Wow,
You're car is the perfect restoration candidate. This is what I think the best way to start. Drop the engine and transmission, that way you can get around everything. Possibly have them rebuilt while you're working on the body and frame... and the floors. By then, when the frame and floors are done, the engine and transmission will be too! Have the engine bay re-done before you put the engine back in. After that, put them back in! Basically, the hard part is done. Have someone take all the bondo off of the car and replace those spots with scrap sheet metal, then obviously have them sanded. Same goes for the rocker panels under the door (and the other places with rust like the doors and possibly the trunk). Then, throw a paint job on the car. Please keep it original, I BEG YOU!! The suped-up amazons really sicken me! The paint will have to be done sooner or later. Also, its better just do do this as well. Have all the brakes completely done over or put new brakes in there. Even if they are good, you want your car in new condition, right? Same goes for anything in the car, electrical stuff, maybe even interior somewhere down the road (i dont know if the interior needs work though because i cant see it) Its easier said than done but your car will be perfect. Good Luck!
jake
PS- as you go along in the restoration, please email me with pictures, i love seeing the restoration process!

I think it's great if you want to revive her. But for what it's worth, there is usually between 1 and 4 122's in the bay area for sale at any given time in various conditions. Surely you already know this and you've searched the SF Bay Area and LA area Craigslist's.

For a couple grand (not peanuts, I know) you could save yourself a BOATLOAD of work.

Today:
car 1, $1k
car 2, $3.5k


They must ship cars from the bay area (?), as my buddy in Maui just sent himself a truck a few months ago, originally located in the North Bay. I don't think they trucked it all the way down to Long Beach first; they must have shipped it out of Alameda.

Good luck.

vh.

Yikes. Nasty Surprise. My 67 wagon had bad floorpans and baseball sized holes rusted through the fenders, but nothing like that.

Nobody seems to have mentioned it, but 1964 was the last year that the volvos had the inferior rustproofing. 1965 onward are supposed to hold up much better. Still, comparable to the 544s, they say that the 100-series cars could be half rusted and still have a solid body.

Check out Mike Dudek (sp?) you can get 1800 series replacement spars that ought to go right into the 120. I was also told by other BB'ers that some repairs have involved building a "U-shell" around a damaged spar or crossmember.

I was sourcing such things when I discovered that my 73 1800ES was like this:


That's the main transverse crossmember under the seats. The rockers were unspeakable and the lower spars were shells held together by the undercoating.

If I knew how to weld, I would have saved it. It had a perfect interior.

Good luck. I'll try and save the proper bits for you *if* I have to disassemble the 65.

Mario,

That looks like the Fred Flintstone floorboards in my 4 door! I am looking forward to following your progress. I can cut the a-pillar off my donor car for you and whatever else you need and send them out your way. Just shoot me an email and I'll let you know the specifics of my situation.

I can't believe that thing passed inspection!

Tyler

Mario,
The "curbside" body repairmen at this site haven't tackled anything quite as challenging as what's facing you, but I've picked up a few pointers from them for some of the things I had to do to my 142E to get it road-worthy again.
The best of luck,
Bob S.
--
"62 PV544 (B20, M41), "71 142E, "93 240 Classic Wagon.

I'm with you. My mother in law has a '73 Mercedes that sat under a car cover too long and rust ate the leading edge of the top of the windshield. That's going to be a fun repair too. I'll let you know how that turned out.

If there were another option I would take it. I'm no glutton for punishment and realize this is going to be a LOT of work.

I'm crossing my fingers that its possible to make it road-worthy. I have a feeling it will take some re-engineering, possibly adding a cage inside to stiffen things up if the structure is too compromised.

What is crazy is this thing just passed a safety inspection in March. I don't know how that happened. This is Hawaii and although I've only been here a few weeks I can say it is the United States but it ain't completely America.
Possibly a hundred dollar handshake? It ain't safe.

Brakes are soft, front end is squirrelly and of course the Swiss cheese body. Luckily I have good doors, hood, trunk and front suspension coming. The motor is apparently sound, receipt for a rebuild about 50,000 ago so its not fresh but still seems tight. No leaks, and I'm hopeful a tune-up with the addition of my fresh carbs and electronic ignition will smooth things out. It pulls pretty good from a stop but flattens out about 4K.

At least I won't be sentimental about it. I'm thinking whatever it takes to stiffen it up and have it still look like a 122 on the outside. There are cars deserving of a loving, concourse-quality job but this ain't it.

However if anyone does hear of a good 2-DR shell near a West Coast port, please let me know. Costs about a $1000 to float one over here and it could save a lot of time.

I think this project is blog-worthy, another fortunate situation is that I can't set up the furniture shop until early September so I have all my attention during the week to devote to the car.

Aloha,

Mario E.
Kea'au, HI

and if you are successful in the repair, Beldar Conehead's words come to mind - "Your name will be on the honored rolls. When my people take over your planet, you will not be harmed".
Here on the Canadian west coast I've seen worse than that. Not much, but some.

¡Oye hermano!
Parece que te espera MUCHO trabajo.
A few points come to mind. One is the importance of keeping the door drains OPEN!
Be sure and remove the fenders to see the condition of the rectangular-section rail
where they bolt on under the edges of the hood. On Li'l Red I used lag bolts like
giant sheet metal screws through the bottom of the section where it was solid enough.
Otherwise I used regular bolts, nuts and washers. (This was a keep'er rolling-type repair.)
The locations of many of the rust attacks seem to indicate that salt was trapped for
an extended period and not washed off thoroughly enough. If you are located in a place
with an onshore wind (like the Atlantic side in Panamá) you should get a car cover
or maybe even a fairly tight garage to keep the atmospheric saltfall off. This is especially true if you are within a mile of the coast. And frequent, diligent freshwater
washing is of tremendous value.

--The voice of experience
--
George Downs, Bartlesville, Heart of the USA!

It looks like that car is a two door... If you were looking for a solid 4-door, I have two of them at the moment.

Good luck with that project.


Chris

You, sir, are a brave man on 2 fronts – first in your undertaking such a task, and second in sharing the starting point, which could easily expose you to criticism for tackling what many would suggest is a hopeless task. I applaud you. My ’67, Betty, has similar issues but to a lesser extent and I intend to tackle them this winter. The car has significant sentimental value, plus as others have pointed out there are the payoffs - the learning experience and the satisfaction of saving yet another old Amazon from the scrap heap.
I, and others, will be watching your progress with great interest. I hope I have the guts to reveal Betty’s inner most secrets when it’s my turn to start down restoration road.

Cheers,
--
Barry -- 1967 122S 'Betty'

Now that really will be a challenge, and one that will tax the welders ability if it's not yourself. You might like to have a look at this thread as it tackles some of the same bad areas you have.
http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=54783
Hopefully the VOC site will soon be fully operational again within a week or so and Gordon will be able to update the progress. It's possibly back on the road now as he'd started the paint when I spoke to him some weeks ago.
I hope you'll post your progress pics too. Good luck!!!!