p2 v70r high miler resto - advice welcome!

[pepinosport]

So, the intermitent overboosting was due to a sticking turbo solenoid. Sometimes would underboost too. I had a used one laying in the garage and fitted it and now it's OKish. Sometimes I get hesitation and what feels like throttle modulation when flooring it between 3k and 4k rpm. Probably the wastegate needs adjustment

Too high fuel pressure: this was easy, but difficult to find. Previous owner wired the pump earth directly to the chassis, bypassing the PEM. The PEM was faulty, but hopefully I had one that was working fine. Fuel pump was replaced in 2015 and still goes strong, so problem solved.

The bi-xenon solenoid failure was the position sensor inside the headlamp. I just fiddled a bit with the cable and now's working. The headling height adjustment was due to a blown fuse. The headlamp height motors use the same fuse as the headlight wipers. I had a seized headlight wiper that was blowing the fuse, so I went to the scrapyrd and 35€ and one fuse later everything was working fine.

Things I'd like to do before christmas:

1. Downpipe, swapping the original broken cat with a 200cell sports cat. I'm currently running a second downpipe

2. Sort the interior, torn leather on the driver's seat, filth, broken auto dimming mirror...

3. Currently waiting for my TME spring set

4. Subframe bushings, still undecided: XC90 or solid?

[pepinosport]

hmm long time no write
- I finally fitted the TME springs with new original top mounts.
- I went for the solid billet subframe bushings from Shemtek. The understeer was MASSIVE with these. The car also feels harsh and much worse in noise (higher frequency)
- To solve the understeer I went for Powerflex front LCA bushings and it improved slightly, although I still dont like the progressiveness at the grip limit.
- Fitted poweflex at the rear in the trailing and control arms. New alignment, drives beautifully, but still undecided about the solid subframe bushings. I wouldn't want to change them... How are you guys liking this mod?
- Steering rack refurb and new column Ujoint. Steering precision is just amazing now.
- 200 cell competition core on original downpipe, for that stealthy look
- Exhaust manifold gaskets burnt. Fitted C30 T5 part number
- Fuel pump gone due to the previous bypass that had it working at full pressure all the time. The original Volvo pump, changed in the official Volvo dealer in 2016, was routed the wrong way with the auxiliary pump, showing kinks an whatnot. New DW300 fitted with the idea to tune the car.

[pepinosport]

That pretty much sums up the first 18.000km of the motor vehicle.
It includes long trips with the family up to 3000+km and a trip to the south of france to Montecarlo rally. Several issues with brakes, with no bite at all (brake booster leaking air), broken one-way valves in the vacuum circuit, etc...

At this point, I decided to contact Gustav Urbas (ContrastWorks) to tune the vehicle. This was November 2021. We're in April 2024 and I'm still on the basic stage 2 map he sent in January 2022. He was super helpful at the beginning but then he went silent. I just wanted to know if his calibration was ok, because I paid for a 300bhp tuned vehicle and believe me I'm using all 300+ of them, so I don't want the engine to ££££ itself due to a wrong map. It's usually Porsche drivers that get caught by the perfomance of the V70 but also some S5 and early A45 struggle to keep. I'm happy, but sometimes I can feel uneven pull from the engine, as if it were reducing boost or delaying ignition with partial and full throttle runs. Checked spark plugs, bought a new pierburg TCV, checkd for boost leaks, etc... no idea. Gustav won't answer.

As of today it's on 416.000km, engine is strong and has gone through a pair of PZero 4's and a full set of brake pads. It has developed an oil leak in the sump oil pump side and needs oil change and belts. VVT units are very noisy on hot starts and sometimes hot starts are diffcult (too much cranking, low idle that picks up eventually). Picture of the car as it sits at the moment:

https://ibb.co/sq0hP4h

Abandoned in the unit because I bought a V40 D4 to replace it as a daily/family car in the beginning of 2022. Then I got a Clio 203 end of 2022 and a Megane f1 team end of 2023, and these are taking a lot of my time, because Renault.