Volvo V70 3.2 | Shed of the Week
Super-rare, six-pot Swede for sale - trailer optional
Mrs Shed was pleased earlier this week when Shed presented her with the waterproof poncho she’d been nudging him into buying for her birthday. The hole at the top for her head was a bit small but Shed promised to sort that out for her. Unfortunately he then ruined everything by stupidly leaving the receipt from Bell Tents UK on the kitchen table. Now he’s got a problem with his own head.
The danger of ‘going large’, either for clothes or fast food, has been a cause of public concern for a while now. It was, of course, expunged from motoring many years ago when some spoilsports in high circles decided that ordinary folk shouldn’t be driving around in cheap old V12 Jags. Today’s shed, a 2007 Volvo with a naturally aspirated 3.2-litre inline-six petrol engine, could be one of the last examples of unnecessarily heftily-engined commoners’ cars to be sold on the open market.
In the late '00s that market was very much more on the left-hand side of the Atlantic than on the right side. In fact, when the gen-three V70 came out in ’07 the 3.2 was the only engine you could get in a US V70. Producing 235hp at 6,200rpm and 236lb ft at 3,200rpm, it soldiered on until 2016, by which time it was developing slightly more horsepower at 240hp, which still wasn’t really enough in a car weighing not far short of 1,800kg for anything other than relaxed performance. With Volvo’s usual 6-speed auto slushing the changes you could expect a 0-60mph time in the mid eights, a top speed of 146mph and a combined fuel consumption figure of 26.9mpg.
The positive side of relaxed performance, you’d think, would be an equally relaxed reliability experience. Besides appearing in the V70 and various other Volvos, this SI6 (Short Inline 6) B6342S motor could also be fitted to Land Rover’s Freelander 2. Shed is fairly confident that the 3.2 was built at Ford’s Bridgend Engine Plant which, following its closure in 2020, has now become a US-owned data centre. Bah.
There were some design issues with the B6342S that were rectified in a 2011-on iteration, but which you need to know about on this ’07 car. The unique to six-pot Volvos READ (Rear End Auxiliary Drive) that drove components like the serpentine belt and alternator needed periodic attention if you didn’t want the splash-lubed bearings to die. Belts and cooling parts are known to fail once you get past the 105,000-mile mark. Our shed has 126,000 miles on it. The serpentine belt needs to be changed in the 150k service and that’s not cheap. Our shed has 126,000 miles on it. Catalytic converters are expensive and there are four of them in this engine, two being in the exhaust manifold. Some say that cats are doing well if they get past 100,000 miles. Our shed has 126,000 miles on it.
Suspension and steering parts should be regarded as consumable items. AC compressors can go west. On the plus side, many of the jobs that were difficult on the old Volvo engines like PCV valve replacement were made somewhat easier on this one. Access was nicer and timing was by lifetime chain. if you kept up with the maintenance and the oil (to which some examples have been partial) there’s no reason to suppose this V70 3.2 won’t give sterling service, but the amount of sterling you’ll be pouring into the fuel tank might sting a bit if you’re doing any sort of mileage.
You could get this V70 3.2 with an AWD chassis but that’s not what we’ve got here. It does have a tow pack though, so if you’re a horsey type with more money than sense you could use it to haul your nag from field to field. You just wouldn’t be able to haul it into or out of the actual fields.
The four advisories on last October’s MOT – surface exhaust corrosion, engine undertray fitted, two slightly cracked/perishing rear tyres – do not suggest abuse or neglect. The 6,000 miles covered in the three months since the test do suggest an easy, extremely comfortable, but potentially expensive, life on the motorway. It’ll be tax expensive too. Based on a level of CO2 emissions you can almost taste, i.e. 251g/km, Shed is for once reasonably confident about his guess of £735 for the annual VED bill. There again, he was confident about his tent poncho purchase and that went horribly wrong.
I love a V70. But by heck this one has some major Bork risk.
I’m sure there’s much better simpler versions available for shed money if Volvo’s are your thing. Personally for an estate car of a similar size I’d be looking at an Insignia, Mondeo, Passat, Superb or Octavia.
Of more concern is that the drivers carpet has vacuum lines in one picture and what looks like mould on the transmission tunnel carpet in another.
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