Volvo 940SE and the Junk Yard Adventure

Jeffrey and Becca at the YardMy oldest daughter and I spent our Saturday at a junk yard for the first time.  It was good times.

I had made a list in my Evernote Notebook of things we wanted to find.  We had some neat finds, some success and some frustrations.

Finds

We found one 960 sedan and one 960 wagon.  Both are gold, and have great, rust free doors (I need the drivers side door at some point – but didn’t feel like I was ready to pull it this time.)  We found a red 1996 960 wagon.  You can tell they really did make the 960 more of a luxury car – much more nose insulation; a much nicer steering wheel.  I also did confirm (which I’ll write here as I can’t seem to find confirmation about this out on the web) that my 940SE (940 SE) is really a first version of the 960.  Short of the fact I have the Turbo 4 (sorry, Volvo aficionados – don’t have my exact engine model number handy) and doesn’t have the upgraded interior trim and noise insulation, its interior design changes are all 940.  It was neat to explore these cars and learn more about them.

Donor Volvo 960 Wagon

Successes

We found the rear seat with the kid booster (that I want to find a way to put in the 940SE to be Charlie’s future seat.  We found the desired instrument cluster bezel (some previous mechanic tour mine up to no end), as well as better looking trim (will show in another post), and new headlight lenses (yay!  Finally!  With those and the new grill from ebay I can start reducing the ghetto look!).

Frustrations

We spent a lot of time on two items (being the amateurs we are).  The back seats took us a lot of time to get out.  And, now, looking at my 940SE, it looks like the latches and the way the seats connect is significantly different. (Sounds like a phone call to Allison Customs again!)

We also spent a lot of time getting the glove box door out.  We ended up in a Passenger Air Bag Equipped car, and getting the glove box and door out of that was basically impossible.  Upon post research, and as demonstrated by getting my glove box out in about three minutes, finding a non-airbag car would have made for an easy win.  Oh well, live and learn.

Over All Excited

All and all, I’m excited that we have some good parts to keep the project moving forward.