‘It’s a tidy estate, yours for free!’
James saves another handy big Volvo from the scrapper
James Walshe
As well as being Britain’s premiere classic motoring publication, Practical Classics frequently feels like a home for stray cars. If it’s not the office phone ringing with the offer of an unfinished project or classic-in-need, it’ll be one of us hearing rumours of yet another unwanted old car that’s destined for the scrap heap. Like the sensible, professional people we are most definitely not in the PC office, we can rarely find the willpower to refuse.
Cars such as these are rarely faultless, though. Every stray that ends up being deposited on the office door mat comes with a list of issues and we rise to the challenge of each one. The newest addition to my fleet is no exception – and comes from a good pal of mine, Richard Seagall Jones. Having just bought a new car, his Volvo 850 was facing an uncertain future.
As you might have previously read, I’m a sucker for service history and the car has paperwork by the bucketload, preserved as it has been by Richard who bought it seven years ago. ‘I only paid £1000 and intended to use it for a few months, but it became the family wagon and hasn’t failed me once’. The fact that he has added to its substantial history with regular servicing made it completely irresistible. It’s a tidy car with an MOT until January and it’s yours for free.’ Oh, alright then.
As with any ‘free’ 22-year-old car with 160,000 miles, there’s plenty to do. The five-cylinder 2.5 sounds throaty and goes well but, unlike the period T5 police cars of the Nineties, it’s normally aspirated and has an oil leak that’s common to this model. The cause is a main rear seal between the engine and gearbox – a £10 part and morning of fiddly work. It will be the first job to do but Richard also says the air con will need regassing and both the odometer and driver’s heated seat have packed up. The front tyres are looking a bit elderly, too. Well… you can’t have it all, can you?
Being in the 850 is also a bit like meeting an old adversary, for me. I was pulled over by a traffic policeman driving an 850 T5 in 1998 and ended up at Barnsley Magistrates after being ‘a bit naughty’ on the M1 in a tuned Citroën CX GTI Turbo. Such embarrassments aside, the 850 will sit well with my other Volvo – a £350 S80 – that is still going strong, proving that Bangernomics motoring has never made more sense than it does right now.