[s-cars] Avant for sale and learning to drive

[Lee Levitt]

Paul writes:
>
> Morning all-
>
> 2nd:  As far as learning to drive, etc.  I was one of them poor bastards
> relegated to a '79 Volvo 242, 4 spd in highschool.  Parents were smart, it
> 100% saved my life.

Hmmm. I think there's more than a few closet Volvophiles on this list. :)

I learned to drive on a '69 145 wagon with 100K miles. Fiber timing gear
went not long after, not my fault, as they say. :) Fiber? What were they
thinking...and I'm not talking *carbon* fiber.


> But then I replaced it with an '80 242GT, oh, the
> screamer that it was (um, no).  What a way to learn, just as Taka
> and others mentioned.

Those were interesting cars. After I went through my P1800 phase ('66, '72
coupes, '72 wagon), I ended up with two of the GTs, one at a time.

> Benign handling, no power, safe as a brick house and heavy as
> one too.  But that was short lived, IPD came along and offered all the
> goodies, "Safety Sway Bars" (nice marketing, the f'n things were 1" thick
> with poly bushings!), springs, bilsteins, Group 6 cam (barely streetable),
> exhaust, etc.

I didn't start doing ipd stuff until I got into turbo Volvos. Very well
designed products.

Lee