Hi there
I am a long time BMW owner and self repairer (520i 1984)

I am looking at buying a 1996 Volvo 850 wagon, which I like, but I am
worried about a couple of things. First of all it has done 275,000 kms
(170,000 miles) and the owner is a bit clueless about maintenance, and
has a 17 year old son who has been driving it. Therefore it is a bit
clapped out looking. He says it needs to be topped up with oil between
services, but it doesn't seem to blow smoke at idle.
Second, when you open the driver's door, it CLACKs loudly, twice. On
closer inspection, the hinges are fine, but the centre connection, the
one with the yellow metal section coming from the door with a detent
which controls where the door stops when fully open... where that
connects to the car body it has broken a small section of the body away
with itself. Like an extra half an inch around the hole on all sides.
There is a little rust around it and a bit of a tear running down the
body. Most of this is under the rubber boot. When you wiggle the door in
the fully open position it all moves about 5mm (quarter inch)

Am I being paranoid or is this a massive PITA to fix?
Alas I never learned to weld and I don't think this would be a good
project to learn on.
And that rust, difficult to get rid of ???

"jom" <jom@zip.com.au> wrote in message
news:jom-2F4C93.23101407102006@sn-indi.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net...
> Hi there
> I am a long time BMW owner and self repairer (520i 1984)
>
> I am looking at buying a 1996 Volvo 850 wagon, which I like, but I am
> worried about a couple of things. First of all it has done 275,000 kms
> (170,000 miles) and the owner is a bit clueless about maintenance, and
> has a 17 year old son who has been driving it. Therefore it is a bit
> clapped out looking. He says it needs to be topped up with oil between
> services, but it doesn't seem to blow smoke at idle.
> Second, when you open the driver's door, it CLACKs loudly, twice. On
> closer inspection, the hinges are fine, but the centre connection, the
> one with the yellow metal section coming from the door with a detent
> which controls where the door stops when fully open... where that
> connects to the car body it has broken a small section of the body away
> with itself. Like an extra half an inch around the hole on all sides.
> There is a little rust around it and a bit of a tear running down the
> body. Most of this is under the rubber boot. When you wiggle the door in
> the fully open position it all moves about 5mm (quarter inch)
>
> Am I being paranoid or is this a massive PITA to fix?
> Alas I never learned to weld and I don't think this would be a good
> project to learn on.
> And that rust, difficult to get rid of ???

Thereare much better 850's about for the price / mileage- avoid this one.

Tim.

What you are seeing is a problem with the metel around the body end of
the door check. It is quite common on 850s. My local dealer has sent
scores of customers to a local body shop for repair. It runs about
$300.

Terry

Tim (remove obvious) wrote:
> "jom" <jom@zip.com.au> wrote in message
> news:jom-2F4C93.23101407102006@sn-indi.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net...
> > Hi there
> > I am a long time BMW owner and self repairer (520i 1984)
> >
> > I am looking at buying a 1996 Volvo 850 wagon, which I like, but I am
> > worried about a couple of things. First of all it has done 275,000 kms
> > (170,000 miles) and the owner is a bit clueless about maintenance, and
> > has a 17 year old son who has been driving it. Therefore it is a bit
> > clapped out looking. He says it needs to be topped up with oil between
> > services, but it doesn't seem to blow smoke at idle.
> > Second, when you open the driver's door, it CLACKs loudly, twice. On
> > closer inspection, the hinges are fine, but the centre connection, the
> > one with the yellow metal section coming from the door with a detent
> > which controls where the door stops when fully open... where that
> > connects to the car body it has broken a small section of the body away
> > with itself. Like an extra half an inch around the hole on all sides.
> > There is a little rust around it and a bit of a tear running down the
> > body. Most of this is under the rubber boot. When you wiggle the door in
> > the fully open position it all moves about 5mm (quarter inch)
> >
> > Am I being paranoid or is this a massive PITA to fix?
> > Alas I never learned to weld and I don't think this would be a good
> > project to learn on.
> > And that rust, difficult to get rid of ???
>
> Thereare much better 850's about for the price / mileage- avoid this one.
>
> Tim.