I have a 2005 Volvo XC70 2.5L with a Turbo. I let a friend borrow my car and the ran it dry there was no oil and now that we filled it there is oil burning in the pistons. I need advice should I try and fix it ( if so what do I need to replace-the whole engine, just the pistons) or should I just sell it to the junk yard and get a new car. I have no idea what to do in this situation so please help

 

Sorry for your troubles - hopefully your "friend" will buy the car from you for fair market value after destroying it. Personally I would not spend the multiple thousands needed to repair a Volvo engine on a 16 year old Volvo that at best is worth a few thousand dollars if almost perfect. Hopefully you have a responsible "friend".

 

There is nothing else wrong with my Volvo everything still works and it’s still in amazing condition inside and out other than the oil burning in the pistons, how much should I sell it for

 

Sorry to be realistic here but - your at best $3500 car needs whatever it takes to make it stop burning oil after running dry and damaging the crank/pistons/turbo/cams/everything in the engine - whatever. That is several thousand - say retail $3500. So your car is worth $0.

So, offer it first to your "friend" for what maybe $2500 - or put it on Craigslist for XXXX, and hope some unsuspecting idiot buys it from you. It's amazing what some people will buy thinking it's an easy fix.

Sorry for your troubles.

 

oil burning in the pistons? If as you say somebody ignored the oil pressure light long enough to damage piston rings, its a safe bet other parts like crank bearings, cam journals are all toast and the engine is beyond a rebuild. That said, there are other causes for burning oil - such as failed turbo seals, bad PCV oil separator etc so if you haven't done a compression test to confirm ring damage, do that. As to hoonk's math, you can prove this for yourself by going to car-part.com to price a used engine from a yard, then google for the estimated shop hours to replace an engine. Keep in mind shops have lifts and tools where they can drop the engine out from below vs pulling up to simplify the process. I'd expect a complete engine to be in the $1K range and shop time to swap in the 10-15 hours area. If you local indy charges $125 you are in the $2500 range already and that doesn't cover anything discovered along the way. As noted, somebody who's a competent mechanic may want to buy the car to do the swap themselves so you may expect to get 1000-1500 for the car.