Found this 83 242 GLT in Edmonton, appears to be nice but haven't called the seller and going to look at it isn't an option. At $2200 with 205K miles (american car?) it seems a bit steep?? There was another identical car with 250K km about 2-3 weeks ago in Edmonton advertised for a $1000 and it sold in 2 days.

http://edmonton.kijiji.ca/c-cars-vehicl ... dZ84605454

sounds decent to me, for the year and its apparent condition. the po of my current wagon (with 500000km) paid like 4 for it before he tinkered with it and screwed it up.

DO IT!!! its definatly worth it if it is actually in the condition that the guy describes it as being in!

200 psi? Must be a B23E...looks pretty clean, but have one of the Edmonton fellas check it out first.

'83 Canadian spec GLT will have a B23E, but it's not the "good" one that came in '81/'82 cars. 398 head instead of 405 (for 10.3:1 CR instead of 10.0:1) and an A cam instead of a K cam. Still had K-jet, but not the bigger fuel distributor IIRC.

Coincidentally, I was screwing around with my bastard 740 turbo engine (B23-based 9.2:1 T cammed 2000 km old thing) and on a cold engine it scored a 193 psi reading across the board, with a 10% leakdown on my cheap gauge. Given those readings, I would expect a late B23E to get a bit higher.

I'm a mechanical noob (especially in the company on this board) so the 200 PSI sounded good but a ton of googling produced nothing for me to know what new spec was. I was pretty sure it was a B23E as there is no "Turbo" badge on the grill, although I suppose it could be missing. Could get the BIL to check it out for me, but an Edmonton CVC'er would be the way to go.



WOW!!! Thanks for all of that info, you should re-write the 240 model FAQ's section on Swedishbricks. This gets me thinking that if he lists the car as having 205K miles and it is an american car it would have the B23F?

From your compression testing results are you saying that his 200 PSI on a 205K mi/330K km engine is reasonable? That is you said it should be higher but your engine has 200K, and bear with me here, the lower CR and more aggressive cam (The T is more aggressive, right?) develops more pressure than the factory B23E?

193 PSI even sounds like that engines in pretty good good conditon. Where's the 10% coming from (even that sounds fine)? Either way - the B23E is a pretty good engine - in naturally aspirated form it is no tire shredding monster but if the original poster is getting 200 psi even it should perform pretty well.

@ Woodenshoes, if you want me to go have a look at it let me know. I'd be happy to go check it out.

That would be great, really appreciate you helping out.

Just got off the phone with the seller and got some details:
- It's a Canadian car originally from Halifax.... (rusted?)
- he's the third owner, said that the rust was repaired before he bought it
- non-turbo, B23E and an M46
- the O/D is off and on for about the last year
- not much spent/done to the car for the last 6 years he has owned it
- asked if the car was american b/c he listed odometer as miles not km, not sure?
- he didn't have the vin# on him, said it was out in the car

Sounded sincere enough over the phone, my big concern is the eastern heritage, and how it's been repaired. His name is Slavek and his number is 780-953-3395. It is plated/insured so it can be test driven.

Thanks again,
Jim

ALL 240s were built in halifax, so no worries there- it's where it was purchased and driven that counts. VIN check will solve that.

O/D is either wiring or tranny switch, no biggie.

IMO, only worth that much if the body is PERFECT.

I assumed he meant the car was "from" Halifax not built there, although he does not appear to be in to Volvo's.

Yeah I wish i had know more about the M46 O/D when we got told ours needed rebuilding in the 740 years ago, it only had 330K at the time

From other cars sold on TBrix and elsewhere I thought $2200 was a premium price, an inspection in person will say for sure.

I didn't actually read the ad. Does he say that it's an American car or from Halifax? I'm confused. If it's a US car it'll have the first year of the B23F, which is similar to our B23E except that it's got the first generation of EFI, while ours was K-jet. We also got the A cam and I'm thinking they got the M cam that the other B23Fs got.



I'm saying that 200 psi is reasonable, yes. He's got more compression than me, but I've got a smaller cam which will drive up the compression pressure some. The T is less aggressive than the A, so it closes the intake valve earlier and allows the piston to build more cranking pressure.



My engine's basically brand new. Richard Thomas built the bottom end and ran it on his shop's engine dyno for maybe 20-25 hours. I built the head with some oversize stainless valves and some swish valve guides, and lots of porting. It should be in good shape, since I've only put a few tanks of gas through it since I got it from him. It's all coming from the rings, which is pretty normal. The 10% is only valid when testing with this gauge, as I'm not sure there's a standard calibration system for leakdown testers, and if there is I doubt this one observed it. 10% is at the junction between the "set" and "low" ranges on the gauge, so according to the gauge manufacturer, the engine's pretty healthy.

The '83 B23E is totally different from yours. 108 horsepower versus your 136, or whatever the numbers are, and a much lower powerband. Things that can be fixed, of course, but for this much money I'd agree with Athal that the only thing making it worth the $2,200 is a pristine body. Bring a magnet!

This is one of the things I like about the 240 series cars...they rust where you can see it, nothing much is hidden. For example the rear quarter sections and butt cheeks. Remove the spare tire and the wheel well cover and have a look. That's where they rust on the rear and it is obvious if the car has been repaired with bondo/fiberglass or with metal. The front rocker panel directly behind the wheel is another good spot for rust, not as easy to see, but it should be checked. What else is there - I've seen fenders on occasion that go if the inner fenders aren't there or rock dings that got salt soaked in winter. Some will rust around the windshield.

When I talked to the seller he said the car was from Halifax (could be confused as it was built there?) and he could not remember/explain why he put miles in the ad if the odometer would be in km for a Canadian car. For owning a car for 6 years he couldn't remember if the odometer was km, miles or both... I suspect that he put it in the ad as miles to make it look lower and it is in fact reading ~ 330K km.

If the car looks reasonable I'll get the vin and look for some history.

Ok, I'm going to look at it at 9 pm.

I'm pretty familiar with these cars, but is there anything you want me to look at in particular ? (Anyone, feel free to chime in on that one)

I'll bring my camera as well.

EDIT: If I'm not back by 11 someone call the cops