Junkyard Find: 1971 Volvo 144
The Volvo 140 is the often overlooked parent of the extremely successful Volvo 240, with everything behind the rear doors pretty much the same between the two cars. I owned a very tired 144 for a brief period and I’ve always liked these things, so I photograph them when I spot them in wrecking yards. So far in this series, we’ve seen this ’68 142, this ’69 145, and this ’71 142. Today we’ve got a very clean-looking ’71 four-door, which I spotted in a Denver self-service yard last week.
There’s a bit of rust damage here and there, but nothing fatal.
The interior is pretty nice, too.
This car looks like it has plenty of good miles left, but it’s 42 years old and not really worth fixing up. Next stop, The Crusher!
The good old reliable pushrod B20 engine, complete with SU carbs.
The “thermometer” speedometer, complete with driver-settable top-speed-warning indicator, is one of my favorite bits of 1960s car design.
My cousin Sam wanted the SUs for his much-modified Harley Shovelhead project, so they’re on their way to Minnesota.
Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.
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My 144 was the sort of very light grey. Best front seats of any car I have owned. My wife agrees. Every time we bought a new car, we always looked at Volvo's first, but never bought another because theyl did not seem to be worth the prices charged.
This is just too new for me. My Volvo love ends where it starts, with the 64 PV544 B18D I drove in high-school. It was hard to destroy, but ... what can I say, I was young and found a way.