General: 850: Want to buy a 850 estate

[Duncan R]

Hello All,

New to the forum. I was thinking of buying a 850 estate next year. The car would be used for fairly long trips only, about 4 trips a year to SW France. I would estimate my annual milage to be around 12000 (no commuting involved) Any advice on what model? turbo/non turbo , auto or mannual. I don't have any where to work on the car, what are usual service costs at an independent?

I was looking at a website for PGI in Farnham, Surrey they seem to have some nice cars with full service history and warranty ( I asume you pay over the top for the warranty and dealer back up) Anyone have any dealings with this company?

Are these cars as bulletproof as people say? I am a bit worried about the ammount of electronics on the car, on most of the cars I have owned the only thing electronic has been the radio!!

Thanks for your time
Cheers

Duncan

[AndysR]

This is a common question and one I asked myself when looking to buy an 850, I had a couple of very informative responses and from what I could gather at the time they do have a few common issues which need to be checked prior to purchase, including blocked breather systems which causes excessive crankcase pressure and eventually rear main oil seal failure which is a gearbox out job to fix. From what I understand from other members fuel consumption doesn't vary much between the n/a and turbo models although don't quote me on that. Mine is an 854 R auto and that averages about 26 mpg at the moment but does about 22 around town, I did manage 29 on a steady motorway run this week without the air con on, but have since had it remapped and expect that sort of fuel return to be a thing of the past. In terms of which model seeing as your planning trips to France I would probably steer clear of the 2.0 10 valve as I believe this can be a bit under powered and probably better for shorter runs. Manual or Auto well that depends on you personally until I drove an Auto I would have said go with the manual but the auto box in my 850 seems to be very well suited to the car with well picked ratios meaning it never seems to be in the "wrong" gear kickdown is also very responsive and quick to operate when required. Running costs well turbo models love front tyres, and as for servicing costs even the youngest are now getting on for 10 years young so expect to need the odd bit and piece replacing above standard service parts. If you are going to run one as it should be run they aren't cheap to run make no mistake. However having said that the 850 is the most comfortable car I have driven to date and I have driven alot of different cars, having covered about 400 miles over 2 days in it I can safely say you get out feeling as fresh as you did when you got in at the start of the journey. It also feels well composed and very well bolted together even after 11 years of service not a squeak or rattle to be heard, having said that I believe the estates suffer with squeaking rear tailgate inner trims although I am sure I have read somewhere that there is an easy fix for this. In short I think that provided you pick a good one you will certainly get a good service return for your money and one hell of a car!

Here are two very good guides for the T5 and R models that were offered to me when I was in your position, as far as the n/a models go I am sure there are similar guides available and that someone on here can point you in the right direction,

http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=29096

http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=40622

[JIM C]

If you are traveling fully laden I would miss the 2.0 litre 10v and 20v models. The 2.5 10v and 20v provide good performance. I found that when I changed my 2.0 litre 20v to a T5 there was little difference in the fuel consumption. I would look out for a 2.5 litre or a T5.

[Mike Smith]

Hi Duncan
Welcome, yep I would also recomend the 2.5 20v, although a little biased as thats what i drive!
whatever model you buy, rest assured this forum will help you with any problems that occur. I would also recommend aircon, for the long hot trips your planning, this though can be a probmatic area with early 850s suffering evaporator failure which will entail the whole dash being removed, expensive unless your able to tackle the job yourself, so may be best to see if these have been done.
Good luck on your search!

[pookie]

You may want to do a search on PGI Farnham.

Pookie

[pat.j.volvo]

Hi, first thing you want to check when buying your 850, is run the engine and pull dipstick out a little, if there is back pressure then walk away regardless of the service history. any stamped service book dosent say how good the mechanic was. always a good thing to have invoices to read as well.However having owned and serviced 2s3s7s9s series models, I recently bought an 850 with backpresure as a projectand it drove with the dipstick pulled out slightly, over 300 mile to my house. volvo build quality on and on.

[jaanspeed]

Originally Posted by Duncan R

Hello All,

New to the forum. I was thinking of buying a 850 estate next year. The car would be used for fairly long trips only, about 4 trips a year to SW France. I would estimate my annual milage to be around 12000 (no commuting involved) Any advice on what model? turbo/non turbo , auto or mannual. I don't have any where to work on the car, what are usual service costs at an independent?

I was looking at a website for PGI in Farnham, Surrey they seem to have some nice cars with full service history and warranty ( I asume you pay over the top for the warranty and dealer back up) Anyone have any dealings with this company?

Are these cars as bulletproof as people say? I am a bit worried about the ammount of electronics on the car, on most of the cars I have owned the only thing electronic has been the radio!!

Thanks for your time
Cheers

Duncan

I had an 850 Tdi and got 40mpg and it was pretty fast! was a great car, just wanted a faster car but would easy buy another diesel!

[JIM C]

pat.j.volvo, Hello and welcome to the forum.

[Swede2]

Check out the latest on PGi here

http://www.ukdata.com/creditreports/...liateId=258361

Steer well clear - going down the pan just like the last name they traded under.

[JIM C]

Best plan as you say is buy else where.
It is all bad news.
Thanks