of the make. I would say pass that deal down seems like it will cost you as much as getting a running car in the end anyway.

 

I will make an offer for $200-300 since they are going to have issues getting the title and part it out. I believe with the excellent condition of the interior and exterior I should make some nice money off the deal.

Thank you for your responses, once I started reading about things like the turbo being a single piece with the manifold and variable valve timing I knew it wasn't worth it.

Car seems as unnecessarily complicated as my Italian motorbike: Piaggio X9 500. Expensive to work on, faulty computers, absurd immobilizer (Piaggio, if you loose key you have to buy a whole new ECU!).

 

The turbos come off the manifold just like any other, not sure who tols you that they are a single piece. I pulled mine off a couple of months ago and rebuilt them. Its not even the turbos the VVT thats the issue, its the car's reliance on a very early CANBUS network.

It sounds like you are parting it out so yeah, if (for example) you rebuilt the turbos out of it and sold them you'd have your money made back.

 

Most S80 T6's blow head gaskets. Cause overboost.

 

If you don't like the problems, don't buy that car. You should of researched before buying. Never buy a volvo newer then 95.