Volvo 480 Club Europe

I have 13 cars, including three Volvo 480s awaiting restoration. Some were involved in crashes by inexperienced drivers, prompting me to salvage usable parts. The remaining 480s were neglected until recently when I started working on one, only to realize the challenges of restoring them due to rapid decay and lack of available parts. Am I crazy for attempting this? Living in New Zealand, where 480s are rare, the slow rusting climate is a saving grace.

We are all crazy here and if you are a little bit more so there will be no judgement.

Not crazy at all - my only issue would be parts availability, but seeing as you have three of them it shouldn’t be an issue!

I’m pretty sure the 440/460s were sold in NZ, so a lot of electronics and mechanical components should be fairly(?) easy to find.

I personally only know of two 480s in NZ. A very shabby light blue one (sitting outside a museum) and a white Turbo imported from the UK. Nice to see there are others.

Its almost like this post was meant for you.....

DustinBryant wrote: ↑

Wed Feb 21, 2024 6:30 am

I have 13 cars, including three Volvo 480s awaiting restoration. Some were involved in crashes by inexperienced drivers, prompting me to salvage usable parts. The remaining 480s were neglected until recently when I started working on one, only to realize the challenges of restoring them due to rapid decay and lack of available parts. Am I crazy for attempting this? Living in New Zealand, where 480s are rare, the slow rusting climate is a saving grace.

If you have a couple of donor cars at hand, good times! I take it in NZ only the cars with naturally aspirated 1.7 litre engine were sold (1987-1990), so chances are their electronics are compatible.

Trouble is that in NZ only very few were sold, so even the usual wear parts like brakes and belts might become a challenge. Did they sell Renault 19 over there? Because that is where many engine parts are shared with. Also, some parts (very little) are shared with the first generation S40/V40 (1996-2004)

Did you buy the one that came up for sale when a museum closed? And do they have instrument clusters in kilometres or miles?

Depends how high you want to set your bar...

Just keeping them going from a collection of donors doesn't seem crazy to me.

Spending £15,000 on something worth 5, shipping parts around the world? Yeah, utterly bonkers

Bonkers is to be celebrated though...

it's never a crazy thing to try something out.