A tale of maintaining the "Messy Car" Volvo XC70

Well, I bought a 2006 XC70 from my work for about 2k. had 150k miles, AWD didn't work, and it sat under a tree forever.  The inside reeked like mouse urine and feces. The tires where clapped out snows that were dry rotted and bald. Upon first drive of the "Messy car" with my girlfriend and her 4 year old son, he proclaimed it to be the messy car because the inside and outside were filthy.

Anyways! onto the pictures!

this was the first picture, right before the test drive at work

Snapchat-1455141891 by tjbell88, on Flickr

Shortly after, I wanted to get a baseline of the horrible dirt and animal crap that had built up in, on, and around the car.

20181115_110049 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181115_110046 by tjbell88, on Flickr

by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181115_100909 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181115_110022 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181115_100845 by tjbell88, on Flickr

I started with the basic maintenance stuff like oil change, spark plugs, cabin and engine air filters.

20181108_092911 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181115_100854 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181108_092916 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181108_161501 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181108_161510 by tjbell88, on Flickr

had to refinish the headlights because you couldn't see 10 feet at night

20181115_110009 by tjbell88, on Flickr

Next up was fixing the AWD system. Volvos of these vintage use a "Collar Sleeve" that goes in between the transmission, and angle gear (transfer case)

and often times, they strip out.

20181117_112053 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181117_112055 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181117_112057 by tjbell88, on Flickr

shortly after that, I go outside to start it to warm it up. insert key, and no turn. great. I remove the ignition cylinder which is a common problem on these cars and tried to repair it, gut it, jerry rig it to no avail. ended up with a new lock cylinder- 325$ later

20181122_112451 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181122_112441 by tjbell88, on Flickr

 next step, cleaning the interior. it was disgusting. smelled so bad. here is what i found 

20181108_165055 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181108_165053 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181201_100355 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181201_100353 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181201_111045 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181201_111017 by tjbell88, on Flickr

The tensioner starting click and had a ton of play, figured it was time to replace it

20181215_105514 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181215_105517 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181215_105518 by tjbell88, on Flickr

With the interior out, I decided on a new battery, 

20181108_165046 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181108_165049 by tjbell88, on Flickr

while I had the tensioner off i decided to check on the timing belt because it had no records of being done. It was a OEM volvo unit, but oil was everywhere!

20181215_105530 by tjbell88, on Flickr

20181215_105524 by tjbell88, on Flickr

I cleaned off the oil, and replaced the oil fill cap gasket which is a common leaking point, and it drains down  and gets all over the T belt.  I guess I'll do cam seals, T belt, water pump in the near future.

We had someone trade in this cars Doppelganger, and it had brand new tires, and front struts (OEM Volvo(1200$ receipt))  . was also able to grab some new carpet front and rear.

passenger front floor, is that rice?  or maggots?

Cool! 

It is funny how much of a mess is made when you miss the oil fill cap putting oil in these things. 

I never cared too much for modern Volvos until my mom got her 03 s80 about 10 years ago. I maintained it for 140k (95 to 235k)  miles, sold it, and got her another one with 119k. This time with two turbos!  That plus working on some customer cars has got me to the point where I actually like the engine, foibles included. 

Still not a huge fan of the quality of the interior trim, though. First project I did on the 'new' (2003) s80 was spend hours reinforcing the mounting points of the broken center console with sheetmetal, and precision placement of 1 mile of felt tape between all the surfaces that creaked when everything in the interior would flex.

In reply to AngryCorvair :

It is actually chewed up foam pieces from the carpet

The Entropy Gods are smiling upon you.

Recreating order from disorder. 

Is the smell gone?

In reply to tjbell :

I’ve been wondering what these are like to live with as daily drivers.

In reply to ebonyandivory :

I actually really enjoy it .Super comfortable  pretty reliable, very diy friendly  just underpowered  and poor fuel economy. I'm getting about 21,70% highway but it is winter so I expect 24 to 25 in the summer

That's some more than average interior cleaning!