I appreciate you defending Volvo here after that absurd "My dad hated a 740" commentary.

Yeah that's kinda a no brainer (to, you know, most people). I've never heard of a car that got stuck in the snow/ice because it had so little power that it somehow bogged down and wouldn't move forward when the accelerator was pressed, with the poor driver lamenting why they didn't get the supercharged LSX. I sure can…

Your parents either had a total beater of a 740 or they have really stupid opinions on cars.

Hand shifter, foot throttle versus foot shifter, hand throttle.

#becauseshifterkart

This makes me want to buy my ~15th rwd Volvo or so. There's no way my gf thinks I have too many, because that's not possible.

Well with this one they can market it as "The 500 for people who aren't cruel to 2 out of 3 friends."

I guess they poached the Porsche guy in charge of raising the prices every time they remove a part from the car.

"Dog leg transmission" is not the same thing as dog ring transmission, which is what is in that car. Dog rings are what connect the gears rapidly and without clutching. Dog leg is just an odd shift pattern.

Yeah I'm pretty sure that's the only badge-engineering job in American history that resulted in us actually getting a better car (because it was developed in Australia). The G8 is the easy, easy winner here.

Yeah it was just plain deceptive. Clearly the fluid isn't magical in those transmissions.

'sno problem for him apparently.

Well yeah that's something to look for if the engine that was in there before the US switched over to low sulfur fuels somehow never got replaced (for free by BMW for all affected engines) and somehow survived all the way to now without going noticeably downhill.

Yeah a lot of those were lifetime units, and I don't think there was any overt way to service the trans behind the M70 (though you can just unhook the trans cooler lines to pump it out). But yeah just like a few other car companies with "do not service" transmissions, you really did need to change the fluid with…

I wouldn't be surprised if it was transmission issues that really felled the V12 cars. My theory is based on the ones I see in the junkyard. An easy way to go Sherlock Holmes on a JY car that's known for having a very reliable engine is to check just a few things to determine why it's there in the first place:

Yeah it's pretty amazing how big a jump in MPG BMWs got as soon as the M50 arrived, replacing the M20, or the M60's variable timing successors. The cars immediately jumped like 25% in the gas mileage department and picked up another 20-30hp at the same time.

Seems kinda odd since the M70 was effectively just two M20s grafted together (including literally having one engine management system for each bank), and those M20 engines are famously very, very reliable as long as you swap the timing belt on time.

Yeah it's just a shame that somewhere north of 90% of them are the Ls, at least around where I live. There are more 750s here than short wheelbase 740i models.

"This never works!"

Ironically "ethered" was the only confusing word in this entire post in which an ex-gf mistakes easy words as complicated and condescendingly explains them to her former boyfriend.